Joy in the Journey: Happiest place on Earth...

"Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation: the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak."

-Matthew 26:41

The 14th was a special day, IT WAS ELIZAS BIRTHDAYYY! She is now 15.. (C.R.A.Z.Y.) but it was super fun to spend the whole day with her, because we needed her out of the house. Why you ask? We decided to get her a trampoline for her birthday to help her with gymnastics! So Mom & Erik jr helped set it up and Eliza and I went to the mall and shopped, had birthday lunch, and then we let her open her other presents and she went outside to see her trampoline! It was such a fun day.

I went to another GI this week. She was a lot better than the first one I went to, but my parents couldn't get an appointment until now and decided more than one doctors opinion is better. Although I'm so tired of doctors appointments, I know its the only way for me to figure out whats wrong and how to treat it to get back out to the mission field. I had to get an endoscopy the morning after the doctors visit and that was a long and tiring day, but results came back and everything is fine.

"If you are lucky enough to live by the ocean... You are lucky enough..." -Unknown

Our family spent our weekend in California for my dad's high school reunion! (Main reason why this post is late) We landed in LAX (with my dream and my cardigan) We grabbed our rental car, (its peak tourist season y'all) and we were off! We drove to San Diego (La Jolla Shores) so we could stay at my uncles house for a bit. We ate some true mexican food, (Delicioso) and finally arrived! His house is the best because its so close to the ocean. The distance from his house to the beach is around 20 yards. AKA at night when the windows are open, you hear the ocean like surround sound because its right there AND you can even smell the sand and feel the mist. Its perfect! We stayed there for 2 days. The first day we went to walk around the shops and town. We went into a couple stores and found a place to go to lunch. We went to the beach for awhile and then THE. BEST. PLACE. EVER.

SAN DIEGO CALIFORNIA TEMPLE

THIS IS MY HAPPIEST PLACE ON EARTH, sorry Disneyland

Since I was a little girl I have dreamed of getting married in this place and today I would be able to go inside and see how gorgeous it was! It was basically a dream come true. The best part was my mom came with me AND we got to go into a spanish session!

The next morning Dad, Mom, Erik and I went to the beach to walk and take pictures of the sunrise, it was overcast (so no great pictures) but Erik and I had fun walking on the beach and getting stuck in the sand.

We then left San Diego and headed for Mission Viejo to my aunts house! It was so nice to go and see her and my uncle and to spend some time for them! We talked and played with their cats & dogs. Spending time with family is time well spent. We went to the hotel where we would be staying that was close to my dads high school reunion.

It was so fun to have all the kids together. MANY new inside jokes came out of that hotel and the hours we spent bonding together. We got to watch some movies and wind down from our many travels. Sunday came around and we visited the La Mirada Ward and sang some of my favorite hymns, and heard some awesome speakers. One was a returned missionary of 3 weeks from MEXICO CITY WEST! He didn't speak any spanish while up there (which he probably could have and people would be able to understand) but his talk was on Finding Faith in Christ through our Weaknesses. I loved it because he talked about the mission and the fears he had there and how he was able to pray to The Father and gain strength and make his weak things strong. I have a strong testimony about Heavenly Father being with us every step of the way, its our job to pray for Him to be there and recognize when He is reaching out to us, whether it be by a friend, or in my case, better health. We saw some people my dad knew, which was pretty cool.

We went to East L.A. It really made me homesick for Mexico. Erik had to stop and use the restroom so we went into a market place and everything was authentic and from Mexico. I asked a worker where the bathroom was and she looked surprised that a white girl like me could speak spanish! We went around an alleyway and saw some graffiti it really reminded me of mexico because its not your typical kind. Its actually talent.

Afterwards we went to China town & Olivera Street. It was THE BEST to be in a place where everybody and everything was from Mexico. I really loved it because it was like being home. It is really hard to explain but when you live there for a while you become apart of it, you love the people, culture, food, and language more than your real home sometimes. We ate at a yummy mexican restaurant on Olivera Street and it tasted so right. We also visited a place called Philippe's a famous place and a restaurant my mom ate with her family a ton. (She even told us that it was the place where my grandpa got his car stolen...TWICE!)

We decided to end off the right way by visiting the Pier. We did a lot of things this trip that we hadn't visited before so it was really neat. It was so cool to see the sunset on the pier. I loved it. It was breathtaking. It was fun and we took a TON of photos, (well abby and the parents did)

Beach Volleyball anyone?

So that was this week! Oh and before I forget there we are taking pictures, some normal some not so normal, and we noticed there was a little girl staring at us like she didn't know how to blink, so naturally Abby took a picture of her...