Squaw Valley

For my second week of summer vacation, Rachel and I spent it here:

Becky's parents own a cabin in Squaw Valley, California and Rachel and I got to enjoy it for a whole week. It was a great way to kickstart my summer vacation this year. We spent our vacation with Becky, Grant, Sita (Becky's mom), Fopa (Becky's dad), Beau (Becky's husband who came up after a couple of days) and Old Man (Beau's dad who came up with Beau). This is what Grant calls his grandparents and so Rachel does as well. Since we have been back, Rachel talks about all of them but especially Becky, Grant, Sita, and Fopa every single day.

Yep, they think they are sooo cool!

We spent a lot of time outdoors even though the temperature was close to 100 every day.

Sita found a frog for the kids to play with. Grant was more than happy to hold it (although it kept jumping out of his hand), but Rachel had a look but don't touch attitude. She wasn't quite sure about touching it. I helped her pet it, but that was the only way to get her to touch it.

We had many meals outside on the balcony. It was so peaceful out there...except for the mosquitos...and making sure Rachel stayed in her chair to eat. She still eats in a high chair and it was pretty difficult to get her to actually sit down and eat.

They looooved this chair. It is one of the wicker ones that sits up on a stand, but they would put it on the ground and turn it into a ride and roll around. It was so fun sitting in the other room and listening to the laughs they played in this thing.

They had many very dirty baths together. I love how well this picture shows their coloring. Rachel definitely got my olive skin.

Every day when we were out at the pool, I would look out at the hill behind their house and look at how cool the moon looked.

The two little ones did a lot to keep themselves entertained. They had dance parties...

played choo-choos...

took pretend naps...

swam...

a lot...

hung around being monkeys...

...and singing/talking/shouting into the old milk jugs (and actually singing/talking/shouting everywhere). So the funny thing about these jugs is that Rachel and Grant's sippy cups disappeared for a couple of days. We kept asking them where they went and we couldn't find them anywhere. Right after I took this picture, Grant went over to the red one and started saying "Milky". I went over there and sure enough their cups were hidden inside of the red jug.

One afternoon right after we put the kids down for a nap, Becky, Beau, Beau's dad, and I headed out to King's Canyon National Park. Becky's wonderful parents watched the kids for us so we could enjoy this time away for the afternoon. We thought about taking the kids but wanted to do some hiking so we left them behind.

One of the things that I thought was so crazy was how some of the Sequoias were burned. Some were burned just on the inside, some just on the outside, one would be completely burned down while the one next to it hadn't been touched by fire.

Beau had to climb on everything. (No, he is not actually doing what it looks like he is doing in this picture.) The drop-off on the front of this rock was fairly far. I felt like such a mom and wanted to keep telling him to get down and that is was dangerous. I kept my mouth shut, but it took everything inside of me to stay quiet.

We took a fairly long hike out to see this lake overlook.

So, you are actually allowed to take the pinecones from the National Park. Becky and Beau took some fairly large ones back to add to Sita and Fopa's collection, while I took a tiny one back to Rachel.

I took this picture to show the size of the tree in comparison to a full size bus. They were HUGE!!!

Rachel got sick a few nights in. Right before she was going to bed, she lost her voice and I knew she wasn't feeling 100%. She started coughing a bunch and it sounded exactly like croup and she had a fever. She couldn't sleep so I put her in bed with me (which was never going to work because she can't sleep in bed with me and I can't sleep in bed with her). While she was in bed with me, she threw up all over. I took her to the bathroom to clean her up and luckily Becky heard me and was able to help me out. Rachel was shaking and miserable so it would have been hard for me to clean up alone. Eventually I put her back in her bed and she fell asleep. The next morning, she was still coughing but it didn't really sound like croup anymore. After that, we had a lot of long nights, early mornings, etc., because she had a hard time sleeping while she wasn't feeling well. On one of our early morning walks, we found the nest that she is carrying in the picture above. We tried to take walks so that she wouldn't wake everyone up while they were trying to sleep in a bit.

This picture is so Rachel.

She had the Furbies circled around her cereal bowl sharing her cereal with her.

The men played some hoops while the kids ran around the tennis court.

For the record Becky, this is the start of it all. I am pretty sure this picture is evidence.

Her sweet little Grant wanted Rachel's tennis ball and when she wouldn't give it to him, he grabbed her by the shirt and started flinging her around like a rag doll (as Becky put it). Eventually, he wasn't mad at her because he thought it was fun to swing Rachel around in circles. She was terrified as he flung her around. This was the night before we left. As much as they love each other, by this point they were acting like brother and sister and were getting on each others nerves a bit.

The last night we were there we had some very messy S'mores. You can't tell by Grant's face though. He had a few bites but wasn't really interested in them.

Rachel and I on the other hand definitely made a mess out of things.

I had such an awesome time on this vacation, I just wish Tim could have joined us. Thanks to the Duplans for their hospitality. I hope we can do it again sometime.

*Yes Becky, I stole some of your photos from your blog.