digger to the face...

While Uncle Dean was out visiting he had fun playing with the boys...almost too much fun.  After watching Luke ride his balance bike down the cul de sac he encourage him to go faster.  Needless to say, Luke's face took a digger at the end of the street and this was the result.

Cheyenne Mountain Zoo day

We loved the CMZ zoo in Colorado Springs because it was very interactive.  Thanks to Uncle Dean, I did not have to push the boys up the mountain in the stroller.  WHEW!  Luke liked looking at the giraffes but did not want to feed them, Wes was very interested and got close up to them but did not want to give the giraffes any lettuce.  Overall, Luke still loves the elephants and Wes loved anything that was a furry mammal.  He did NOT like the bullfrogs and held on tight to me when we were next to them.  We had not gone to the zoo since Halloween and it was so much fun to see how Wes got excited looking at the animals.  Too fun!  We will be back.

Check out that tongue!

Luke loved to feed the birds with the seed stick.  He stayed very still while the bird was right next to him.  

The moose is on the loose!!!  We all loved looking at the moose in their new Rocky Mountain Wild exhibit.

Luke is becoming a regular cowboy.  He just loves riding ponies.

Both boys loved the hippo who was eating grass and veggies.

We even fed the chickens.  Luke stayed away while Wes got up close to pet the chickens. 

That's Amore!

For our last and final day in CA we went on a fun gondola ride in the canals of Long Beach. It was a beautiful hour ride where we kissed under each bridge. Luke really got into this and was kissing everyone at every bridge. This even lasted when we got back home as he tried to kiss me under the interstate bridges. Luke also said that there are two kinds of gondolas, one in the water and one on the mountain. Wes tried not to cry when we were on the gondola and we bounced him up and down a lot during the ride.

Playing in the sand with Uncle Dean

After we went to Gramci and Grandad's house for a Chinese dinner.  Grandad even wore his Chinese hat.

4 generations

4 generations

Finally, Luke stopped at Trader Joe's to shop with his own sized shopping cart!

"California knows how to party!"

Hanging out by the pool

Yummy food!

Aunt Mindy, Gramci, Aunt Paula, Mom, me and Holly

My parents threw a big party of over 25 people from both sides of the family.  We all had a great time and the party went on from 10AM to 6 PM!  It was great to see everyone all in one place and they could see the boys.  It had been since at least Christmas since I had seen most of my relatives.

Great Gramci and Great Grandad

Playing the piano

Legoland California

We had a great time at Legoland.... wanted to upload pictures and will write later...

Our Lego Family

Luke's new friend

Griffith Park

Uncle Dean took a day off of work to play with the boys in Griffith Park in LA. It was an amazing park with so many fun activities for kids. It has been there for around 100 years and has so much history.

We had to ride the kid sized train of course.  Luke loved every minute of it!

After the train ride we went over to check out the ponies.  Luke at first did not want to ride them but the more he watched the more interested he got.  When he did decide to ride the pony we asked what its name was.  Get this, Luke's first horse that he rode was named Kim!  I had a ask again to make sure I heard that right.

Uncle Dean, Grandy and the crew before the carriage ride.

We all had a great time.

Wes was also not so sure of the horse rides.  We went to check it out a second time and once he got over the fear of the guy buckling him in he was happy.  His horse was named Chip.

Our next stop in the park was to a historic 87 year old Carousel ride.  It had seen better days but I loved how it had not been updated so you got a sense of its' history.  Walt Disney rode this and they had an old fashioned music player in the back.  I took a break from this because I get sick when I go on these types of rides.

We were hungry so on to our lunch spot at the sight of the old LA zoo.  It was super fun to play around the old lion cages.  Luke ran around pretending to be a lion and was roaring loudly.

Our final stop was Travel Town...

Uncle Dean and Wes inside a retired coal train.

Our 2nd train ride of the day.