The Jones Girls

After my meeting with Lyn, I went home and packed us all up to go away for the weekend.  Cliff was ready to have some fun after working so much.   We also brought our dog Teddy.

We drove up to Camarillo and I gave them a tour of where I grew up and the homes I lived in..on Merced Drive and on Lemon Street.    

We stopped by Cliff’s customer, Alberto.  What a nice guy.    The girls and I got out, did a bathroom run, then took Teddy out for a walk.  We walked past a building with barrels…it was a winery!!   The lady in the office kept staring at us walking Teddy.  Then she walked out and asked if that was her dog.  I said no.  Then her dog appeard and her dog looked exactly like Teddy!!  Her dog’s name is Lucy.   She invited us in and we had a nice chat,.    I purchased a present for Steven and Reyna’s 25th Wedding anniversary present.    I got them a signature wine from the winery (good bottle of wine..$35) and got them 2 gift certicates for a wine tasting and they can taste fresh from the barrel.   It doesn’t get better for fresher than this!!  I thought this would be a unique gift.

Cliff wrapped up his meeting with Alberto and we continued onto Venture to meet our friend Barbara Hobbins and visit our dog Scottie, who now lives with Barbara.  Our plan was to have dinner with Barbara.  When we got to her house, she didn’t answer the door.  She was gone.  So we went and had dinner at Marie Calendars.

We enjoyed the famous cornbread @ Marie Calendars.  After eating 3/4 of it Savannah started freaking out saying aunts.  There were ants crawling in her cornbread!!   By this time we were already eating our dinner.   The manager comped our dinner and gave us a whole pie.   Barbara was home so we took her the Razzleberry Pie to her house and had a very nice visit.

At about 9pm went drove to Oxnard to Steve & Reyna’s house.    We gave them their present and they really like it.  We partied and had so much fun.   At about midnight we all went to bed.

The next morning we all got up and got ready for Steve & Reyna’s big 25th wedding anniversary brunch.  We all dressed up.     We drove to Five Points Sheraton off of Harbor Blvd.    What a beautiful reception it was!!   Reyna was dressed in a beautiful white gown that looked similar to a wedding gown.     I was suprised to see some old friends there, Janet and Mike.   We had so much fun!!   Steve & Reyna’s son played the piano beautifully and entertained us all.

We left at about 2pm and drove by our old house on “M” Street.  Then we drove home and got ready to go to Disneyland.

We arrived at Disneyland at about 7pm.  We wanted to see the show Fantasmic and it started at 9pm.  They have a new dragon in the show and we wanted to see it before the show goes on hiatus till May.  Tonight was the last night it was running and it was very crowded.  It is a good thing we got there at 7pm to get a decent spot.  It was a wonderful show and the girls really enjoyed it.   We also got to enjoy the fireworks too.   We got home at 11:30pm.

What a fantastic weekend!!

Today is our last day at Paradise Point.   I don’t want to leave…waaah!!    I called the Front Desk and got to speak to Annette and she arranged for a late check out.   Yay!!

The girls begged for more pool time and more beach time.  So we spent a couple of hours playing on the beach and then headed over to the pool for a while.  

Then I packed us all up.  That was not fun.    My 10lb pkg in 5lb bucket turned into a 20lb pkg in a 5lb bucket…yikes!!     I crammed everything in and slowly crawled out of the Paradise Point.   Please Gimme More of this resort.  I love this place.   I will be coming again for sure.

I decided I wanted to take the girls on a Harbor Cruise of San Diego Bay.  So I used my handy dandy GPS Navigator (I know nickname it Navi) and it guided me to the Harbor.   We purchased our tickets and were just in time for the next harbor cruise.   What a breathtaking tour it was.    There was a lot of fascinating facts and topics during the narration of our cruise.     We all had a great time.

Cliff has been in Arkansas working on a water purification project.    We miss him a lot.  He called me just as we were driving out of the San Diego Harbor area.     I told him we had a great time.  

We did a quick stop drive thru at Del Taco and then headed up to Tustin, about 1/2 hours north of San Diego for a cook out family picnic with my multiple moms club.

We spent a few hours at the cook out and I won the 50/50 raffle!    Just enough money to fill up the gas tank!!  Yippee!!

One neat thing that Sea World is offering is when you buy a ticket, you can go as much as you want till the end of the year.  So this meant we could go again and again.  We decided we would go back to Sea World in the early evening.

We spent the day enjoying the beach.    The girls grabbed their sand shovel kits and we walked to the beach…all of about 20 steps and we were on the beach from our bungalow.  It can’t get better than this.  

The sand was so soft.   We went out to the water and it was amazing.  The water was shallow to our calves for about 20 feet or so.    It was the perfect beach for us.   We walked along the beach collecting different shells and they learned about all of the different sea kelp and sea weed.    I showed them the little holes in the wet sand were made by tiny sea crabs.    They made sand castles and met little friends and helped them make their sand castles even bigger.     It was just beautiful.

We ventured over to the jacuzzi for a bit then headed to our bungalow for showers and change of clothes.   We headed out to Sea World at 6:45pm.

At 7:45pm we found ourselves at Shamu’s stadium anxiously awaiting to see a neat night time show called Shamu Rocks!    We stayed away from the soaker seats…LOL!!

Afterwards we enjoyed some neat nighttime entertainment called Summer Nights.   That was fun and amazing to see.   

We then visited some fish exhibits and by 9:45pm we headed back to our bungalow.

Another beautiful day in paradise…

After we got up and had breakfast, we all got ready and headed out for Sea World.    Little did I know from learning from my GPS Navigator in my handy dandy minivan, Paradise Point was only 1 mile from Sea World.   Apparently, Paradise Point Resort is the closest resort property to Sea World.  Well, what do ya know!   

So a short drive over a bridge and in 4 minutes after leaving Paradise Point, we entered the Sea World parking lot.   Totally convenient.   More thumbs up for Paradise Point!!

Sea World has added some fun things for the kids.   They now have a themed Elmo adventure park.  It has all kinds of cool little rides and splash park  for kids.   We had a blast in there .

We headed over to the Shamu show.   We opted to sit in the “soak” section.   It was a hot day and we wanted to cool off.  We enjoyed the show and didn’t get wet at all.

We got to pet the dolphins but unfortunately we couldn’t feed them since they are on a strict eating schedule of early morning hours before the park opens.

We decided to go watch the dolphin show.    It was packed so the only seats available were in first row – yep you guessed it – the soaker row.     Oh well, it was a hot day so we weren’t too worried about it.   Well, these cutsie little sweet dolphins faked us out!!    We were surprised that they can splash just as much water as Shamo can!!   We got S.O.A.K.E.D.     We smelled like an aquarium – nice!!

The girls wanted to check out the Arctic area where the penguins were.  That was nice.

I had to execture my promise to the girls to pick out a Sea World Toy.   They all got cute Shamo squeakie toys.    Boy, was that a noisy choice!!

At about 5:30pm we ventured out of Sea World and did some shopping to get some swim rings and pool paraphernalia.    Then I swung by Subway for sandwiches for diner.  

Then we headed back to the resort.   At check-in yesterday, the front had told me that they today at 8:00pm were showcasing a Disney movie (Wall-E) on a large screen at the main pool.  All of the kids could swim in the pool and watch the movie.   The resort provided free smores, popcorn and movie.  We hailed down the bell boy and he drove us to the pool.  We had a lot of fun in the pool watching the movie and ate our sub sandwiches for dinner there. 

Another perfect day in paradise…

This morning I felt like taking our new minivan onto the open road.   Doggone it, if I am going to have car payments, I am going to enjoy driving my new hooptie!!

I have been fantasizing about staying at this resort called Paradise Point in San Diego.  I had seen this resort previewed on the Jon & Kate Plus 8 show.   The thing that impressed me was that if it was safe and good enough for the Gosselins multiples, by golly, it should be perfect for the Jones Multiples!!  

Paradise Point is on its own island.  It consists of dozens of acres of lush tropical surroundings, with 6 salt water pools and 4 of them are perfectly suitable for little kids.  All of the accommodations are private bungalows and each offers it own little private grassy backyard with comfy Adirondack chairs and table on a nice sized patio.    The most outstanding part of this property is that it is completely surrounded by beaches.    Every bungalow is just steps away from the beach!!  You have to check this little piece of heaven on earth…  www.ParadisePoint.com

I just so happen to be putting together a presentation as a guest speaker for both of my moms clubs on the subject of family travel within a radius of 2 hours from La Habra in Orange County.  Paradise Point would be the perfect property for me to showcase for my presentation, especially for my multiple moms club.

I called Paradise Point at 10am this morning and spoke to Annette, the Manager of Reservations.  I told her my interest in previewing and showcasing the resort for my guest speaker presentation.    We negotiated a price for our stay at the Paradise Point.   We have an awesome bungalow waiting for us.   We will be there today through this Friday – yipee!!    Look out

Have you ever seen a woman pack  10 pounds of stuff in a 5 pound bucket?  Well, I sure did !!  I packed all of the comforts of home for me and the girls- including a microwave for our food so we could have some easy heat up foods in our bungalow.       It took me about 1 hour to pack and another hour to get the girls are ready and then we headed out to our vacation to paradise.  

I used my handy dandy GPS navigator and it got us there perfectly.     As we were driving up the driveway, it was just like being in Hawaii.    There was so much attention paid to detail.   Check-in at the lobby was easy breasy.  We were met by the bell boy who asked if I needed any assistant.    I was good to go but and thanked him anyway.   Check this out.  The bell boy has his own 8 seater golf cart mobile that will transport resort guests all over the property.    He will also do errands around the property or whatever.   Nothing is impossible for the bell boy – tip is the hook to get awesome service with the bell boy.  We did use him to take us to the little store that they have on the property.  Very convenient.  I just phoned and they had the bell boy with his 8 seater ready to whisk us away.  Totally cool dude!!

So we unpacked our stuff and headed out to the pool.   It was the first time the triplets were in a deep pool.  The pool was perfect because it had a gradual decline, so they could slowly walk into the pool.    The jacuzzi was well loved by the girls too.

At night they had amazing fire pits blazing with flames.    These fire pits were located around the 6 different pools. The fire pits looked so beautiful.   They had tiki torches in every nook and cranny of the resort.   It was like I was on the show survivor.    The property welcomed people to roast marshmallows and make smores around the fire pit.  How cool is that!!      We went to the store  (thanks bell boy) to purchase their signature smoores package which comes complete with long wooden sticks, marshmallows and the smoores fixins.     Fun times at the fire pit – yes baby!!

Sunday we caravan-ed with Steve and the family to Hollywood Hills.    Mindy was awed by the high profile area.  We drove along Laurel Canyon.    

When we arrived, it was at this amazing house!!    The entry had a fountain full of fish nestled in a bunch of rocks.  The girls perched themselves there and had a ball.  There was a circular stair case and the party was happening upstairs.  We all went upstairs and were greeted by all of Cliff’s family – his siblings, parents, grandparents and numerous cousins.  He has a cousin who has triplets so the kids had a ball playing with the other triplets!! 

The house was super sleek, decorated in Mardi Gras theme with blacks, hot pinks, golds and mirrors!!   It was truly an art form.     With so many people in the house, it made it unbearably hot.  Everyone was sweating profusely.

We e left at about 5pm and headed back on the 101-south back to our house in La Habra.

What a great vacation we had.    Relaxing, cool and lovely. Thank you so much Steve and Reyna for making us feel loved and like family.

I tel you, Steve and Reyna are the best hosts!!   We felt so comfortable and welcome at their home.  They invited us to stay another night and attend their family reunion which was held on Sunday in Hollywood Hills.  We were thrilled!!

Saturday we planned a fun and exciting day at the park which is adjacent to the beach in Oxnard.  Steve packed up his RV and the girls piled in his RV. I followed in my car and we all drove to the park and beach!!   This was the first time for the girls to drive in an RV.  How exciting for them.

This park was massive.  The playground was magical.  The girls played there for about 3 hours.  Then Steve grilled burgers for us and we had lunch.  

Reyna had to work in the morning and she joined us for burgers.   Their daughter flew in from San Francisco and joined us for burgers also.  We drank wine (in real wine glasses!!)  and Steve had beer.  It was so fun.

We wandered over to the beach.    The girls brought along their shovels and pails.   They played till their heart’s delight.  We all got our feet wet and breathed in the soothing ocean air.  It was perfect.

Then a guy carrying his pet iguana came over to us and asked if the girls would like to pet his iguana.  He told us he had his pet for 22 years!!  The girls were in awe and just amazed!!  I got lots of pictures.   Reyna thought it was pretty special too.

People were flying kites on the beach and in the park.  The girls chased after the kites.  There was a Nemo kite and the girls, especially, Savannah, was mesmerized by it.

We left the park at sunset, 7:30pm or so.

Then we got home, cleaned up and then went over to Steve’s bakery.   He gave us a tour of the baker and surprised the girls!!   They got to make and decorate their own cupcakes.    He looked so proud.     It was just way too much fun!!