Shasta 2010

Destination: Shasta, California: more specifically, houseboat on Shasta Lake

Date: June 2010

Purpose: Fun with the whole family...on a boat

Theme: I'm on a boat!

How it all went down in pictures:

Porter sayin' what's up as we arrived in Shasta

Grandma and Bria on the first night

My Dad riding the jet ski

On the boat ride in going under a bridge

Anna, Me, Kayla, and Jenny jumped off the top deck, but it took us a long time to work up the nerve. We weren't suppose to jump off the top deck, so actually we didn't do that. I'm going to try and post the video because it's seriously hilarious how chicken we were, but we did it! I think it was about 25 or 30 feet.

Brian in mid flight after jumping off the 3rd deck, all the guys did it like it was no problem.

Some of our fun toys :)

Bria dancing

We were so sad that Lance couldn't be there, but we tried to make the best of it so we printed a few pictures of him and brought him along. Here are him and Kayla Monday morning :)

Grandpa and Bria dancing

Kayla, Jaime, Anna, and Jaidyn laying out

Bria's absolute favorite activity, walking in and out of the water

Chillin' inside to grab some lunch and take a break from the sun

Schuyler and Jaime

My Dad and Anna

Jaime, Jenny, and I after going down the slide

The beginning of our awesome synchronized swimming routine

Our name is the synchronized sisters, you better recognize.

We are awesome

Grandma and her Bria

"Are you trying to kiss me Grandma?"

SURPRISE BRIAN!!! The boys went wake-boarding while us girls set up Brian's surprise party. He had NO idea what we were up to, as he walked up onto the second deck we had the pomp and circumstance song playing and we formed an aisle that he walked down. He was shocked and so happy.

The graduate and his baby girl

So proud of her Daddy for getting his MBA

Having fun with the graduation ball

Bria took a nap in Grandma's arms on a boat ride

Our evenings were spent on the middle deck eating food and playing games

My cowgirl

Getting cuddles from my baby girl

Uncle Kyle and Bria dancing

Our little family

Oh, we are so cool performing our routine out of water, so talented.

Kayla sporting her awesome Lance shirt, ya know, since her boyfriend is Lance Armstrong (for realz)

My adorable ballerina

Lil' Abby and me

Brian and me getting sun on the top deck

Abby, Bria, and Kailey chillin' in the sun

Pssh, we don't let anyone tell us what to do

Glad we didn't know there were water snakes in the lake until the last day, otherwise I'm not sure we would've gotten in. Brian took care of this one for us.

Cassidy and Anna havin' fun on the jet ski

Me, Jenny, and Jaime on the ride back into the dock.

On our ride back into the dock Bria started her nap on Daddy...

...then moved to mommy...

...then onto Aunt Jenny. It was a good little nap :)

Loading up the cars and getting on the road for our long drive home.

Details in writing:

This part you can skip, it's more for me and journaling purposes.

Summary:

• Bria HATES car rides, which means I hate them. She slept an hour on the way down, played nicely for a total of an hour, and the remaining 3 hours she cried/fussed/screamed. The way home was about the same.
• Bria LOVES the water.
• Bria rocks at sleeping on a houseboat with tons of people and noise, she did so good.
• I love my awesome family, we had a blast and I didn't want it to end.
• I jumped off the 3rd deck
• We threw Brian a surprise graduation party
• I made up a synchronized swimming routine with my sisters and Kayla, it was so good.
• My attempt at a Spanish accent came out Irish (inside joke for my girls)
• My Dad found a snake in the water and Brian killed it, Brian felt bad for killing it and wished he had just shooed it away. I was glad he killed it.
• Houseboats on Shasta lake are fun, like really fun, especially the slide.

Sunday

So we left on Sunday at 11:15 am. The plan was to leave a little before Bria's nap so that hopefully she'd fall asleep and sleep for a couple hours. Well, she was kind of cranky but eventually fell asleep around 12:30 pm or so. Then woke up an hour later and would not go back to sleep, so she cried, whined, and fussed most of the way there. This girl does NOT like car rides. But we finally arrived in sunny Shasta and we were thrilled beyond words. We loaded up the houseboat with everyone's stuff (enough stuff for a month) and began our fun family vacation. It was surreal sitting on this ginormous 3-story houseboat with the whole family just looking around at how awesome it was to be together in such a fun place.

Brian and I brought Bria's pack 'n play in hopes that one of the rooms would be big enough to put it on top of the bed, but no such luck. When I say rooms, the rooms were just a bed, no walking space. So we decided to barricade Bria in one of the rooms (again, just a bed) and it ended up working perfectly. I thought for sure she'd try to climb out or play with the curtains, but she did really well and knew it was her bed and time for her to sleep. It helped that I brought her comforts from home so she could cuddle up with them. Since Bria was in our room, Brian and I slept out on the couch that folded to a bed, the things you do for your kids :)

We didn't do too much that night besides getting our things in place and just talking under the stars, it was a wonderful relaxing night and perfect way to kick off the vacation.

Monday

Monday morning starting early with Bria up at 5:45 am, I thought she'd sleep in since she went to bed late the night before, but I think she saw it was light out and thought it was time to get up. So we started our day bright and early and got suited up for a dip in the cold lake. Bria absolutely loved the water even though it was cold, she'd suck in her breath in shock but then giggle and laugh. She splashed around and her absolute favorite was to walk back and forth between the water and shore, we did that for a long time. We had tons of fun inflatable things to play on so we spent a majority of the time in the sun, which meant we were applying sunscreen to Bria every 10 minutes, and it worked, our little girl didn't burn at all, wahoo! She did get a little bit of a tan which is adorable because her fat roll creases are still white-LOVE IT.

That night we all crashed around 10:30 or so since we all got up early and were exhausted. We meant to be party animals but the sun wiped us out.

Tuesday

Tuesday Bria was the last one up, she slept until about 7:15 am or so, NICE. I believe this is the day Brian and I got out on the jet ski's with Jenny and Kyle and had a blast. It's fun to let loose and haul ass down the lake, especially when you hit bumps and go flying, loved it.

In the afternoon all the guys loaded up on the speed boat and went wake-boarding and skiing. While they were gone we decorated the second deck for Brian's surprise graduation party. When they rolled up we got the music ready and as he walked up the stairs we play pomp and circumstance. It was awesome and Brian was in shock, he had no idea we planned it. Anna even made his favorite: chocolate cake for dessert. We had spaghetti and bread and talked about how proud we were of Brian :) It was fun and I'm glad we were able to celebrate Brian's graduation.

Bria got pretty cranky that night and was a little tougher to put down for bed. I laid with her for awhile and rubbed her back, it worked because she settled down eventually and drifted off to sleep.

Wednesday

We went for a boat ride on my mom and Randy's speed boat in the morning, then spent the afternoon playing around like usual. I really tried to soak it up since it was our last day there. Bria was a little cranky which I think was just being overtired from going to bed so late every night. Although I will say she took a fantastic nap everyday and that was nice because it gave Brian and I a chance to play without worrying about Bria and where she was.

We all danced on the deck in the evening and then moved it inside once the wind picked up. That night apparently Bria woke up and was whining for Mommy and Daddy. Neither Brian or I heard her since we were in the living room at the opposite end, but Aunt Jenny was right across from Bria and heard her. She went in there and as soon as she opened the door Bria laid down and Jenny rubbed her back for awhile and then she went back to sleep. I felt so bad I didn't hear her but I was glad Jenny knew exactly what to do :)

Thursday

Time to pack up and head out. We did a majority of the packing up in the morning so we could spend some time out in the sun before heading in. We went down the slide a bunch to try and soak in all the fun. This is also when my Dad spotted a snake. The jet ski's were tied up to the house boat and my Dad climbed on one to adjust some stuff and a snake head peered up at him. I didn't see my Dad's reaction but Brian did and thought it was a bee, then realized it was a snake and started beating it with the bumper. This killed the snake and calmed our fears a little. Although I was hesitant to get in the water because I never even though of snakes being in there and it freaked me out. Good thing it was the last day.

So we finally headed into the dock and then loaded up our stuff into the cars. We stopped at Mt. Shasta, California for some dinner and then hit the open road. Which is where Bria screamed so loud that I was able to see inside her mouth and spot her 1st molars on top! I couldn't believe she got her 1st molars, I was so excited. I'll admit I was a lot more patient with her on the ride home because I knew she was probably in a little bit of pain. So I gave her some Tylenol, played as many games as I could think of, Brian and I sang the OSU Fight song about 50 times, and then at 7:30 pm we told her it was time to go night night. And after a little fussing she did. Whew. We carried her in bed when we got home and slept there soundly until 8:30 am.

It was a fantastic vacation.