Our first destination was Santa Clarita and the home of our dear friends, the Stimacs. We spent many happy hours just hanging out at their home, swimming in their pool, visiting our old church, sharing meals together, etc. Marc and Josh were college roommates in 1996/97 (or somewhere in there). What started as just two friends has now become 12 friends! You can imagine the craziness that ensues with this group.
We took the whole gang to see the Dodgers play the Reds.
Some watched the game....
...and some just ate cotton candy all night!
Josh also found us a great deal on a Seafari trip to the Channel Islands.
Check out the look on the kids' faces as they saw...
... these dolphins following out boat!
Some of us enjoyed the beautiful views of Ana Capa Island and all the wildlife.
And some of us puked our guts out and then slept for the rest of the ride. (Poor Calvin!)
We spent the fourth of July at the beach in Carpinteria.
I'm not sure who had more fun...Marc or the girls?!
There were several outings in the kayak.
Lots of paddle-ball playing.
And lots and lots of wave jumping!
Here are the proud daddies and their spawn....minus Calvin, who was napping in the car.
Another highlight of our visit with the Stimacs was a day at Six Flags Magic Mountain, which is less than 10 minutes from their house. We decided not to haul our camera around that day, but I will never forget the looks on the girls' faces after riding Goliath, Viper, Log Jammer, etc. We've got three little dare-devils! They were fearless.
After a tearful goodbye, we made the short trip to Bakersfield. We spent the night at Marc's Uncle Kirk and Aunt Pamela's house. His grandma also lives with them. It was a good visit...but so hard to see MeMa begin to lose her memory. She was so pleased to have us come visit and we are thankful that the girls will have this memory of her.
Our last stop was in Grizzly Flats, CA, near Lake Tahoe. Marc's older brother, Steve, and his family just bought a place in the mountains and this was our first time to visit them there. It was beautiful! Aunt Kim bought the girls some bear hats in honor of their new hometown.
And she made bear pancakes for breakfast!
We were all impressed with the size of their pine cones! You don't want one of these falling on your head...or car.
There were four dogs for the girls to play with, so they were completely occupied the whole time.
Valerie was a little overwhelmed....
...until she discovered Uncle Steve's Star Wars pinball machine.
After two fun days with Steve, Kim, Sammy and Heather, we started our trek home. What was supposed to take 10 hours, ended up being 25!!! We made it to Winnemucca, NV, just fine. It was there that we learned that highway 95 was closed at the Oregon border due to a wildfire. We spent several hours debating other routes, looking for hotel rooms, playing at the McDonald's playland, etc. When we heard that the road had opened, we busted out of town. At 10:00p.m. we reached the fire line, only to be told that the winds had shifted and the road was closed again. The whole night is a blur, but I know we spent 7 or 8 hours in our car in McDermitt, NV. At dawn, the road was opened again and we followed a pilot car through an eerie, smoky, blackened wasteland for miles and miles. We were so happy just to be moving!
There were dozens of power poles dangling in mid-air, held up only by the wires. The fire had burned the lower half to ashes.
We screeched into our driveway, just in time to unload the car and try to get rid of the smoke smell before returning it to the airport. Thankfully we had given ourselves a cushion of time - we didn't know how much we would need it!
So now it's time to print these photos (and the 150 others that I didn't share - aren't you glad?!) and add them to our albums so that we can laugh and cry over them in the years to come.
