Pitchers come to Cali!

Landon’s family visited over the weekend and it was too short! Sharman, Linda, Adam, Monica, and Cambrie all stayed with us. We were out and about most of the time so it didn't even feel crowded. Adam’s girls are in New Jersey visiting Corie’s family so he came alone, and Court & Kelli let Cambrie come along for her first trip away from home!   Cambrie is so good with Capri, I hope we end up living close so we can have her babysit soon.  It felt like a mini vacation for me since Capri was getting so much attention and love from Grandma, Aunt Moke, and Cambrie.  Friday we headed straight to Carmel to spend some time on the beach and do the 17 mile drive. Don’t mind our wind blown hair.  Saturday was a San Francisco day. Landon and I made Sharman come on our 16 mile run with us while everyone else got a head start in the city.  We ran on the Los Gatos Creek trail and It wasn’t too difficult, but it did seem like it took forever to finish since we had to stop for Capri a few times. Usually Capri does pretty good on our runs, but she was needy this time.  We love running with “Coach,”  it’s a great therapy session and we solve so many problems while running and talking.   We met the rest of the family at Giradelli Square and had an Italian dinner on the wharf.  It was colder than we hoped for (always is!) so I bought Capri the cute owl hat.  I'm sure she was fine, but I liked the excuse to buy it.  After church on Sunday we enjoyed our apartment amenities, relaxed for a bit, and then went to Stockton to visit Chris and Geniel.  Geniel is just like Linda and it's fun to see the sisters together.  We ate delicious breakfast food for dinner and played botchy ball at the park. Busy and great weekend.  We were sad to see Landon's family go so soon, but it won't be long before we see them in Utah for Dave Earnhardt's wedding and before we head back to Arizona for Landon's  last and final Trimester at Thunderbird, yippee!

Sweet Tooth

The Hoopers picked up on how much I really LOVE candy and suggested we take a trip to Rocket Fizz in Campbell for Family Home Evening.    We met at their house and Andrea fed us dinner, she is a fabulous cook and made a chicken and pasta dish.  The Samuelson's came too and Tori gave a great FHE lesson from one of Elder Ukdorf's talks about enjoying the journey.  It was perfect for us.  Landon and I often get caught up in the "when MBA school is over... when we are settled down somewhere...when Capri grows out of her colic... when we have money to buy... when I go back to school....."  and forget to enjoy the journey of getting there.   When we look back on these past few years, I think we will have some pretty found memories of our graduate school journey- living in Arizona, making wonderful friends, traveling all around the world, and our first few months with a new baby in Cali.  I was in charge of the Family Home Evening activity and created a candy scavenger hunt.  Hayden found all of the candies on the list first and won.  Each couple also bought a new or different candy for everyone else to try.  We bought white and milk chocolate Lion bars that Landon enjoyed on his mission and we ate almost every day in Europe. The Samuelson's bought money candy (ha ha!), and the Hoopers bought Harry Potter jelly beans, and mini burgers.  Don't worry, we didn't really let Capri try her burger, it just looked so cute in her little hands and she knew exactly what to do with it.  I think she'll have a sweet tooth like her mama if she remembers anything about being in the womb!  I loved trying candy from the different countries when we traveled and pretty much lived off of candy in China.  My candy consumption has always been pretty high, but I think it did increase while I was pregnant.  I am going to try and wait as long as possible before we introduce sweets to Capri.  Do you think her first experience with sweets could be on her first birthday with her birthday cake?  I think it's silly when parents give their kids candy and the kids don't know any different, but at the same time, I'm not going to be the parent that never lets her kids have candy.   Hopefully we will be able to find a heathy balance.  Capri looked like she was in heaven, she was so stimulated by the candy store and all of the different colors!  The next week we went to this cute candy shop off of the beach in Carmel.  I bought all kinds of licorice and cookie dough balls for Landon.  The store felt like Hansel and Gretel's cottage, I loved it.