San Diego..best of Uncle Troy's camera

Aunt Rachel shared a Dropbox folder (a nifty storage sharing thing) of photos with Mom and Dad. The Preslars took a total of somewhere around 550 photos. So sit down and get comfy.

Only kidding.

I think Mommy and I make that joke after every Disney trip! Here are Mommy's top favorite photos from those 550 (we only took a measly 208..for a whole week..with TWO theme parks...we gotta step up our game!)

Mormon Battalion Museum

Check out our ballon hats!

The entire Romney Family

Legoland

Beach Babes....

Iva "discovered" Romney on our last beach day. They had a wonderful time together spinning and lying in the sand!

The siblings...

This awesome shot is of Cara having a complete meltdown over kelp. At one point, she was trying to
"clean it off the beach" and a wave came up and took it and her and it left her FRANTIC. Mom and Dad finally had to tell her that it wasn't her job to clean up the kelp out of the water. It could be there. Instead they showed her how to pop the little balls.

Reunited after getting lost...

That really wasn't very many pictures...maybe we will have to post more although I think this is our FIFTH post about San Diego...maybe seventh...

Finale...part 2!

Okay when I said "Finale" I meant for the Romney Reunion. We weren't quite done with our trip as a little family. Our Legoland tickets were actually 3 day "park hopper" tickets (we got a heckuva deal) and so Mom and Dad decided they would go back on Saturday and look at the "hopper" stuff. This meant an aquarium and a water park!

The aquarium opened up an hour before most of the rest of the park so we gave it a go first! We enjoyed it! It was kind of small and it was a very specific path you walked, but still fun to see all the kinds of sea life they had!

Sadly, this is the ONE day on our whole trip that it was COLD and CLOUDY and wouldn't you know it even RAINY. Well kind of. We wanted to spend the whole day at the water park, but just as the park opened the sky started to sprinkle. We stuck around and rode a few rides. Here is Daddy and I on the Knight's Challenge.

And then even though it was raining, Mom suddenly said we were going to put on swimsuits anyway so why not go ride a wet ride in our suits and then go to the water park rain or not. So here we are riding the wettest ride you can imagine. We were grateful we were in our swim suits.

We headed into the water park just as the rain officially stopped and the sun started peeking through here and there. The water temp was nice. In fact, it was actually warmer than the air! Iva was in heaven.

We tried out every water slide. Or at least Dad and I did. Cara snuck on one that she was actually too short for, but it was fun!

We did get pretty cold and called it fairly early in the afternoon. We got dressed, Iva fell asleep, and we got in one more ride with Dad before calling it!

All three of us girls slept for probably 90 minutes once we were in the car. It was such a great week and I hope that we get to do another trip like it in the future. Seven days of mom and dad and no work was awesome!

The Finale

Friday was our last big day together. Nobody could believe our time was almost up! We had some grandiose plans of checking out other beaches a little farther north like La Jolla, but after we had a slow morning one by one the grown ups decided it was just too much work and Mission Beach had been good to us. Mom and Dad tried a local Mexican food joint that provided us with SO MUCH FOOD and then we once again packed it in on the beach. Today was by far our coldest day on the beach. The sun kept hiding behind the clouds making it just a little chilly. 

Iva skipped her nap and decided she actually DID like the beach. She had enjoyed playing bay side before, but this time she even handled the ocean.

Three little maids are we!

Besties...at least for the moment...

Uncle Troy took some pictures of all of us with his big boy camera, but here are a few cell phone editions!

That's all of us Romney grandkids with the exception of the baby brewing in Mom's belly...

Iva really found her groove...

All wrapped up and ready to chill back at the house!

We decided that the Baked Bear was so yummy it deserved a second trip. Iva didn't make it due to missing her nap.

More fun with the octopus!

It was so sad to say good bye to our awesome Seattle cousins. We really enjoyed our time with them!

Sea World

We had been looking forward to visiting Sea World again since we went two years ago for Cara's fourth birthday! It almost didn't happen this trip even though we were just on the other side of the Bay, but luckily there was a GREAT deal on tickets and it happened!

The Preslars and our family headed out for a little fun on Thursday morning. We rode Atlantis first thing. Cara was big enough to go and this time I LOVED it. Mommy even decided to ride it even with her belly!

The Ray Tank by the Atlantis ride

SHARKS!

I brought my penguin that we bought two years ago. Here is me and the actual penguins with my penguin.

We did our best to keep the Preslars out of the sun. Iva liked the glasses more than Emma.

Shipwreck Rapids was perfect. Romney and I got SOAKED. Too bad the sun started to go down!

Cara loved trying to touch the rays below the Manta roller coaster.

I was super excited that with a little fiddling with my shoes I was able to go on the roller coaster. It was so much fun.

Headed out of the park, Iva held onto our penguins and killed everyone with cuteness!

We were all still smiling at the end of the day!

The big group together. It proved impossible to get a photo of everyone looking.

Iva's eyes are closed and so are mine I think!

Our crew...

And we couldn't end this blog without mentioning this:

Yup. I ended up in this little office. Actually, my mom ended up here and I met her there. Fairly early in the day (before lunch), we saw the sea lion show (one of our favorites) and I managed to get separated from everyone as we left the theater. Mom and Dad and Uncle Troy spent some time frantically circling the theater and the FOUR DIFFERENT WAYS YOU COULD GO, but they couldn't see me. I, on the other hand, was up by the dolphin show when I noticed I couldn't see anyone I knew. I stopped and squeezed my penguin tight when a woman saw how scared I looked and she took me to an employee who took me up to the Lost Children area where my mom was waiting with her arms out! I was a champ and only cried once I saw mom. And even then I was fine. I stayed pretty calm although I DON'T want to get separated ever again!

Another Elder Larsen...

Guest post by Mom:

Well the day came. My youngest brother, Eric, has reported to the mission field. He boarded a plane at 11:40 am this morning here in St. George and will finish his journey in Santiago, Chile tomorrow morning sometime. His actual call is to serve in the Rancagua area of Chile, but hopefully they train him up for six weeks before really sending him out on his own! Almost six years ago, my brother, Marty, left on his mission. I wrote a blog post about my feelings at that time and as I look back on it and read it, my feelings are much the same as then, but also I think a little more complex.

Eric has chosen to serve a two year, full time, mission for our church. As I think about what that means (no cell phone, no contact with family or friends aside from a weekly email and two phone calls a year, no social media, no regular TV or movie watching), I am once again staggered by his commitment to the Lord. He is a whole year younger than Marty was thanks to new guidelines allowing 18 year olds to submit their papers and somehow that makes him feel a lot younger! He just graduated from high school!

I also think my feelings are different because I have been privileged to live in the same city with Eric for the last 5 years. With Marty, I had been living in California, back home for a minute, and then up in SLC. I will feel Eric's absence much more keenly than Marty's. Eric is THIRTEEN years younger than me and yet I consider us to be close. I watched many football and basketball games with him. I liked to make a new recipe and bring it over to my parents' house and let him try it. Their home will certainly feel different and since I am over there almost every day, I'm going to notice more! I have always felt strongly about how awesome my family was, but, and I'm pretty sure my other siblings will back me up on this, Eric has always been the coolest. Our family truly wasn't complete without him. He is a fantastic uncle. My girls are going to miss him.

Even as I think about that little ache of having him gone, I couldn't be more excited for him. I am looking forward to the emails about what he has been doing and discovering. I can't wait for those smiling photos of him and the Chilean people! My husband speaks so highly about his mission and is actually jealous that Eric has reached that milestone in his life. I can picture the light radiating from Eric's eyes as he gets to be truly dedicated to serving people every day. He won't have to worry about school or money or a job or too much of his future. For two years, it is about what Jesus would do. What would I give to actually do that? To be honest, I'm not sure I would have been brave enough to do it. Eric is head and shoulders above me both literally and figuratively. I love that brother of mine. As a parent, I know in my head how quickly these two years will actually go by, but in this moment it feels like an awfully long time before I can hug him again.

Good luck, Elder Larsen!