First Vacation Day in San Jose

Do you like my rhyming title? I thought it was pretty clever. Now onto the task of writing about our adventures.

Saturday, January 29th the kids and I got on an airplane way-too-early in the morning and flew to San Jose, CA. It was an adventure in and of itself to fly with two kids by myself. I mean it was me, the kids, our stroller, two car seats, two bags of luggage, and two carry ons. In case you don't know, I only have two arms. I was outnumbered but we made it! I even got on a taxi in San Jose and made my way (with everything mentioned above) to Jim's hotel. Jim was working, so he wasn't able to pick us up.

I must say, when you're traveling with two kids, have a bum-load of luggage with you and said kids, and you're running on only a few winks of sleep, you're bound to do some pretty air-headed things. For instance, leave your cell phone on top of the taxi only to remember that it's there as the taxi driver (who doesn't understand English very well) starts to drive off into four lanes of traffic. I started out by saying, "Please stop, my cell phone is on top of your cab." He didn't hear or understand me. So, I tried again, "STOP! MY PHONE!" No response and continued driving. After a few more failed attempts to get him to stop, the taxi driver turned a corner and SLIDE. DING. CRASH. My phone hit the pavement. The taxi driver asked, "What's that?" I responded as calmly as I could muster (which probably wasn't very calm) "That's my phone! I need to get it." He mumbled something about not being able to stop, but finally did when I opened the car door and made a bee-line for my phone that was in the middle of the lane 15 yards or so behind the cab. I dashed, watched as other cars drove over it, and finally made it to check the damage. The battery was out, but my phone and phone cover were relatively un-scathed. I put the battery back in and miracle of all miracles: MY PHONE STILL WORKED!!

Anywho, a few minutes later the taxi driver dropped us off at the hotel, I checked in at the front desk, got my kids and all our stuff in the room, and then I crashed on the bed. Well, first I unpacked toys for the babies, found a cartoon on the tv, got out all the snacks the kids like, and then tried to rest as much as possible. The kids were so good this day as we waited for Jim to get off work. When Jim got back to the hotel we went out for a bit that night. We checked out some stores in the area, picked up some groceries we could keep in the room, then went back to the hotel to rest up some more.

Jim had to work on Sunday, so the kids and I just hung out again for a bit until we made our way to my cousins house. My cousin, Meagan, her husband, and three children live in San Jose and invited us over for Sunday dinner. I hadn't seen her since her wedding around five or six years ago, so it was nice to get together and let our children play. It was also nice to have something to do while Jim was working. The only downer was Jim's truck started acting up. We realized we'd have to get it looked at before we could really start our vacation.

So. . . Monday, Jim's first day off, and first official day of our vacation, we spent getting our truck repaired. Hooray! We rented a car for the day while Henry (our truck) got fixed. Luckily our trusty blue rental got us to the beach and back. This wasn't really how we planned on spending day one of our vacation, but it ended up all right. We hit another few snags along the way this day (thinking we left Jim's drivers license at the car rental place only to drive all the way back and discover that it was actually in my purse the whole time. Or pick up our truck, then go back to drop of the rental car only to get to the rental place an hour after it closed). Luckily, Jim and I were able to laugh each snag off while saying, "We're on an adventure."

So. . . yeah, day one wasn't all that exciting, BUT when we finally made it to Nature Bridges Beach in Santa Cruz at sunset all the snags along the way were forgotten. The beach was pristine, the weather accommodating, and the company perfect! We played until we couldn't see anymore then finally made our way to. . . well we weren't sure since we checked out of hotel numeral uno and still needed to find a place to stay. Luckily we found a really nice place for a great deal online in San Jose, and checked in there for the night. The hotel was a bit dated, but clean and comfortable. Our room also had a large jetted tub that we all climbed into and went "swimming" in. It was a great end to the first day of our adventures. So here are some pictures from the beach:

Cute Hunty Dizzle checking things out

Hunter scaling a cliff

Tralee being cute

Hunter and Jim walking my way

This is how Jim usually totes Hunter around. I kinda love it.

Tralee playing as the sun sets

Cute girl having so much fun

There was a little stream that the kids had fun climbing into and around. Jim made a little bridge for Hunter to hang out on in the middle of the stream.

Hunter. Beach. Birds.

I kinda love the picture below

Hunter wasn't too sure about the waves

Just hangin' out

My cute family. I like Hunty's sandy bum.

I told Jim, "Let's take a we're-sexy-in-California picture." This is what we came up with.

We tried for a cheesy kissy picture, that didn't work out too well either.

Lastly we did this one cause we're sick-os.

That's that folks! Check out my next blog post if you want to see some giant trees.