Homeward Bound

So, that night in Tucson Emily was asleep around 9PM.  I wish we had followed much closer behind because she woke up on Texas time (the day before we were in TX after all) but with the two hour time change it was only 3AM.  BRUTAL!  We tried to get her back to sleep but it didn't work out so she hung out in our bed "trying to sleep" for a while but eventually watched a couple of shows before it was light enough outside to explore before breakfast.

Unfortunately, breakfast was not very relaxing since our two year old was functioning on 6 hours of sleep!!  Plus, Paul called the moving company (since we hadn't heard anything about our truck) only to find out that our things would not be delivered during our promised delivery period - Wed. to Fri. - but, instead, would be arriving the following Monday or Tuesday.  Not great!  There was nothing we could do about that though, Paul tried, so I decided that the one thing we could deal with was the whiny, overtired two year old.  Getting outside and burning some energy before buckling back in the car again was a MUST.  So, with her bathing suit neatly packed away for the road I did what any parent would do - stripped her down and encouraged her to play "naked" in the fountain.




It worked... that day Emily slept for 2 hours in the car!!!!  A new record! 
She only awoke when we crossed the border at 12:15 and had our trailer checked.
Everyone had been waiting for her to wake up but didn't dare interrupt so at our first opportunity we stopped for some lunch.  Lucky us, there was an In-N-Out!!!
Emily stuck with her old fave though.
It was smooth sailing up from the south and through the mountains (even though it seemed to take forever, as it always does when you are near the end) and at 5:01PM we saw our off ramp!!!
Paul thought that was a good time to open the sunroof and let in the cool air and California sun...
for the last couple of miles to our new house.
Finally!!!
We were pretty happy to be "home..."
and just as we promised, there was a bunny in the backyard waiting to greet Emily.
What I didn't remember there being... a lemon tree!!!
After exploring the house a little and kicking it outside for a few minutes we decided that everyone deserved a treat - no unloading and unpacking - 
we headed straight for the BEACH!!!!
Of course, our tired girl fell asleep on that short trip and was a little reluctant to hit the water.


Getting close didn't even work...
it was time to get serious!  (thanks Dad for the assistance)



And then, just like that...
our California girl was born!

Emily LOVES the beach and invited everyone to dip their toes in with her...
(okay, so she dipped more than her toes but we had a change of clothes)






We finished off our evening with dinner and a walk on the pier.
We had traveled over 1700 miles, seen a lot, experienced all kinds of new things, sweat, cried (or was that just me?), laughed, and bonded.  Thank you all for a great great trip!