About: Going back...

If Well that was a nice little long [unplanned] blogging break! In all honestly, I wasn't ready to get back at it. Vacation was wonderful, and I was not ready for it to end. But it did, and then I had to contend with the mental switch, the mountain of laundry, and the mass of Christmas boxes waiting to be unpacked, so blogging got pushed to the backburner... and with that I'll just jump back in, 3 weeks ago... actually a little longer, because these pictures were from the week of Parent-Teacher Conferences, and I forgot to put them in with my last post. The kids stayed with Grandma and Papa on Thursday that I was working till 8, and the weather was still nice then so they went rock hunting! The kids love it! I'm not sure how long Carolina wants to be at it, but Liam could go all day. Especially if there are snacks involved.

Lovely autumn weather.

Lucky kids...

But the week after was our last full week of work before Thanksgiving break - every day after work I would start packing a little at a time, so by the time it was the night before I was mostly ready. The kids were anxious to pack their backpacks too, but they needed them for school, so I had them make a list and a pile of items. This is Liam's: 

It was a busy, fun week, the students were CRAZY - which is pretty expected though, and I just didn't have much desire to work at chilling them out. I mean I was excited too! I stayed late at school to get all of my work done and get a little ahead so I wouldn't have to stress while I was gone that something wasn't ready for the first day back. Friday afternoon - after the traditional shoebox parade - and the dismissal bell - I was ready to bolt. We met Todd at home, threw our bags in the car and were on the road for Nevada by 3:45. I had the kids put on their pjs to wear through the whole trip - so the only bag we had to unload at the hotel was the overnight bag for toothbrushes and Todd and my clothes.

We had been planning to drive all day Saturday - but decided it was worth the $50 to stay the night in Ely, about halfway, so we could spend all afternoon and evening at Downtown Disney with the Michaelsons, and also - in case there was weather or traffic or something that held us up. And there was a little, typical southern California, but it didn't delay us too much.

And it really was worth it, not only is it nice to break the drive up, but it was so nice to get there at lunch time and just enjoy the sights and restaurants and shopping and still get to bed on time for the big day coming up. 

Just look at this little Mickey someone (I assume janitorial staff) made on the ground in Downtown Disney!!! This is why I love it all. 

We dragged the Michaelson's all up and down that strip, ate at the ESPN Zone, the kids acted like the crazy monkeys they are - we were all so happy to see each other. We wandered through the Disneyland Hotel hoping to see some characters, although we didn't see any we did find this adorable gingerbread Disneyland castle for picture taking! We were all in bed and half asleep when we heard the fireworks go off, it's too bad we were too tired to see them because they didn't run the next day - but it was ok, we had a GREAT time...