Like I mentioned earlier, we took a little trip to San Diego on November 21st and 22nd, and since it is pretty close to Yuma, it only took about two and a half hours to drive there. On that Friday, one of Trent's coworkers had his adopted son sealed to him and his wife so Trent attended the sealing at the San Diego temple. I didn't go in because one us of needed to stay outside and watch Brooke and Jade. We had fun waiting out there, though, because the kids just played in the grass and looked at all the flowers (and sometimes tried to pick them). The missionary couple out there was also from Boise.
The hotel that we stayed in was very nice and right by the ocean; plus we got a good deal on it so it was relatively inexpensive. Of course, it was too cold to swim in the ocean, but the hotel had a heated pool and hot tub outside so we were able to swim anyway. On Saturday, we went to the San Diego Zoo. I think that the zoo is pretty neat and there are lots of animals, but
I have one complaint. It is ridiculously expensive in my opinion. For Trent, Brooke, and myself to get in (Jade was free) it cost $92! When I consider that it probably would have cost about $20 to get into the Boise Zoo, it makes me cringe a little. The San Digeo Zoo does have a petting zoo, some animal shows (like sea lions), a bus tour, and a sky ride among a few other things, but I am still not so sure that it's worth it when essentially all that you're doing is looking at animals. I don't necessarily think that the San Diego Zoo was almost 5 times more enjoyable than the Boise Zoo. I have to add that the food was beyond ridiculous in price so if you ever go there and want to save a little (actually a lot of) money, make sure to bring your own food (even snacks and drinks). I understand that a good portion of the money from the tickets goes towards conservation, research, and whatnot, but now that I have been there twice and Brooke and Jade have
been there, I don't feel a need to return for quite sometime.
I don't want to sound really negative about the zoo because it does have some neat things. We were able to see a lot of animals that aren't at the Boise Zoo, like flamingos (my favorite), rhinoceroses, polar bears and elephants. They also have twin bears that were found in the wild in Idaho a few years ago; they had been orphaned when their mother died. There are panda bears as well, but we didn't see them. One has to wait in line, and the line was way too long. Since the zoo is so big, I don't think that we even saw all of it. We were there for at least four hours and were exhausted by the time we left.
e in Arizona so it wasn't cold and we are away from all of our family on both sides. Then there is the not so obvious way -- the car that crashed into our backyard. On Christmas, at 11:30 pm, a car crashed through the cinder block wall that serves as our back fence. Trent was at work at the time, and the kids were in bed, of course. I was on the computer when I heard a crash and then something flew through window just to the side of computer. Not knowing what it was and being thoroughly frightened, I grabbed the phone and ran in Brooke's room. I called 911 and told them what happened. They said they were getting reports that a car had crashed
into the wall. So the police came and discovered that a car had indeed crashed into the wall, and it was a piece of the wall that flew through our window. (In the picture, you can faintly see glass right below the window although it was spread out more than that. The pieces of the wall that broke the window are in the lower right by the couch pillows.) The front of the car was completely smashed in and the driver's side of it was lodged against a street light, causing the light to lean at an angle. Because of the light, the car wasn't removed for several hours as the power company had to come remove the light first. The driver of the car (I am assuming he was intoxicated) actually fled but was found shortly after. I am just really grateful that the car didn't go into our yard any further; that part of the wall is only about ten feet from the window that was broken and I was sitting only a few feet beyond that (in the first photo, the wall of the house is just beyond the right edge of the picture so you can see how close the cinder block wall is to the house). So until the damage is repaired, we now have a hole in our window and a hole in the back wall of
our yard. The hole in the wall is particularly vexing because we can't let the kids go out back without us, and now anyone has easy access to our backyard (which is up against a fairly busy road). So, needless to say, this wasn't the best Christmas surprise.
