san diego

some fun things have been happening with us. the reason is because tanner resigned from myspace and took a job with amazon. we are really so excited about the change and can't wait to see how tanner will thrive in a new job. he postponed his start date at amazon, which gave us just over 2 whole weeks with a free tanner. it was awesome.

so, to start out this two week adventure, we went down to san diego for two days/one night to use our sea world passes before they were up(we went about 18 months ago which automatically got us the next two years for free... good deal!).

we went down on friday with not as much time in san diego as we would have liked (tanner had to work that morning (on side project stuff) and then we hit some traffic) but still walked around and went to the shark exhibit and then let the boys play in the big play ground area for a while.

when sea world closed we went to our hotel and got dinner, then enjoyed the fun pool and hot tub that evening. the bottom right picture in the collage (above) was in our hotel room with the boys all lounging in one bed.

the next morning we woke up and went straight to the beach that was right across from our room.

then we got dressed and headed to sea world again. we saw a couple shows (shamu definitely being the boys favorite) and the boys each got to pick out a little whale toy from the gift shop which they thought was pretty awesome.

we all had a great time and the boys seriously loved it... which means we'll probably be planning another sea world outing before our passes expire.

merrell family vacation

its been far too long since my last post. sorry mom! but in the mean time i have been busy and having fun. my oldest sister, jordan, came into town with her husband and three boys. i had so much fun hanging out with them while they were here and miss them a lot already. so here was last week -

tuesday late afternoon jordan + fam arrived at my apartment in santa monica. that night we ate dinner and spent some time on the santa monica pier. tanner was really excited to take my two older nephews on some of the fun rides, but unfortunately they were all closed by the time we got there. maybe next time.

easton keeping eli company in his crib

cutie brennen waiting his turn to get in

wednesday was disneyland day! i love that place. we spent the day between disneyland and california adventure and one of my new favorite rides has to be the toy story mania game at c.a. it was definitely worth the 30 min wait.

eli and i waiting in line for the haunted mansion

on thursday eli and i drove down to meet up with the merrell fam and my grandparents at sea world. it had been a long time since i saw my grandparents so it was great being able to catch up with them even if it was only for 1/2 a day.

after the shamu show

my mom's parents with all the great-grandsons

tyson and eli were best buds on this trip. it was so cute seeing tyson interact with eli and how protective he was of him. before tanner came around i liked to think i was one of tyson's favorite people, but now sadly, even in my little elton family, i think the order is now eli, tanner, and then myself. oh well.

jordan and brennen came with eli and i to a hotel that night. i was very glad because as you can tell by the way we moved the desk, we were a little worried with the sketchiness. i dont know if we will have tanner book another hotel room for us in the future.

friday we went to the animal kingdom park. i dont know if its cause i've been to tanzania on an actual safari, or the park was just a little lame, but i wasn't too impressed. but we still had fun spending time together so thats all that matters

eli was apparently a little bored with the park as well

i had so much fun with jordan and her family and am already wanting them to come back. jor, why dont you just convince matt to move here? that would be awesome.

sea world

last saturday tanner and i went to sea world with another couple in our ward (for some reason we only took video of them and i couldnt figure out how to get video on here).  i hadn't been their since i was little so it was fun going back to see what it was like and spend a day out in the california sun.  but when looking at the pictures try not to get me confused with shamu....seriously....