Jenna - EIGHT

 Happy 8th Birthday Jenna Mae Nullmeyer!

I sure wish I could rewind time and keep you young forever. Everything about you if just soft and sweet and kind. You continue to be the peacemaker of the family. 

If there is a conflict, you will often "give in" and give up your preferred option, just to keep your brothers happy. While I appreciate your sweet spirit, I also want you to learn how to stand up for yourself.

You stretched out so much this year! You've lost your baby fat in your face. You have long skinny legs and though you continue to grow taller, you haven't gained much weight this year. I think Andrew may catch up to you soon in weight!

You love playing with anything soft and squishy and cute. You currently love bunny rabbits and any sort of stuffed animal. You cry when I try to get you to donate a few of your stuffed friends! (You have become more emotional this past year). But still quite goofy!

You can often be found at our school table, writing and illustrating a new little story. Your stories are so precious! You are a terrific reader and read in bed at night with a flashlight for probably close to an hour every night. Sometimes you're still reading when I'm done reading!

As soft and sweet as you are, you are amazingly athletic and determined on the sports field. You are SO fast! You really excelled at soccer this year, running laps around your teammates. You were often one of the youngest and smallest players on the field, but you made up for that in speed and natural skill.

You joined a children's choir this year and you really enjoy it! You were quite timid at first, but your teacher says you've really blossomed during practice. You recently told me that you want to play soccer and sing in a choir "until they don't exist anymore".

You naturally gravitate to healthier foods. You love cucumbers and salad and you hate gooey melted cheese. If I ask your brothers what they want for lunch they might say pizza or tacos. You will request something like "garbanzo beans with cucumbers and italian dressing, with a peanut butter-butter sandwich on whole wheat bread, and pear slices". 

Your latest obsession is baking homemade shortbread....all by yourself! You even made yourself a little recipe book with all your flavor combination ideas.

A trip down memory lane:

Newborn Jenna

1 Year

2 Years

3 Years

4 Years

5 Years

6 Years

7 Years

8 Years

Jenna, I just love so many special things about you. Your sweet giggly voice, your gentle spirit, your spunk on the sports field, your creativity, your thoughtfulness, and your love for God. Happy Birthday my sweet girl!

San Diego Vacation

Our family tradition has always been to take some sort of trip during the summer. This year, we decided to take advantage of being homeschoolers and go on our vacation in the Fall, while everyone else was in school. We also decided it was time for our kids to take their first plane ride, so we planned a trip to San Diego! We flew out on a Tuesday morning with plans to fly back home Saturday night.

Excited (kids) and anxious (me). It had been 8 years since I'd been on an airplane and I was pretty nervous, but I managed not to let it show in front of the kids!

Thankfully the flight was smooth and uneventful. After we landed and got our rental car, we had about 4 hours until we could check into our hotel. So we drove over to the marina. Our first impressions of San Diego? Overcast......and dirty! This part of San Diego felt more much more run-down than I was expecting.

We opted to get lunch by the water at a little place called Carnita's. October is "Kids Eat Free" at many restaurants in San Diego, and we had selected this place ahead of time for that reason.

I'm glad I documented my lunch with a photo because it was the best meal I had the entire time we were there! Fish tacos for the win.

After our bellies were full we rented this fun little family bike. There was a path we could follow along the harbor. It was fun to stop and look at all the boats (While dodging all the homeless laying on the sidewalks. Another part of San Diego I wasn't expecting). 

Next we checked into our hotel room. (Homewood Suites by the airport) Adam and Ryan were feeling pretty worn out but I was ready to explore the hotel. So I grabbed the other 3 kids and we went outside to look at the view.

So cute! That is our hotel in the background. We weren't by the ocean, but as you can see, we were right next to a little strip of water near the airport. And look, the sun finally came out at 5pm!

The kids were fascinated by the outdoor shower by the pool.

Wednesday was our Legoland day. We had never been there before and had heard mixed reviews from different people. Overall we enjoyed it but I think it would have been more fun with more rides.

I was surprised by the long lines on a random weekday in October!

Our first roller coaster! It was perfect for our kids because our oldest doesn't enjoy big roller coasters.

The kids got to drive around in lego cars and get their "driver's license", which was really cute.

Renting a stroller was our best choice all day!

Mini Town was amazing. It's basically a miniature sized replica of many famous cities, all made out of legos.

I can't imagine how many hours went into building this. 

And now Lucas has officially discovered his dream job.

We got back in line for more rides.

Legoland was fun, but I think we all much preferred Disneyland. There just wasn't as much to do at Legoland. A lot of cool things to look at, but not as much to DO. Also, I think they should have stayed open later than 5pm, especially for the price! But the kids all had a blast, and that was our goal.

On our way back to the hotel Andrew fell asleep, and that was my first indication that he wasn't feeling great. Then Ryan mentioned his throat was hurting, and that was the beginning of the end of our trip.

Thursday we woke up with plans to go to Pacific Beach for the day. Andrew wasn't acting like himself, and Ryan didn't feel well, but we naively loaded up the car anyways. We got to the parking lot next to Pacific Beach, and as soon as I got Andrew out of the car he threw up in the street. He was miserable, so we turned around and drove back to the hotel.

Andrew went downhill fast, and Adam and I knew we'd have to head home early. Unfortunately, we didn't think it was a good idea to put a really sick child on an airplane. So I spent about 5 hours that day on the phone, trying to cancel our flight, change our hotel check-out date, and alter our drop-off location for the rental car. Our new plan was to drive home on Friday.

I felt so bad that the kids never got to actually see the ocean during our short SD trip, so I took Lucas and Jenna to Ocean Beach that afternoon for a really short beach visit.

We walked out on the LONG pier. (Once again avoiding the homeless)

I loved watching all the surfers in the water!

We got to play for about an hour.

Pure joy! I'm so thankful these two got some beach time.

On Friday we packed up the rental car and headed out bright and early for the LONG drive home. Even though we had 2 sick boys, it really wasn't terrible. The kids were such troopers and never really complained about our trip being cut short. We had planned and talked about this trip for so long, and I knew they were all really looking forward to it. But we got to squeeze in some fun in just under two days, and of course we'll have lots of special memories from this trip now!