Christmas was great. The travel was a little exhausting, to say the least, but the time spent at home with the family was well worth it in the end. Jesse relaxed, I had fights with my older sister, Laura gave us the flu, we all ate and drank to our liking...it was perfect. (Except for the flu part, of course. At least my 24 hours with it didn't happen until I was home on Friday, so I was able to work from the couch. Jesse never caught it, thank goodness!)
On Monday, we went down to Carlsbad to visit with our friend Lyn and to have some breakfast and possibly do a little shopping at the outlet mall that the restaurant was at. It was great to be able to show Jesse where I had lived for a short while back in 1998, and we also found him two great sweaters on sale at Calvin Klein for only $25 each! That was nice.
After we were finished there, we headed back up the coast to Laguna so I could show him dad's condo on the beach there. Here's Laura and Jesse right after I tried to catch her pushing him over the railing! He turned around, though, and she wasn't able to go through with it after all...
On Christmas day, my older sister Wendy, brother-in-law Sean, Jesse and myself went for a hike on the horse trail near dad's house. There are several trails around him, actually, but this one led up to a water tower on the hill across from his place, where we'd heard we could see some pretty amazing views. The initial climb up almost killed me...I thought I was in pretty good shape, but apparently I was wrong! My sister and brother-in-law went on from the top of the hill over around the golf course below and then back to the street that leads to dad's after we were done catching our breath (or trying to catch our breath, as was the case for me at least!) and looking at the pretty view from the top. Here's a picture of dad's house from the top of the hill. It's hard to see...but it's right in the center of the photo, behind all the trees. That big house that's prominent in the photo is the newest neighbor who built right across the street from dad.
And here I am on the way back down the hill. Off in the distance is the main part of San Juan Capistrano which lies across the 5 Freeway and the railroad tracks from dad's house. I think I was pointing at Capo Beach, but I can't remember.
I'd been taunting Jesse with a "surprise" I wouldn't tell him about until it arrived on Monday night. Every year for the past 6 or 7 years or so, I think, we've gotten a bouncy house for the kids to play on for the day at some point around Christmas. This year I was able to convince my sister to order it for Christmas day so Jesse could benefit from it as well. I saw a pirate ship one on the website and I was all, "Ooh! Get that one!" It was a success! Somehow, it manages to keep the nieces and nephews busy from just about sun-up to sunset when we have it. Even though there isn't much to it, they play and play and play. (Where do they get the energy? Bleh!) Here we are on the starboard side of the ship. Or is that the other side? Oh, I don't know...
Once I'd gotten myself up and into the bouncy part of the ship, I realized what a huge mistake it was for me to be in there. Jesse bounced around, and I think he even slid down the slide once, and I tried to avoid being careened into by my nephew who had taken to jumping from the top of the slide directly onto the bouncy portion of the contraption, and I seriously thought that if he didn't break himself in half, he would quickly work his way to snapping one of my appendages with his reckless abandon. So while the look on my face in this photo isn't exactly a flattering one for me, it gives a good idea to you of my feelings about being any part of the bouncy ship at that point in time...
It was a great time. I wish we could have stayed longer, and relaxed some more, and spent more time with dad and Yvette and everyone. With the Twin being sick a good portion of the time we were there, we didn't have a chance to play half the games we'd wanted to, so that made me sad. But we did get to spend time together, since she drove us around while we were there, and everything. That was great.More to come later this week! I've got bunches more pictures to share...hope everyone had a great and safe New Year!
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