Excape From Alcatraz

Lasst weak wee wint tue Al KuhTraz and sau thuh nete selz that thuh prihzuhnuhrs had tue stai inn. Iht wuz prittie phuhn dispight haffeeng tue lihmp uhrownd ahl dae beecuz eye hert migh nei plaeing soccuhr.
Luckily it was a very nice day, much warmer than we expected San Francisco to be.
The audio tour was quite interesting, including stories from old, released prisoners recounting their time on the rock. It is quite a creepy place, though. I'm not sure how the prison guards and their families lived on the same island as the worst criminals in the country and slept at night.
After the tour we got some good ol' San Francisco clam chowder in a sourdough breadbowl and fish sticks!

With a hurt knee, Labor Day weekend was spent lying around the house, watching the last season of Lost, and checking Craigslist for apartments like an addict. We FINALLY have a place to live in Seattle, we're moving this weekend (thanks to help from our families), and we just have to figure out what to do with our bed out here!

It's been great living out here in California. Going back to a roommate-style arrangement has been interesting, but we're excited to have our own place again. The weather has been amazing, prices - expensive, fun times - awesome. We'll see what adventures await us in grad school and Washington! Anyone who is ever up in Seattle or wants to come visit us sometime, feel free to drop by - we've got an extra room!

Happiest Place on Earth

We went to Disneyland this week! It was incredibly fun. This was Mitch's first trip to Disneyland and the whole experience exceeded his expectations. We stayed at the beautiful home of our cousins Grant and Natali Lenning and enjoyed visiting with them too. My favorite new feature was "World of Color" a water and light projection show in California Adventure http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=glpeElM-l5U&feature=fvw . We spent 3 days bouncing between the two parks and enjoying every minute. The first 2 days weren't too crowded and we were able to go on all the best rides with hardly any waiting in line. Our favorite rides were... Toy Story Mania (the ride is in 3D, how sweet is that!?), Space Mountain, Pirates of the Caribbean, Tower of Terror, California Screamer, It's a Small World. Another highlight was eating at the Blue Bayou. This is the restaurant inside the Pirates of the Caribbean ride. I've wanted to go there since I was a little kid and so we decided to celebrate our 3rd Anniversary a little early. We also loved the Pixar Parade...truthfully we loved everything about the whole visit. We'll let the pictures do most of the talking.




Back off Minnie!

Get yours today for only $25.95. This is a mint condition, collectors edition, new in box!

We were lucky enough to be in line just when Jesse was leaving and Woody was replacing her so we got a photo with both! Bonus! The new Toy Story Mania ride in 3D is SWEEEET! It's worth the long wait in line!

Sully wouldn't let Mitch hug him or come anywhere near me. He is a very protective monster...and very cuddly soft.

The Mad Hatter was tickled pink that we all matched!

Fantastic Family Fun!

This week we almost had more fun than we could handle! My brothers and dad came to visit on Wednesday...it was pretty much 3 days of non-stop excitement. Wednesday night we made smores and got to hear stories from Lee's mission. Thursday morning we went to San Francisco and visited all the trademark tourist spots including the sea lions, Fisherman's Wharf and Pier 39. We also went into some really pretty art galleries and had some delicious sea food and sourdough bread. One of the best parts of the day was Dad's street performing debut as part of the Merry Mary show. Mary is a circus type performer and Dad helped her with her juggling act (after she made him shake his booty chip n' dale style at the audience).

Dad helping out with the Merry Mary show. Leftys...the only ones in our right mind :)

That night Kody and I got see Wicked. It was BRILLIANT. We had fantastic seats and the performances were spot on. It was even better the second time around. So glad I got to see it with Kody. The whole experience was unforgettable.


Friday we went to Six Flags Discovery Kingdom and got more than we bargained for. We started off by hitting all the big roller coasters. Then we caught some fun shows (sea lions, Shouka the Orca, and dolphins). Then back to rides. We also went through a beautiful butterfly house with hundreds of unique and lovely butterflies. We finished the day with bumper cars.


One of these things is not like the other.

Saturday we went back into San Francisco and drove across the Golden Gate Bridge. We had lunch on the shore at Sausilito. Then we went to Muir Woods - the most gorgeous forest I have even been to. Some of the trees are thousands of years old and a hundred feet tall. That evening we had some tasty pizza and went to the Tennis Club and played Marco Polo in the pool and relaxed in the hot tubs. We polished the night off with Livermore's famous Donut Wheel and Miracle Snow.

BIG BRIDGE...........

little bridge

See the little tiny speck at the bottom of the picture on the right...that's me compared to the enormously humongous redwood tree. The beautiful picture on the left was taken by Mitch.


GIGANTIC, beautiful trees.

The boys left this morning after Sacrament meeting, which I might add, was excellent. The topic was education. The talks were really well done and the Spirit was amazing...a great way to wrap up a great week.

An Awfully Big Adventure

We saw a brilliant performance of Peter Pan this week at threesixty theater in San Francisco. Mitch got an amazing deal on the tickets and we couldn't pass up the opportunity to see my favorite show. It was performed in the round in a huge tent with projections on the inside walls of the tent for scenery. This made it look ridiculously cool when they were flying because it seemed like they were really soaring through London into Neverland. It also made the mermaid lagoon scene very neat because we felt like we were underwater. The design of the show digitally, esthetically and architecturally was fantastic. Their fly system was also very neat and allowed them to flip, turn and hang upside down. Most of the cast was from England and some characters used Scottish accents which was very fun. We also loved the incorporation of puppetry and aerialists. I love the magic of this show. This was definitely the best performance of Peter Pan I have ever seen. Good job Mitch on planning an unforgettable evening!



This will be my last week with the family I've been nannying for all summer before they go back to school. We've had a lot of fun playing with water balloons, going to the park, making cake, brownies and cookies, collages and a plethora of other activities. I will nanny for a new family until we move starting at the end of the month.


Last weekend I got to go home to Utah for my best friend's wedding! Katie Bond married Kenneth Bennion in the Logan, Utah temple last Saturday. I was so thrilled to be there sharing in such a happy and beautiful celebration. Everything went perfectly and it was so good to see this perfect couple sealed together forever. I arrived in Utah a few days before the wedding and got to hang out with my family. It was a blast spending time with Natalie, Jordan and Kody at the movies, shopping and the water park. It was delightful spending time with them. Lee came home from his mission yesterday and called us from Salt Lake! It was so great to hear his voice and lucky for us my dad and all 3 brothers will visit later this week.

Mt. Diablo

We went to a play this week at the Broadway West Theater Company called "You Can't Take It With You." It's a Pulitzer Prize winning play from the 1930's about an eccentric family in the post-depression years. Despite the theater having the name Broadway in it, it was actually pretty small with only 60-70 seats. Before the play, we went out to dinner at Sweet Tomatoes. Megan calls it her "Tucanos Grill" since it's an all-you-can-eat salad, bread, soup, and healthy-dessert restaurant. It was actually really good food and we both love a soup they had there called Island Coconut Lime Chicken. It had quite a kick from the ginger, but you have to try it sometime!

For Family Home Evening, we went to Barnes & Noble and just sat there and read a bunch of books together, including "This is Why You're Fat" - a book showing all the worst foods from around the nation. A favorite of mine was a stuffed taco you wrapped in refried beans, a pita, cheese, pizza crust, butter, blueberry pancakes and then deep-fat-fried the whole thing! There was also the Big Boy Sandwich, topping the charts at 29,650 calories!

Yesterday we went for a hike around Mt. Diablo. It's only an hour away from us and is the tallest mountain around here. With a summit at about 3,800 feet, it is definitely quite taller than anything else in this sea-level area! While hiking around, we came across some interesting trees that seemed to be peeling from a California sunburn. There were also some "wind caves" carved into large boulders from an acid-water solution that formed millions of years ago.



Most of the sandstone boulders there have been smoothed from thousands of hikers climbing all around them. We didn't climb all the way to the summit of the mountain (you can drive there), but you can see that it is much higher than anything else from the hills in the background. There is a lighthouse/museum on the top of the mountain. Apparently fossils from many different eras have been found in the sandstone of the mountain, including a 4-tusked elephant.



It was a beautiful hike and a wonderful view from the top - highly recommended if you're ever in the area! It does take a while to drive to the top though. I have never driven on such a curved road. We were in our little red car and many of the curves could only be taken at 15 MPH or less!

We're still enjoying our time out here in California, but the summer is drawing to a close. We'll be moving to Seattle in about a month and a half. With any luck, we may end up here once again, though!

Santa Cruz

We almost having more fun than we can handle this summer :) The last couple weeks are no exception. We went to Santa Cruz yesterday and walked along the boardwalk. It was pretty windy and a bit chilly, but it was fun to see the sailors, surfers and kite flyers enjoying the wind. We had a BBQ, played in the sand and dipped our feet into the freezing water. Our favorite part was watching all the sea lions hang out underneath the wharf. They were lying on trusses and barking at each other. They are such interesting little creatures to watch. We also saw some giant star fish on the beams under the wharf.

We also learned how to play the card game Mitch got for his birthday called Dominion this week. It is WAY fun! Last week we tried out our new croquet set and Mitch played with the soccer ball his sister got him for his birthday. He invented an activity called soccer bowling (you set up powerade bottles like bowling pins and see how many you can know over by kicking the ball). We've also been watching 'Last Comic Standing' which is hilarious.

Today we spoke in church. It went well and we are relieved that it is over. We love our ward and keep saying we wouldn't mind moving back here someday after graduate school. Unfortunately we've been forgetting to take our camera with us lately so no photos from the last week, but here is a photo from the rafting trip a couple weeks ago.

Mitch's Birthday!

Mitch had a birthday, shout hooray! He now belongs to the quarter-of-a-century club! A good part of the celebration was last week when we went into San Francisco and had a blast there. Megan made a delicious cake, which involved pouring sweetened-condensed milk all over the baked cake (Mitch LOVES moist cakes), and then topping it with whipped cream and Symphony Bar!

As far as presents go, Mitch got a croquet set, an award-winning board game (Dominion), Super Mario 3 for our Wii, and good gummy candies - he felt just like a 10 year-old!
We also went out to dinner at Macaroni Grill, and their food was delicious!


On Wednesday after work, we went down to Del Valle for a little hike and picnic. It was such a peaceful walk and when we got to the picnic tables and started eating, we noticed a bunch of squirrels coming to clean up the area. With all the food others had dropped, the squirrels were well-fed and not shy at all!


Just yesterday, Mitch's work organized a rafting trip out on the Stanislaus river. The water was pretty cold (around 55 degrees), but it felt wonderful with the 100+ degree weather! Everyone on the river was engaged in a giant waterfight. It didn't matter if it was between friends, strangers on other rafts, or those on the shore! After rafting for 8 miles, we refueled with a much-needed BBQ, complete with hamburgers, fresh watermelon, pineapple, licorice, etc! On the way back with Tony driving, we got to watch the movie The Great Debaters on his fancy in-car DVD screen, while trying not to fall asleep.