Aussie Invasion

The last 2 sessions

Now that I have a moment, I can share a few from the last 2 sessions Jinky and I did.  The first 2 are from Lena Hydes family in Florida, and the last 2 are from Sherial Starrs family in San Jose, CA. 

**cry**

They are heading home.  They are in the air now, with about 16 hours left of their flight......yikes!  Hopefully they are sleeping, worn out from a busy day in San Francisco. 

I am so sad.  :(  It was like saying goodbye to family.  3 weeks of fun, and now back to reality. 

Today was a great end to their time in America.  What better city to spend the day in than San Francisco?  I think we did pretty much all the touristy things (No, I didn't have a map, and I am directionally challenged)....took a cable car to Pier 39/Fishermans Warf; got lost in the Presidio; got lost all over SF; finally found Haight/Ashbury; Went over the Golden Gate; Went to Sausalito; Took pics at the Marin Headlands......and said goodbye....for now. 

Tons more pics to post in the days ahead....

The Aussies say goodbye to Sactown

Tonight is their last night in Sacramento.  In the morning, we head to the Bay Area. 

Today we were supposed to do a session with our girls.  Jillian had a funny cough last night, but she kept saying she had a hair in her throat, and I'd look but never saw anything.  She seemed a little tired today, but went out with Walter anyway and got ice cream.  So when they got back Jillian and I left to pick up the girls.  As we drove looking for a place to shoot, Jillian seemed to start feeling worse and worse.  We couldn't find any fields that weren't fenced off, or plowed, so we decided to go back and pick Simon up and go to dinner.  At dinner, Jillian was worse, and felt warm.  So........no session with the girls.  :(  I dropped them back off at their hotel, and took Jillian home.  She had a fever.....poor thing. 

So, it looks like the Uils will be needing to come back soon so I can get a session with all the girls.  Darn.  ;)

Here are a few more random shots from the past week. 

If you look closely at the Dumbo shot, I got all 4 of them.......Jinky and Penny in one Dumbo, and Simon and Talia behind in the other.

Back to Sactown

We're back after a week in S. CA.

The trip didn't start off so well.  I had rented us a house on the beach in Newport Beach.  The pictures online looked okay, but the house wasn't a house, but the top unit of a condo.  That would be fine, had I had rented a condo, and not a house.  Luxury home is how it was described...steps from the beach.  Well, it was far from luxury, and about 2 blocks from the beach.  The rental agent rep was supposed to meet us there at around 10:00, but didn't show until 1:00.  Then gave us attitude, and talked badly about his company.  In the end, after standing on a corner for 3 hours with 4 children,  we decided we didn't want to stay and we drove up to Embassy Suites near Disneyland.  I have yet to speak to someone about the possibility of a refund as my calls weren't returned, and when it finally was returned, we were at Disneyland. 

Whew.....that was just, not cool.  I felt horrible for everyone, but we were so much more comfortable at the hotel.  I suspect we won't have our money refunded as their contract releases them from just about everything, but I'll fight it as well as possible. 

So life was much better at the hotel.  We drove up to Hollywood and Beverly Hills one day.  We went up to Malibu and let the kids play on the beach for a little while.  We saw lots of stars in Hollywood, but Lucille Ball was the only one I recognized.  ;) 

We spent 2 half days at Disneyland.  A few hours was all the kids could take.  It was pretty hot, and after about 11:00 am, it was far too crowded.  We took the kids on Dumbo, the Teacups, It's a Small World, Mr. Toads Wild ride (which was far too scary for them!) the train and some other misc. little rides.  Jinky and family left after lunch to go back to the hotel to rest.  We stayed and met up with Nancy (Wizzy and Friends) and just walked around the park a bit then realized it was far too crowded, so we left. 

The next day of Disneyland the kids made it a bit longer.  We went and rode the Autotopia cars, did the teacups again, did the Storybook boat ride and the Jungle Cruise.  We went back to the hotel, then later, Jinky and I decided to go check out California Adventure.  We only had 2 hours or so before the park closed, so we did the Tower of Terror, which was super cool (the end of the ride photo showed the vice grip jinky had on my arm turned it blue! hahahaha).  It was a fun thrill.  Then we went over to Soaring over California.  That was very cool.  Then we went to Disneyland and rode Indiana Jones.  Did a little shopping then left.

Yesterday Jinky and family spent the day with Tara Whitney while we were lazy around the hotel.  My husbands childhood friend came up in the afternoon to visit and we talked about his music. He's an amazing musician who can do anything.  I mentioned needing Royalty Free stuff for slideshows, stuff that's not all over and he said he could do anything I wanted.  So, we may be in business together before long.  He rocks.  He and my husband went to California Adventure for the evening, so I stayed in with the kids.  Tara and Jinky came back and we ordered room service and had dinner together.  Tara is really nice, and so down to earth.  I'm glad I had the chance to meet her.

Today we got up super early to catch our plane home.  That was pretty uneventful!  We're home, we're tired, and we're nearing the end of our Aussie (ozzy) visit.  :(  Tomorrow we're taking our girls out for a session, then on Monday we head for the Bay Area for a session in San Jose, then to San Francisco for the night.  Tuesday will be touring SF and then to the airport for their redeye flight back.  :(

Here are a few snaps from our week...

This is me and my family.  :) 

the girls.  :heart

Off to the Beach!

We leave tomorrow morning for the Beach til next Saturday.  I'm not bringing my laptop, so I won't be able to blog while I'm there.  :(  I'll be sure to take lots of pictures, and post the details of our adventures when we come back.  Here are a few random pics from the past week.

Thank you Amy for the suckers!  The kids loved them! 

We're back!

What a great tip!!!  So glad to be home, we missed our families so much.  But what an adventure!  We met so many cool people, and saw so many cool places.  It was fantastic!!

I wouldn't suggest ever using Dollar car rental.  They were pretty much our only problem the entire trip.  When we arrived at 4 am to return the car so we could catch our 6:00 am flight back to Sacramento........they were closed.  Another car was waiting too.  I tried to call, couldn't get in touch with anyone.  Travelocity tried and I think succeeded, but not until 5:00 am.  Then the guy showed up, but decided doing other things was more important than getting people to their flights.  Anyway, we made it to our flight, with a little time to spare, but the stress of it was not cool.

Here are a couple pics.

The first, is the view from the hotel pool area in West Palm Beach.  It was *right* on the water.  The hotel was okay, but had some damage from hurricanes.  The next picture  I took of Jinky after we enjoyed a fab dinner of lobster ravioli and champagne.  Mmmmm.  Great way to end our adventure.

A few words about Jinky...

I am SO not a gusher.  Really. I don't have too many friends IRL because people bug me.  I think maybe I have high expectations of my friends.  I dunno.  Anyway......put 2 chicks together, on an 8 day trip, and you never know what you're gonna get.  Add into that, the stress of traveling and the stress of paid sessions that arent' able to be re-shot easily.  Really, all of this is a great test of friendship. 

Thankfully, we have a friendship that just totally rocks.  I absolutely adore Barb.  I am so proud to call her my friend.  We discussed many times how we are so opposite.....like, total opposites.  But we *get* each other.  We both joke a lot, are sarcastic, and I think we're pretty funny.  We giggled a ton, and I really really enjoyed our time together. 

I can't wait to spend a week at the beach with our families.  Disneyland..........here we come!!!

Oh.........I also want to say a HUGE Thank you to our Husbands and kidlets.  They are both truly amazing, for taking care of our kids while we were gone.  I know how difficult it can be after a day with my kids.......but they did it for 8 days.  :)  Thank you guys!

It's humid

Orlando is humid.  Orlando has frogs.  Orlando has AmyS and family.

We met AmyS today and did a session with her family.  They have a gorgeous home, and her daughter is just a doll!   Her family is just so cute!  Ok, I don't feel like posting a lot tonight. 

I got jumped by an attack frog last night.  That was exciting.  Amy had us wading in a spring, that had squishy mud in the bottom, and I kinda freaked out a bit.  What was under all that squish???  Blah.  Probably frogs.  ;)

We went for a real Aussie meal at the Outback Steakhouse.  Jinky felt very much at home.   It was a Bloomin good time. 

Check out Amy's cutie...

Take 2

*sigh*  I had a big long post about todays events, had issues posting images, so I quickly copied my text so I wouldn't lose it......and.......well, yeah, I lost it.  :(

So, I'll save the story for tomorrow. 

We are safely in Orlando.  Here is a map showing where we have been and will be, and where we "stopped" on our flights. 

Fun day in Boston!

Ohhhh I really really love it here.  It's SO beautiful, and so full of history.  The buildings here are so beautiful, and around every corner I was so excited to see another gorgeous building.  So, I spent the morning taking pictures of cool buildings.  Oh fun!  Ask me what they are, or why they are, and I can't tell you, I can just say they are super cool!

We spent the morning and early afternoon wandering around Boston downtown on foot.  We ended up at Newbury Street, checking out some cool shops.  We bought a bunch of T-Shirts in one store that had tons of cool T-Shirts.  Then we spied an Indian shop that did Henna Tats, so we each got 2.  That was fun.  The woman who did them was so talented and so nice.  The picture below is of Jinky's Henna Tat in progress. 

We came back to the hotel, and had lunch, a beer and came up to the room to get ready for our session with Reb. 

Reb picked us up at our hotel (thank you SO much!), the we went to the camera shop to buy Jinky a new camera.  Yes, another camera.  She's the proud new owner of the 5d.  I'm green.  GREEN.  Then we headed to Rebs house to start the session.  Her 3 boys are so cute, and so much fun, just full of life and energy.  We started inside, then headed outside.  Later we went to the Arboretorium (is that how it's spelled??) and let the boys run, and took some pics there. 

Then we went back to their house, chatted for a while, Joshua drew Jinky this great picture (below) then Reb, Jinky and I headed to Finale for dinner/dessert with Teya, Angela and Tracey.  Great food, great conversation, great fun!   Thank you all for driving out!

 

From our hotel in Boston

I took these when we arrived...  In the second one, notice the lovely screened window on the right.....ha!