Introducing Doctor Adams!!

I am so proud to share that BJ graduated with his Doctorate in Physical Therapy from the University of Southern California!!! USC is the #1 physical therapy program in the country. He spent countless hours studying as well as countless hours working for free. All of these years in school have finally come to an end!

BJ's parents and my family came out to attend the graduation. It was great having everyone together!!

Tommy the Trojan

The graduate!

We had a USC style party after the graduation. 

Congrats Dr. Adams!

The party goers. Credit to Gingre for being behind the camera. 

So so proud of him!!! 

Thanksgiving 2015

As you can tell there is no real order to this blog. I'm kind of 'blog vomiting' the past year and a half per request of my cousin Karen so please excuse the lack of organization.

Mandi, Clay, and pops came to California for Thanksgiving!

Since I only had a couple of days off for Thanksgiving I sure was not going to spend the whole day cooking. So we had our Thanksgiving dinner at the Storytellers Cafe at the Grand California Hotel. Let me tell you it did not disappoint. I have never had such good food in my life. This is where I will be spending my Thanksgivings.

As you can see behind Mandi and Clay ti is a buffet... a THANKSGIVING BUFFET! Needless to say we were all beyond stuffed by the end and had to roll ourselves to the car. We were all really close to pulling up a bench and taking a nap. 

The whole clan together. Ginger really wanted a picture... pops not so much.

We went on a hike when they came to visit. Did I mention how I love California and that you can be outside in the winter time without freezing your buns off?? It's amazing!

The 'waterfall'. Easy to see that we are in a drought.

I love when they come to visit! I wish they would just move out here already!

Visitors

As I was looking through my pictures from 2015 and the first half of this year I realized we had so many visitors! I wanted to dedicate a post to all of our awesome guests; we absolutely love when people come to stay with us (so please keep coming:).

SCOTT'S VISIT

So this was SUPER long ago... Like over a year.....like he's married now and has a baby on the way. I'm a little behind. BJ and Scott spent most of the days surfing. It was fun having Scott come visit!

Brotherly Love

It was Easter when Scott came so I made them do a super intense Easter Egg Hunt. I'm sure they were thrilled...

SHELLEY AND DUSTY'S VISIT

Dusty came to visit us for the first time (finally;). Dusty and Shelley are my cousins and Dusty was a good friend of BJ's growing up so we all have such a fun time when we get together!

I call this "Reunited and it feels so good"

On the tram to Six Flags

Our faces depict the day we had at Six Flags... Poor BJ was sick the whole day and Dusty.....well Dusty had an unpleasant experience on one of the rides as well. We'll leave it at that. 

On our way to Disneyland!

We included Dusty in our traditional 'Ears Photo' No words area really necessary for this gem.

I think I saw Daisy blush.

SHELLEY'S VISIT

Shelley' an awesome friend/cousin and came multiple times in one year. The two of us are in heaven when we get to go to Disneyland together.

I make her take awkward pictures with me....she's a good sport.

She also rides the Merry-Go-Round with me....not many others do that for me.

Possibly THE most awkward photo in Disney history. We don't even care that much about Frozen but there was no line....and the line used to be three hours just a year ago....so we felt compelled to take advantage.

Tradition

KRISTIE'S VISIT

Ginger and my friend, Kristie, came from Utah to visit! She actually came out a couple of times because we convinced her that it was best to buy a season pass to Disneyland:) It was her first time going to Disneyland!!

Three Utah friends with season passes to Disneyland.

San Diego and San Francisco

Over the past year we took the opportunity to explore different parts of California. It made me fall in love with this state even more!

We spent a long weekend in San Diego where we went to Sea World, the San Diego Zoo, Coronado Island, snorkeled at La Jolla Cove, and ate amazing food!

We stopped to see the San Diego Temple which is beautiful.

Coronado Island. I will live here one day...

My spirit animal. They sun bathe, swim, nap, and eat. All my favorite things. If reincarnation is real I sure hope I come back as a sea lion.

Too cute. We waited in a huge line to see this guy... but his cuteness was worth it. 

This is why I should blog sooner, I can't remember much about this strange creature. Just know it's some super rare species... 

Our Sea World tickets came with a free day. So later in the year we took a day trip with Ginger. Sea World is one of Ginger's favorite places so it was fun to experience it with her. She was a champion and only slept about 3 hours after working long night shifts right before the trip. 

Christmas season at Sea World

Ginger's spirit animal: the sea otter

BJ's spirit animal: Dolphin. It's perfect for him; fast swimmer and always happy.

Our 2016 Christmas Card  (or maybe awkward family photos....)

Early this year I also had to make several more trips to San Francisco for work. It was fun to explore the city more and eat way too much Italian food. But it sure wasn't the same without Mandi. I'll limit myself to only a few photos of my new favorite city since I already dedicated an entire blog post to it. 

I walked half way on the Golden Gate Bridge. 

The Bay Bridge light show

I'm finally done making trips to the Bay Area. While I loved the experience it was definitely becoming quite exhausting. I hope to go again sometime for vacation purposes only.