A Tale Of Two Parks! One Wet, One Dry...

Take a look at these pictures! The first picture is of AdventureLand in Disneyland on the first day that we were in the park. It was pouring! All of the Californians decided not to come! It was great, it was like we had the place to ourselves! We're from Oregon so who cares about a little bit of rain.

The second picture is on the 3rd day we were there. It was Sunny and 70 degrees, you could tell that who the fair weather Disneyland fans were. There are just a couple of more people in the same shot.

The Whitakers in Southern California

Well, we've been back from vacation for quite awhile. I figured it's about time we blog about our trip to southern California, and of course Disneyland.

It was a great trip, we had a blast with the Craig's and the Hoefer's! Who could ask for better company while on vacation? In the end we ended up having a great time and doing some new things this time around. However, the trip didn't necessarily start out really smooth.

We got to the airport very early in the morning on Saturday the 14th. What better way to spend Valentine's Day right? Well, we get there to learn that our flight was actually delayed for some unknown reason. They didn't have a lot of explanation as to what was going on. However, they neglected to tell Matt and Kristi that their flight was delayed. Which was odd since we were all on the same flight. They checked their luggage as if everything was absolutely fine. Then we let them know it was delayed and we were all able to book a different flight into LAX instead of John Wayne. It was a nice smooth flight, but we couldn't help but wonder if the Craig's luggage knew that we were going to LAX instead of John Wayne.

We were all pleasantly surprised to see that all of the bags made it to the same place that we did. On that first day in California - we went to Sprinkles - which is a cupcake store. I personally didn't see the draw for cupcakes, however - the 20 people in front of us in the line apparently did. I couldn't really get all that excited about it until I actually ate one! They were actually really really good!

After Sprinkles, we had lunch at an old fashioned diner and then headed down the coast to visit some friends in San Diego. After that, we decided that we wanted to go to the Griffith Observatory to take a look through the big telescope. What we didn't count on is that half of California wanted to do the same thing. By the time we got there, the closest parking place was easily about 1 1/2 miles away from the actual observatory. So we ended up just packing it in and heading back to Anaheim.

The next day we had breakfast at a great place that Kristi suggested and then we spent the day at Universal Studios! This was the first time I had ever been. Andrea was there like 25 years ago. It was great to see all of the behind the scenes stuff. We took the tour and saw Desperate Housewives street (whatever that's called) and we saw the wreckage of the plane from War of the Worlds, and the Bates Motel from "Psycho", Jaws, and lots of other things. We rode fun rides and had a great time all in all. Here are some pics from the first couple of days in southern California:

Ben's Blurb - what's up with the Whitaker's?

Well, it's been awhile since we've posted or blogged anything so I figured I would give a quick snapshot of what we've been up to for the last couple of months.

It seems like we have just been non-stop busy without a moment to spare. Honestly, we do it to ourselves. We've been hanging out with friends and having people over, going out to dinner every now and again. I'm buried in schoolwork from the two classes that I'm taking this term. It seems like I'm doing some type of homework every single day. Last weekend, I think I literally spent 7 hours on homework. That's not such a good time.

We did go to the Auto Show last week. It was kind of a drag. Not a whole lot going on there. Andrea was able to sit in her dream car, The 2009 Honda Odyssey Touring Edition. Someday, that will be our next ride. Maybe not the 2009, but some variation of it I would imagine. We had a good time, but there weren't a lot of cars to oogle.

We did just buy a freezer from Direct Buy (I know all of this is just fascinating stuff isn't it?). We're actually pretty excited about it. Andrea is a coupon clipping Queen and her only limitation is where to put all of the food. So she has yet to reach her full savings potential due to space limits. She finds some insane deals. Sometimes, I have a twinge of guilt - like we're almost stealing from the store. But that's only when I have all of the items protruding out from underneath my shirt. Kidding, kidding. She is pretty dang amazing with the amount of food she brings home from the store. I look at the receipt and think that it must be wrong. She gets a special joy when the Supervisor of the grocery store has to come over and override the register because she's saved so much money! I have to say though, I can't go with her because I just don't have that kind of patience. Doing the grocery store-saving thing - takes a special kind of person. And it most certainly isn't me. So anyway, we have a new freezer on the way and we're both pretty excited about it. I think that's one of the main indicators that you're old when you're truly excited about a new appliance. Yikes.

As most everyone knows - we are taking a return trip to California on Saturday. We're going with our good friends the Craig's. It should be a great time. We're going to spend Saturday driving down the coast to San Diego and basically goof off all day. Then on Sunday, we're heading to Universal Studios to spend the day there. On Monday-Wednesday we'll be in Disneyland! It's funny how I always think that our last trip was "the last time for awhile" until we're somehow headed down there again. It'll be fun though. We're spending the time in the park with the Hoefer's so it will be a great time.

Well, to keep you all from boredom - I guess I'll quit. It's a little after 5am and it's time to wake-up Andrea so we can go to the Gym this morning before work. Here are some random pics of the last couple of months from the Auto Show and also the SuperBowl party and Bj and Tracy's.

Stay tuned for Blog updates on the California trip!