And now...

She's Eleven!!

I can hardly believe it!  So grown up so fun and wonderful, smart and beautiful!!

We love you Abby Girl.

Happy Birthday!!

Thanksgiving here we come!

Every other year Paul gets to choose where we are going to spend our Thanksgiving holiday (that is because the other years we are with my family).  Every time his turn comes up he calls his sister Audrey and invites us over to spend a week in her home, for her to house us, feed us, take care of us, and entertain us.  She is always a good sport and opens her doors to all five of us (we double the normal occupancy) with loving open arms and we are so grateful.  Because they live in California we don't get to see them very often, and they have three girls like us, as well as a delightful little boy that Paul always want to take back home with us.  We love our Wilson family and our time spent with them.

Get ready for picture overload!! 

We arrived the Sunday night before the holiday and spent the following Monday just by ourselves as a family over at Knott's Berry Farm. 

Now, I will be honest, this was not my first choice.  I had only been once before when I was 10 and I remembered it being rather boring.  But let me just tell you , Knott's has stepped it up!  They have expanded into a full force roller coaster amusement park and we had such a good time!!  I don't have any pictures because I only brought my phone in, and last week before I was able to transfer the pics, I broke my phone and lost all the photo's! Yes I am soo sad,  but just know that Abby, Paul, and I rode as many thrill rides as we could squeeze in (taking turns with Liv and Eva on more tame rides).  Abby and I LOVED Boomerang and Blast Off.  Paul loved the Silver Bullet, Eva loved the Log Ride, and Olivia loved the Pony Express.  What a great day- I love my adventurous family!

Tuesday our cousins were still in school so we packed a picnic lunch and went down to their pool and spent the afternoon sunning and splashing about.  It was really relaxing and fun.

That night the adults had a dinner together in LA at a really fun place with a live Mariachi band- one of the weeks highlights, it was great to be away from the kids, laughing and having great food and conversation.  Yes, the children were at home eating popcorn and having a cousin movie night - we just love that they are all getting so grown up!

Wednesday we put on our shorts and sandals and made our way over to a beach full of rocky tide pools.  The water had many shells,

and it was crawling with hermit crabs and sand crabs, star fish and anemone's.

  It was really fun to explore and you know that our animal lover Eva was in heaven.

 Olivia- not so much!

One of my most favorite shots of the entire trip!!

Thursday was Thanksgiving.  The kids went swimming again and Audrey and Kevin put on a spectacular meal complete with all the fixings and a turkey roasted to perfection - and Pie, lots of Pie!!

Most of our down time looked like this:

Everyone on a personal electronic device playing MineCraft - well going into each others world and destroying it by setting things on fire and filling up houses with water, etc.  "Lizzie! Get out of my world!!" was a familiar sound!! Followed by some sinister laughter :)

Friday we decided, despite the rain that was drizzling outside, we were going to go and hike up to the Hollywood sign.  I was so excited to do this, and wouldn't you know that right when we arrived at the trail head the clouds cleared and the sun shown, even a rainbow graced the skies and it turned into a really perfect day!

Of course Olivia kept asking why we were doing this and I told her because every time she sees that sign in a movie for the rest of her life she can say "I've been there!"

Saturday all the kids wanted to go to a sandy beach with good waves so that the coastal Wilson kids could give our landlocked children body-boarding lessons.  We made are way over to Malibu and found ourselves on an almost deserted Zuma Beach - It was GLORIOUS!! It was almost 80degrees and we had almost the entire beach to ourselves.  The girls had the most fun that day playing in the surf, finding "Jellyfish" in the sand and riding in the waves.

  I just love the beach so much and it was a great way to end our trip.

Sunday we drove the 11 hour drive back home, stopping for dinner at our usual Pizza Hut in Ceder City for dinner.  Abby ended up with not only a 48 oz cup of Mt. Dew but an entire sizzling HOT pepperoni pan pizza in her lap and getting us our entire meal for free - but that is a story for another day!!!

Thanks again Wilson's - you made our trip so fun and we love you all so much!!!