Trip To California - Beach Time

Our first day in California was spent at the beach. It was chilly! But that that didn't stop any of us from getting in the water. Especially my Megs who is my swimming water lovin' fool. She would so be a surfer if we lived by the ocean.

She has some pretty mad body surfing skills. I (who am not such a water fan), was concerned she would be swept away  by the undertow (which was strong!), but kept my concerns to myself, so as not to plant fear in any part of her.

Jackson was mostly a wave wader and wave jumper:

I was a play in the water for enough time that the kids don't think I'm not any fun, and then retreat to the beach to read my book kind of woman:

Sade is a play in the sand, get a little wet, and then freeze type of gal. Which means she spent a lot of time cuddled with me on the blanket:

And Eric is a do whatever the kids want to do, play with them constantly kind of Dad. The totally best kind.

The highlight (according to everyone) of our afternoon and evening at the beach, was sand burying.

I thought we would never stop laughing at these pictures:

I also thought we would never get all of the sand out of our hair.

My 34th Birthday

Well.....I am now 34. As of a little over a week ago. 

The lead up to my birthday was great (although I gained a bunch of weight going out to lunch and dinner a number of times), but the actual day was less than desirable. Without listing a litany of complaints, I will move on and show a couple of pictures of the happy parts!

Bavarian Cream Pizza!!

Present opening:

And happy kids who always give me the best homemade cards:

Sadie Said

Sadie: "Dad, feel how soft my hair is. Mom put air conditioning in it."

(aka: hair conditioner)

Also:

Sadie: "To be a model you have to live in New York."

Me: "Do you want to be a model?" (As if I didn't know)

Sadie: "Yes."

Me: "Why?"

Sadie: "I just find it fascinating. And you get to wear make-up."

There Is No Such Thing As A Free Vacation

Last week we took our FREE vacation to Legoland. You may remember that I won it off the radio earlier this year. And while it wasn't completely FREE, it came pretty close.

First: Gasoline

I had a free $100 gift card for gas. We ended up spending about $120.00. So my final gasoline cost was $20. Pretty good.

Second: TOLL ROADS! We have never been to Carlsbad before, so we relied on Eric's phone GPS to get us there. And in doing so it took us on 2 toll roads,  2 miles apart from one another. Total cost $6.00 (not much, but still maddening nonetheless)!

Third: Our first night we stayed at the La Quinta. Eric always tries to stay at a La Quinta whenever he goes out of town so we earn points towards free nights. He had about 19,000 points earned. It seems like a fairly large number, and he has stayed for what seems like a huge amount of nights at La Quinta, however, did you know a hotel in Southern California will run you 15,000 points a night?!!!  And....at this particular La Quinta, you have to pay an upgrade fee of $10.00 if you want queen beds. Lame. But still a big savings. A room on a Thursday night would have normally cost us $95.80 (with taxes and fees), but we paid $12.25! Woot-Woot! (And he is currently out of town, staying at a La Quinta, so just think, in one more year we just MAY have enough points for another free room).

But best thing about staying at the La Quinta (other than the beds being really comfortable) is that you get FREE breakfast.

Bonus. And major savings!!

Fourth: Our second day we moved from the La Quinta to the Sheraton. It is kind of like always wearing clothes from Target, and then starting to wear those from Neiman Marcus. It was nice! Like resort for rich people nice.

Sade and Jackson on the balcony:

On the dates we stayed it would have cost us $600.00 (with taxes and resort fees) for the 2 nights. Plus $24.00 in parking. But for us it was FREE!!! However, nice resorts don't have things like free breakfast, free microwaves, and free water bottles, so La Quinta wins on those categories.

Fifth: LEGOLAND tickets! We received 4 free 2-day passes to Legoland, the waterpark, and the aquarium.

Total amount of 4 free park hopper tickets: $396!!! However, since we are a family of 5, I had to buy Sadie a child's ticket from Costco that cost me $70.00.

Sixth: Food and souvenirs from Legoland. Normally I would refuse to buy and food or souvenirs at Legoland, due to the extreme fleecing they inflict. However we had a FREE $100 Legoland gift card, so we ate lunch there both days, had ice cream, and bought a couple of small souvenirs. Total cost: $4.00 (we went over the $100 while having our second round of ice cream cones).

Seventh (AND MOST EXPENSIVE ASPECT OF OUR TRIP): Eating Out. Now I was fairly good on this trip, and brought multiple snacks, along with breakfast supplies for both days we were at the Sheraton. But we had to stop in Riverside to eat at Spaghetti Factory:

It used to be our favorite place to eat, but now Eric and I find it rather blah. But we also at at BJ's, which was enjoyable, Panda Express and Wendys (one our way home). Not bad, but still at a cost of $149.00. By the way, Wendys in California is hella more expensive than Wendys in Nevada. Seriously.

Anyway.....Now for the totals:

Total amount spent (gas, toll roads, La Quinta, Sadie's Legoland ticket, ice cream, food): $261.25

Total Amount Of Free Stuff (gas card, La Quinta, Sheraton, parking, Legoland tickets, Legoland gift card):

$1315.80!!!

Woo-Hoo!

Back To Oatman

On Saturday Eric had to go to Needles, CA for work, so the kids and I went with him. While waiting for him to finish his job, we had a picnic at the park. We are very well acquainted with this park, as we have spent hours and hours there over the past few years waiting for Eric to fix the T.V. system at the nearby Motel 6.

 

After Eric finished, we then headed over to one of my favorite places: Oatman, AZ. I have posted a few times about Oatman before. Most recently, a few months ago, when I detailed my severe disappointment that we were late getting to Oatman, and all of the burros had headed up into the hills. But not this time! The burros were there, and more than ready to eat the carrots we brought. FYI: Bring your own carrots, and bring lots and lots of them. They sell carrots there, but for a very steep price.

Sade is an extreme animal lover, and has no fear of the burros. She was more than happy to feed them carrots.

The burros will completely surround you if they know you have carrots, but will completely ignore you if you don't. Eric being surrounded:

Jackson likes the burros, but not so much he would actually hold a carrot and feed them. He dropped all of his carrots on the ground for them to eat. This one was just his size:

Megan has what she says is a "healthy fear" of the burros. I say it is an irrational fear, but, regardless, she surprised me by feeding one of the them:

But soon they started to surround her, which did not please her in the least:

A few more pics from our time in Oatman:

After leaving Oatman, we traveled to Laughlin, NV to spend the rest of the afternoon and evening on the river:

I love a good day trip.