California!

Sunrise from above the clouds. (One of the few perks of a 6am flight). 

First stop, school! Our Classical Conversations community allowed us to visit for lunch and Kik joined the Challenge B mock trial seminar as our traveling campus will be joining the Anaheim campus for this event at the end of the semester.

Next stop, the Schultz's home... Our home away from home. We have so much fun disrupting their lives. (: It was good to hug Z in person. And the rest of them too. I cannot say how amazing these friends are. They encourage us and love on us and we are so blessed. 

WEDNESDAY  began with ortho visits. 

Kik: regular visit

Sy: replace broken appliance. ): $$$

Ky: retainer check

Jo: 1st time ortho, new appliance

Afterwards, we went to my dad's house and I found these fun pictures of my parents.

Kik hung out at the Aksel home then all the kids went to Awana and youth group. 

THURSDAY, Kik and I resolved my dad's cell phone issues. (He's been without it since Christmas and though I tried to help from Georgia, it's challenging from far away.)

Lots of rain, errands run, kids forgotten, kids remembered, and an evening movie.

FRIDAY was packed with fun. We started with school at the library and headed to In-n-out for lunch.

Field trip to Mission Microwave where Mr. Schultz gave us a tour.

At book club, the boys discussed A Wrinkle in Time. So fun that both our visits have coincided with their monthly meeting. (:

While the boys were discussing, he girls were baking and making homemade lemonade. Yum!

The big kids went to Broomball and missed out on lemon bars. 

SATURDAY

While getting some laundry done, we went to lunch with Grandpa.

Then we had a fun visit with the Tyson family. I so miss times on the soccer sideline with Jeanne. In fact, I expected to meet her on a sideline somewhere, but we actually sat peacefully in her backyard - with only the sounds of our boys' playing. (:

And our evening was spent with the Liu family. We learned to make dumplings and Erinn is not afraid to make enough to feed many hungry growing boys! (We both have 3 boys and a girl - which means our girls were also super excited to hang out.)

They had a map ready and a little bus for us to show them our route so far  (:

We had a great night encouraging each other.

What an amazing week of blessings as we visit with so many friends in California!