California Dreamin'

On January 4, 2008 the FitzGerald Four hopped a 6:40 am flight from Newark to LA. Armed with our new portable DVD player, we thought we were all set for a manageable flight. Sadly, the DVD player did not work and Tom and I spent the next 5 1/2 hours doing everything we could to entertain the monsters (one of whom had a double ear infection and the other with pink eye). Somehow we survived. A transcontinental flight really can test not only your parenting skills but your marriage as well as I completely blamed Tom for the DVD player fiasco (only to discover days later that the machine was broken) since it was the ONLY thing he was responsible for packing, maybe he could have figured out it was broken before we got on the flight?

We landed to rain! RAIN! It was 63 that day in NJ because of some freak warm spell and 55 and raining in LA. Hmmmm... not cool. Luckily we had a fun place to go. Our very generous and wonderful friends, the McIlhargeys (see pic), put us up for the next few nights. They live in a great little area of LA whose name escapes me right now in a big beautiful house. We hung out and let all 4 kids run around like mad, ate, drank, and even took in the Car Museum (see pic) which was a major hit with our Hot Wheels fanatics.

At the end of the weekend, we drove to visit our friends the MacDonalds and meet their new beautiful baby, Sydney (see pic). What a little peanut. Unfortunately, too short of a visit but we were happy to see all 3 of them.

On to Anaheim! Spent two nights in a hotel right outside Disney. And finally, the rain stopped! Just in time for our big day at Disneyland (see pic). We rode all sorts of rides including a somewhat scary (for Mommy and Zack) roller coaster ("again" was all Ben said about it). And stayed into the night to see the fireworks display - "too loud" but very cool.

On to San Diego! So excited to see our cousins and their new pad. FAB-U-LOUS house. Seriously, fantastic. Not only did we have so much fun hanging out with the Zirkles but we got to be the first to stay in their great new place. Highlights of our San Diego portion of the vacation included SeaWorld where Zack fed the dolphins (see pic), the San Diego Zoo, fish tacos in OB, a day of farm fun for cousin Gwen's birthday (see pic), lunch at the Hotel Del Coronado with Aunt PJ, and meeting up with lots of friends.

All in all, a great vacation... way too short and now we miss San Diego..... guess we'll just have to be content with our California dreamin' until we get there again!