RECITAL 2011

Recital day is always fun. Each year Madi still wakes up really excited and ready to go! We are so fortunate to have found a studio that puts their heart into these girls! Her teachers yet again outdid themselves with amazing choreography to some fun music. Madi's danced ballet and jazz again this year. They did awesome and were so fun to watch. Her ballet dance was to an instrumental version of Be Our Guest from Beauty and the Beast and her jazz dance was to the song When Will My Life Begin from the movie Tangled. Her classes did awesome and certainly showed their hard work! Looking forward to what next year brings already!

Our ballerina in her ballet costume before the show in the dressing room.
After recital, in her jazz costume, with Samantha!

Our family after recital... loaded down with bags and flowers.

Really there was a garment bag with costumes, a makeup and hair supply bag, Madi's activity bag, my purse, flowers and more! It was a little out of hand how much we had to hold on to! :)

Heading Home...

With a long week ahead of us, it is time to head back... After swimming and packing up, we went back to the cafe/bakery! Daddy wanted to try Drew's sandwich too! Then back to the Tech museum for one quick redo of all the fun things and then to the last IMAX -- Born to Be Wild. We arrived back in Dallas at about 11:00p.m. By the time we got back to our car, packed in and drove home -- we arrived back home around 3am... Just in time to catch a little sleep and start getting ready for company!

San Francisco Round 2

Madi and Drew had SO much fun in San Francisco that they wanted to go back. Since the cable cars were having repairs done while we were there, we decided to go back and catch a little more. With a short drive back to San Francisco we were off for another day full of fun. We started off at the Golden Gate Bridge again. This time from the San Francisco side. You could see the bridge better and it definitely seemed less windy...

I conquered my fear and walked on the side of the bridge... Definitely not as bad as I had built it up to be. Unfortunately we still were only able to go half way as we put our only change in what was apparently a broken parking meter and we didn't want to get a ticket.

After our walk back, we parked the car in a lot and started on our day... We took the cable car to Chinatown.

Ate lunch in Chinatown -- everything was really good and then decided to walk around for awhile... so we headed back to Coit Tower and hung out for a bit and then to Lombard Street. It was a lot more crowded in San Francisco this round but the kids still wanted a couple more pictures and were acting pretty silly.

We headed back towards the wharf and grabbed some more ice cream. Ended up seeing a really entertaining street show. The performers were really funny and had a lot of energy. Then we went to the Sea Lions for a bit and walked around Pier 39

Silly kids with their sea lions...

We called it a day in San Francisco and headed back to the car... One last drive down Lombard Street -- this time Daddy let Madi and Drew stand out the sunroof and back into traffic to get back to San Jose.

Once we made it back, we headed out to dinner -- got lost a little walking there but finally made it. Ate dinner in the trolley car at the Old Spaghetti Factory and then caught a little bit of the outdoor movie on the Square.

Day 2 San Jose...

The second day in San Jose we attempted to swim a bit in the morning... I decided it was too cold to go in and Madi and Drew decided it was too cold after about 10 minutes. We hung out down by the pool though as we had it all to ourselves and it was relaxing. After the pool, we got ready for the day. We went walking to find lunch and decided to eat outside at this little bakery/cafe that was just a couple blocks from the hotel. The food was really good and Drew's sandwich was a hit... Crunchy peanut butter with whole cranberry sauce and piled high with apple slices and banana! Seemed like and odd combination but super yummy! It was also gorgeous for eating outside.

After lunch, Madi and Drew wanted to show Daddy the Tech Museum -- he met us there after his conference. We watched another IMAX about the Hubble telescope and a mission into Space to fix it. Madi and Daddy built robots in the Got Bots? section...
Madi and Daddy working hard...

Madi's awesome creation.

After the robot building we found a whole new section we hadn't even discovered the day before. It had a whole area of space with rovers to maneuver around, a space walk chair and game, an earthquake simulation platform and so much more. It was another successful day at the museum.

After the museum, it had warmed up outside and the fountain splash area looked like a lot of fun to Madi and Drew... So we let them go in, clothes and all. :) They had a great time running through the fountains.

Soaking wet kiddos...



warming up and drying off before heading back into the hotel

After playing in the fountains, we went back and changed and then headed to Santa Cruz. Unfortunately everything had already closed up for the day by the time we had gotten there so it was really uneventful but the drive was pretty at least and the kids had fun playing in the sand by the cold ocean.

San Jose

The first night in San Jose was spent exploring the area. After several failed attempts to get food -- everything seemed to be closed -- we ended up around the corner from the hotel at Johnny Rockets. At least we were able to check out the city a little in our search of food. Marty's conference started the next morning so we turned in early as it would be his long day there...

The next day we took our time getting ready and went to the pool for a bit. Madi and Drew decided it was too cold so we went back up to the room and got ready to head out for the day. We went across the street to The Tech. We had lunch and started in on the exhibits at about noon... Madi and Drew LOVED this place! They loved it so much we stayed until 4:30 when things were starting to close down with plans to come back the next day. Everything was hands on - there was a very cool huge replica of Earth that you could set to different settings and spin to see the whole thing, different demonstrations of energy requirements, one being a bicycle that you had to pedal to get lights and fans to turn on, robot areas, areas to build and play with reflections and sound waves, computer to set up your own website to customize your visit, and that was just some of what was downstairs.... We had a 1:00 showing at the IMAX to see Under the Sea. The IMAX theater here is incredible -- it is a dome, it is huge and loud, and awesome to see movies on! After the showing, we headed to the upstairs where we played with a big marble tilt game, a full setup on genetics that we collected cards for reading information, holding senate hearings with a teleprompter and all, taking colorblind tests, seeing what ultrasounds look like including seeing an ultradound of our own hand and more. Then we found the Silicon Design Area -- befitting of the Silicon Valley. There was so much to do here too... There was a place to hardwire a chip to make the car do different things depending on how you wired it, design a chip to make a robot and program a chip to control Mr. Potato Head. We also were able to use a program to design a roller coaster and then have it simulated in a machine. There was so much to do here, we didn't even get to it all...

Playing the Marble Tilt
Ultrasound of the hand

Hardwiring the chip to operate the car

In honor of Daddy!

Creating a roller coaster

Programming Mr. Potato Head

After a ton of fun at The Tech we went to reminisce a bit... First stop was the Japanese Friendship Garden. Madi and Drew had a great time running over the bridges, hopping over the stone paths and exploring around. Just outside of the garden was a huge park with an outdoor "stadium." Madi thought this was pretty cool and had to "perform" her dance for us. Drew, Daddy and Madi did a little performance after that.

Hanging on the bridge

Fun little waterfall...

We left the Japanese Friendship Garden and drove by the apartment that we lived in... Drew thought it was pretty cool and wanted to move in. Sensibly Madi informed him that he would not have a backyard if we lived there. We drove around some of the areas we remembered and then headed off to The Elephant Bar Restaurant. We loved this place when we lived nearby and still LOVE it! The food was great and we had a good time. After dinner we were in search of our old workplaces. We never found mine and after a few wrong turns, we found Marty's which is now a differenct company as ATI research no longer exists.

Back to the hotel to turn in early which we did but we were also awoken early. About 12:30, sirens were going on. The fire alarm had started and we figured we better head out. Several problems with doing this easily... Madi likes to sleep in a tank and shorts -- it was like 50 degrees outside, Drew asked if he could sleep in his underwear and shirt and we obliged, Madi could not be woken up and we didn't even attempt to wake Drew up, and to save the best for last -- we were on the 18th floor! I first of all did everything that you shouldn't do if there is a fire... I was grabbing sweatshirts, shoes, phones, blankets. Marty decides that he will carry Madi and I should get Drew. As my head is pounding and I am contemplating carrying a sleeping child down 18 flights -- I laid back in bed -- I seriously just wanted to take my chances with a fire coming my way. Fortunately an announcement was made over the loud speaker and after about 10 minutes, we were told all was clear. An excedrin later and after the adrenaline settled it was back to sleep!

P.S. Madi and Drew had no idea that any of this took place in the morning!

Never trust the weather forecast

70% chance of thunderstorms turned into partly sunny and NO dang rain! Seriously our luck!!!! We hadn't planned to go back into the Valley as it takes over an hour and a half just to get close to the Valley... Our plan for the day was to hit Mariposa Grove, home of some of the giant Sequoia trees and possibly heading to Glacier Point. We made it to Mariposa Grove, about 20 minutes from the hotel. Put on those wet shoes from the day before and planned out a short two mile hike to see some of the unique trees. Silly kids... crazy big tree roots...

Bachelor and Three Graces
The giant grizzly tree

The California Tunnel Tree

The kids played baseball with Marty in the slow traffic areas using their "hiking" sticks and pinecones. There were a few good hits. After returning to the car, we decided it was too late to head to Glacier Point -- we didn't want to add another 3 hours on to the drive to San Jose plus we need to leave something to do the next time we visit Yosemite! :)

YOSEMITE

A few things we learned... #1 Dramamine apparently actually works and we made it into the valley with no sickness - YAY, #2 - it can snow in California in June too, #3 we can certainly have bad luck but know how to make the most of it.

The weather report for Saturday was 50% chance of showers and for Sunday 70% chance of thunderstorms so we decided to make the most of our day Saturday despite the constant drizzle before the storms rolled in.

It had snowed in the ridge the night before we arrived and we had heard that the waterfalls were flowing the most they have in 50 years due to the amount of snow in the mountains. Just past the tunnel of the ride in, we made it to one of the first viewing areas of the valley. Madi and Drew were AMAZED and COLD! I really thought San Francisco would be the coolest portion of our trip and packed according to that. Yosemite was warm each time we went the summer we lived in California... who knew it would be 46 degrees -- add the constant rain and dampness to that and we were downright chilled!

Our first stop was a very short hike to Bridalveil Falls. As we neared the Falls, you couldn't see anything, the water coming off of it was so heavy, we were getting soaked and couldn't see. The pictures we took do not do this waterfall justice but we know it is there!

Madi, Drew and Marty as close to the Falls as they could get...

All of us wih the Falls in the background... it is really hard to see as we are off the base of it quite a bit.

Further into the valley, we were able to see Upper Yosemite Falls... we told the kids we went to the top of that one the last time we were here. They were glad we weren't planning to go again!

A view back in the other direction.

After lunch, we were in the area where you could see both Upper and Lower Yosemite Falls... Upper Yosemite is hidden behind a cloud in this picture but it is behind there somewhere!

The big one for the day... Mist Trail to the top of Vernal Falls. 3 miles round trip with a climb of 1000 feet!

At the bridge about half way up... we were already slightly tired and the hard part was yet to come... After this bridge came over 600 uneven, steep, and very wet steps...

Making our way up some of the easier steps when my attention could be diverted for a few kodak moments!

We were pretty soaked by this point! The waterfall was spraying so much, it put the constant rain shower to shame!

We made it!!!!! Madi hiked the entire way up by herself without being carried. Drew had to do the hard part by himself as the rocks are not safe to be carried on! Seriously very proud of both of the for sticking it out -- so many people told them how impressed they were on the way back down! The total trip took up two and a half hours which seemed like really good time!

Coming back down was quite challenging as the rocks were extremely slippery... We made it with very few minor slips while being completely drenched while walking that was -- for some reason when we went to wring out Drew's socks a bit, I had a problem not slipping while standing still! Leave it to me!

Since we were already soaked, we decided to catch the shuttle at the base of the trail and head to the Mirror Lake trail... a much less intensive 2 mile hike to a place we thought would look beautiful. We tredged our sopping wet, freezing cold selves all the way to this....

DISAPPOINTMENT!

There was nothing exciting about Mirror Lake... maybe it was just the weather but it was so not worth the hour hike to it in the misting rain... Most people kept standing there asking if that was the spot -- apparently we were not the only disappointed ones.

After the way back... we ventured back to the gift shop to buy dry sweatshirts. As much as we wanted to continue on, we were completely chilled and ready to get into the heat of the car and soak ourselves in the hot tub back at the hotel!