USA Holiday

Friday, December 14, 2012 - Wednesday, January 2, 2013

Sydney made snowmen with her friends.

We spent a great three weeks in Wisconsin. We had dinner with Dale and Gabby the first night.  Sydney can't wait to go to that steak restaurant again.  Then we were able to spend time with Adam's parents and our Mukwonago friends the first week.

Topaz!

Won't Dagan look cool on the beach?

Rudd and Sydney

The second week we headed Up North to spend time with my parents and Topaz.  We've really missed our dog.  Adam's brother joined us for the week. We went snowmobiling, sledding, walked across the lake, and much more. We were glad to see and play in some snow.  It feels more like Christmas when it is cold, and there is snow.  Adam's parents joined us for Christmas, and my brother's family came for a couple of days after Christmas. 

We have missed bacon.  We got some for Christmas!

Our last week was spent in Mukwonago.  We unfortunately missed seeing Adam's sister's family, but were able to see Robin and David.   It was nice to be home for a few weeks.

Disneyland

 Thursday, December 13, 2012

We are actually at Disneyland!

Family photo with Adam's phone.

Their late for an important date!

We let the kids guess where we were going today at dinner last night. Dagan made the right guess. We were parked and headed into the park by 9:30am.  Dagan was especially excited. It ended up being a great day to be at the park. It was overcast, but it didn't rain which I think helped keep the lines pretty short. Our longest wait was for Peter Pan.

I had to remind Sydney that she loved a few Princesses.

Look at their muscles!

My Mad Hatter

We went on all the rides the kids wanted to go on. A few attractions were closed, but that didn't effect us at all. We had dinner at the Blue Bayou which is located inside the Pirates of the Caribbean ride.  It had good food, and it was nice to be able to sit down for a while. We did see the Christmas parade.   I saved seats while Adam and the kids went in the Small World ride. They knew why I volunteered to wait after they went on it.  Sydney says she will never go on that ride again.  Her face made me laugh when she got back. Our favorite rides were Star Wars, Space Mountain, Big Matterhorn, Big Thunder, the Haunted Mansion, and Indiana Jones. We were going to stay for the fireworks, but we were finished by 8:00 pm. We were back in the hotel and asleep by 9:30pm.  Adam was surprised that we stayed awake for as long as we did. Both kids said this was a great reason to stop over in California.  Dagan wants to know when we will go again.

Santa in the Christmas Parade

Los Angeles, California

Wednesday, December 12, 2012

Isn't this the best family photo ever?

Sydney gave jumping a try.

Dagan likes to jump into the sand.

We are heading towards home today. We decided to stop over in California for two days. Our flight left on time and went pretty fast. 13 hours later we were in California. It is strange that we left on Wednesday, December 13 at 3:00pm and arrived in California on Wednesday, December 13 at 10:00am.  After checking into our hotel, we went out for lunch at Pink's. Yummy and cheap chili dogs and hamburgers. Then we went to Venice Beach. It would be really crazy during the summer. Sydney wanted to go to Beverly Hills, so we found the Playboy mansion. You couldn't really see it, but the size of the other houses were amazing. We also drove down Rodeo Drive. The street looked pretty all decorated for Christmas. Adam was really excited to see a fancy car that I can't remember the name of. We headed back to the hotel to let the kids swim. Our goal was to stay awake until at least 8:00. We were all fading fast. Dagan took a nap in the car, and I almost did. We went to the Hard Rock Cafe for dinner.  After dinner, Adam fell asleep first. The kids and I were asleep soon thereafter.  At 11:30pm both kids woke up and thought we should have a party.  It took a little while to get them settled and asleep again.

Walking along in Venice Beach.

Adam's wedding ring

Sunday, December 2, 2012

Adam said I needed to blog this, so we wouldn't forget.  I don't think that will happen. 

Adam, Dagan, and I were sitting outside on our balcony.  Adam was using his hands while he was talking.  Mid sentence he jumps up and asks Dagan and I if we saw that.  Neither of us knew what he was talking about.  As he was talking, his wedding ring slid off his finger and flung over the railing of the balcony.  We are 7 stories up.  First, we looked under our furniture in hopes of finding the ring, but no luck, so we headed to the ground floor.  It was like looking for a needle in a haystack.  We took a few small rocks up with us to toss over the side to see where they would land.  A few really bounced, so we went back down to look some more.  We decided to quit our search and to call the management company on Monday because there is one open balcony beneath us.

View over the side of our balcony.

Adam's ring after the fall.

Monday evening, we got a call on our intercom system.  It was our neighbor who said she had something of ours.  Adam went to meet her and came back with his ring.  She actually found it on her balcony.  Needless to say, we are both rather excited.  It will have to be fixed, but we have it.  It is nice to know that we have another nice neighbor.

Wollongong Botanic Garden

Sunday, December 2, 2012

Dagan's work

Dagan was getting tricky taking pictures.

This was a beautiful hydrangea. 

We decided to go to the Wollongong Botanic Garden today.  It is pretty.  You can walk through a variety of gardens, and there are some great green spaces where you could have a picnic.  We spent an enjoyable hour or so here.