If your on Facebook you saw the pictures of our trip home.  If your not on facebook and would like to be.  You can find me under Tonia Bower Signor.  rsignor@centurytel.net  Just let me know your from xanga.

I got really tired of how slow xanga was loading. 

But I wanted to “chat” about these pictures, so loaded them here.

We each rode our favorite ride.  And while we were waiting for Jamari to ride his–nobody else wanted to, we puttered around the castle for a bit.

Where I managed to take my favorite castle picture of Rainee.  The thing around her neck is her Disney Cast pass.

We also toured Pixie Hollow. 

But my favorite pictures of this day, are of the Sword and the stone.  They aren’t great pictures.   But you can sooo see each person’s personality by just looking at the picture.

Give it your all Jamari

Smile Cheezy Rainee

There’s gotta be a way to outthink this rule of not getting the sword.  Samuel

This would be easier if I was taller Jeremiah.

Rob, well if the rest of my family did it I sure better try.

Kaylin if I’m going to do it, I’m going to do it well!

Zeria.  I am way too cool to do this, but if you *make* me I will, but I ain’t gonna smile.

Shortly after those we had to wait for the parade.  The rules about parades are much waiting much much waiting.  Every parade is that way.  We left the kids with the coach, as we weren’t even allowed back where they waited.  And puttered around.  It was too hot, to be too relaxed. And we were both rather tired of Disney.  LOL

Eventually we got to see the parade.  And it went WOOOSH past us.  Didn’t even get pictures of everybody.

After the parade were all exhausted, hot and tired.  Two of the kids were in tears.  WE bailed out of Disney.  Zeria limping with a sprained ankle.  Jeremiah just EXHAUSTED.

So Rob carried Rainee.  And Super Big Brother.  Carried Jeremiah.

And we were out of there.

Day 8 was the day before the competition.  We wanted the kids rested for the competition, so we spent an hour or so at Huntington Beach, a nice nap, and a couple hours in the pool.  We were so good about sun exposure until this day.  And then we just BLEW it.  I look like I have leprosy on my back.  Kaylin got BLISTERS she burnt so bad.  *cringe*  It totally screwed her competition day as she spent most of the day trying not to cry she hurt so bad.  But oh well we had a blast at the beach. 

Such deliciously soft sand to play in.  And the waves were much softer at this beach. 

Rainee and Kaylin spent a long time collecting seaweed out of the surf.  Then they dug a BIG hole.  Then they buried it.  And then they butt stomped the seaweed so it could never escape. 

Rob and I spent a good deal of time laughing hysterically at them.

She actually had a lot of fun in the surf.  Eventually her and I got brave enough to get past the breakers and spent a long time riding the rollers.  Soooo fun!

The next day was the competition.  Kaylin Rainee and I were HURTING.  The rest of the family was just fine.  (so not fair)

The competition was smaller then we thought it would be, but still a lot of fun.  With BIG trophies.

Kaylin did okay in her flag.  But not her usual smiles.  Its hard to smile when you have blisters on your shoulders, and a leotard pushing down on them.     She came in second.

The gym we competed in was HUGE.  But we didn’t have it all.  There was mens US Volleyball going on in part of it.  That made competiting a bit intresting.  Samuel placed first in his rifle.  But we’ve all seen him actually do his rifle better.  But at least I *finally* got a good picture of him.

There were “smaller” trophies, and then big trophies for combined awards.  Everybody but Kaylin placed first or second in the major awards.

Zeria came in first with Twirtacular Grand Champion.  Against girls who have been twirling a LOT longer then her.

Samuel actually got to compete in a boys competition.  But we all kind of giggled when we realized the boys he was competiting against.

Yeah there a bit short.  LOL.  Jeremiah placed third in the big Strut King.  But placed first in two of his events.  It was rather suprising he didn’t beat Coby in this event.  But still he did very very well.

Rainee finally got to compete *not* against jamari.  And came in second in the twirltacular competition.   She was very excited.

And Jamari also placed second in the Twirtacular competition.

The girl standing next to him.  Yeah she beats him every time.  ROFL  There each others best competition. 

  Day four was our drive to LA.  Rather ugly on I-5.  No pictures LOL.  We arrived at the motel about 1′ish.  Checked in, took a nap, and then went and played at Huntington Beach.  I managed to leave my camera in the motel, so no pictures, but we had a lot of fun.  Although the surf scared several of my kids–Rainee the worst as she got a rather nasty mouthful.

Day five and six were our first two Disney Days.  I took a TON of pictures.  But am rather kindly only sharing a few that have special memories.  Like KK loves volcanoes, and Jeremiah loves trains.  Rainee LOOOVES castles.

So that was the highlight for her.

We explored it several times, and in several different directions.]

We rode lots and lots of rides, and did one parade. 

My family was rather disgusted with how long it took for the parade to come, but when it finally did they were enthralled.  It was a High School Musical themed parade. 

These two were my favorites.  They did some AWESOME dance lifts.  And at one point they came and invited Jamari and Rainee to join the dance.  And the nitwits wouldn’t.  I was so ticked.  Jamari LIVES to dance.  But later when they passed out drums, he mellowed.

I still wish he would have danced with the Disney crew!!

At some point we spotted Pluto.  Zeria’s favorite charrie.

And both nights we watched Fantasm, which is a show done on the Rivers of America.  And then the fireworks.  We had a rather crappy seat the first night, so came back earlier the second night, and had MARVELOUS seats.  We also had one of those weird moments.  Rob was off getting dinner while the kids and I held our seats.  These two different ladies joined us to also save there seats.  And we began visiting, which we had done the night before.  People were remarkably friendly at Disney.  Anyhow eventually the one lady introduced herself and said my name is Tonya.  The other lady said really?  My name is Tania.  I just started laughing, and informed her my name was Tonia.  We laughed for a long long long time over that.  And I have one of the lady’s webpages and email addys.  We became GOOD friends while waiting LOL.  Our respective husbands were just rather blown away by the whole thing. 

Waiting for Fantasm the first night.

And my favorite scene.

Peter Pan and Captain Hook fighting on top of the Sailing Ship.  Super duper cool.  And the ship was moving the whole time.  Fantasm was just amazing.  Part water show, part fireworks, part Disney Characters.  Definitely my favorite thing the whole trip. 

We had a ton of fun, and came home in the middle of both days for a nap, and then went back when it cooled off.  It was remarkable weather only mid 80s, so not ridiculously hot. 

The funniest thing about the first day was when we got up from our nap.  I said “Okay guys lets go to Disney.”  Rainee says.  “Can’t we just stay and swim in the pool.”

“Umm, we did NOT spend that much money, and drive that far to swim in a very small motel pool.  LOL.” 

San Jose is the town Rob grew up in.  He’s wanted to take us there for a long time.  The kids are all old enough to remember it now, so it was a logical third-day stop.  Rob and I spent our fifth anniversary in Santa Cruz, Rob’s grandparents home-town.   And did a very brief tour of San Jose….one in which we got very very very lost, and rather grumpy.  LOL 

But this time we had our trusty Navigator on our phone.  So that made life much easier.  We again left very early (5:30′ish)  too early for Continental Breaky, so splurged on McD’s.  It was nummy!  Mostly we ate out of our motel, so McD’s felt like luxury.  But I love McD’s breaky anyhow.

Shortly after leaving Yreka.  We got a GORGEOUS view of Mount Shasta.  KK is totally in LOVE with volcanoes.  So we stopped alongside the freeway and admired it for several minutes.

Our trip to San Jose was uneventful, and very quick.  We hit our motel again about 12:45, checked in, and headed to Vasona Park, Rob’s favorite childhood park.

As in love with Volcanoes as KK is, Jeremiah is in LOOOOVE with trains.  And Vasona Park has a real working steam train (small) that you can ride.  We had planned from the get go to ride on it, but didn’t tell the kids until we got to the park.  Jeremiah was sooooooooooooooooo excited.  Unfortunately we were there on Fathers Day.  So everybody else in San Jose apparently had the same idea.  We had to wait in a rather long line for the train.  We told the kids it was good practice for Disney.  While waiting we amused ourselves with trying to send a picture to Grandma and Grandpa Signor of the kids at Vasona Park.  It didn’t go too well, as Grandpa S isn’t too tech savy when it comes to cell-phones.  But eventually about four hours later he got it.  ROFL.

 

Xanga is loading very very very slowly.  *sigh*  Anyhow have a couple more pictures of the train coming.  Jeremiah was so much fun to watch as he watched the train.  He was shaking he was so excited about getting to ride on a “real” train.  Every time we go to Olympia, he and daddy take a wee side trip to watch the trains go across (about a mile from the gym).  That’s how much he loves them.  So to ride a real one, oh my goodness was that cool.  And of course that meant that Thunder Mountain Railroad was jeremiahs favorite Disney ride.  Awesome!  Was the recurring theme each time he got to ride it.

Rob’s recurring theme the whole day was “that was much bigger when I was a kid.”  He was quite convinced the park had shrunk.  *snicker*

It was shortly after this picture was taken we had a little um set-to.  Jamari, Sam and Zeria had ridden in a second car.  Rob almost opted to sit with them, but he wanted to watch Jeremiah on his first train ride.  It was a choice that wasn’t great.

The kids were as good as gold.  Sam had his flip video and was holding it recording all of the train and the ride.  This is how we know that that the kids didn’t do anything wrong.  About half way around the park the train came to a hault.  WE were a bit suprised, but so relaxed didn’t think anything of it, until the guy on the caboose came up and began chewing out Jamari for “hanging out of the train.”  Jamari shrunk in his seat and got very quiet.  The train started back up, and Rob and I groused about poorly behaved kids.  We assumed it was Sam who was in trouble, because it always it.  We got off the train, and fairly promptly forgot about it.  Sam, Zeri and Jamari were the ONLY black people on the train.

Later in the day Samuel says “Look I have video of Jamari getting in trouble.”  I watched all of it.  The whole train ride.  Neither boys even ONCE had any part of there body out of the train.  They had done absolutely NOTHING.  We’re pretty sure instead they were victims of being black in a all white community.  We spoke frankly about it to our kids, and moved on.

After the train we ate hot dogs in the park bought from a concessions stand, and then headed over to the airplane that Rob and his brother used to play on.  The kids loved playing and exploring on it.

Its a real airplane.  Rob could tell you what kind.  You could climb all over it.  Very cool.

After a good long explore at the park, we left to find Happy Hound.  A place that had hot dogs Rob used to love to eat.  And yes we’d just eaten hot dogs, but its all good it was vacation.  ROFL.  We found it, ate, and then typed in the address to Rob’s old house into the Navigator.  When he showed it to us I suddenly understood why he couldn’t find it the last time he and I’d been there.  Such a generic neighborhood, all the houses look the same, and there all squished together.  Blech.

But it was a wonderful house for him to grow up in, and full of great memories.  Oh and he’s glad he no longer lives there.  LOL

I was amused by this.  Rob’s name for a very long time was Robbie.  Its written on his stuff from when he was little etc.  Its apparently a chain in San Jose.  And apparently he used to design gas stations named Rotten Robbie to play with with his cars.  His brother Devon was quite jealous that he didn’t have a gas station named after him, so he ran a gas station called Devlish Devon.  It all makes sense now.

By this time in California we had begun to spot Palm Trees.  This meant for all of the kids but Jamari we were finally in California.  Rob was highly amused as to how EXCITED they were over these things.  They LOVED the Palm trees, and for several days played counting games, as to how many they saw. 

Samuel tried on several occasions to climb them, but had limited success.  Rob and I spent a good part of an hour contemplating how the heck they would remove these two palm trees should they even get rotten, as they were in the middle of a very tiny motel courtyard, and there was just no place to fall them.  Yeah I might  be a loggers daughter.

Day two was another get up early day.  We *never* set alarms.  We just got up when we were restless.  We grabbed continental breakfast, and then headed out.  We again arrived to our next days destination quite early.  Checked in, and went to find some place to explore.  What we found was a LOVELY park that we spent several very happy hours exploring.  It had a small lake that we walked around, and got to see wild life we hadn’t seen before.

But first…CALIFORNIA border.

Jamari was VERY unimpressed.  This does not look like California he said rather empathically.  We assured him it was.  This theme continued from him for several days.  ROFL.

Shortly thereafter Rob announced we should start seeing Mount Shasta, but there was hide clouds.  We couldn’t, and he was quite bummed.  Until the kids shouted that they saw it.  So we had to stop and take this rather funny picture.

Do you see Mount Shasta.  (hint) its not the brown mountain down low.  *snicker*

Beautiful lake to walk around.  With several fun pelicans we spotted.

The mighty explorers. 

Our favorite find.  We watched these guys for a LONG time, and then eventually one swam away.  which just made us all the more excited.

Okay I think I’ll do these by days.  Our first day was Friday.  We got up super duper early went and picked up Rob at work, and headed down the road.  We made a brief stop in Olympia to meet our Coach who had stuff that we needed for the trip.   She also had a HUGE box of donated snacks to give to us.  We had brought lots of food, but it was definitely a bonus.

We made such good time that we hit Portland by about 1:30.  Checked into our Motel, and then went to explore.  After a couple false starts, We *hate* driving in Portland.  We both think its worse then LA.  Stupid stupid town.  ROFL.  Anyhow we did not get where we wanted to get, but we found a fantastic place to play at the water fountain.at the Rose Quarter.

It was loverly and warm.  And the kids had a blast playing in the fountain, that constantly changed patterns.  Rob had a blast laughing his head off at them.

After a lovely long splash.  We had gogurts (compliments of the coaches donated snacks)

And then we wandered back to the motel in the ridiculous Portland traffic.

Samuel actually wanted to pose with this.

We had a nice nap while the kids watched tv.  Ate dinner, and headed to Christina’s.
We managed to go up and down up and down the road Christina’s apartment was at until we finally called her.  She could see us, so directed us to where we should be.  LOL

We brought ice cream, and had a lovely impromptu visit with her and Marcus and the boys.

After a few minutes of playing shy.  Malachi became my best friend.  Probably the fact he ate more then half my ice cream didn’t hurt.  LOL 

I didn’t get a single picture of Little Marcus and Jamari.  Darn it.  Jamari LOOOVES Little Marcus.  And was very very bummed when he had to leave him.

We got back to the motel about 9:45 and quickly went to bed, so we could start day 2.