Universal Studios! Caleb loved Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey. He would've gone all day long! Avery screamed next to me. Presley was terrified and had her eyes closed. Aaron was puking. I thought the castle was cool - chimneys, snow on rooftops, the wand shop. We got $40 to eat lunch from American Express ( Aaron stopped to qualify for Credit Card on the way in). Lunch cost $65 though :) - hamburgers, ch nuggets and turkey leg. Avery's favorite was the studio tour. Dad liked it too - especially the Fast and Furious part. Presley and I liked Jurassic park - Avery was screaming and crying again, poor girl. Dinner was Jake's Diner on the way home. Girls were exhausted and laid on booth seats.
Ed and Monica are great hosts! Caleb wanted to sleep in hammock last night... he's on the floor and the girls are sleeping together on a pull out bed. Aaron and I are on a full bed in the other room. There's a little table, microwave and fridge. Medium size bathroom. They've had breakfast for us everyday. Monica likes to talk :) There's a cute dog named Daisy that the kids like. So the second day was Disneyland! We made the mistake AGAIN of choosing too intense of a ride to begin the day (at Universal it was HP). We did Indiana Jones first and the girls were terrified the whole time - covering their ears, closing their eyes on both sides of Aaron. I was sitting with Caleb and couldn't enjoy a second of it with him because I kept looking back at them and it made me so sad. After that, the girls and I went immediately to Fantasyland and started looking for pins to trade and finding fun, happy rides. It was soooo crowded the whole day! Aaron and Caleb did things they wanted to do and we met up to do the Haunted Mansion together. We also all loved Thunder Mountain. Right before we were walking out we found a new pin for everyone and even met some semi-professional pin traders.
We tried to sleep in the next day (hard to do that at Ed's house though) and had a fun lazy morning talking and the kids swam in their heated pool and had a great time! Morning turned into lunchtime and Monica fixed us some grilled cheese sandwiches before we left. White bread and American cheese - what can beat that? We went to Hollywood and saw the Dolby Theater, Hollywood stars on the sidewalk and the Hollywood sign amidst lots of picture taking Asians). It took a while in the car to go from there to third street on Santa Monica, part of the reason was that Aaron wanted to drive by his old apartment. We chose a place for dinner right away when we got there and then walked out to the pier and back. We got Ben and Jerry's before heading home. Uncle Ed came downstairs when we got home and started watching the BYU game with Aaron. I had to have the girls fall asleep in our bed in the other room (the minute they closed their eyes they were out). And Caleb climbed into the hammock and fell asleep without even realizing it.
On the last morning we slept longer than we should've but everyone upstairs was a little quieter than usual, and we were worn out. We started packing up and Monica called us up to have breakfast with everyone. We talked for awhile and got some pictures before heading to Venice beach. The kids wished we had the whole day to play in the water! They soaked their clothes right away and we took a walk down the beach. We got to some rocks and the waves would come up over them once in awhile. The kids were wanting to go climb and not long after they did, an ENORMOUS wave came and drenched them and knocked them down! They were startled, especially Caleb who tripped and scraped his leg up pretty bad. dWe tried to get him cleaned up and then had a long walk back to where we parked along the boardwalk where there were street performers an vendors. All three were happy (and were good sports to walk so far in wet sandy clothes) with souvenirs they found before we had to leave for the airport.
