California

Addison's cheerleading "forced" us to California for a competition, so we made a vacation out of it. 

We stopped and spent the night at Lyndsey and Ryan's house in Vegas.  Even though we got there late she let her kids stay up late so we got to see everyone.  Then the next morning got everyone fed and out the door.

 . . . with only a picture of cute Annie.

We got back on the road and made it to San Diego in time to head straight for practice.  There was just no complaining sitting outside in that weather, by the ocean with the palm trees . . . even if we were practicing (and "we" is used loosely here).

We went to Hard Rock for dinner with the other two families from our neighborhood.  And though the music was loud, the service was slow and the food was expensive . . .

the kids had a full on dance party with the waiters and waitresses, got applause from everyone and sang as loud as they could all night . . . One direction, Justin Beiber, Carley Rae Jepson, Black Eyed Peas . . . it just kept coming. 



We found some Ghirardelli ice-cream on our walk back to the car and made our first ice-cream stop.

We went to the San Diego Zoo and believe it or not . . . we were there at opening . . . on time . . . us. 

 We "only" had 6 hours and we weren't sure we'd get through all of it.  4 hours into the hills and the heat we were sure we would get to see enough by the time it was time to leave. 

We went back for Addison's first performance and then headed to Coranado Beach . . . "to play in the sand for a bit."

And maybe get our feet a litte wet.  

 But the Chipmans came over to hang out with us and it wasn't long until they were swimming in their clothes.

It was definitely not warm enough to comfortably swim (and then walk around in those wet clothes) but we were at the BEACH for goodness sakes!

We dusted them off, took their clothes off and made them drive home naked.  Well we did, the Chipmans kept their clothes on with blankets.

Ansen stayed up and did laundry until 1:00 in the morning with all those wet clothes and sandy towels.