Santa Barbara 2014

We were away from home all of last week. The trip started with the wedding of Nick and Chelsea (Hallaian) Galucci in Los Angeles. From there we went from there to Santa Barbara for the week. It was fun.........as fun as a week away from home with four small children can be.

The first day there we took the kids to a park near our hotel. Gracie loved watching the turtles....

I love these sisters.......

 Gage enjoyed the time to wander around and explore the scenery.

 This little cutie loves the slide. She will go around and down over and over again.

 Jay figured out how to climb this ramp and he was so pleased with himself.

When we take trips like this Gage doesn't get as much time to do what he wants because we have to work around the schedules of our smaller children. This park had a lot to explore and gave Gage an opportunity to go off on his own a little and check things out.

The time we spent at the park was a lot like the time we spend at the park by our house-scary. The twins are at the worst age for the park. They are big enough to climb to the very top but aren't quite aware of the consequences of a misstep. It makes the park visits not so fun for me but I do it anyway because the kids all love to be outside, and I figure they learn by doing. 

The next day was beach day. The boys loved it, Gracie was eh (she just wanted to go on the swings in the play area) and Ash pretty much hated the beach.....

Matt took Gracie down to the water.......

 She clearly couldn't wait to get in......

 These two are so in love

 This is Jay's favorite kind of toy, any kind of container and any kind of utensil to bang with

 Gage loves the beach

 Jay thought the freezing cold water was hilarious

 He laughed and laughed as the water rolled over his legs

 My boys at the beach

This was Ashlyn's beach experience-on the blanket. As soon as we put her feet in the sand she started crying.

In this next picture you can see Ashlyn's foot hanging out of the stroller. Jay tried to get her to come out and play but she wasn't really having it. She actually climbed into the stroller herself and began brushing the sand from her feet. Weird. 

At some point in the trip Gage and Gracie both had a meltdown. Gage cries much more easily when he's tired. He's always been that way. I learned a long time ago that if he's crying and we can't see an obvious reason-it's exhaustion and he just needs a nap. When Gage got upset on this trip he kept saying that he was just tired and ready to come home. During Gracie's meltdown (well, one of MANY meltdowns) she cried that she didn't want to stay at the beach, she just wanted to go home.

Meltdowns suck-but theirs were a reminder of just how fortunate we are. I know from my experience teaching that there are children everywhere (from all ages and every demographic) that would do just about anything to avoid going home-and ours were begging for it.

One of the first things I loved about Matt was that when I was with him I felt the comfort of home. In many ways his home reminded me of my own. When he took me to the farm I felt it was a place I could curl up on their couch and go to sleep (then again, I've also felt comfortable enough to take a nap at a bar when I wasn't even drinking). Anyway, home brings a certain comfort to me and I love spending most of my time here at home with these guys.

I hope that home is always a place our kids want to be. And when they've all grown up I hope it's place they love to come back to.

Love.