Our First International Family Trip

For our first trip internationally as a family, this past Christmas we went to Mexico. It was really neat to see a place so different than any I have seen before. To see the poverty there was something I had never seen before. It was also really neat to be exposed to the culture there. I really enjoyed getting to practice my Spanish and of course the food was amazing! I also really liked exposing my kids to the different culture and language.

To save some money on airline tickets, we flew into San Diego, CA and then made our way to Mexico via bus and then walked across the pedestrian bridge. Here Jenny and I are right at the entrance to Mexico.

For the first few days, we stayed at Rosarito Beach. The beach there was clean and beautiful. We could see the beach from our hotel room, which was beautiful. We went spent most our time playing at the beach and eating tacos at the taquerias.

View from our hotel room window

We could also hear this lovely church bell ringing from our hotel room. So Tessa and I investigated it and found the church. So beautiful!

We got the girls matching Mexican dresses that the wore often throughout the trip. One time walking down the street wearing them, the girls got a comment "Somos Mexicanas?" which was cute.

After Rosarito Beach, we next went to Tijuana. We had a larger hotel room there with two bedrooms and a kitchen so the girls had extra room for playing, which was nice.

One of my favorite things was just walking around to get to know the city and just stopping wherever for ice cream or tacos or whatever somebody is selling at whatever random stand pops up near you. We walked to a local park and after playing a while a man wheeled the fruit stand up and we got mixed fruit seasoned with spices and limes. Mmmm. Delicious! Also my first real exposure to papaya. 

Then on the way back to our hotel after we were done playing at the park, we stopped at this random hole in the wall shop and had some delicious homemade hielo - or popsicles. PS - don't be alarmed at the giant bandaid on Jenny's face. She had the tiniest of scratches and a completely unnecessary (medically speaking) bandaid made her feel better.

Tijuana has a lot of museums. Tessa and Jenny's favorite one was Mini-city. The concept behind the museum is kids work jobs like adults and earn money and then with the money they earn they can spend it on fun activities or at the store at the end and get some candy. Here Tessa is driving the little car around the track - an activity that costs money. Another child is filling her car's gas tank and is earning money.

Then also in Tijuana, I wanted to see the wall dividing Mexico and the United States. It was crazy to see the wall extending even into the ocean. It was really neat to see how the wall has been colorfully painted on the Mexican side of the wall and the political statements and things up on the Mexican side of the wall.

One of the things that blew my mind the most was walking along the ocean boardwalk and you could look directly to your right and see the ocean and then if you look directly to your left, you could see completely dilapidated homes. The poverty right even along the ocean with an amazing ocean view, was just completely shocking to me.

Next after Tijuana, we went to Ensenada. I found it a bit too touristy particularly near where the cruise ships dock but the local parks and beach near our AirBnB were nice. When we went to this local park on a Saturday, a man had set up kid sized tables and chairs and paints and was selling plaster sculptures for children to paint. The girls had a lot of fun with it.

The girls had a lot of fun playing on the playgrounds and they even made some little friends. Tessa even learned how to say "Soy Tessa" to introduce herself to the other children. It was neat to see Tessa able to play with other kids even without really speaking Spanish and the other children not speaking English; it seemed the kids could play together and get along without needing to speak the same language.

In Ensenada we saw La Bufador - or the blowhole. It was this spot where during high tide, the waves from the ocean are forced to shoot up. It was fun and wet and overall more impressive than expected!

We did a walking tour at Ensenada, which was kind of a lot considering David and I carried the girls nearly the whole time as it was too much walking for them. It was really interesting to learn about the history of Ensenada though. The walking tour introduced us to a few museums. Here we are at one of them - an art museum. Tessa is lying on the floor here as that is the spot the artist designed her work of art to be viewed from.

Here we are at a historic hotel from the walking tour.

Antics at the place we stayed at in Ensenada because it can't be all museums and walking tours when you've got kids!

And then of course we also spent lots of time at the beach in Ensenada. Our place was again within walking distance to the beach for our time in Ensenada.

Then also while in Ensenada, David and I took surfing lessons. Surfing is as hard as it looks! It was fun though. It was something I had wanted to try for a while so it was really cool to get to do it.

And here we are on our way home in our matching Mexican sweaters. It was a fun but long trip. While in Mexico I think we most missed home, routine, family and hot showers. Now that were back from Mexico, I most miss the delicious food (especially the fresh tortillas and the pastelerias with shelves of delicious pastries I've never tried before for a few pesos each), getting to practice my Spanish, the warm weather, the beach, and all the unscheduled family time.

Meet Max and Owl

Jenny has had these imaginary friends for the last 6 months to year or so and it's so sweet. Their names are Max and Owl and they are bunnies. She says they are tiny bunnies too small to see. Max is a girl and Owl is a boy. She even has an imaginary garden where she grows carrots for them. From time to time, she'll tell me where they are and have me hold them and pet them and feed them. On a recent trip to Washington, she even found a toy phone and told me she had to call Max and Owl and check on them and make sure they were okay.

Jenny at Tessa's preschool in the upstairs section where we can watch Tessa's gymnastics where we most often play with Max and Owl.

Summertime

I love, love, love summertime. There are always so many fun activities going on for kids and I love getting out and doing fun things. Tessa is the same way. If we stay home for too long she'll get stir-crazy and ask if we can go out anywhere.

This Summer has been especially busy. We started off the summer with camping just in the mountains near our home, which was really fun. It was the first time we had been camping as a family on our own. Now that the girls are about 2 and 4, they seem like they are old enough now to handle camping so it's been really nice to be able to do that.

We wanted to go camping at least one night to prepare ourselves for the 3-night camping trip we had coming up - camping at Yellowstone National Park. We had a really nice trip and we were impressed with how well the kids did camping for that long. It was a pretty fast trip for all there is to see at Yellowstone so we kept up a pretty break neck pace to see everything so mom and dad were pretty tired by the end but it was really fun.

We had to see Old Faithful of course.

Upper and lower falls were really neat. It was cool to hike down and be right on the edge of the lower falls. It was totally mesmerizing watching the water fall down the falls.

We got to see some buffalo up close which was neat and also a bit scary. One was crossing the road right in front of where we were driving. We saw loads of them on the sides of the road too and some near one of the picnic areas we stopped for lunch.

We saw mammoth hot springs.

One of my favorite things we saw was grand prismatic spring. We did the hike to see it from up above which lets you see the colors better as up close there is so much steam, you can't see it as well.

I liked the the small paint pots. They were a lot like grand prismatic spring but just on a smaller scale making them easier to see the colors better. I loved the bright oranges and beautiful blues, teals, and greens.

We saw the mud volcano area too. It was so so stinky. We had to bribe Tessa with unlimited cookies to get her out of the car. It really was bad though. By they time we had walked through the length of it, I was feeling nauseous - it was that stinky. David is in front of dragon's mouth in this picture. Every so often the dragon would "belch" and you'd get an extra strong wave of sulfurous stench blow right at you.

The grand canyon of yellowstone was really, really beautiful. We did the hike near the viewpoint and it was nice to get away from the crowds temporarily.

Then on the way home, we went the long way so we could see Grand Tetons National Park and that was really beautiful.

This picture reminds me of the sound of music.

The wildflowers near the lake were so beautiful.

Then at home we've kept busy enjoying the nice weather spending a lot time outdoors. Here we are at the zoo.

I love it when it is warm enough for splash pads and just stripping down to the diaper when your clothes get too wet or if you forgot to bring a swimsuit.

The girls love the fairytale festival and princess party that are put on in Lehi every summer too. It's been nice to just be able to take them to these events instead of having to do a much more expensive Disneyland trip.

Jenny especially loved the mascots that were at the princess party.

Then I love all the little summer city carnivals like American Fork's Strawberry Days.

Then we've been out and about a lot close to home too. Here we are visiting the Krishna Temple in Spanish Fork. We enjoyed a nice tour and a vegetarian lunch and all the people there were so friendly and welcoming.

Then I also took the kids to Topaz Museum and Topaz internment camp historic site a few hours south over a 2 day trip with a stopover at grandma and grandpa's house. The museum was really good. It was about Japanese and Japanese American interment in Utah at Camp Topaz during WWII. The museum included a lot of artifacts from people who lived at the camp. For it not being a children's museum there was really a lot there that kept the kid's engaged. Tessa was especially interested in the children's toys on display there; we talked about how when the families were forced to leave their homes, they were only able to bring what they could carry and talked about what one toy she would choose to bring with her if she could only bring one like those children likely only could.

She was also really liked the Valentine's Day cards on display. She had just had a Valentine's Day party in her classroom so it was neat to be able to see her relate to the kids at the schools at the camp. It was nice to be able to talk to her about how the people there were not really any different from her and it wasn't right to force them from their homes in California and force them to come to camp Topaz.

They also had this diary replica that a class kept which even included pictures the children drew. There was also a replica outside of what the recreation areas were like at Camp Topaz.

The kids also enjoyed looking at this little map and we learned about how to read legends, which was neat.

Then getting to spend time with grandma and grandpa was fun. Jenny especially loves seeing extended family. Here she is with her grandma's help, riding the original scooter her dad rode at 3 years old.

Then near the end of the summer we visited my Grandma Hein, the girl's great grandma in California. It was great to spend some time with my grandma. It had been more than a decade since I had been to her home in California, but I had fond memories of visiting her home many times over the summers throughout my childhood so it was great to revisit those happy memories and introduce my girls to them. 

I was wanting to visit the Redwoods while we were in California so we visited Big Basin Redwoods State Park.

The trees have burn proof bark to help them survive forest fires so we saw a few there that were totally burned and hollowed out with only their bark still remaining.

We also visited San Francisco. Our first stop in San Francisco was seeing the seals at Pier 39.

We also visited Grace Cathedral. The girls loved stopping at the playground directly across the street from it as well as running the labyrinth inside. The stain glass windows and other architectural features were just beautiful.

We enjoyed checking out Chinatown. The food was yummy and inexpensive and we got to try some fun, unique fruit.

Then we also stopped at the cable car museum in San Francisco and that was interesting.

We had quite the busy Summer but it was great! We had so much fun! And with living in Utah, you learn to really take advantage of Summer weather getting out as much as possible as soon as the weather gets warm enough and before it gets cold again.