Trip to Cali-Day 6 (Heading Home)

I know, I know. We're more than halfway through January, so why am I still posting Christmas break pictures? Because it's still bugging me that I never posted all the Channel Islands pictures from almost a year ago, and the ones from the Sequoias when we were visiting Fresno on a job interview, and the ones from the beach when our friends Scott and Betsy were in town . . . So I couldn't let the last few pics from Christmas get in my brain and afflict me too. Posting these pictures today is almost as distasteful as sending out that last batch of Christmas cards sitting on my paper pile in the kitchen. (You know, the ones you get new addresses for after the fact?) 

But it must be done.

The morning we left, I made everyone french toast with buttermilk syrup. (Thanks to my mother-in-law for the homemade syrup!) I wanted to buy the Kneader's chunky cinnamon bread on Christmas Eve to take with us on our trip, but it sold out, so we used Trader Joe's cinnamon bread instead. Good stuff:

Time to say good-bye to the cousins again. It wasn't quite so painful this time around, but we still really miss these guys!  Elizabeth and Jackson:

Will and Ty:

Kate and Nicole looking a little rough. It just makes me laugh:

Me and Shauna with our attachments:

Brandon and Todd:

 Grandma and Grandpa with the kiddos:

Another "bookends" picture with the oldest and the youngest:

Time to go:

Yep, still working on the binky addiction:

Of course, we lost an hour driving back, so I think by the time we actually drove away from Brandon's parent's house, went up to Rithik's house to drop off a gift and say one last good-bye, and make one last stop for gas, it was like 3:00 in Utah already. Ridiculous! We thought we'd beat the Vegas traffic by leaving on Saturday, but no such luck. Then there were the five million and one bathroom stops, mostly for me. (I finally stopped drinking.) And for some unexplainable reason we found ourselves in a Denny's in St. George at 10pm--still four hours from home! Ahhhhh!! And I had the WORST breakfast burrito known to man, which only increased my annoyance about our slow pace. Needless to say, we got home at 2:30am. It was painful. Especially when we realized there was water leaking from our ceiling in four different places. Not so great of an ending to a wonderful week and month of Christmas joy.  

But the craziest thing ever? Descanso Gardens contacted me about using some of my pictures for their brochures and stuff. Isn't that cool? Who'd a thunk?