The last post

So lest see what I can remember from Tahoe. Well after Tahoe we had to stay at one of my mom's friends, Shannon. We also had met up with another of mom's friends, Shelly. Shannon got us to stay at her house two nights. After that we got back on the road and headed to what would be our last camp spot. We camped at North Carolina and saw Mt. Rushmore. Mt. Rushmore was a pretty site. The heads were in a semi circle so if u saw one side one of the heads were facing away from you. You had to get right in the middle.
 After two night at the camp spot we headed to Chicago were stayed at a hotel at got to a six flags there. We had to drive threw Chicago which was not all that pleasant. The traffic there was just horrible it was almost impossible to get out of there. As we got out of city I noticed the land, this is what I thought about it: The surrounding area was full of rolling hills and was a patchwork quilt or green and yellow grass. It seemed to me that the city was one gigantic black whole in a land of peace.

After Chicago we went to St. Louis were we met up with Amy, Cedric, and Pete again. We stayed at another hotel and had gone to the Six Flags before we left. We had stayed for only one night. After we had stayed a night at the hotel and had gone to six flags (which had rained while we were there) we had made an important decision. The decision's were to spend a night at a campsite to break down a 16 hour drive or just drive it. We took drive it. We had spent more then halve a day in the car and drove. Ugh! By the time we got home it was like 5:00 am and we were past tired. And I had past out in my bed for I thing was 2 hours. When I had waken up I went  about my normal day.

The Final Post

We went to South Dakota and we stayed at Hot Springs for 2 days. When we got there we unloaded everything and then we built our broken tent. Later that day we made dinner and after we ate dinner Ella and I played tether ball and Ella won but that was OK, because I had fun and that's all that really matters and after the game it got dark so we went back to the camp spot and went to sleep. The next day we went to Mt. Rushmore and man was it cool and after we went to a B&Q and got B&Q buffalo ribs and after that we went to a crystal cavern and there were a lot of stairs and now I have a fright of stairs, other then the stairs crystals we pretty. Later when we got back we went swimming in a POOL (who would put a POOL in a camp, apparently these people) ah, other than the pool the night went the same. In the morning I got pancakes and then packed up and left for Chicago.

In Chicago we stayed at a HOTEL woo woo, when we got there we unloaded and unpacked and then we went to six flags and it was so cool, because it was at night and a little cold witch gave it a good kick. The first ride we went on was batman it was so cool and the dark made it really cool. The next ride we went on I forgot the name of but I do know that it was a really long line and we had wait and wait and wait but when we got to the front can I admit that I was scared, but I liked it. The sadly last ride was The Demon and it was really freaking awesome and after the ride we left the park to the hotel and in the morning we left for St. Louie.

When we got to the hotel we checked in and went to go see Ammie Peter and Cedric and then we unpacked and then we had mac and cheese for dinner then we went to go play arcade games and Ella and I spent ours on air hockey but we found a really fun game that is a racing game and Cedric let us use his coins and we all had fun and I actually got to race a stranger but I lost ;), after games it was peter's bed time so I just started watching TV and then went to bed. The next morning we packed the car and went to breakfast and left for HOME.

Leaving Tahoe

It is with a great deal of mixed emotion that I am FINALLY writing today. Yes, yes, I know that I have been severely remiss in writing. Truly sorry. :) Since we got to Arizona it has been go go go. And see see see. From Colorado we visited Four Corners, the Grand Canyon and most importantly our friends Doris, Amanda and Jason (with a quick hello to Larry and Dave). What a tremendously good and relaxing time. Although, as you have already read, we finally lost the bird. It was very sad for us to go through that but it was made easier with the company of Doris, Amanda and Jason. I am reminded from this visit that some friends just are. Doris is the woman I talk to sometimes on a daily basis. We just are. It is hard to define but my life would be lost without her. Yet, she is probably the most different from me from all my friends. I want to be her when I grow up some day. Our visit with her family seemed way too short. ALL of our visits have seemed way too short, but that one was the beginning of these quick visits and it was sad to say goodbye.

That truly is something about moving all the way across the country. Although I don't think (never say never) we would ever leave the East coast while the kids are still school age, it is weird to see 1/2 my life and support here on the West coast. Maybe it is a good thing? After all, I always have somewhere I can go, visit or just get away. But when you spend the little time we have with more people we love, it sad to remember that they are not within physical reaching distance. :/

From Phoenix, and great mexican food, the science center, some hashing for mommy, etc. we moved on to San Diego where the kids and I were spoiled by our Aunt Sandy. Paddle boarding, beaches, pedicures, massages, GREAT GREAT food, long conversations and visits with other family members such as Mark, Aunt Kathy, Uncle Jack and Uncle Hank abounded. It is always a great moment to spend time with Aunt Sandy. While growing up, Sandy was my second mother. She helped raise and guide me, and trust me that was no easy feat. For a few years, I lived with Sandy, Mark and Andy and that was/is a stable part of my young world that has helped shaped me today. It is a blessing for the kids to have her and be exposed to my family and all our wonderfullness and quirks. Again, leaving Sandy's and Mark's was fraught with sadness and a feeling of being cheated but an overwhelming sense of being cared for and loved and knowing we will see them again.

We moved on to visit Hollywood, Malibu and of course ANOTHER Six Flags. Unfortunately though we all ended up with head colds here and were not at our 100%. Ella impressed the hell out of me. She never gets sick and when she does she is like a big overgrown baby. Quick side story, Ella has never been a very snuggly kid. When she was a baby I would look at how other kids would cling to their parents and wonder if I was doing something wrong that mine didn't. Both Kirk and I wrote it off as, just her personality (as we should have in my opinion). However, when she was about 2, she got this horrible flu and was very sick and I got my snuggly kid! I have to say, I was sad to see her sick of course, but man did I eat up all that snuggle and lovey time! Well, she is like that as a young adult too! :) "Mommy," she says to me in our tent, "I am dying!" :) Ahhhhhh my poor baby. So we petted and got her medicine and then she said, "Yeah I don't like this, I will be better within two days." She was! Ha! I love that kid. So we sort of enjoyed the area and then eagerly made our way up to Napa and my brother, Amanda, Aaralyn and Daylin.

We camped one night in a weird little campground in Napa (I don't recommend it) and headed over to Six Flags Discovery Kingdom where we met up with my sister in law Amanda and niece and nephew, Aaralyn and Daylin. What a great day! We literally, once again, walked onto the rides. We saw so much and just generally enjoyed the day. From there we headed to my "home" of South Lake Tahoe and Ryan's actual home.

The magic of being in Tahoe is just about impossible to put into words. This place has a beauty and a calming feeling like no other place in the world that I have experienced. It could be that is because it was my home for so long but I remember when my mom decided to move us here. The reason she did was because of that magic and we knew it was home. So, we have spent the last week here and it is with a somewhat heavy heart we say goodbye today. I was able to reconnect with my friends Henry, Shelley and Shannon. The connections with these people were / are so easy. The KNOWING of each other that we have, its just simple and easy and a true blessing. Everyone's life is going along so well and they are so happy. Henry is tackling school again and he (along with some others I have met this year and on this journey) has inspired me to spend some time volunteering for the VA and re-entering military. Shelley is the mom to a beautiful 15 year old, owns a beautiful home and makes me laugh like she always has. Shannon, ahhh Shannon, a friend I met in the 7th grade, who literally is the only person besides my brother, who I think sees the girl I was with the woman I am. After 25 years, it was like just sitting with a friend I have been in close contact every week. I am looking forward to meeting her husband today and her AMAZING, funny son was a joy to be around yesterday. Shanno's joy with her life was so evident and I was really very happy for her!

We have hiked, sunbathed, hung with Ry and the fam, seen Ryan act, been to improv, had sushi, wreaked havoc, on and on and on. The kids are very sad to leave their cousins. Two more energetic, smart, creative children you could not find. They fit very well with Ella and Katrin and it is fun watching them all. Ryan and Amanda have been generous in letting us impose on their lives for a whole week. I know we will be seeing them again this year. It is just important to me and to us that we maintain some kind of contact so, it isn't as heavy saying goodbye to them. HOPEFULLY they will come to CT sometime soon!!!!

So that is the peanut shell edition of our travels. We are about 10 days away from home now and man are we REALLY looking forward to that. Katrin is a bit overwrought missing her daddy and Ella and I both want our beds (as well as to see Kirk). We are looking forward to the sites to come, sad to have such short visits with the friends and family we have, looking forward to seeing Aimee, Cedric and Pete again for a day, anxious to get home and dreading some of the long driving in the days to come. Who knew there would be SO MUCH emotion in this little trip of ours?

fun time, lost pets, and friends and family.

Well I have realized I don't quite remember every little detail or big details so I will do a place and people skim threw till California. So well we had gone to Colorado, which was pretty. The Colorado camping spot was near a lake, but only mom had gone it since it was freezing cold. Also the Colorado camp spot had no showers, or at least no free showers. $3.00 per 5 min. People could get sick. Ok so any way we had gone to Arizona after that, were we meet up with my mom's friend Doris. We played games with Doris's children, and saw the movie Echo. (Sad movie.) Also in Arizona we had lost Captain, our bird. We had put up signs and posts to see if anyone has found the bird. After Arizona we had gone to San-Diego California. In California we had gone to see our Aunt Sandy. At Aunt Sandy's we had shopped and, stayed at a friends house, and Aunt Sandy had taught us the game Head and Foot. After Aunt Sandy's we had gone to Malabo, California. Were we had stayed two night and left. We had gone to Six Flags on the first day in Malabo. The we had left to go to another place in California and had stayed there one night. We had left and made our way to another six flags which we met Aunt Amanda, our cousins, and a friend of our cousins. After a day at Six Flags we had made our way to Aunt Amanda and Uncle Ryan's house. We have so far gone to see a movie called Guardians of the Galaxy, hiked in the rain, and went to a river near by. We have so far been at there house for 3 days. And that has been our long weeks, and no internet days (sorta.)

Mom's friend's house to cousins's house. And I know we hadn't blogged in a while so here.

We went to Arizona to one of my mom's friends and you could say that we had fun, because we did but the only down side was that our cokatiel flew away. He was a very cute bird and our cute bird at that. We miss him but we are getting a new cokatiel that is sorta cute, and I'm sure that peep is going to miss him (peep is our other bird that is a parakeet). We also swam there a little and I played with Amanda a lot and on the second to last day we played with a really cool game I liked, about marbles lives. On the last day we left for Sandy's house and when we got there we settled in and left for sushi YA!!!! On second day our friend Avani came and after a game of hand in foot we went to the beach on the ocean side, the ocean side has HUGE waves and I almost drowned in one but luckily Avani was there to pull me up. Then when we got to scared we went to the bay side and hung out at one of Sandy's friends's house and for dinner we had B&Q and it was AWESOME. After dinner Ella and Avani covered me with sand and I had to dig to get out, UGH! After all that Avani stayed the night. The next day we went SHOPPING and I got three outfits unlike Ella who got a BILLION outfits and Avani got like ten less than Ella, so Ella won shopping wars surprisingly. We stayed the night at Avani's house and that was tough, because they had a non hypo allergenic DOG, as most of you know I highly allergic to DOGS. The next day we went shopping for shoes with Sandy and I got pretty good shoes. That night some of our relatives came over and we had dinner. The next day we left for Malibu to camp two nights and when we got there we went for a walk to a rock pool which looked scary to swim in so we just walked back and ate half dinner because we weren't hungry. The next day we went to six flags. When we went to go eat the people didn't cook there chicken fully and almost food poisoned me so they gave me more chicken which made my stomach hurt, so I didn't go on any more upside down rides. The next day we went to Napa for ONE night. The next day we packed and went to six flags with our cousins's. And now we are in Tahoe.

Back to camping

We went to a Lake Hills, TX (the middle of nowhere Texas) and on our way to the camp we saw a bar call adolphs it was hilarious. The really interesting things about that campsite was that there was a pool, activity center WITH WiFi, mini golf course, a not working hot tub, and a playground so we had a lot to do while we where there, oh and I forgot to put the brave deer who can be a little more than foot away from a person on my list. The first day we where there we went to the activity center to play some ping pong and MOM won of course but after the second round there was a candy game going on and the people there wanted us to play so we did. Then we went to go play mini golf and mom won the first game but I won the second game, YAY.

The second day we went to the Alamo and I MISSED ALL OF RIPLEY PLACES. After the Alamo we went to Six flags fiesta, the cool thing was that the place was surrounded by a canyon and some of the rides went over it. We went on a couple of water rides and I only went on one really fast and upside down ride called poltergeist, because after the ride my head hurt, we had missed the water park that day so we made a plan so we could go in it. The next day we had to Leave For New Mexico but we went six flags so we go to the water park. We spent 2 hours at the water park then we hat to the campsite, we arrived late at night so that took a long time. And now we are in NEW MEXICO.

Pretty mountains

Dallas Texas was after Oklahoma. In Dallas we slept two night in a hotel. In a hotel people! With REAL beds, and clean showers! Oh ya! Sadly it only lasted 2 nights. In Dallas we had gone to Six flags Over Texas. Then we had gone to see Queen! It was really cool. We had also saw downtown Dallas. We played checkers there, which I won every game :).
After Dallas was Lake Hill Texas. Our campsite was named Medina Lake. Medina lake was a pretty campsite. It had a pool and an activity center. (Activity center had WiFi.) The lake itself was dry. Apparently the lake was nothing more then land that dipped into the ground. Other then the lake with no water, every thing else seemed normal. We stayed at Medina lake for three nights. On the second day and on the last day we went to another six flags in Texas. We went on the last day only because on the second day we weren't prepared to find out that the water park there was free. Meaning we had not brought bathing suits. So we had done all the main park rides on the second day (Iron Rattle, the best ride we have been on, is AWESOME, and scary), then on the last day we had gone to the park again and had done 5 of the water park rides. We had also gone to see the Alamo Mission Fort. After we had gone to the water park in six flags we drove 8 hours to New Mexico. We got another time change, one more hour back. Since the Water park in six flags was only open at 12:00 pm. and we had spent 2 hours in the water park, we had gotten to New mexico at like 9:00 pm, since the time change. We had to put up the tent in the dark. We now know that putting a tent up in the dark is not one of the brightest ideas. At least the site of New Mexico at night is really pretty. With the dark sky above the dark mountains in the background is a really pretty site to see. After we had gotten the tent up we had gotten our stuff inside the tent and just crashed into the beds. Today we had gone to see the White Sands. The sand is so white in some areas it looks like fresh snow. After the white sands we have now made our selves comfortable with the new campsite. Which is hot, desert looking, abandon looking, and is really pretty with the large mountains all around us. I feel we are trapped. Other then the blazing heat, looming mountains, and abandon feeling being here, everything is fine.....