#souzascampingfun–Silver Strand State Beach

If you are a camper you know that booking reservations is usually done 6 months in advance (if you are going to a state park…private parks you can usually book in less time but for more money). When I heard Caoimhe’s dates of her vacation I knew we had a camping trip planned.  I’ll be honest…I was a little nervous. I was hoping that her experience would be good…and her sleeping location (cushioned kitchen table) would be comfortable, the food would be ok, etc.

Again Caoimhe proved to me that she is the easiest visitor ever. Actually…it was GREAT to have her extra hands there.

Silver Strand State Beach is in Coronado (past San Diego) and the sites are about 20ft from the sand. Its parking lot camping and pretty tight spots BUT we like it.  Can’t hate camping at the beach no matter where you are!

Couldn’t keep the kids out of Caoimhe’s bed…luckily she didn’t mind the morning cuddles!

My little eater!

I had Caoimhe on a strict sunscreen routine. I did NOT want her getting burned the first week she was with me. But we were trying to get that white girl a tan too!  Daddy also thought of this brilliant idea of washing the kids…without the mess of sand inside the trailer.  We made an “outdoor bath”. Ella loved it! And yes it was warm water!

I was on Baby Duty and Caoimhe went out to the water at sunset.

Instead of cooking dinner one of the nights we headed into town and found us a Mexican joint (from yelp).  It was prety good and came across this yummy ice cream shop too!!

And during the nights…we put kids to bed (or would try too…Maggie gave us a run one night and Owen LOVED being the last kid up at night…so he fought to stay up even when he was exhausted) and would have a few drinks and laughs around the campfire. It was good times.

I hope Caoimhe enjoyed her camping experience.

Fireworks and Family

I really love the 4th of July.  I love the idea of big BBQ’s, swimming for hours, relaxing with some cocktails BUT life just isn’t there for us yet.  Having an infant makes all of the above NOT relaxing in anyway! haha But some year we’ll be able to do the dream 4th…someday.

This year all our friends were busy doing other stuff and we were hanging at home.  My sis-in-law invited us over for some swimming and the best firework viewing spot around (the top of Day Creek in Rancho).

First I had to TRY and get a cute patriotic pic of the kids….oh dear LORD it was hard hahaha.

Getting 3 children to sit close to eachother and smile is hard work. Someone is always NOT looking at the camera, or their smile is horrendous, maggie’s annoyed or crying because someone is touching her…never perfect. BUT thats ok. We’ll take what we can get these days.

With all the hustle and bustle…I forget that it was Maggie’s first 4th of July…gosh I feel like I made a big ol’ deal for the other kids….buuuut I guess 3rd baby probs means its not always about you…how sad.

Maggie’s first 4th of July. 9.5 months old. 7-4-2016.

Owen’s first 4th of July. 3months old exactly.

Ella’s first 4th of July. 5months old. 7-4-2013

Gosh my babies!  Its so crazy.

Anyway…now that I’ve spent the last hour looking back at 4th of July pics from 2009-2016…oh the memories.

We headed up to Yosh’s sisters house.  It was actually very nice and chill afternoon.

We walked down and around the street from their house to sit at the ledge and watch all of the inland empire’s firework shows.  Its a pretty awesome view. And I swear Fontana looks and sounds like a real war-zone. SOOO many illegal fireworks come out of that city!

Of course…thanks to Maggie’s early bedtime routine we didn’t get to stay all that late. But I sometimes have the feeling about fireworks…once you’ve seen one show you’re good for the year. haha. 

It was a great evening and a fun easy 4th of July!

The 3rd of July

The 4th of July was on a Monday this year.  It didn’t really matter to us teachers…everyday is the weekend for the 9 weeks of summer heaven. But for the rest of the world a lot of people had to go to work.

Since Caoimhe landed on July 1st…I thought staying around the house the first weekend would probably be good. Wanted to get her body clock set to California time (and with the help of a little pink pill called Benedryl she had NO PROBLEM in the sleep department).

So we BBQ’d, swam and did some legal fireworks ILLEGALLY in our backyard (they were legally purchased in Fontana but since our city prohibits them we illegally did them in the backyard).  Caoimhe had never really seen these types of fireworks before.  So it was fun. The kids loved the little show as well.  And the fact that our neighborhood didn’t seem to give a darn about the “no fireworks” law…because a lot of them were shooting up in the air and cooler than the disneyland show!!

 

Owen was a little obsessed.

Ella liked the sparklers but was surprisingly pretty cautious.

And Owen’s love of the sparklers ended about 3 second after this picture was taken…

I should have looked on pinterest BEFORE this evening and used the “solo cup over the hand trick”…yeeaaahhh for next year!!

Maggie slept and we watched fireworks…it was a nice day/evening to start our Independence Day celebrations.

And I laugh because I remember a few years ago when we did fireworks at my parents house…and Owen was about the same age as Ella is now…and he was terrified. And then I looked at Ella….and she is the TOTAL opposite!

The Beast loved it…the loud bangs would startle her but for the most part shes all about the big show!! haha

Our Irish Visitor

We had one day to regroup and do laundry before heading back to LAX…but this time it was to pick up my cousin Caoimhe (pronounced Qee-Va…yes thats not what it looks like spelling wise but its a very common Irish name).

Caoimhe had just finished her senior year of high school and was VERY excited to come back to California. She’s been here a handful of times on holidays with her parents but the last time she was here was back in 2006 for my wedding…

She was coming and staying with us for 3 weeks. I was a little nervous that she’d be bored but I had some activities planned to keep her busy.  We hung out by the pool a lot, got her nails done, saw a few movies, did some shopping, went camping at the beach, celebrated 4th of July with a family BBQ, spent a day at Disneyland, Universal Studios, The Cove Waterpark and did a Hollywood Tour. The big events I’m blogging about individually but her overall trip was full of fun and from what she told me she really enjoyed herself.

Here are a few pics of our random days…

My kids absolutely adored Caoimhe. And they kep that poor girl busy! I don’t think she got to sit down for a second while there little eyes were open.

It was Caoimhe’s vacation but it was ours too…so we did some fun stuff!