So it isn't super late but I am tired and the only one left awake but I didn't want to go to sleep as annoyed as I am so I thought I would write it out and try to change how I feel right now.
My girls really are the best little things ever and literally the most consistently happy kids I know but even the best of them have their bad days. For the past few days Elliette has refused to go to sleep for naps or for bedtime which is completely unlike her; She usually welcomes nap time with a smile and grabs her blanket and drink and lets you know she is ready to go. She has been teething some more and had a bout of sickness that included throwing up a lot recently but all that had been good for about 4-5 days before her sleep refusal started so I don't know if it is still connected to all that or not. She hardly ever really breaks down into a full blown fit and every time I put her in bed she screams for at least 30-45 min and sometimes longer before she is to exhuasted to continue and then only sleeps for a little while and seems to be waking up 2-3 times/night. What is up?
I know I have been spoiled being able to sleep most nights at least 6-7 hours and I am definitely not complaining about that. But, even with those hours of sleep I don't get good sleep so I seem to be extra tired pretty often (not the girls fault, I just don't sleep well) but still can't get myself to be able to fall asleep which gets very frustrating the later it gets at night. So when you combine my own sleep issues to waking up an extra 3-4 times a night (yeah Camryn started waking up at least once also or at least just cries out in her sleep enough to wake me) eventually I am going to loose it. I think tonight was that moment because I had no patience at all with not picking up toys and ignoring me and crying and wanting to be held at all times. Don't worry I did not freak out on the girls to much other than force Elliette to help me pick up her toys but I was just ornery. Now that every one is finally sleeping I am starting to get into a better mood so I am hoping that will help me sleep well so I will get my patience and smile back tomorrow
I promise this only happens once in a blue moon cause there is normally a smile plastered to both of these cute little girls faces but like I said before...even the good ones have bad days. I am attaching a few pictures that make me smile so that I can finish getting my good mood back and can go to sleep without wanting to push Justin off the bed and punch him in the nose cause he is sleeping soundly and snoring in my ear (apparently I like to put all my tired orneriness on him when I can't sleep. note: I have never resorted to pushing Justin off the bed or punching him in the nose, if it gets bad enough I sleep on the couch. I am really not a mean abusive person I swear).

Elliette loves:
Giving kisses to everyone and everything,
Animals-and is always very soft,
Being a goof and cheesing it,

fruit,

Playing the piano,

Laughing,
shopping-even if it is in Grandma's pantry,
reading,
getting her lips done

Camryn loves:
being held and getting attention,

smiling and giggling,


staring into the distance and people watching,

pulling faces and spitting,
sleeping and her binky,

watching and playing with Elliette,

exploring her artistic side

and, one just isn't enough...

Ocean 1, Justin 0

(from my point of view): Justin was invited to go surfing this morning and since the equipment rental is pretty cheap at the ORC on base he decided to go. I wanted to get out of the house and Elliette loves playing in the sand so we decided to just go hang out on the beach and watch Justin attempt surfing for the first time with his buddy Dan. When we got to the beach we noticed that the waves seemed pretty intense (probably 12-15ft waves, definitely more advanced waters than what they should have been in but Justin is a good swimmer so I trusted him) and there were no other people out on the water, but since they had paid for their rentals the two of them decided to go for it anyways. As Justin was getting his wetsuit on I realized that I forgot the diaper bag so I had to run home and get that as well as fill up the car so I took off with the girls for probably 20-25 minutes. On the way back to the beach I get passed by about 3 cop cars heading that direction, I found a place to park and look out into the water and the two of them are nowhere to be seen but the cop cars have parked just a little ways up the road from where I am and now 2 fire engines are coming and everyone is staring out at the rocks. I knew that they had to be there for Justin and Dan but was really hoping it was something else. I hurried and grabbed the girls out of the car and walked up to the beach access and asked a guy what was going on. He told me that there was a guy out in the water by the rocks who had been swept out by the rip tide. I told him my husband was out there and he asked if he had a yellow board, I wasn't sure which one had the yellow board but I knew one of them did and since he said no one else was out in the water I figured it was them; he did only mention one guy though so I was hoping that at least one of them was safe on the beach. I hurried down onto the sand to get a better view and saw one of them get tossed up onto the rocks near the other one but both were standing and moving around so that was a good sign. I talked to another lady to see if she noticed if either one was hurt and from what she had seen she thought they were both ok. Eventually they were both able to get in safely (thank goodness) and that ended their fun day of surfing. Justin ended up with a broken surf board and a hole in his wetsuit and I am pretty sure that they both ended up pretty sore after that. I told them that if they wanted to try this again they have to go to a different beach and they have to drive down and check out the waves before they rent their gear to make sure it is more beginner friendly. (Sorry I didn't get a pic of the boards or them out on the water/rocks).
(Justins point of view):
Before looking at the waves be and a friend decided to try surfing today. Dan had been one time before and I hadn't been at all, so we knew it would be pretty rough but it still sounded like fun. We rented out equipment in the morning and went right out. Melissa decided to come watch, but when we got to the beach she had to go back to the house for something and fill up the car as well. While she was gone we decided to get started even though Dan looked pretty worried and the waves were huge. I kinda persuaded him to go out anyway and just stay close to the beach. Even though the plan was to stay close to the beach once we got out a little bit, that was it. Dan was trying to teach be some stuff, but I was just paying attention to the enormous waves smashing us. Before I knew it I was way out and drifting towards a bunch of rocks. At about that time a huge wave came up and I decided to try and ride this one as far as I could. I hadn't had much success before now so I thought I would put the point of the board in a little more to force some resistance and get pushed farther, if that had worked I may have been able to ride that one wave all the way to shore, but it didn't. At the same time the wave was pushing the front of the board down I was trying to force it up to stay on top of the wave, then all of the sudden I was in the air then in the water. I know enough to know the best thing to do is go limp since you don't know which way is up and your less likely to get hurt, I stayed under the water for what seemed like a long time which turned out to be a good thing because another large wave followed before I surfaced. I found the surface because the board was attached to my foot, so I just went the direction of the tether. When I reached the surface I noticed my board was broken, I straightened it out and hoped I could keep trying to ride a wave, but after getting thrown around a couple more times I was too exhausted to do anything more. I held onto by board and tried to kick my way to shore, but I kept getting pulled towards the rocks. Thankfully the waves were more mild among the rocks so at least I didn't feel like I would drown anymore, I just had to really pay attention to where I was. I wasn't making any progress and just at the mercy of the ocean when my buddy finally reached some rocks large enough to give shelter. I was still quite a ways away just hoping to make it there somehow without getting smashed. Oh, yea, by this time there was a fire truck, ambulance and a few cop cars waiting for me to..... None of them really had a way to help me though, so I really had to get to those rocks. Just then 2 very large waves managed to make it through the rocks and still be pretty big came up from behind me and pushed me towards the rocks where my friend was and gently set me down with enough time to climb up to safety. Even while I was on those last 2 waves hurling towards the rocks I felt like I would be alright and that the hand of God was saving me. The firefighters that were there agreed that I was very very lucky, I said that I was very very stupid and if God had saved me it was for the sake of my wife and kids because that was my own stupid fault for going out when the waves were so huge none of the locals even dared to go out. Live and learn has new meaning.

Ellie and Isa

Chirstmas vacation

Well our Christmas vacation started with a LONG day at the airport flying first from Monterey to LA then to Dallas and then finally landing in Wichita. Now that wouldn't have been so horrible if we didn't have 2 kids with us who 1. hate being held down to one spot 2. are still in diapers 3. doesn't nap well anywhere other than her crib, and 4. really HATE the landing part of flying because it hurts her ears. Oh and also we couldn't sit by each other because there are not enough oxygen masks in each row for two lap children, that also wouldn't have been as bad if we could have at least been put across the isle from each other but for the longest flight of the 3 we were actually 4 or 5 rows apart which was pretty annoying. On that flight I had one of the stewardesses tell me that she smells poopy diaper so I needed to change my child; Now don't you think that I would know if my child had pooped considering she was on my lap the whole time. Anyways, I got up and went to change Ellie (who was not poopy and the problem was that the bathroom (or an adult sitting near by, who know) was what stunk). I had to go up by Justin who had the diaper bag and as we were heading up the rows Elliette started blowing kisses to everyone cause she thought we were leaving. She wasn't exactly excited when we ended up going back to our seats. They both did really well considering though and Elliette only really cried while landing so that wasn't to bad.

While we were in KS we had a whole lot of fun with Justins family watching movies at the WORLD'S COOLEST theater, playing games, and just hanging out. Thanks to everyone there Justin and I were actually able to spend some time together without the girls which was so muc fun since it has been quite a while since we have seen a movie together. On Christmas Eve the Sis. Missionaries came over for dinner and we had a German meal of brats, potato pancakes, and schmokle (don't know how to spell it but it is a sweet/tart red cabbage dish). After dinner we sang Christmas Carols and reenacted the nativity, Justin, Camryn, and I were Joseph, Mary, and Baby Jesus and Elliette got to be a sheep complete with the baa sound. That night the grandkids got some cute new Christmas pajamas from Grandma and Granpa (thanks again). Christmas morning we did our stockings and ornament exchange which was fun and even though we had our family Christmas before we left we were still spoiled out there (thank you everyone). On the morning of the 26th we were also able to bless Camryn and ALL of Justin's family was able to be there and participate (thanks for staying Brit and Dan) which was really an awesome moment. During the blessing I had Ellie sitting on my lap but as mentioned previously she HATES being held in one spot so in order to keep her quiet so I could hear I let her get down towards the end, she ran right over and snuck her self right into the center of the circle and watched from there. Camryn was also having the time of her life thinking that she was being played with and cooed, talked, and smiled through the whole thing
We did end up cutting the trip short because in the hustle bustle of the season Justin and I managed to go out just looking around and ended up buying a Hyundai Sonata since it was cheaper to buy in KS than in CA and it was just such a good deal we couldn't pass it up. The morning that we left we all ate at a small diner in Wichita that was on Diners Drive-ins and Dives which was fun and pretty dang yummy. After breakfast we took off and drove to Denver for the night. The next day we jumped back in the car and drove all the way to my parents house in UT. On the way there we found out that Elliette gets carsick and threw up twice on that trip (3rd time since we had bought the car - oxyclean is AMAZING by the way).

When we got to my parents no one other than my mom and dad knew we were coming and we were excited to run in and surprise everyone but since Ellie puked just a few minutes from their house we ran in and straight to the bathroom to clean her up but it was still fun and a BIG surprise. We didn't have a whole lot of time in UT since that wasn't exactly in the plans at the beginning but we were able to spend a few days with the fam. My dad got an SLR camera for Christmas so we did play a lot with that and we were able to dress Ellie up in her snow clothes and make a snowman. Ryan took some pics of the girls for me in their Christmas dresses and then touched them up a bit for me (thanks again).

On New Years Day we went to Texas Roadhouse for lunch and told them my moms birthday was coming up so they made her get on the saddle, she was SUPER embarrassed and refused at first till they had everyone chanting "saddle, saddle" so that was HILARIOUS (side note: I was not specifically banned from putting those pics on the blog, sorry mom but I just couldn't pass it up)!

We ended up packing the kids up that night and driving all through the night in hopes that they would sleep and Ellie wouldn't be so sick and it worked, thank heavens. Justin drove the whole way and I got to sleep a little bit but we were all worn out for about 3 days after we got back. All in all it was a long mostly relaxing break where we had a TON of fun hanging out with family and learned that we can clean up throw-up without adding to it. Oh and we were able to continue our anniversary tradition of eating dinner at Wingers with one of my siblings and their spouse and watching a movie and then talking about going to the Heinz Mansion for the night but deciding that maybe we will make it next year. FUN STUFF! (I have a million more cute pics from the trip but they are on a cd and I don't have a cd drive for this computer yet, sorry family).