Austin and Alex's California Adventure

From March 6 to 12, the kids and I went to California to visit Ali, Billy, Teddy and Julian. Here's a rundown of our trip.

Wednesday, March 6
Today was filled mostly by flying -- it is afterall a 5.5 hour flight from Toronto to San Francisco. Fearing long lineups at Pearson, we arrived at the airport by 9:30 for our noon flight. But who would have thought that we'd clear baggage drop off, customs and security in 20 minutes -- giving us 2 whole hours to kill at the gate! We managed to pass the time by snacking, surfing the moving sidewalks and buying activity books for the plane.

The flight itself was uneventful and by 4:30 we were in their house and the kids were already playing together. Of course, 4:30 p.m., felt like 7:30 to us and after an early dinner, it was early to bed for Austin and Alex (because early to bed actually felt like 10 p.m. for them).

Thursday, March 7
But the early/late bedtime didn't affect Austin's internal clock; he was awake at 4 a.m., and Alexandra was awake by 4:30 a.m. So, after several hours of quietly playing video games in the living room; the rest of the house woke up at a reasonable hour.

As it was 'cooler' and cloudy that morning, Ali and I took the four kids to the Children's Museum in San Jose. It was crowded, but the kids had fun and by 1 p.m., we headed back to their house in Sunnyvale so Teddy and Julian could have naps.

But, by this time Alex was melting down from being up so early so she went into bed for a nap. And then Austin fell asleep for an hour on the couch!

The afternoon was rounded off with a trip to the park...and the walk there made it worth flying 3,000 miles:

Friday, March 8
Everyone was a little better rested today, though the kids were still up by 6 a.m. The weather was also nicer today so we headed off to the Happy Hallow Park and Zoo in San Jose. This is one of Teddy's favourite places to go, and so Austin and Alex were excited to be going with him.

We visited the animals, rode the kiddie rides, had a picnic and played outside. All in all, a fun day.

Saturday, March 9
On this beautiful Saturday morning, Austin and I started off the day by going for a run. It's the first time we've been running together since last Fall and it was a lot of fun. In all, we covered 3 km and he did really well.

Then it was off to the Sunnyvale Market for fresh fruits, vegetables and bread. And balloons :)

Later in the afternoon, after Teddy and Julian had naps, Ali and I took the three older kids mini golfing. It was Teddy's first time playing (and only Alex's second time). We didn't keep score, or anything like that, and had a lot of fun. It brought back fun memories for me and Ali of when we used to mini golf in Cape Cod with our cousins when we were kids.

Sunday, March 10
Today we went on our biggest adventure yet -- Santa Cruz to see the ocean. Austin and Alex had never seen the ocean and were super excited. It was about an hour drive through the mountains (which was beautiful) to get there. It was a warm sunny day and although it wasn't swimming weather, we all put our toes (or in Austin's case, legs and pants) in the ocean. The kids played at the water's edge for awhile and in the sand. (And yes, we tasted the salt water.)

Santa Cruz has a big boardwalk with carnival rides, so we wandered around there for awhile and let the kids go on some rides before they convinced us to go back down to the water.

Afterwards, we drove over to the wharf and wandered along there with ice cream shakes to see the sea lions that sleep in the sun.

We headed home around 4 p.m. and both Teddy AND Austin fell asleep in the car on the way home!

Monday, March 11
This morning was spent at a nearby park and at a Mexican restaurant for lunch (which mom thought was delicious but Austin and Alex declared that they like the stuff I make at home better!).

In the afternoon, we headed back to downtown Sunnyvale for ice cream and train watching (apparently something Ali does with the boys at least once a week). They all had a blast.

Tuesday, March 12
Today we had to go home. Again, we had good airport karma and dropped off the rental car, cleared baggage check and security in about 30 minutes. Once again, the flight on the way home was uneventful -- but we did get a quick peak at the cockpit when we got on the plane!

And although we never made it into to San Francisco for a day, we did see the Golden Gate Bridge from the airplane as we were taking off!

We had a fantastic trip. Austin and Alex loved having time playing with their cousins and I loved having time to simply hang out with my sister. It's definitely a trip we'll have to do again!

Here's the link to the rest of the photos.