Comet, California, and Craziness

I'm sorry! I am finally getting around to posting.  It has been a crazy and busy and fun summer.  This is going to be a long post so I understand if you just want to look at the pictures.. So a few weeks ago Ava was in quiet time and I could hear her walking around but didn't really think much of it because quiet time is not always quiet at our house but I went upstairs to find this:

Yes that is a brand new bottle of Comet cleaner poured all over her room.  She had a footprint trail all over upstairs too.  I had put it in my bathroom to clean our shower and forgot all about it.  Apparently Ava hadn't.  Let's just say I wasn't happy.  It had been a rough day prior to this happening but this was the clincher.  It was a nightmare to clean and I'm not even sure it was fully cleaned.  I'm just glad she didn't eat it even though it was all over her and she had white hair.  Oh how I love that girl but some days she is lucky that I do :).
For our vacation this summer we headed over to California.  It was so fun just getting away and spending time together as a family.  It helped that it was 40 degrees cooler there than here - no exaggeration.  We stayed one night at the LA Temple apartments.  It was so amazing to look out our window and see this:

Although you can't tell from the picture this Temple is huge! It is so pretty too.  Definitely the biggest temple I have ever seen.  We went to the visitor center there and Ava loved the Jesus statue and kept wanting to give it a hug:

It's moments like that when I forget all about the comet moments.  She is a sweetheart.  After our morning at the temple we headed down to Rodeo Drive.  It is only about 3 miles from the temple.  We just wanted to check it out.  I'm sure we fit right in driving down it in our minivan.  We headed to Hermosa Beach next.  Dave's old roommate lives there so we got to spend some time with him and his wife which was lots of fun.  It is so pretty there.  Ava and Ella loved being on the beach and playing in the sand.  Ella loved eating the sand too...

We didn't end up getting in the water because it was freezing cold.  Even just sitting on the beach was cold to me hence being wrapped in a towel.  It was so pretty though and tons of fun.  After the beach we headed to Downtown Disney.  We didn't go to Disneyland because it was so expensive and we didn't think our kids were old enough to appreciate it - well Ava would and she would LOVE it but it was a little out of our budget and we decided we would go when Ella gets a little older.  Anyways it was lots of fun to walk around the shops and we even got to see the awesome firework show they put on.  Ella loved it and kept saying "more."  She is so funny and cute.  Unfortunately we didn't get any pictures of it but the Lego store was incredible and they had lifesize Beauty and the Beast and Toy Story Characters made out of legos.  It was amazing! Afterwards we decided to go ahead and do the 1 1/2 hour drive down to San Diego so we wouldn't have to worry about traffic the next morning down there.  If you want the full story of what occurred during the next 5 hours of our trip you will have to give me a call because it was quite the adventure and I have been banned from posting all the horrible details but let's just say if you are planning a trip to San Diego be sure to book a hotel in advance and if you don't be sure while you are driving from hotel to hotel telling you they have no vacancies be sure to check your gas light so you don't run out of gas on the one exit with nothing around... Yeah so anyways at 3 am we finally found a place to stay the night 45 min. north of San Diego... That was a rough night! But we survived and it is a good laugh now although not so much in the moment.  The next day we slept in a little and then headed down to the San Diego Zoo.  The girls loved all the animals and had so much fun.  It is such a pretty zoo and one you can actually comfortable walk around at in the middle of August. 

 This is how she napped half way through the adventure.  She was tired :)

The next day we went to SeaWorld.  It was so fun too and so kid friendly.  Ava and Ella both loved the shows and seeing all the animals there too and sat through the shows too.  They are very entertaining though so I understand why they loved it because Dave and I loved it too.

 Before Shamu soaked us

 After Shamu splashed and soaked us... It was a lot of fun sitting in the splash zone there.  Ella didn't love it but the rest of us did.

 We sat in the splash zone for the nightly Shamu show too but thankfully he is nicer at night because I was freezing being dry.

 There he is - Shamu

 And yes Shamu totally rocks :)

We got our girls Shamu stuffed animals and they were so excited.  It was such a fun day and I highly recommend going to Sea World with little kids.

This is what we saw on our drive back to our hotel.  You can't really tell from the picture but I can understand why they have to turn the San Diego Temple lights off at night.  It is an amazing sight to see when you are driving down the freeway.  Very easily distracts drivers.  Ava called it the temple castle.  We loved our vacation and had so much fun!

Now we are back to our crazy and fun lives:

 This is how Ava came out of quiet time the other day.  She had a different outfit on before and I guess decided it wasn't as suitable as Ella's shirt, her underwear and a headband.  She is hilarious.

 We had some dress up wigs we were playing around with.  Ella begs to wear them and I think it is so hilarious.  They are Belle, Sleeping Beauty and Snow White.  The white wig is my fairy godmother one from last year.  This is their new favorite thing to do... I love it!

They are so silly and I love them so much!!  We hope everyone else had as fun of a summer as we did!!!