Vacation Recap

Madeline with her cousin Ella at Corona del Mar State Beach, California

It's been difficult for me to find the time to blog about our vacation. It was a whirlwind 12 days and I thought of so many things I wanted to blog about but I'm afraid it will just turn into one monster post and some of my readers may become bored. So I'll just keep it simple with some bullet point highlights and links to all of my uploaded photos.

Our vacation officially started on June 3rd, which also happened to be the day Madeline graduated from Kindergarten. It all worked out with her ceremony early in the morning so we could fly out to California later that day. Madeline along with all of her classmates performed a music program where they sang and danced to 6-7 songs they had learned. They did awesome! After their program and diploma ceremony there was a small reception with her teacher where she gave her predictions of what each student would grow up to become...Madeline was her most creative and artistic student so she thought Madeline would become an Artist. Click here to view pics from Madeline's last day of school.

Once we arrived in California we had a jam packed weekend full of wedding events for my best friend Robyn. Stephen was most happy her rehearsal dinner was held at his favorite Mexican Restaurant, Mario's. On Saturday Stephen watched the kids so I could take the bride out for a day of pampering and a nice dinner. I stayed with Robyn in a hotel the night before her wedding. On wedding day we prepared for the beautiful ceremony and reception to be held on a yacht in Newport Harbor. Madeline did perfect being one of the flowergirls. And the celebration went off without any hitches! Click here to view pics from Robyn's wedding events.


James with his cousin Bryson on his quad in Mesa, Arizona

After all the wedding events and the happy couple headed to Hawaii for their honeymoon we enjoyed some visiting time with family and friends. We had a beach day ended with a bonfire. boy did the kids have fun and by the end of the night were sandy, filthy, and smoke-smelly. We spent a few days out with family in Corona celebrating our nephew and niece's birthdays, bbqing, doing another beach day, watching the Lakers and taking the kids to the Rain Forest Cafe. On our last day in California we visited with my parents and then bbq'd burgers and dogs for the Laker game. Some friends with their kids stopped by. It was a great time! Wish we would've seen more family and friends and had more time, but I guess all things come to an end including vacations.

Instead of flying back home we used Stephen's Hertz perk and took a roadtrip back in order to transport some furniture we inherited. Our first stop was in the Phoenix area. We were able to visit with Stephen's mom's sister, Aunt Margaret and her family. Cousins Chris and his wife Tatiana were there with their adorable 3 kids Bryson, Jaxon and baby Macie. We had fun playing games on their Wii and the boys got to take turns riding on the quad. That evening we had dinner over at one of Stephen's best friends, Tim and his wife Kacey's home. Madeline and James were so happy to play with their daughter Elizabeth on her slip'n'slide and we also got to meet her baby brother, Matthew. They graciously put us up for the night.


Stephen and the kids swimming at the indoor hotel pool in El Paso, Texas

The next day we made our way through Arizona stopping in Tucson. We stopped at a souvenir shop somewhere in New Mexico and made it to our home state of Texas and stayed the night in El Paso. We stayed at the Radisson near the airport, had a nice family dinner out and then took a late night swim in their indoor pool and spa. Then finally the following day we made our 8.5 hour drive through our big state of Texas to home! Click here to view all of our vacation photos.


Overall we had a nice vacation. It's always nice going back to California to see family and friends. We were very blessed by everyone. I know Madeline and James will have these memories forever and be so very fond of their time spent with everyone and doing all the traveling we did.