Thanksgiving in San Diego

We had such a fun time on our trip to San Diego the week of Thanksgiving!  We were fortunate to meet up with my parents and my brother and his girlfriend.  We stayed on Coronado Island and were super close to the beach and all the cute shops and fun things to do!

Right after we arrived, we headed straight for the beach.  There are few things that are better than watching your kids play in the ocean.  They all loved it!

On Thanksgiving morning we walked around downtown Coronado and then rented bikes and cruised around the perimeter of the island on the scenic bike route!  Maya and Jacob rode in little trailers behind Joe and I.  Gabi was big enough to ride her own bike.  Maya is a great bike rider as well, but they didn't have any her size.

Snoozin....

Beach cruisers are so fun to ride!!

It was a good thing we got some exercise Thanksgiving morning because we ate dinner at the Hotel del Coronado Thanksgiving buffet.  It was AMAZING!  There was anything and everything one ever dreamed of eating and all so good!  They even topped it off with a 15 foot chocolate fountain with all kids of things for dipping!  The kids were in heaven.

The whole clan headed in for dinner

Such a great time!  So thankful for my family!

Jacob's feast...he actually ate most of it!!

The kids burned off some energy at the pool after dinner.  Jacob loved walking around the courtyard.

Checking out the "moooooon!"

Family picture time on the beach Friday morning!

And finally we let them swim in their swim suits!! It was 85 degrees!  The warm weather and sunshine felt so good!

On Friday afternoon, the guys went golfing and my mom stayed with Jacob while he took a nap, so the girls and I headed back to the beach for more swimming and boogie boarding!  Gabi really got the hang of boogie boarding and had a blast!

View of the hotel

Such a fun time with my girls!!

We also got lots of family time in and the usual shenanigans.  :)

Humongous pizza we ate one night!

On Saturday, we went to Sea World!  The kids loved the shows and seeing all of the marine life!

Dolphin show....Gabi's favorite

In a tunnel under the shark tank!

Shamu show...Maya's favorite

The plane ride to San Diego was only slightly delayed.  The plane ride back to Billings came with a 5 hour delay/layover in Denver.  The kids managed okay, but we were pretty thankful when we got home.  What a day that was!

Jacob sleeping on the plane...this might be the hardest age to travel with.

Happy to be home and help empty out the suitcases. :)

Silly airplane pics.

Why do selfies always make me look so tired?  or do I always look this tired? :)

 We are very thankful for such a warm, relaxing, memory filled, and fun trip!

Windy Ridge Fire

On Saturday, November 8th, Amanda & I were driving home after attending a craft fair in town.  As we drove up the mesa on Upper French Creek Rd, we spotted smoke.  At first we thought a house was on fire, but it soon became apparent that it was a forest fire on the South side of Windy Ridge.  It is suspected that it started at a shooting range near Hwy 16.  We spent the rest of the day Saturday watching the fire grow larger and larger.  

11:30 AM Saturday...view from our house...fire started on opposite side of the ridge (south side)

4:00 PM Saturday...flames visible on top of the ridge.

5:30 PM Saturday...definitely visible on ridge...just started to jump over.

2:00 AM Sunday...burning down North side of Windy Ridge towards us

I will always remember the sounds I heard when I took this picture...it was so quiet (like usual), but I could HEAR the fire.  I could also hear coyotes whimpering and lots of other unusual animal noises!  I could also hear the firemen that were stationed along Upper French Creek Rd in murmured voices.  It was surreal and so very eerie.

This is a zoom in at the top near the towers.  We watched trees exploding all night.  Note the taillights on the right side of this picture.  The firefighters saved the towers and we could see them fighting the flames all night!

4:00 AM...these are the "three trees" which has been known as the first resting stop on the way to the top of Windy for a long time!  The fire actually didn't burn these trees down!  It burnt around them!

6:00 AM...dusk...nobody in sight and it was starting to get a little close for comfort.

Note the firetrucks on top of the mesa on the left side of this picture...they had a patrol scrape a fire line along that edge so the fire wouldn't come over.  It worked!!

The firefighters showed up around 7:00 AM and quickly made a plan and acted!

The scraped a fire line between the ranch and the base of Windy and lit a fire to back burn.  We are SO LUCKY that the winds turned and sent the fire back onto itself!  We were told by some firemen later that if this hadn't of happened, the fire most likely would have burned to French Creek (on the other side of our house).  Eek!

You can kind of see the fire line running parallel to Dave's fence in the distance where the fire trucks are.

The patrol "scraper" that made the fire breaks.

After our immediate fire danger was over, we continue to watch the fire burn across (west) Windy.  We could see them lighting fires using flares and drip torches.  It was actually pretty cool to watch!  Every once in a while a tree would burst into flames.

A very welcome sight.

Joe took this picture when he went with his dad to check on some cows a little further up the road.

Gabi's card for the firefighters

Maya's card for the firefighters.

 And to hide the scar...a fresh layer of snow fell Sunday evening.  It hasn't melted yet and probably won't for awhile.

We're going to try to hike to the three trees tomorrow (the 16th) just to check it out.  As much as I hate to see a black Windy Ridge, I know it won't last long.  It will be a wonderful science lesson for our kids to see how Mother Nature renews herself and the miracles that fire can bring.  We probably won't see any elk on Windy this winter/spring, but I bet they will be back in full force once that green grass starts coming back!

We are so very thankful to our county firefighters and to all of the other agencies that responded.  At one point there were 170 people working on the fire (and most of them volunteer!!)  No houses were lost and the communication towers were saved!)