Rose Parade 2010

We had front row seats to the parade thanks to our friends the Hansens who slept out on the street to save us all a spot. This allowed us to see every detail of the flower-covered floats as they went by.

Brielle was introduced to Silly String this year. Needless to say, she is a fan. Happy New Year!

Here you can appreciate just how close the kids were to the action. Gavin was pointing out the big drums to Ellie. They giggled and clapped the whole 2 hour parade.

Ethan also loved the parade, but by the time was walked back to our car he was just a little pooped.

Back to Morro Bay

We went back to Morro Bay for a few more days after going to Monterey. Meg took this picture of Ellie and I walking on the north beach just near Morro Rock.

Here is the family (minus James of course) by Morro rock. It was a beautiful day.

About 30 seconds later his mouth was full of sand. Didn't see that coming. :)

Santa brought some Movie Star glasses for Ellie. She loves them.

Aquarium #2

About halfway through the day at the aquarium we decided it was time for lunch. So we went to Ghirardelli and had a peanut butter sundae for lunch. Ethan just gazed at the waves while we all shared the treat. Don't worry, we had a real lunch that day, this was just a special treat! Back to the aquarium!

The Monterey Bay Aquarium had a new seahorse exhibit that was just awesome. These little creatures break about every rule in the biological book. Here is a Sea Dragon.

The kids loved the play toys in the Splash Zone. Here they are in a giant clam.

Ethan was having a staring contest with this fish. The fish won as Ethan turned to see the camera. :)

Aquarium #1

As a surprise Christmas present we took a trip to Monterey and went to the aquarium. Megster and I haven't been in many years so it was exciting to go back.

The jellyfish are just so fun to watch. It is like a real-life screen saver. Very relaxing.

Brielle loved all the touch tanks they had there. She said that the starfish were "slippery-bumpy".

You can't see from this picture (but I just love Ellie's smile so I had to post it) but there is a wave that crashes over the top of the glass roof in this part of the aquarium. The kids were a little afraid of it at first, but grew to like it very much.

Don't Forget the Elephant Seals!

A spot of beach about 3 miles up the coast from Hearst Castle is a favorite hangout for Elephant seals. We went and watched them sunning themselves on the beach.

The elepahant seals flip sand on their back as a form of sun screen. The pup next to this female is a few days old.

Here is some of the crew as we were waiting for a female to give birth. See video below.

Trip Up to Monterey

As a family Christmas present Megan and I got for ourselves a trip to Monterey, CA including a day at the famous aquarium. We traveled up Highway 1 through Big Sur. Some of the rest of the crew tagged along part of the way up the coast. Here we are about 1300 feet above the Pacific Ocean at one of the many look outs.

This is again along Big Sur at the look out near Bixby Bridge. No people in the pics since all the kids were napping in preparation for the park below.

Probably one of the best parks we have ever been to is in Monterey. Dennis the Menace park has about 10 full playground structures including a huge red rolly slide which was made up of several hundreded rolling pin-like pieces. Megan and I really got some good speed going down that slide.

Here we are in Monterey at the El Torito (which is Spanish for The Torito!). Our table was right over the water. The food was pretty good, but the view of the otters playing the the water below made up for that.

Morro Bay Trip #1

We drove up to Morro Bay on Christmas day (very late at night) to get away from LA for a little while. There were some huge wave breaking outside the bay and we went to go take a look...

It is a little hard to tell from this picture, but if you look at the green wrap around Ethan you can see two tones. That was all thanks to a huge wave crashing over us on the break. Whoops!

On Sunday we took a walk on the main drag of Morro Bay and took this little photo outside a fresh seafood restaurant. The smells outside were very tempting.

This time we stayed a very safe distance from the waves, which were even bigger the next day! 15 to 20 foot swells.

The BIG Day

Ellie was super excited that Santa came and ate the chocolates that she left along with the carrots for the reindeer Both her and Ethan's stockings were filled to the brim with goodies and toys. A merry Christmas indeed.

Ethan loved all is presents! He was particularly excited about the paper that was around them. He must have eaten a whole roll of paper that morning!

Ellie with counsin Gavin sitting with their loot. Spoiled little buggers!

Megan stayed up until 2am making the walls and roofs for the gingerbread houses which we then docorated. A fun family tradition!

Pre Christmas Fun

As you can see Ellie is clearly very excited about the cookies that she and Gavin are making. They are decked out in their Home Depot aprons to keep things a little clean. Those cookies did not make it to give to Santa. Round two came a little later.

Ethan and Elise wanted to get into the fun cooking times so that pulled the pantry door open. They had a great time rolling cans across the floor. A mix of refired beans and sweet and condensed milk sounds delicious.

Brielle wrote a nice letter to Santa asking for "Big Legos". Santa delivered and got her a box of Duplos.

Brielle entered a free raffle at the local library and won 4 tickets to Disney on Ice. She took Gavin along with the two moms. This was the only picture of the kids' faces as they were glued to the arena the whole time. Those are real cars from "Cars" driving around on the ice.