Solvang

Today the boys and I headed to Solvang with my mom and youngest sis. We had great fun. It would have been a lot MORE fun if my kids weren't so whiney, but it was fun.

Unfortunately their was a fire up in the mountains above Solvang, so the sky was filled with brown smoke. The 96° weather didn't help either. It was hot and felt almost humid...yuck!

Jonah begged to ride one of these. He begs everywhere we go that has them. The beach, Solvang, Santa Barbara...but his mean ol' mom just doesn't let him. Some day, son, some day!

For those of you who have no clue where Solvang is or what its all about, I'll give you a little background. Its south of us a little ways about 45 minutes to an hour I guess. I don't know. But its this little Danish town nestled between rolling hills back behind Buelltin. All the buildings are designed to be like old Denmark and their are tons of Danish bakeries and gift shops. A real cute town. Anyway, if you wanna learn more, go here.

Since Hans Christian Andersen is Danish (I really hope you all know who he is!), glimpses of him are everywhere!

Jonah thought the big head statue was so cool.

I don't really know what this rock is all about. I think its just telling how far it is to Copenhagen, I don't know.

Jonah thought it was super awesome. Of course being the all-American boy that he is, he had to climb on it. Then he struck a pose...I love it!

Such a cute kid!

I haven't been to Solvang a whole lot. I went a couple times as a kid. I remember the kite shop they used to have and a lot of old lady gift shops. I went a couple times for regional youth dances for church, but we didn't see much, just the church building there.

So the last time I was in Solvang was on our honeymoon. We stayed there 1 night and it was interesting. I really don't suggest going to Solvang in the middle of December...its a ghost town! We were all excited to eat at a tasty Danish restaurant, but of course every store, restaurant, gift shop...you name it...shut down at like 3 o'clock, if it was even open for the winter at all. So we had no other choice but to eat at this Mexican restaurant. Its a great location and a cute little building, but if my memory serves me correctly, it was not tasty. How much does that stink...gross Mexican food in a Danish town? Well apparently it hasn't lasted, because it was closed and there was a "for rent" sign out front.

This was another honeymoon memory. All the delicious Danish bakeries were closed as well, so we had to go to Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory. Now I'm not complaining, I'm a fan (love their caramely, chocolaty apples), but yet again it was quite disheartening.

One place I remembered from our honeymoon that I DID go back to today was the cheese store. Oh how I love it! I'm such a dutch girl...you really can't be a true dutch girl and not love cheese (...and butter...and bread!). I LOVE cheese! So I'm pretty sure this store isn't Danish at all...I'm pretty possitive it's Dutch. The owner had a Dutch accent and everything in the store was dutch...it was like walking through my Oma's pantry. I got to sample yummy cheeses and bought some super yummy goodies.

Isn't this so stinkin' cute? Oh my. If I had a little girl (or knew that I would have a little girl sometime in my future anytime...even if it weren't until I were a grandma!), I would buy this. So stinkin' adorable, especially with the little red boots!

There's lots of windmills there. I love windmills. Yet another Dutch thing I suppose. Growing up my Oma & Opa always had a mini windmill my Opa built in front of their house. In fact they still have one! Love it! If you ain't Dutch, you ain't much, right? :)

They had some real fun shops. One was the Christmas store. I wish I had lots of money to spend. They had some really cute ornaments and lots and lots of cute little elves. When we were done looking through the store (and unfortunately buying nothing), Jonah grabbed a stick and said,

What an imagination he has!

Gramma spoiled the boys each with their own Hawaiian shaved ice. They're so much better than Sno-cones. The ice is smaller, so you don't get huge chunks of ice...mmm.

Jonah loves it when his tongue changes colors. I couldn't believe he ate that entire thing by himself!

Jaxon had to be like Jonah and show me his tongue too.

My sister Carina just HAD to try an aebleskiver. They sure look tasty, don't they? I don't know though, I don't think they're really anything great. They're basically just German pancakes baked into a ball. Oh well.

Jaxon called the aebleskivers "mine swaberry cocake." That's Jax for "my strawberry cupcake" (as if you couldn't figure that out yourself!). He just licked the strawberry syrup off it and handed it back to me...mmm, nothing like an aebleskiver that's been licked dry by a slobbery 2 year old!

On the way home we saw 3 different huge fires. Some states have tornado season, others a wet season - we Californians have fire season and it has definitely kicked into gear. We don't usually have this many that are that close together, but I guess its has been a dry year. It definitely doesn't make for good air quality! Luckily we live in a little canyon, so we can sometimes smell it, but we're pretty un-effected thus far. We've still got blue skies! Thank goodness!

We had a great time. Thanks Gramma and Carina for taking us along and putting up with our crankies! Can't wait to go back!