The Wissinks: Christmas- Part 1!

Before January gets away from me, I need to post about Christmas! Unfortunately, our family (mostly the kids) have continued to deal with sickness, but we are thankful that it didn't stop us from enjoying our travels. We had quite the Christmas trip planned, and were also thankful that we didn't have horrible weather to deal with.

Remember the weekend before Christmas we enjoyed urgent care trips, an ER trip, croup for Hope, ear infection for J, then ear infection for H?

Ah yes, all right before we left! So J finished up his 5 days of Zithromax the day we left, and H had just started her 10 days of Cefdinir. We left on Christmas Eve for some time with Adam's family in Dubuque! Weather was great and the kids did great for the 5 1/2 hour drive!

We met up at the Grand Harbor Resort hotel which had a great water park! Both J and H had a great time there!

Typical. J being silly, H on the go, Adam smiling. :)

There was a really big tube slide that went outside the building and came back in, and Adam was finally able to convince J to ride on the inner tube with him down the slide (J is very cautious, so this was huge!).

See J's terrified face?? This was right before they flipped over. Needless to say, this was the first and last time J went down this slide.

We also did presents and spent some nice time with Adam's family. J was thrilled to see and spend time with his cousins Kyan and Kobe again!

Hope had a great time with the hotel mirror!

We stayed in Dubuque until the 26th, and then we headed to Chicago. We drove to my Uncle Roger and Aunt Sheryl's house- they were kind enough to let us stay the night at their house, park our car at their house, and Uncle Rog even gave us a 3:00 am ride to Midway! So so nice, we can't thank them enough!

Early in the morning of the 27th we flew out to our next destination- CALIFORNIA!! My side of the family all flew out there to see Matt & Cheryl, Josie and Evan! The last time we were all out there was 5 years ago- J and J were 12 months and 10 months old! E and H were not here! So it was definitely time.

We flew Southwest and were less than impressed with their customer service. Terrible lines, rude check-in people, no responsibility taken for making us almost miss our flight.... Etc etc etc. Boo. However, we made it and surprisingly so did all of our luggage!

5:30 am. J was beside himself with excitement, H was exhausted.

We arrived at LAX about 8 am Sunday morning. When we got to Matt and Cheryl's house, J went straight to bed and slept till like 1:30 in the afternoon. Adam stayed with him while the rest of us had lunch at Panera (and we sat outside!). The rest of the day was spent playing outside!

Bedtime stories with grandma!

On Monday we had lunch at In 'n' Out!!!! So yummy!

Abby and Hope were excited!

And who doesn't love a good candid shot of people eating?

I think Hope was yelling "More fries!!!"

The kids spent the afternoon playing outside again!

Uncle Matt was working on his gopher problem, so the kids watched him put some kind of smoke thingy down the gopher hole.

J was convinced it was dynamite. Also, it didn't solve the gopher problem.

Monday night we did our Christmas Eve tradition of appetizers for dinner and then presents!

Matching PJ's from grandma!

Tuesday morning we did our stockings!

And then we went to urgent care- but surprisingly not for one of the kids, for me! :( I must have come down with what J and H had before our trip- started Christmas Eve with a sore throat, then congestion, lost my voice, cough, etc etc. Just FYI, urgent cares in different states are so different! In CA they are quite quick to offer a prescription, even if they aren't sure if you need it. I got Zithromax, and I think it really did help. I honestly think I had a sinus infection, because on the plane ride home I had terrible pain in my sinuses on our descent. Ouch.

BUT. We pressed on- this would not ruin our trip!!

We headed down to my hometown of Escondido for the afternoon and evening. First stop?