A California Adventure

Our long awaited trip back "home" finally arrived very early Tuesday morning. Our flight left at 6:30am so that meant getting out of the house by 4:30am. The kids were great and big helpers at the airport. By the time we got through check-in and security, the plane was boarding and we got right on. The flight to Houston was a quick 1 hour and 51 minutes. After a muffin and juice Nathan fell asleep for about 45 minutes and Andrew used the bathroom...... 4 times...I think he just found it fun to use the tiny bathroom so he kept going which was fine as it kept him busy. Luckily we were right up front and close to it. Once in Houston we had a 3 hour layover. I would not suggest this as optimal with two kids....not only were they tired, they were hungry and bored. We played a card game, called Dad (Brent did not join us on this trip), walked around, played on the moving walkway until a rude, old airport worker told them "Boys, that is not a toy" and watched the airplanes. Finally we boarded and it was a pleasant surprise to find out the flight to San Diego was only 2 1/2 hours. I figured no problemo since I brought my computer and had two new shows for them to watch....ha, little did I know that my battery life has gone down to less than 1 hour, so as soon as they really got into the show, the computer shut off. We were served a personal cheese pizza, side salad and m&m's for lunch so that kept them busy for a while and Nathan even ate his salad. After the computer died they did workbooks and colored then Andrew finally fell asleep about 25 minutes prior to landing.
My best friend picked us up and dropped us at her home for the afternoon to take naps. However, the kids had other ideas and I could not get them to lay down. Needless to say they were quite tired that night but were up early due to the time change. We had a full day at Sea World the next day and left for Lake Arrowhead today where we will spend the majority of the trip. The kids were excited to see the tree house that Papa built for them.
So that is the trip so far, here are some pictures and I will try to keep updating as the trip continues. If there is anyone reading this who is in Southern CA and wonders why I did not call....I apologize but we are only going into Orange County one morning to see the kids school and need to get mom to Fullerton by the afternoon. This really is a trip to visit with my parents and I wish we had more time so I could visit everyone...next time I promise.

First swim meet!

I think I might have mentioned in another post that Andrew's teacher at the Aquatics center thought he had the makings of a good swimmer. After his YMCA practice on Thursday, the teacher approached us and asked if Andrew would like to be on the swim team and participate in a meet on Saturday. I am pretty sure he did not know what that meant because when I told him he said he thought he would be watching the meet. But, he agreed to go to the practice on Friday evening. He did really well, although was quite tired since he is not use to swimming 25m over and over in different strokes and he agreed to be in the meet today. We arrived this morning at 8:15 and the coach (same person as his swim class teacher) said she signed him up for 6 & under, 25m, freestyle and backstroke. I thought this was great since those are his best strokes. Little did I know until he was warming up in the water that he likes breast stroke the best because you get to come up for air with every stroke. Oh, well. He swam backstroke first and was concerned about running into the lane line, but he actually went pretty straight. It was a bit of a wait until his next event and he started to get bored, but finally they called for freestyle. He is still working on the diving off the starting block and was nervous. His current issue is being concerned about breathing so he stops for long periods to turn on his back to get a breath...thus not going as fast as he has before this "breathing" issue. Something to work on and he has agreed to go back to practice Monday night. We also saw our neighbors there with their two boys who swim out of a different Y. They asked if Andrew would also be interested in Boy Scouts....wow, I think our lives are going to be very busy this school year!