Arriving in Sacramento we were greeted by Kim and Justin and got to spend a night in their cute apartment. Aunt Jessica joined us during the night so when the girls woke up they were very excited to see her. After picking up a few groceries we all headed for some time away from it all in the mountains.
Just a few of the highlights....
Much to the girls pleasure Aunt Jessica opted to ride to the lake in our van. It was fun to hear them all in the back laugh through "Megamind", taking pictures and catching up.
Somehow everyone overlooked packing bug spray and unfortunately the mosquitoes were so thick that I was literally breathing them in on my attempted hike with the girls. So priority the next day was for Jarom and Justin to head down to the Ice House small store to purchase it. All us girls entertained ourselves with time in the canoe. About an hour later the guys come back and no bug spray. They got lost and just drove until they found their way back to the cabin. Aunt Jessica was already covered in bites as were Sarah & Justin so we really couldn't just rough it. This lead to a girls trip down the mountain. Mission accomplished we saved the vacation with our $12 cans of bug repellent.
At night the grownups wanted to spend time together and play games. The only dilemma is that we were staying in basically a one room cabin. The girls would go to bed in the bunks and I would hang blankets to try and keep the light off them so they could sleep while we ate junk food and tested our skills at Pass the Popcorn, Hit or Miss, Outburst and Shanghai. Spunky could fall asleep quickly but Sarah especially had a difficulty with being left out of the fun so she would continually peak out at us. I can't really blame Sarah it was a lot more fun then sleeping.
Anna's favorite part of our trip was the hike to the waterfalls. She did a great job of keeping up and not complaining even though it got hard in a few places. Every time I looked to check on her she would give me one of her beautiful smiles and a thumbs up.
During one part of the hike I looked ahead and noticed Justin walking with his long legs and Spunky sprinting to keep pace, she would take almost 3 steps to his one. She was attempting to leap over rocks he merely stepped over. I took the opportunity to catch up with them and offer a turn holding onto Spunky's hand. (She could be exhausting to hold hands with as you do tend to support her a lot). Spunky agreed to the hand off but kept saying "Uncle Justin, does this mean I can still be your best buddy?". It was really cute.
I was proud of how determined Sarah was to enjoy the freezing water. We actually passed patches of snow on our hike up to the waterfalls; that water was freshly melted sow!
Kimberly took the girls out a couple of times so Jarom and I could rest. They climbed boulders, gathered flowers and talked Kim's ear off. I'm sure that by the end of the trip Kimberly was looking forward to some restored peace, but the girls would never have guessed it.
Meals were excellent. We were eating better than we do at home, the best part was that the guys would do the dishes without even complaining. (I got it on video, it certainly was something to be remembered).
The outhouse was a surprisingly decent experience. It was actually much better than using a public restroom. Spunky said her favorite time with Aunt Jessica was when she'd take her to the outhouse, don't ask me why.
When it was time for us to head home there were tears of good-by and hope that we would get to visit again soon. For me the best part of this vacation was the time spent with family!
Enjoy the pictures ...and please ignore the typos and misspellings I put the slid together at around 1am.
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| Picture slideshow generated with Smilebox |
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