okay -
I'm sorry in advance.. I have alot of somewhat redundant pictures but when it comes to thinning them out..... I just can't

so you'll have to suffer thru my gazillions of pictures
http://share.shutterfly.com/action/w...wzcsWY&notag=1

in my defense, we were gone for 10 days so really, the quantity for 10 days isn't THAT bad

Very neat! Looks like you all had a great time!

Wonderful pictures Karen! You all seem to have had a great time!

I love the camping pics!!! Those redwood trees are SO BIG!!! WOW!!! THe sand dunes you were at remind me of the ones we use to visit in NC. They are shifting so fast and not as big as they use to be when I was a little girl. I need to get my camping trip set up!!
Oh and how was the quick trip to the IL's?

It wasn't so bad at the ILs.
the kids spent a couple hours in the pool there, they watched a movie, and we had dinner there and it wasn't too terribly bad.

MIL is starting to understand what I say is what I mean. Took her long enough.
I also pulled a bunch of her shenanagans.
the kids didn't want to have anything to do what what she was BBQing on the bbq (ribs) and so I got out the hot dogs from our cooler (had them left over from our camping trip).
then the kids said "I want mashed potatoes"
I just happened to have a package of the idahoan potatoes in our camping food stash too that I threw in there as "extra" just in case. So I whipped those out and fixed them for the kids.
When it was breakfast time and all they had was nasty cereal, the kids looked at me and I pulled out the kid cereal from our stash too
MIL had a watermelon she bought for dinner. I happened to have a bunch of left over watermelon from our camping trip already all cut up and I figured turn about was fair play and so I pulled out my not-so-tasty watermelon (it wasn't the best one I could have selected in the store ) and made her serve my already cut up stuff before it spoiled and she had to keep her fresh one to eat by herself after we were gone
It was sort of satisfying that we were using my food instead of her food that she'd special bought because she insists on using her food all the time (which is inferior to my food alot of times) while mine sits in the fridge and goes bad. (all because she can't plan properly ... long story )