H&M

Last summer my cousin went on a trip and was telling me about an awesome store she found called H&M. A couple months later we went on our vacation to Chicago and before we left I thought to myself, "I wonder if they have an H&M??" So I looked it up and they did! When I shopped there I fell in love. I wish we had one close. The store is european, and the clothes reflect that. When I was planning the things I wanted to do in California, of course, I had to see if they had an H&M..... and they did!! I got Ray this mushroom print shirt and I just love it. She wore it to church today so I thought I'd write a little blog about it.

My Second Favorite.......

I think my favorite part about Thanksgiving weekend is shopping on Black Friday. It's become a tradition with me, my mom and my brother. This year my mother-in-law even came! The time this year was 4:45am.... yep, that's the earliest I EVER get up all year long!! A close second, is decorating for Christmas. We moved a shelf in our living room so we could put the tree in a position where you can see it from the couches. In the past few years it's been off to the side and I really wanted it where I could see it more. I love Christmas time. And I love putting up the tree. I'm using the pink and red theme again this year. I really loved it last year. Saraya was a big help, helping put all the ornaments on the tree, even if they were in a two foot radius. :-) As soon as we were done last night, she started asking if it was time to put up her tree. I just couldn't do two in one night, so we saved it for today. Of course that was the first thing out of her mouth when she got up. I was able to push it off til after the trip to Target. We buy an ornament each year for her tree of something that she's into. This year we let her pick it out herself. Of course, she picked Tinkerbell. When we got home we put her tree up and she was so pumped. We're now ready!!!!!! Now I just need to start wrapping presents.....

My Top Five....

Here we are at the end of our trip. It doesn't seem possible that this time tomorrow we'll already be back in Jonesboro after our flight. Vacations are great. I love to travel. But it's also nice to get back to family and friends.

Here's James and his brother Rich, and us with Rich and Tina.

So in case you weren't keeping up with it, here's my top five things about our vacation to California:

1) In-n-Out Burger

2) IKEA

3) Disneyland

4) the beach

5) seeing family

Thanks to all you folks that have been reading my blog!!!

Ronald Reagan Library

When we visited two years ago, we went to the Reagan Library but since we went they added a new building that houses his Air Force One plane. Today, we took my niece Dabe and toured the place again, plus we got to see all the new stuff. It was all just as impressive the second time around. One of my favorite parts about going there, is that it's up on top of a mountain, so the scenery is beautiful.

My Top Five...

It was totally different going to the beach in November rather than the summer. The wind blowing in off the ocean is so cool. But it was still great to go and walk around along the coast. We just took a few pictures down on the shore then we walked around at the stores and got hot chocolate (for me a chai tea) and watched the sailboats. It was very relaxing. Unfortunatly, after James took the picture of me and Saraya, he said, "look at that big wave" and the next thing I knew my shoes, socks and ankles were drinched in ocean water with waves rolling around my feet. (Sorry David, I know this breaks your heart) When we got home and I rinsed them out and hopefully they'll dry without smelling like salt water. :-)

Happy Anniversary Blake and Susan!!!

I really hate that we're not there to help you guys celebrate! Hope you guys were surprised! Can't wait to see the pictures. We love you guys!!! And we send you best wishes... may you always be as happy as Minnie and Mickey!!!!!!

Disneyland at night....

....was amazing. It's pretty at night anyway, but to see all the Christmas lights and decorations up it was just b-e-a-utiful!! As tired as we were, I am so glad we stayed all day. Main Street was great all lite up, but my favorite was the castle. They had so many lights on it... with Christmas ribbon, and icicles.... so I think that this will possibly be my favorite picture from the whole day.

The Mad Hatter Tea Party

We weren't really sure what Saraya would think about the rides but she really surprised us. You can tell by the look on her face that she's having the time of her life!!! These are by far my favorite pictures from a ride.

Meeting Mickey

Ahhh.... to be a kid again. Ray was beside herself when we told her we were going to meet Mickey. She could hardly wait. I was a little shocked that she wasn't timid. But she walked right in there, waved hi, gave him a hug and posed for pictures. She was thrilled!

Laura and Rowan

It was so wonderful hanging out with Laura and Rowan. As I sit here typing my blogs Saraya is writing a letter to Rowan.... "I had so much fun at Disneyland with you. You went bye-bye and I was sad." I think we're going to go through sad goodbye's all over again when we leave them!!!! It's been hard the past two months in Jonesboro without the Cebulski's, and now, even though it's been wonderful to see two of them, and share memories that will last forever of our first trip to Disneyland, we will go home and be reminded all over again of how much we miss them being in Jonesboro!!!!!

The Real Photographer

We took a disposable camera to Disneyland with us so Saraya could take pictures. I'm anxious to see what kind of pictures she took. She was totally into it!! The top picture was on the Jungle Cruise and the bottom picture was in Mickey Mouse's house.

At Last!!!

After getting a little bit of a late start (because of the one morning Saraya wanted to sleep in - sheesh) and getting stuck in traffic on the 5, we finally arrived at Disneyland. It was awesome. Everything was decorated for Christmas and the streets were filled with Christmas music. It really got me in the spirit!!! It was so fun to watch Saraya be amazed by stuff. Here we are on Main Street (probably my favorite part) and James and Ray in front of the Walt & Mickey statue with the castle in the background.

Old Friends...

Yesterday Laura and Rowan drove down from Northern California in their veggie oil truck to visit us!!! We didn't tell Saraya that we were going to see them so it was fun to watch her light up when she realized she was waving at Aunt Laura in the truck. She started waving almost as if she was used to seeing her, then a light went off, "wait! I don't see them anymore!!" We sat outside and talked and watched the girls play, then we took them to eat at Chuy's and then to Ben & Jerry's! Laura and Rowan are going to Disneyland with us today... speaking of.... we're walking out the door!!!!!

Our New VW!!!

Well, we rented a car to go to Disneyland tomorrow.... and though it's not James' dream car the VW Van, it is still a VW!! An '08 Rabbit. I know dad is saying "oh good grief" as he reads this. :-) Sorry, there were no american cars availible. It was nice to trade in the tank we've been driving for something that we can actually go through a drive-thru in!!!

Today we went to the scrapbook store I love. I found it online last night. It didn't close, it just moved to a new location. It was close to heaven.... such a great store.

We also ate lunch at Baja Fresh. We ate outside in the patio. The weather is great out here.... feels like summer til the sun goes down.

We're all geared up to go to Disneyland tomorrrow!!

My Top Five....

Wednesday we spent the afternoon in Burbank.... visiting one of my top five places to shop.... IKEA!!!!! What a great store. I could've spent hundreds, no thousands, of dollars in there. But I had to settle for some awesome shoe racks, a new utensil to use when I make hush puppies, and some new bag clips. On the way out, something caught my eye..... a swiss version of our Rolos.... except they're even better cause it's mint caramel filling!!! Wow. I'm eating them as I type out this blog and let me tell, they are awesome. After we shopped at IKEA, we walked accross the street and ate at the Califonia Pizza Kitchen. That was some great pizza. We had the Jamacian Jerk Pizza and a mango curry one. It was awesome. I'm all about some indian food but I would've never thought to put those ingredients into a pizza! It had a curry sauce with chicken, onions and fresh cilantro. Need I say more??? Then it had mango chunks (which I picked off)and a mango sauce drizzled on top. We drove back to Simi and I went in a scrapbook store (which had nothing) and then we ran in Target before picking Tina up at work. Now I'm just chillin' at the house. We're going to go out with our friends, Matt and Suzy tonight for dinner. Guess I'll tell about that later......

My Top Five....

Here we are in California!! I can't believe it's already Wednesday. Saraya did wonderful on the plane. She loved that we "blasted off" just like Rocket on Little Einstiens. And we played the game "how wide can you open your mouth" as we landed. It seemed to work. Monday we lazed around the house all day... which was really nice. I even took a nap!

Tuesday we went to a mall that I found close by because it had a scrapbook store and a H&M... unfortunatly the scrapbook store had closed!!! But the H&M was just as good as the one I went to in Chicago. I love that store. Wish we had one... I scored a couple great pairs of earrings, and found a great hippie shirt with mushrooms all over it. Since I was disappointed with no scrapbook store, I wandered in a sporting goods store and found a Lakers sweatshirt!! Woo hoo! One thing James got was a bag of $7 speciality popcorn.......... you know you're on vacation when you spend $7 on popcorn just cause it's "White Chocolate Caramel"!! He also lucked out at Target by finding a Raiders cooler since we're in Raider Nation and all...

We drove back to Simi and ate lunch at In-n-Out.... definatly on my top five list of favorite things about vacation to the West Coast. I could eat it every day... double double animal style!!!!

It's Finally Here!!!

Well, I made the mistake of telling Saraya at the end of August that we're going to go to Disneyland. It was fun to show her pictures on the computer and watch her get excited. But of course, that turned into her asking every five minutes, "are we were going to Disneyland now!!?" So I made a countdown calendar and we've been putting a sticker on it every day since.... time has flown by and today was the last sticker!!! We're sooooooooooooooo excited about flying out to California tomorrow!! Check back for blogs from the west coast.....