The Land of the Big Trees

In July, we took at road trip to California to visit Sequoia National Park. It was great to get away for a couple days, escape the Las Vegas heat, and get to spend some time as a family. Parker loved exploring the woods and picking up sticks, riding the "vator" in the hotel, and swimming in the hotel "pond". I think Tyler's favorite part of the trip was the constant snacks in the car to keep kids happy, including a couple dum-dums. Parker didn't mind that part either :)

San Diego!

Last weekend Chad and I had a little get-away to San Diego for a couple days. My parents watched Parker - it was our first time to leave him for a couple days. I think he had a blast getting spoiled with lots of attention while we were gone.

We enjoyed a few days in much much cooler weather with high temperatures only in the upper 60's. We stayed on Coronado Island and spent quite a bit of time just hanging out there, walking around the shops and enjoying the beautiful scenery.

On Saturday it was a little drizzly outside so we opted for some inside entertainment and took a tour of the U.S.S. Midway. It was interesting to see what life was like for all of those people that spent time on the ship.

Chad is proudly displaying his headphones for our audio tour.

Saturday night we got to drive to the San Diego temple and see it all lit up. It is quite a sight off the side of the freeway!

We spent Sunday at the zoo before making the drive back to Henderson. It was fun to have a weekend together to celebrate our 4th anniversary and just get away from work, if only for a couple days.

Our Journey through Connecticut

Last week Parker and I traveled with my mom and my sister Wendie to New Haven, Connecticut to visit my younger sister, Julie and her family. They live in a cute high-rise apartment nearly on Yale campus. It was beautiful there - especially with the start of the leaves changing colors. I love, love, love the fall!!! It is definitely my favorite and I was more than happy to head east to experience some true fall-ish activities and scenery as we don't have too much of that in Las Vegas (although it is an unseasonably cool 55 degrees this morning here).

Parker went on his first flight! He loves watching airplanes up in the sky, but I'm not sure he had any idea that what we were doing was the same thing. I have to say that overall, the long flights went pretty well. There wasn't too much crying or screaming, but I was a virtual jungle gym. We were all continually thinking in order to come up with something new to entertain him.

We were grateful that Parker had his own seat on the way there so we didn't have to hold him the whole time.

We were also very happy that he slept about an hour on the way there and a couple hours on the way home! :)

One of those fall-ish activities was going to an apple orchard and pumpkin patch. There isn't too much better than an apple right off the tree! We had to go on quite the stroller adventure down steep dirt and rock bumpy roads, but it was well worth it for the delicious apples!!

Julie lives just a couple minutes away from beach. Unfortunately, on the day we went to check it out it was only 55 degrees or so with 50 mph winds. This is about as close to the water as we got. It was pretty...just a little too chilly!

We spent another chilly day in Newport, Rhode Island - about a two hour drive from Julie's place. Although it was cloudy, it was still a pretty place. We took a walk along the coast to see the houses that were built a long the water.

Our babies were all bundled up for the day! This is Julie's daughter, Clementine (Clemie).This is just one of the many sets of stairs that we had to carry the strollers up and down on this trip.They're building my new summer home. Pretty nice, huh?

We took a short day trip to New York City by way of a two hour train ride from New Haven to take in the sites and enjoy some famous frozen hot chocolate from Serendipity. Absolutely no strollers allowed in Serendipity - we asked the guy in the parking garage across the street to hang on to our strollers while we ate. $6.

We loved our frozen hot chocolate and side of hot fudge sundae! Who could have too much dessert?

We took a quick stroll through some of Central Park.

We stopped to see one of the temples for our church that is located right smack dab in the middle of the city - not too far from Central Park or Times Square.

I love the energy of the city with all of the people going so many directions. It was fun to see a few sites of the city.

Thank you Julie for the great accommodations and for putting up with all of us overtaking your apartment! It was lots of fun to see where you live and to take in some of the feelings of fall!