Friday, July 10, 2009

FIRST STOP: CALIFORNIA


We arrived in the afternoon (the same day that Michael Jackson died - we realized this while listening to the radio and hearing them say, "in memory of"), just in time for rush hour, we were fortunate enough to pick up ALL of our luggage and then our rental car. We had rented a “mini van” for the time, but actually got a big 15 passenger van minus the last bench, giving us lots of room to live out of the back, where all our suitcases could be thrown. The kids dubbed it “Emmet” due to it’s vastness. Emmet made it to the freeway before he started blinking “low tire pressure”. We even pulled over on the 6 lane freeway during rush hour, because the on ramp had been so rough, we were convinced we had somehow gotten a flat tire.


We actually made it to Pasadena though - without a flat - to first greet Emily, Caleb, Julie and Max, but Benny took Emmet back and exchanged him for a white van they named “Moby Dick” – needless to say, it was as big as whale. Kind of our "closet" to be for the next 5 weeks, we grew fond of our new transportation. Pictures to come.


After such a long trip, it was just perfect for Tyler and Max to get to play before having to go to bed. They hit it off from the first minute. Tyler still talks about "my Max"

(Caleb actually had taken a really cute video of the boys and Julie playing, but after uploading for over 24 hours, I "cancelled" and upon investigation found that it is 197 MB and uploads can't be over 100 MB, so I will need to shorten or shrink it before I can upload it for you here, neither of which I know how to do - never had the need. I will find out though.)



Cousins before bedtime the first night, except Niklas - he crashed.