The Phalen Family

Sunday, April 1, 2018

Trip to Gold Country-Spring Break 2018

We have been wanting to check out gold country for awhile now, and since our hotels.com rewards were about to expire, we decided to take the trip to start off our Spring Break! James had been excited about visiting Jamestown for weeks leading up to this trip.

Amelia was not happy at Jamestown. "Why is there no 'Ameliatown?" There were tears. But she eventually got over it. After we left...

Jamestown was such a cute little town and so fun to walk through. They have an old operating Railway there, but we didn't end up having time to do that activity.

Amelia was fascinated by the oldtime fashions in store windows. "Why is lady wearing a weasel necklace?" Good question, Amelia.

After visiting Jamestown, we checked into our hotel in Sonora. The Sonora Inn was built in 1896 and has seen several celebrities over the years, including Grace Kelley. It hasn't been updated since. But it does have a charm to it and we had a great time. Amelia loved it. She never wanted to leave the hotel. We went to a little Mexican restaurant for dinner in Sonora and watched tv before bed. Is it just me or is The Bourne trilogy ALWAYS on when we are on vacation? I'm so over Jason Bourne, guys. After we arrived, Paul informed us that the place is also haunted! And if that wasn't bad enough, he downloaded a ghost radar app. James was so scared that he took Paul's phone and deleted the app.

The view from the Mexican restaurant

The next morning we got up early and headed out to Angels Camp. The American Studies major in me kinda geeked out here. Having studied Mark Twain's many works in college, it was so great to see where Samuel Clemens became Mark Twain and to understand where he got much of his inspiration from! I loved Angel's camp. The story goes that Mark Twain challenged a boastful hotel guest to prove that his frog could jump as far as he said he could. And every year since the town hosts the Jumping Frog Jubilee!

The entire downtown area is lined with the frog of fame walk like in Hollywood...only the winning frogs of every year. The kids had a blast reading the silly names and comparing the jump lengths.

Amelia and the shiniest frog in town.

We found a great park while in Angel's Camp and let the kids get some wiggles out after being in the car for so long.

James wanted to see how far his arms could reach around this redwood tree in the park.

And so little sis did it too. My cute little tree huggers.

And then James found this little plaque that says that some boy scouts planted this tree!

More Mark Twain photo ops.

And then Paul decided to just drive. On this scary road. We drove past a bunch of caverns (we wanted to go in but just weren't prepared. Flip flops and short sleeves aren't really cave appropriate). We drove through a bunch of other towns I can't remember. The kids were convinced that a tiny smart car was "chasing" us. I finally just stopped telling them that that wasn't true and let them believe it. They were strangely satisfied by this.

We ended our adventure in Columbia State Historic Park. This place was my favorite. The town has been preserved as much as possible. You can't drive cars through the park as it's reserved for stagecoaches only! The docents of the park are all dressed up in period costumes. It was so fun!

The kids got a lesson on how to pan gold and found a few little flakes! They totally think they're rich now.

You know I took my kids in here and just felt lucky that I live in a time when I can go wherever I want!

The kids were hot so we got them some ice cream. Paul was wondering what I was thinking letting them have cones...but you're only a kid once! After this, Amelia tripped and fell and skinned both of her knees pretty badly. The ice cream shop provided us with bandaids and ice. Poor girl was so sad after that and just wanted her mama to hold her.

Before we left, Paul made Amelia's wish of riding in a carriage come true. While on the stage coach ride we were stopped by a gang of thieves! We were told to "stick 'em up" and Amelia kept her arms raised while the gun-toting, bandana-masked bandits made their way through the stagecoach. It didn't occur to me that she might think this was a real thing! So I whispered to her that he was just joking. Her eyes were so wide and she lowered her arms. Later she told us that she totally fell for it and thought we were being robbed and was trying to be brave!

It was such a great trip and so fun to check another place off of our bucket list!

Monday, October 16, 2017

10•15•2017

This week was filled with illness. Amelia was sick. James was sick. Paul was sick. I think they caught what I had last week. It wasn't fun. But there was a silver lining! I finally got to take a week off from my extremely busy life. We cancelled all appointments, classes, play dates, etc. and got to rest and relax and focus on getting better. As an introvert, the hectic schedule of life is extremely draining. For months I have had something going on every single day. It was nice to take a week off and just bake and clean and let Amelia watch Octonauts all day long.

For family night we Booed some neighbors (secretly leaving treats on doorsteps). We decided to just walk around the neighborhood and find homes that didn't already have "We've been Booed" signs on the doors. We got a lot of steps in that night. Apparently there was an earthquake while we were out walking around, but we didn't notice.

Amelia packing lunches in her underwear.

James' school picture came home. That was...interesting. We are doing retakes this year, I think.

Amelia continues to thrive with preschool at home this year. She is breezing through learning all of her letters. She is so proud of the fact that she can write her name by herself. I'm pretty proud of her, too.

The fires in Northern California really impacted our air quality this week. The school asked parents to drive kids to school and recess was indoors all week.

A campfire program had been planned for Thursday night pack meeting, but due to poor air quality we had to move it inside at the last minute. It went pretty well considering we had been scrambling to find a building with gym availability on Wednesday night. The boys had to race to put tents together and all the wolves received the Paws of Skill belt loop. We've officially split the dens and I'm in charge of Wolves now. Pray for me.

On Saturday we took a drive out to Watsonville's Gizdich Ranch where we got Apple-Ollalieberry Pie, Apple Cider Slushes (AMAZING) and let the kids play on farm equipment, climb hay bails and pick pumpkins from a pumpkin patch.

I also forced them into taking Fall pictures. I've been working on my photography skills lately. It's the one thing that I really want to be better at. I need to get a new tripod though so that we can get a good family picture with all of us (Amelia decided that the last one was a chair and it exploded). Then we rushed back to San Jose so that Paul could attend a memorial for a friend who passed away last week.

This Week's Conversation Highlights:

Amelia was upset with me coaxing her to nap and shower with the promise of feeling better. "you said naps would make me feel better and I'm not better. You said a shower would make me feel better and I'm not better! I'm still sick!"

While we were in Utah my dad told James that he has a very important job: annoying his mom. So James tries to annoy me near-constantly (I'm pretty sure this is also and 8 year old boy trait). Every now and then I shoot him the "mom glare" and he grins the biggest grin and says, "what? I'm just doing my job that Pee-Pa gave me."