He's 10!

This sweet boy turned 10 on Sunday!  He is the sweetest dog ever/ unless there is a thunder and lightening storm. Then, prepare to not sleep all night as he is going bat sh*t crazy. No joke. 

Anyway, back to the sweet dog that he is 98% of time.  

He loves walks, rawhide bones and rolling on the grass after a bath.

We love him bunches!

We sang him happy birthday.

I mean really, can you take the cuteness?

He got a sweet potato chicken treat.

We've never really celebrated his birthday before, but 10 is a big deal. 

We've had him for 8 years, and he's such a sweet dog!

Vacation, Day 13

It was so nice splitting our long travel day home into 2 days. We have never done that before. But, it made such an easier day yesterday.

We got up and the kids had time to play in the hotel pool.  

The drive to Seattle was uneventful, which is perfect. It's so overcast there all the time. It's beautiful, but I know I thrive on sunshine. This would get to me if 11 months a year were like this.

Traveling is usually pretty smooth sailing for us, but yesterday was like error after error. Luckily most were quickly remedied.  But, we left the hotel and Noah forgot the little worry doll under his pillow that Aunt Paula got him. Luckily, we weren't even out of the parking lot. 

Then, we get to the rental car place and we are about to go up the escalator and David can't find his cell phone. He goes back. We wait. He comes back empty handed. I go back. He comes back too. And we start combing the van. Then, we found it. He stood in the trunk and leaned over the backseat to check to make sure the boys didn't forget anything and it fell out of his shirt pocket. It was black and the seats are black, so it blended perfectly.

Then, we get through security. I forgot to take the laptop out, so my bag has to be searched. Then, we are about to walk away and David notices our black bag is missing. It's still sitting at security waiting to be searched. Ugh.

Then, since I'm learning the whole credit card miles and points thing, we had free access to an airport lounge. Which is fabulous, but it was about a 15 minute walk from out gate. But, once we got there, it was so nice. Free food, free coffee, free beer and liquor (not that we had any of that), but it was great. Noah is waiting for his hot cocoa.

The plan landed on time and we literally missed this storm by maybe 30 minutes. Had it been closer, we wouldn't be able to land, and we'd be circling the airport. 

This is how the sky looks with a dust storm coming.

We made it home at 9 and I made spaghetti. The kids were so hungry. Our vacation was so nice, but it's always nice to come home.

A huge thanks to my Dad and Suzy and Uncle Terry, Aunt Paula and Amy for hosting us every year. We feel so lucky to have this trip and make so many wonderful memories every year.  A huge thanks for watching our pets and home. Rocko goes insane during monsoon storms, and this year, we've been hit big time. My poor Mom had to deal with his craziness. And Dakri and Ryan rescued crazy dog on the last day so he wouldn't tear up our house. We are so grateful to all of you.

Now....where to go for Fall Break?  :)

Vacation, Day 12

Today started off with everyone loving on Romeo. He's a lucky kitty, and I bet he's going to miss my kids tomorrow.

Aunt Paula made us yummy pancakes and Uncle Terry made us bacon and it was delish.

Then, we headed off to the beach!

We hung out for almost 4 hours.  Ben did this the whole time.

Amy helped me find loads of beach glass.

Amy and Noah snuggling.

Our last view of Soames beach until next year.

Then, the kids wanted to jump one more time.  Noah didn't want to. They were supposed to jump together, but Emily chickened out again at the last minute.

Then, Amy and David both pushed her.  :)

Ben did a cannonball off the pier for his final jump for the year.

And Emily did her last jump.

We are taking the 7:30 ferry for Vancouver tonight. It's normally a 15ish hour travel day, and it's brutal as we all have to wake up early.  So, it's nice we are breaking it up a bit this time. We'll be back in the states by about 10 tonight and staying at a hotel, so that'll save us over 4 hours of time tomorrow. Let's hope the day goes smoothly.
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Vacation, Day 11

Yesterday's rainy day came today. But that didn't stop us.

We woke up and Noah has to go "catting" which means he visits all the neighborhood cats and gives them treats and love. This is Romeo.

Then he found Cocoa. He gets this from his Grandpa Enrique and his Granny Sharon. They like to feed all the stray cats. So, Noah is doomed since he gets this gene from both sides of the family.

And this Snickers bar makes me laugh...

Because the back of it is grouchy in French and grognon just sounds grouchy, eh?

We headed to Starfish Beach, which is actually Flume Beach.  Ben went right to doing what he does best. Running.

And this is why we call it Starfish Beach.

It was a little chilly, so some kids that weren't running wanted light jackets.

Noah found a cute baby starfish.

It was low tide, so sometimes you'd just find a bunch of starfish hanging out in the sand waiting for the tide to come back up.

This is barnnicle rock. If you don't have shows on, you can't climb on it as it's covered in barnnicles and your feet will get cut up.

My cute kiddos.

Because it was low tide, the sand was so wet and you'd just sink in it.

Here's the starfish.

Noah dressed this one up with moss with and made him look like Patrick from Starbucks.

These two were eating puffy Cheetos and being silly. Cousin Amy stayed home because her back was hurting.

Then, we went to Starbucks and McDonald's for ice cream cones. And we visited the corn guy. He comes with a truck load of corn and sells it in the back of his truck.  And on the way back, it stopped sprinkling, so we headed to another beach to eat lunch.  This is Davis Bay or Sandcastle Beach. We went to a sandcastle competition there a few years ago.  I also call this one crab beach because there are bunches of crabs there.  

Ben took off running again.  

And this ship was so funny. We thought the mountains were right behind the ship. Then, the ship started moving and we realized that the mountains were moving with it.  Oops, it's just hauling mounds of dirt.

Noah's hiding under the towel trying to keep warm.

So, I told them to run 3 laps and they'll warm up. That's what I tell them at home too. And it worked!

Emily doing handstands.

The kids racing.

Noah was trying to feed the birds. They were too far away and not interested. So, then, he'd just eat it.  Noah likes to feed the animals.

I think we are going pier jumping again tonight.  We are heading out tomorrow night, so today will probably be our last day to jump. We are taking the 7:30 ferry out tomorrow night and getting across the border and spending the night there.  It'll be good to break up the long travel day.

Vacation, Day 10

It was supposed to be rainy all day today. It wasn't going to stop us from going to the beach. What's the most that will happen...we'll get wet?  But, as it turns out, it was a beautiful day. A little cloudy, but we are good with that as it keeps everyone away from the beach and we get it all to ourselves.

Ben woke up and headed straight outside to find cats.  I was still sleeping, but I got to see Noah do the same thing.

This is Romeo.

Noah loves him.

We headed to beach and Emily thought a dog was in a neighbors yard, but it was a deer.  Just hanging out without a car in the world.

I didn't even get out my camera at the beach. It was relaxing, relaxing and  more relaxing. I got a  nice beach glass collection going for my own mason jar. Emily and Noah each have one filled, so this year, I'm filling one for me.

Then, we headed to the pier to jump.

Noah wanted to try this year for the first time. He was working up the courage.  

Ben kept jumping to show him there was nothing to be afraid of.

And then he did it! He took about a minute or two to get up the courage and in he went. I have a video of it that I'll post when we get home.

And just so nobody freaks out...cousin Amy and Emily were right there if he needed any help. But, he was a champ! We kind of bribed him with banana bread. Aunt Paula's banana bread is his weakness. He had already had 7 slices, so he got more when he got home.  Did he jump again?  Nope, once was good enough. 

But, these two kept jumping and jumping. 

Then, they swam out to the dock farther away.

This picture of Ben is cool, like he's standing on the water.  There were some other kids doing back flips off the pier.

Then, we got ready and went for Chinese.  They have the best Chinese food. We go every year. I love their honey garlic pork and Aunt Paula gets the ginger beef. They are both so good. We all share and it's delicious. 

I had Noah pose with the seaglass sign.  

And here's some dinner shots. 

And these two girls are so silly.

And Ben must've been starving. He normally won't eat Chinese, so we order him fries. He ate those and starting in on the chow mein and kept eating.  But, honestly, he doesn't stop moving the entire time we are at the beach. He works up an appetite for sure!

David and Uncle Terry.

YUM!

And this was our view from our table.  Gorgeous!

Then, we went for gelato and Emily and my spoons matched our shirts.

And look at her curls.  So pretty!

I saw this canoe of flowers and thought something like this would be good at my Dad and Suzy's house. He just said he thought of putting flowers in the canoe since he didn't use it much anymore.

I think we are heading to starfish beach tomorrow!  It's always a fun place to visit.

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