Our Trip: Part 1

I am sure this is the longest I've ever gone without blogging!  I have thought many times over the past month "Oh....I need to write about that!" but to sit down and do it has been difficult with just how busy we've been.  The boys and I are pulling double-duty with school because we're going to Vail for 3 days next week.  We don't want to take school with us!   

The past month has been an exciting one, and also a busy one.  I'll start with our cruise.  My mom and Linda flew in on 24 March to some nice weather.  We all woke up on the 25th with a pretty good dusting of snow.  The kind of snow that would have halted the entire Southeast, but not Colorado.  The roads were fine and we headed to the airport on our first BIG travel adventure in 9 years.  (We went on an adventure for our honeymoon and our first anniversary...it's been a while since then!)  We landed in LA and picked up our b-e-a-utiful convertible.  

(We rented this same car on our honeymoon!  Sentimental!)

We ate at one of the highly recommended restaurants, In-N-Out, for lunch, and found out we really like it!  We ate there 2 more times before we got home.  

Our first fun activity on the itinerary was to go see the filming of a TV pilot.  Unfortunately for us, Alyssa Milano and the rest of the cast had invited their friends and family, thus taking up most of the extra seats.  Only the first few "regular" people in line got to go in.  They did, however, give us a green card that ensures we get VIP status when we come back.  I am REALLY hoping we get back there before we move. (HINT HINT, babe!  :)  Plane tickets are VERY cheap to Cali from CO!  

We decided to head from LA to Camp Pendleton and we stopped at a Red Robin on the way.  Something familiar!  Plus Matt had a free hamburger for his birthday!!  We entered Camp Pendleton the way the directions said to and we drove for over 20 minutes ON BASE before we got to the hotel!  That place is HUGE!  Our room was really nice and a very good price!  They also had great mugs for coffee...the perfect size!  (HUGE!)  Only problem was the coffee itself was horrible!

The next morning was FANTABULOUS!  We went to meet T.J. Baden of Baden Guitars.

Mr. Baden really supports our troops and actually sent Matt a guitar while he was in Iraq.  He and Matt spent about an hour and a half talking guitar, war, guitar, music, etc.  I took pics (of course) and we got to see his shop.  Matt was able to teach him a John Mayer lick...that was pretty cool!  Matt had sent Mr. Baden a flag that had flown over the mall at Adl and it was on the wall of their conference room.  I did get a neat pic of the two of them standing in front of that flag.  And one-offs, the the many guitars that will never be put into production but they made them  as testers...AMAZING!  People can buy these but they're not really advertised...one of a kind guitars that are very high quality!  

After we left here, I had to go buy a camera lens.  Mine died, but it's been a good one!  Taken hundreds of thousands of pictures!  After Ritz Camera we headed to the Taylor Guitar Factory for a tour.   This first picture was was great!  Here we are at Taylor Guitars and there's a trash can filled with wood.  Some wood gets put into the finest guitars while the scraps are thrown into firewood box.  

Before.....

After.....

Same kind of guitar, at the beginning and end of the process.  I'm going to post all the pics from our trip on Shutterfly so if you want to see over 50 of the process, I can tell you how to see those!

Maybe Matt can write more about his experiences at these two guitar places later.  

After a great day of guitars, we went to a place my brother recommended, La Jolla.  It as absolutely beautiful there, and we got the BEST Starbucks frapps EVER!  

These birds loved getting sprayed by the waves.

Because we had so much fun these posts will share bits and pieces of our trip. I would love to write it all at once, but I have a life to live outside of the computer, and my boys are ready to play!  

~Jen

Absolutely Random

After our wonderful trip to Crested Butte, Hayden and I ended up quite sick.  We had the worst colds we've ever had, and are still praising the Lord that Matt and the other two boys stayed well.  I will say it was kind of nice being sick while another parent was in the house.  Not only did Matt take amazing care of me and Hayden, he also kept the house clean, laundry washed, and all of us fed.  We are better now, though that annoying persistent cough is tagging along for a long ride. 

Last week we spent catching up on school work (Hayden has tested at 5th grade reading level!!) and getting more in before our "Spring Break."  I have been working constantly on preparing things for our cruise.  Things like renting our convertible for the 4 days in LA before our cruise.  Like cooking 14 meals and freezing them so mom and Linda simply thaw and heat.  Like shopping for a new bathing suit and spring clothes (honestly, my spring wardrobe was quite lacking from last year, and it hit me last week that I'm still wearing winter clothes...won't need those in Mexico!).  I wrote all the instructions for mom:  not that mom can't do this without instructions, but I figured if I've already done things the hard way and figured out what works, I could at least share those with her.  Whether or not she and Linda do things the way I do doesn't matter to me.  But I really do want to leave them with as little to try to figure out as possible. 

My final job is to clean the house today.  That's my Monday job, but yesterday I was quite busy.  I cooked, got my nails done for the cruise, cut the boys' hair, then I went to dinner with a friend who is moving.  When I say "moving" I mean to KANSAS and while I'm on my cruise!  This is the person God put in my life to be my back-up parent while Matt was in Iraq.  She lives right across the street and I could count on her to watch my boys in an emergency or while I went out for a run.  She and I swapped child care and food, ate pizza every Tuesday night for a year, and generally enjoyed watching each others' backs during deployment.  

Before I could even consider working on the house or packing, I needed to make sure my SC cards were put on computer and CD.  Fortunately I only had about 15 pictures that were not uploaded and burned.  These were of Bailey's birthday party!  I am so amazed that my youngest child is 5 years old.  I look through the scrapbooks I've made and they take me right back to the moment he was born, the baby years, and I miss them.  Bailey has been a blessing, though he has been our most challenging child!  In the past year he has been diagnosed with SPD (originally by the neighbor I mentioned in previous paragraph, then by our doctor, and finally by Occupational Therapists).  After diagnosis, he spent 6 months in OT and graduated the program in record time.  Bear with me while I give you the stats:  At the original testing he was 50 months old but tested at 28 months in fine motor skills.  6 months later he was 55 months old (not quite 56 months old) and he tested at 55 month level.  Right on track for his age!  Most kids take a year to get caught up, and he came from WAY behind!  He's a great learner, just needed some help with his sensory issues.  Last year in preschool he wouldn't TOUCH a crayon, much less scissors.  This year his teacher has to drag him out of "art center" and encourage him to go to others to achieve a variety of preschool experiences!  I'm floored by his transformation!

Birthdays this year have been very low-key.  Those in NC know I love to make a big deal out of them, but this year with Matt coming back just 11 days before Carson's, we were in no state of mind to do anything major.  We went to a movie in the afternoon, then had two families over for cake and ice cream.  For Bailey, we went to Chuck E Cheese's and then had families over.  But he had asked for the same families with an additional two.  Well, let me tell you, this drained Matt.  He had a good time visiting, but for two days after that he was in silent mode.  We've decided (with Hayden's approval) to host his party outside of the home.  Matt's still not accustomed to large crowds in tight spaces.  (I will say something fun about Bailey's party:  We had 5 families here, and in those families we had 11 kids here:  10 boys and 1 girl!  Bless her heart!)

Well, I just spent an hour on the computer updating, uploading, and burning.  I guess I need to get to the real work of the day!  I'll post after the cruise!  I still can't believe I'm going on a cruise!  First of all because we've never been in a financial position to do so, but also because we're not beach people.  BUT:  We LIVE in the mountains so to see the beautiful beach will be nice!  (Poor Matt...he said while in Iraq that he could live the rest of his life never seeing sand again!  Hehe!!  But don't let him fool you...he's really excited about this trip, too!)