Northern California

After Oceanside, we drove to Northern California to see my Dad's brother, sister and mom. 

We started out in Hollister where we stayed at my Aunt Linda's amazing house. The kids loved picking fruit off of her trees. I loved how Aunt Linda put straw hats on all of them to block the sun. They looked so cute!

 The kids were so proud of the fruit they had picked and were so excited to bring it inside to eat!

 I think it is so funny that Chrissy actually looks adorable in her straw hat!

 Here is Riley trying the lemon he picked...

 Here is Elle eating the plum that she picked!

 My Aunt's neighbor is an alpaca breeder so we went to her house to meet all of the baby alpacas...don't worry, my kids were chasing them all over the field!

 Sunny got a sliver in her hand from the wooden ladder, so leave it to Grampy to get it out for her!

This picture cracks me up...both of the girls saw that my head was peeling, so they got out flashlights and toothpicks to get all of the dead skin off of my head...Dermetologists in the making I guess...

 From Hollister, we went to Los Altos to my Grandmothers house. Aunt Linda was so awesome to have all of us ride her horse for hours. I actually LOVE riding horses and it is all because of Aunt Linda and Papa showing me how when I was young. Sunny & Elle have just taken a real liking to horses, especially Sunny and if I ever didn't know where they were, all I had to do was to go to the stalls and they would be there feeding the horses hay or cleaning up the stalls.

 My Aunt Linda was so nice to get a swimming pool for the kids to swim in since it was going to be the hottest day of the summer when we were there visiting. The kids LOVED finding the rings in the pool.

 As we were getting ready to make the huge trek back to Barstow to get our car, that ended up needing a new engine, then back to Utah, Aunt Linda shared a story with the kids about when she was young her dad would give her coins that she could count in the car and get a treat at the gas station. She had been saving coins, and told them that they could fill up their bucket with coins and use it on the way home. They were so excited to have their very own money, and to be able to get whatever treat they wanted to.

I thought that was the best idea ever and it lasted us for the whole trip. We had a great time in Northern California and I am so glad we were able to make that stop even though it was out of the way from getting home-I felt so bad that we had to travel on my parents 35th anniversary, but at least we were all together! Once we were able to get to Barstow and get the car with a new engine, we decided to just plug on through and get home! We took shifts driving and we ended up getting home at 3am!!!!