Disneyland Squared!

For Thanksgiving this year my family and I all went to Jacob Lake Inn. Jacob Lake is a place by the North rim of the Grand Canyon. My dad and his siblings grew up here in the summers. It has always been a special place to my family. We love it so much that when we were little when we would go it felt like were going to a place just as cool as Disneyland.

The great thing about this trip to Jacob was that not only my immediate family was there but all of my extended Bowman Family was there as well as my Great Aunt's family the Riches. I am positive that my Great Grandpa and Grandma were happy to see their posterity all together.

This is Josh, Jeff, and I sleeping and cuddling in the back seat on the way down to Jacob. These two little boys are hilarious! Every time we would lay down to watch a movie Josh would say "Dominos!" And this position would follow.

On one of the days we were there my dad took us to the Bowman mansion, as he called it. My great Grandpa was born in this house and it's now a museum down in Kanab Utah. How cool is that? Apparently the Bowman family was big down in that area.

We also went to the grand canyon with the whole Bowman Family clan. I wish I had a copy of the picture of all four families together there.

By far the best part of the trip was my dad and his siblings telling all of us stories about the places they love and grew up going to. This is My Uncle Kent, my dad, and my Aunt Nene telling us stories at Billy's Sink. Uncle Kim is the only one not in this picture.

Then it was time for Thanksgiving dinner!! Yummyness!! There were about 120 people that came for dinner. 8 turkeys later and you have thanksgiving dinner!

The last day my two Uncle's went to the ranch but because my family and the Cottens don't have four wheel drive we were able to visit some other places. One of the places we went was to these really cool balancing rocks. My dad also took us here when we were little and it was fun to go again.

This is us at the Vermillion Cliffs, behind us, at sunset. The ranch is by these cliffs. They are absolutely beautiful!

My immediate family in front of the Lodge at Jacob.

I loved my time at Jacob and I am so glad that I was able to be there with all of my family and cousins!

After our adventures in Arizona a lot of my family went back to Utah and a few of us ventured on to California. We got there late Saturday night after a lot of traffic.

On Sunday Kari and I told my brother and sister-in-law that we would drop them off on their cruise before we went to church. When I hopped out of my brothers car I landed on what looked to me like garbage. It was a piece of card board that looked like the back of an old gift certificate. Being the good citizen that I am :) I picked it up to throw it away when I noticed that the gift card was still attached to it! HAPPY DANCE!! It was a $50 gift card to a gas station. I knew I needed to give it back but there was no way of finding the owner so I was told to keep it. I was so happy because I was worried about paying for the gas money that it was going to take for my sister and I to go to the temple later in the week. Well Heavenly Father always provides! The joke the rest of the week was that it pays to go to church! And it definitely does, in more ways than one.

After Kari and I went to church we went to the New Port Beach Temple. We were going to go do baptisms/ a session on Saturday but they weren't able to get me in to do baptisms so we decided to just walk around the grounds on Sunday instead. This temple is beautiful from the outside! I can't even imagine what it looks like on the inside.

Then it was time for DISNEYLAND!! Our first ride was Soarin over California.

Kena and I on Little Mermaid

The sweet little baby that Kena is holding is Tyler. One morning before we left I had my socks on and my foot was hanging over the side of the bed. He started crawling over to me and had the biggest smile on his face. That day I just so happened to be wearing white socks with strawberries on them. He then pulled himself up by my foot and the next thing I know his little teeth are blighting my foot right where one of the strawberries were on my socks! I started laughing and picked him up and he had the most confused look on his face. It was a good and funny morning.

Jack and I on Dumbo! While we were at Disneyland I took Jack to the bathroom and as we were walking in he was holding my hand and he said, "Giggles guess what." And of course I said, "What Jackers!" He then proceeded to say, "I love you!" Little kids are the sweetest!

The Freebairn Family.

Meeting Rapunzel and Flynn Rider. On the way back to the hotel that night we asked Kate what her favorite part of the day was and she said meeting Rapunzel and Flynn.

We met my favorite princess Cinderella! As well as many other disney characters.

This trip was also fun because one of my best friends was there at the same time! This is my friend Jill and I after one of our many rides on splash mountain. It's funny how much dryer you are when you sit in the back. :)

Cruella Deville was really funny! Jack couldn't stop laughing. When she asked Jack his name he started laughing harder. So she told him that his name was Giggles. When we were leaving she told us to get her some puppies and to use the giggley one to help catch them. I was holding Jack when we walked away and he laughed and looked at me and said, "That's silly she called me Giggles!" Kena, Kate, and Jack all call me Giggles so Jack thought it was funny that she was calling him my name.

My little twin Kate and I on Autopia. Lesson learned don't let a five year old drive. I thought she was going to kill us!

Disneyland is so magical at Christmas time! It was so much fun to be there with my nieces, nephews, brother-in-law, and sisters. I can't wait to go again when cars land is done!

After our five days at Disneyland the Freebairns drove home and Kari and I stayed an extra day to pick up my brother and sister-in-law from their cruise. We didn't mind one bit! We were excited to go to some of the temples in California. And don't you worry the trip down was free because of the gas card I found. :)

Our first temple was the Los Angeles Temple. It is amazing! I was also able to inside the visitors center and was able to talk with the missionaries.

Then we drove the two hours from LA to the San Diego temple. It was well worth the drive! Kari and I have always had dreams of going to this temple and they were finally fulfilled that day. This temple is beautiful as well! But what temple isn't? Side not of this blog post, the members in California are extremely nice and loving. Every single one we met was very nice to us. The Church is true no matter where you go!

The last exciting part of my trip was coming back to Logan. I walked into my house and noticed my door was shut. I new that my friends had done something. I opened the door to find my room covered in newspaper! I promise that there is a bed under all of that. If you look closely you can see on the chair in the bottom left hand corner that they have a stack of newspaper that they didn't get to. 6 garbage bags later and it was all cleaned up! I have some crazy friend!