Disneyland and California Adventures

Pictures from SeaWorld and San Diego Zoo

San Diego Zoo & Sea World

I'm still playing catch up from our trip to California. Our friends, Guy and Erin Balogh, moved from Seattle a year ago to San Diego. They were gracious enough to allow us to camp out at their house again (they saved us when our apartment flooded December 2006 and put up with us for 8 days). We had such a great time with them and are super grateful for their friendship and hospitality! We spent a day at the Zoo, one at SeaWorld, three at Disneyland and one day at the beach. Above are some pictures from the Zoo, Erin's parent's pool and SeaWorld.

I don't know if we are just weird... but the Zoo did not amaze us. We liked it, but we "like" the Woodland Park Zoo as well. While we appreciate that the animals are in their "natural habitat"-- we did not enjoy the endless walking and hills :) It was a great way to start our trip though. We figured we would ease the boys into the fun so that they weren't disappointed with the zoo after having gone to Disneyland. SeaWorld was awesome! Dylan LOVED feeding the Dolphins, touching the Sea Stars and Bat Rays. Peyton didn't like touching the Bat Rays as much, but had a great time and loved the Sesame Street portion of the park. The boys did amazing and had a great time.

I am going to attempt to post about Disneyland tomorrow... then Dylan's birthday... some new cakes... etc.

I gradutated!

...... from Wilton's cake decorating courses I & III. Last year for Dylan's 3rd birthday I decided to try my hand at cake decorating with fondant. It is amazing what you can learn in a year :) I was completely self taught until this summer when I enrolled in a Wilton's class through Michaels. I still have more classes to go, and much more to learn... but I have thoroughly enjoyed the process thus far. It is a lot of work, but definitely worth it. Here are a couple pictures of my final. (Yes everything (including the roses) are edible and handmade out of fondant.

My Year of Cakes (In order, starting w/ Dylan's B-day)

Ryan Shupe

I think it was 8 years ago that I heard Ryan Shupe and the Rubberband for the first time. It has been so much fun to watch them "make it big". I even have PJ listening to and enjoying their bluegrass/pop sound. He is actually really impressed by them, which to those of you who know him- means a lot! They were here last year at the Triple Door and we missed it, so I was excited that they were in town and playing for FREE :) We brought the boys and they loved it. Mostly they loved playing in the dirt, but they also love the music (they know it well). We stuck around after the show and got a picture with the band. We also enjoyed running into old friends at the show. It was great to visit and catch up.

SeaFair 2008

After living almost our whole lives in the Seattle area... PJ and I had both never attended SeaFair. Luckily our good friends the Hays had some free tickets and invited us to join them with the Thulins. We all met up and took the city bus into SeaFair. Dylan thought it was so much fun. We really could have ended the day after the bus trip and he would have been totally good. We had pit passes and so we got to see the hydroplanes up close. Peyton and I weren't too amazed... but the bigger boys thought it was pretty cool.
The Blue Angels put on quite a show. On the way back to the bus PJ took Dylan down one of the big inflatable slides. When they came down Peyton said "Papa...May" and was pointing to the slide-which means... Papa me too! So, PJ stood in line with Peyton and he got to try out the slide too! It was a long day- but we had a great time. Unfortunately I didn't realize until much later :( but, our camera was set for email quality pics.... so they aren't terrific- but here are a few shots from our day