Dying over Dippin' Dots!

My search for Dippin' Dots was a complete success in San Francisco! I found a store dedicated all to Dippin' Dots and they gave me a free pencil. And they gave out free samples and they told me I can order Dippin' Dots online! I should have known. Only 40 dollars too!!!! Ahahaaha.

So fun!

We spent a day in Monterrey Bay!

Justine would get nervous just looking at the ocean. We saw a whale tail! She couldn't decide if she was thrilled or nauseated by it. I loved that she would put on the shark hat!

I find this "sexy" surf shark super disturbing and even more so that my kid wanted to pose with him! WEIRDO!

Of course we had to eat at the Bubba Gump restaurant.

We sat right where we could see out the ocean the whole time. And there was an otter out there!

It was serious magic!

The waitress would come and quiz us with questions about the Forest Gump movie. It was fun.

Sky had cajun shrimp and plain!

Kassidy had a tower of shrimp

Zoe had a little boat with a drink in a light up glass!

I had the "Bucket of Trash"!

Justine, who is fairly fussy and unadventurous had clam chowder like six times because it was all she felt was safe at most of these restaurants. Lol.

See the shoes?

And then while shopping and before the aquarium we JUST HAD to get our pictures taken with the giant furry otter. It is tradition apparently.

Cute

Cute

Getting creepy....

Creepiest!!!!!. He looks like he is cradling me!!! Like we are dance partners! His hand is on my HIP! HA HA!!!!!

I got the cute boys up to EFY. I gave them a giant pep talk about since they were such cute boys their challenge was everyday to talk to a girl that might not normally get talked to. I gave them a really great lecture about it. They are in for a fun week! I love them. Sky is such a sweetie. A hug goodbye and a big thank you. Loved getting to know him more. He's a cutie pie.

(poor Nathan's lip was so chapped from the 50 miler!)

Love!

Hi, it is a great sacrifice for me to blog right now. I jammed my pinky into a crack in the oven when I was cleaning tonight and it raised my finger nail and made it bleed under it. So it is very painful to push the shift key. Lol. The sacrifices I make for my blogging!

Are you sick of hearing about my trip yet? I'm not sick of it. In fact...did I already mention that Kristopher told me to plan my next one? Because it was so good for me?

Note to all women: If you need a therapist find one who tells you that women need girl's night out once a week, and to plan trips for yourself. It's AWESOME!

So I don't know if I shared this plan but I am going to look for some airline tickets to anywhere that are just super cheap. And I am going to go there, eat somewhere cool, stay over night, shop or see a sight, and come home. Doesn't that sound fun? I'm doing it. The plans are in the works.

Tomorrow I get to drive these two darlin's to EFY.

EFY is a church program that lasts a week. They stay overnight in dorms, go to classes, play with other kids their age, and increase their testimonies of Christ. Which is the ultimate plan. SO grateful for some wonderful circumstances that allowed Nathan this opportunity.VERY GRATEFUL!

Sky and Nate! Are the girls going to be chasing them or what! I told them both to get girl's contact info and they both just stared at me. Clueless. Baha. They are just such boys still. Even if they are both taller than their dads.

So today was the big day that Kate and Bo got to go play with cousin Sky. 

They each had several time outs for not respecting boundaries. They like to climb on people and get too close. It is honestly like I just unleashed two monkeys. Sky was sweet with them. He handled them well by giving them "challenges" to distract them. Somersaults, etc...

Sad, huh?!

Today we had a really great lesson in church. The teacher, Sherri, shared Dieter F. Uchtdorf's talk.

It was a very powerful lesson. I love Sherri. I have showed you a picture of her before....Mrs Claus..

She shared this from his talk...

"We have all seen a toddler learn to walk. He takes a small step and totters. He falls. Do we scold such an attempt? Of course not. What father would punish a toddler for stumbling? We encourage, we applaud, and we praise..."

and then she talked about how when her grandson was learning to walk and would fall on his bum they would still cheer for him and encourage him and say sweet things to him...."You almost did it" "Way to go" "You were almost there".

My heart broke. Why do we not do that for each other when we falter? Why are we so quick to condemn and judge and be critical? And I am not jut talking about small falling  I am talking about the big ones too. Why are we not supportive? I think it comes down to being judgmental. One thing I am learning and becoming thankful for is that the beauty is...I am not even supposed to judge. What a gift to just be free to love! It is okay to not have to feel "your actions were wrong!" We get to side step that entire step and just love! What a relief!

Another thing I am learning is this... We are really products of our childhood. So much of our thoughts and actions are things we think and are doing because of the ways we were raised or ideas we were given as children or hurts we are still struggling through. So when people are behaving a certain way they are often just behaving that way because of side effects from childhood. Of course that is not an excuse for bad behavior. But often times bad behavior is happening because of hurt. 

Knowing that, and knowing that Christ is the judge anyway, we get the privileged of just loving each other. Yay us!

Another thing that I loved from the lesson was this quote from his talk

"But while the Atonement is meant to help us all become more like Christ, it is not meant to make us all the same. Sometimes we confuse differences in personality with sin. We can even make the mistake of thinking that because someone is different from us, it must mean they are not pleasing to God. This line of thinking leads some to believe that the Church wants to create every member from a single mold—that each one should look, feel, think, and behave like every other. This would contradict the genius of God, who created every man different from his brother, every son different from his father. Even identical twins are not identical in their personalities and spiritual identities."

I love that. Enough of casting judgment against each other. Just love. Isn't that a relief?

Also I have a desperate problem with always comparing my self to others. Do all women maybe? So one of the great quotes that Sherri shared was to stop comparing my insides to other people's outsides. Great, huh?

Okay...so on to my trip...

I have an interest in jails. I don't know why. And I hope to never be in one. I'm not that interested.  But I like the thought of Alcatraz! So fascinating. 

Because of all the time constraints we didn't do a tour but here are a few pictures. Duh nu nu nuh!

Can you imagine trying to escape from that place?

They also had a gift store devoted just to Alcatraz. I made Wendy pose with these men. Sorry Wendy.

And because one of my whole shopping quests was to buy salt and pepper shakers I was thrilled to see these little guys! I couldn't decide! Wendy said I should get both and I should have listened. But I ended up choosing the littler men. Because they have WILD beady little physco eyes.

I also have this book on my list of books to buy. (I buy them used because they are much cheaper that way) It looked really interesting.

Speaking of books... I saw this book at a store in beloved San Fran and I think I might need it also. Just cause it's fun-ny!

sea horse

octopus

crab

While shopping and walking we found a magic shop. My brother always loved magic. It was fun to see a few tricks. 

I adored Zoe's skeptical look. She is a crack up.

They bought a trick for Zoe to perform at home. She did darn good! It was fun.

I love my girls. 

And San Fran. And shopping. And street performers. 

Prancercising across the Golden Gate Bridge!

Hi! I survived work again today. It was nice because our new coworker worked with me today. He is nice and has caught on SO fast. It hurts my self esteem. I admit it.

Whatever.

On our trip to California we got to drive over the Golden Gate Bridge. Did you know that they take a picture of your license plates and mail you a bill to drive over the bridge? I have never heard that before. I was shocked. Doesn't there seem to be a better way? They really bill every license plate that drives over it? I Googled it. They really do.

My brother and his wife payed a lot of fees for our visit. Lots of parking fees. I never realized those expenses when planning our trip. 

There it is!!!!!

So I'll admit it. Driving across it just wasn't that exciting. It was hard to see anything. By this point Jason had been driving us all over and was getting tired. I really appreciated that he took time to stop and find parking so we could walk across the bridge. It was the funnest, freest thing ever. I loved it. I'll share all those pictures tomorrow.

But before I go on...please promise me you'll watch part of this video...please please....it is so funny and cute and...stran.....funny?



My sister in law and I really had a great fun visit. She is so enjoyable!

I love her because she PRANCERSIZED across the bridge. It was so funny.

Jason and Sky couldn't resist the fun!

I love prancersizing!!!!! Hilarious!!!!

Okay...night!

I love Bear and Cookies.

I came home from my beloved vacation and woke up straight to a therapy session and working 10 hours!

Busy day! But I want to finish my vacation blogging so I want to do a little before bed.

But first....excellent therapy day. My brain is just learning! I have had several "paradigm shifts" lately (as Kristopher says) and I really have changed and just "think" differently about a lot of things. It is fascinating to me when I step back and see it.

Kristopher had the nerve to tell me I need to read more when we were discussing some stuff.

WHAT??? I have read so many self help books this year that I can't even remember what "help" came from what book! I am telling you he is a pushy man! :)

But here was his recommendation this week.

and

The fat one wasn't recommended to me for losing weight. It was recommended to me for changing your thinking.

So Bear Grylls climbing Mt Everest may have to wait.

So Kristopher told me he was proud of me for sticking with therapy for so long to get to the point I am at. 

Shoot, I'm fading fast into tiredness. 

So I guess I will just share one simple California thing. Anyone who thinks all we did was eat would be correct.

My darling Nephew Sky told me there was this great place where you got to pick your won homemade cookies and what flavor of ice cream you want and they make you a homemade ice cream sandwich right there.

uh....don't ask me twice! Plus Sky was so cute about how yummy it was, I had to say yes. 

Have I mentioned the first day I actually THOUGHT I was going to count calories? Total joke. I didn't stand a chance.

They were just so yummy!

Zoe convinced her mom she could finish a whole one and she almost did it!

I do believe Wendy told me she had NEVER had one all alone (she is pretty healthy).  I think I may have promised her that I would never confess that she did. Oops.

Okay, see you tomorrow I hope!

I have yet to see Nathan! He is on a 50 mile hike with our church. And Justine has been going up to the church's college for "education week" which is really only education two days, but I am glad for her to have the opportunity! Awesome!

Rhett got to spend the day at Grandm'a with cousin Sky.

Some super sad news. While we were gone James disappeared.

I think it broke my heart for Kate more than it broke her heart. But owiee. She loved that cat. And he was such a good boy. I suspect he died. :( It hurt my heart so much I shut it away and didn't think about it.