Californ-i-a Vacation 2010

I can't believe that I'm blogging tonight - 9:00 on Sunday when I have a ton to do before work tomorrow. BUT, I'm very excited to show you all some of these pictures (we took 1000, so this is but a wee sampling). Plus, the pictures are downloading on snapfish right now. Lily is dying to have a little photo book to take to school and show her friends, so I'm trying to get that done by Tuesday. Anyway....on to the story of our vacation... We flew out on Friday, bound for the City of Angels. Our friends Jordan and Diane let us use their guest house while we were in LA, which was incredibly generous and saved our pocket books some major moolah. Friday night we just hung out with them, had dinner, caught up, etc. Then on Saturday morning we (being the McCollums, us, and Ariana) drove up to Sequoia National Forrest. We stayed in Sequoia until Monday night. It was absolutely amazing there. My favorite part of the whole entire trip. The only part I didn't like was the drive to the top of the freakin' mountain where these trees are. It was really scary - you drive on roads that go right along a mountain cliff. Not just any cliff, a cliff that is 5000 feet in the air. Scary. But we made it to the top and once we were there it was beautiful and fantastic. I was so excited to see the giant Sequoia trees, and they did not disappoint. We went on a couple of hikes while we were there, explored a cave, had yummy dinners, splashed in the river (at the foot of the mountain. It was too cold at the top for any river splashing), and gawked at the fabulous trees. Also, we saw 2 bears! One was very close to us, but he just minded his own business and eventually wandered off. That top picture from Sequoia was taken about 2 minutes before Addy took a stumble off the rock and scratched her eye - saw that one coming! So anyway, here are a few of our many pictures from the park.

We headed back to LA and Diane and I went to DANCING WITH THE STARS on Tuesday night!!!! Ariana was able to get us tickets in the second row. They didn't allow cameras or phones inside, so I don't have any pictures from that, but it was a great experience. I love that show so it was fun to see it in person.

THEN, we spent two days in Disney. The girls were in absolute heaven. It was fun for us too, but wow were we exhausted afterwards! The pictures speak for themselves here - this was the girls' favorite part. On the first day we had lunch in Arial's grotto and Cinderella, Belle, Snow White, Sleeping Beauty and Ariel were all there.

We wrapped up with one day in Santa Montica and a cookout with the McCollums and Barclay's buddy from Oberlin. It was so wonderful to spend some quality time with Ariana. The girls miss her tons. And, as always, we love hanging out with the McCollums. They were wonderful hosts and we hope to return the favor soon and convince them that Indiana is just as exciting as California (in a different way, of course).

Lily's 5th B-day Party

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We celebrated Lily's 5th birthday today with a small family party at our house. As calm as you might think that sounds, it was actually rather wild!!!

The kids were having crazy fun with the 4 wheeler. It was hard to keep up with them! Lily, who lives for her birthdays, was so excited and boucing off of every wall in the house. The party was a success, though, and we are so lucky to have such wonderful family to share days like this with. The weather was phenomenal....actually was HOT, not just warm outside. So that made it nice b/c we could turn the kids loose. Here are some pics....

#1 - Lily was kind of excited about her new princess Tiana dress
#2-The present opening started calmly enough and turned to total bedlam quickly.
#3 - Well, it was a family party WITH Lily's very bestest friend in the whole world - who happens to be sisters with Addy's very bestest friend in the whole world. Neely turned 5 this week as well.
#4 -We ripped the pinata open once we gave up on any success at wacking it open!
#5 - Ha! Caught Lily in this pose..no idea what she was doing.
#6 and #7 - Mike was absolutely giddy over the 4 wheeler. He giggled the whole time he was riding it. Too cute!