San Francisco!

Hi everybody! I feel so bad. I'm missing a huge chunk in my blog. Oh by the way... Happy Thanksgiving! Merry Christmas! Happy St. Patrick's Day! Happy Easter! Happy Broken Wrist Day! Yup, I broke my wrist! I am currently wearing a purple cast. I will get it off in three days! Yay!!! While we're still not far from the topic of Easter...(Well I guess we're kind of far from the topic of Easter. Whatever.) Guess what my family did on Easter?! We drove!!! How exciting! Applause! Applause! But...guess where we drove to?! San Francisco, California! That's the exciting part. That's what deserves the applause. It was so good to be back in California! San Francisco was so amazing! I loved it! You're probably wishing I would hurry up tell you what we did and show you some pictures. So I will. Okay here it goes.

Day 1: We drove, and drove, and drove. When we got to San Francisco we found our hotel and walked to a Indian and Pakistani place for dinner. Then, we walked back to our maze-like hotel. (we could not find our room in that place - it was a giant maze I tell you - plus, they're determined to make sure you never find your car again) We got in bed and called it quits.

Day 2: That morning we ate breakfast at a little diner. I had a fabulous breakfast of cottage cheese. It was supposed to rain that day so we decided to head to this supposedly really good, hands on museum, the Exploratorium. However, it was closed so we walked around the Palace of Fine Arts. I took some really good pictures. Then, we walked along the beach. I took some nice pictures of the Golden Gate Bridge. One of them was even worthy to be our computer background. We headed back to our car and drove across the.......Golden Gate Bridge! The bridge was so amazing! It's kinda weird. It's just a man-made bridge, but it's soooo beautiful! After that, we accidentally got a thorough tour of the Sausalito neighborhoods. Then, we went to this viewpoint and took some closer pictures of the bridge. Next, we drove back to our hotel. We went down Lombard Street on the way there. After we parked our car, we hiked up one of those hilly streets to the cable car museum. The cable car museum was pretty interesting. It told all about the history of San Francisco's cable car system and how it works today. I got a really nice San Francisco t-shirt at the gift shop. Then, as Chad Lewis says, we "went right down to Chinatown." Chinatown was one of my favorite parts of San Francisco! It was just so interesting! If you ever do some good people-watching, go to Chinatown. We ate lunch/dinner at the best Chinese place ever! Mmmm! It's makes my mouth water just thinking about it. After that, we went into a few shops, and I bought a little Chinese character charm. According to the lady we asked, it meant "long life." After I bought my charm, we headed back to our hotel and called it a day.

Palace of Fine Arts

The Worthy Picture's (Almost) Clone

(Not actually the Worthy Picture-My dad likes this one better)

Picture from the Viewpoint

(See my family waaaay out there?)

Hanging out in Chinatown

Gateway to Chinatown

Look at my new friend!

Day 3: Cable car day! Hooray! Except the cable car part of our day didn't really turn out too great. You'll soon find out why. We bought pastries and ate them in Union Square. Then, we bought all day cable car passes and hopped on a cable car. I rode hanging off the side. It was fun! We rode all the way down to Fisherman's Wharf. We walked around Fisherman's Wharf and Pier 39. Then, we walked down to Pier 33 and got on a boat to Alcatraz. My mom and I have read these fiction books about a boy who lived on Alcatraz in the 1930s so we were really excited to see it. We took an audio tour through the cell house. It was so good. We learned a ton of interesting things about Alcatraz. When we were done with the tour we got on a boat and headed back to the city. Back at Fisherman's Wharf, we found a place to buy clam chowder in bread bowls. Mmm. I discovered I like clam chowder! I really wanted to go to the Aquarium of the Bay. Travis didn't want to go though. We decided to split up. Mom and I went to the aquarium and Travis and Dad just walked around the beach. Mom and I really enjoyed the aquarium. You step on this moving walkway and it moves you through a tunnel in a giant tank. It feels like you're actually underwater. It was really cool! After the aquarium, Mom and I met up with the boys. Dad and I walked over to Ghiradelli Square while Travis and Mom waited for the cable car. I got a bowl of chocolate ice cream at Ghiradelli Square. It was really yummy. Then, we walked back to the cable car stop. We waited an hour and a half on the cable car. We just sat waiting for it to go. It never did. That cable car line had broken down! We eventually left and walked up the hill to Lombard Street. We then walked down Lombard Street and got lots of pictures. Then, my dad walked and Mom, Travis, and I rode the streetcar up Telegraph Hill (Dad beat us!). We arrived at Coit Tower and went up to the top. My dad and I took tons of pictures from the windows. After Coit Tower, we wandered around in search for a place to eat. Everything was closed! We eventually found a cable car that was running and we rode to the end of the line. We ended up in some obscure neighborhood. There we found a pizza place and decided to eat there(okay,we sort of had to eat there or I would have collapsed). Then we took a cable car part of the way and walked part of the way to our hotel. We all fell asleep immediately. We had had a long day.

Hanging from the Cable Car

(Notice my purple cast?)

View of the city from Alcatraz

Inside the Cell house

Me standing in front of some jellyfish

(See my San Francisco t-shirt?)

Ghiradelli Square

Lombard Street

View of Downtown from Coit Tower

Coit Tower

Day4: Dad bought pastries and brought them to us in the hotel. We ate, checked out, and headed to Alamo Square. We walked around the park a little bit. Guess what I found just laying on the ground?! I found two 100 dollar bills! Two real Benjamin Franklins! I took some great pictures of those Victorian houses, the "Painted Ladies." Then, we drove over to Golden Gate Park. We walked through a section of the botanical gardens. Then, Dad, Travis, and I paid to go into the Japanese Tea Gardens. It was actually a pretty small garden, but Dad got some nice pictures. After that, we drove over to this little sandwich place called The Yellow Submarine. It was really good. We ate our sandwiches in this little park that looked over the city. After we finished our sandwiches we left San Francisco. We drove until we reached Tahoe, where we decided to stay for the night.

The "Painted Ladies" in Alamo Square

Japanese Tea Garden Bridge

Me and Travis under the Tea Garden shrine (I guess it's a shrine)

Lunch at Kite Hill overlooking San Francisco

Day 5: The next day we ate breakfast and left. We drove through the boring Nevada deserts all day. We stopped in Elko for a absolutely wonderful lunch at McDonald's. When we got home Minnie was right by the door. She missed us soooo much! I missed her too. It was good to see her again.

I loved San Francisco! I will never forget that trip. Thanks for reading this post about the Happy Halls!

I'm So Sorry!/An Update on the Happy Halls

Hi! I'm sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo sorry I haven't posted in sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
long! I'll make it up to you by trying super hard to post twice a month.

I can't believe it's fall again! I'm now eleven! Here's a little update on the Halls. I'm eleven as you know. My dad is almost forty! My mom is thirty-seven at the time. Travis is six. And finally Minnie, my cat, is one!

By the way the Happy Pumpkin didn't work out. For one thing I didn't blog enough. Also the pumpkin didn't get much bigger!

I really hope you'll check back in with the Happy Halls soon. Again I'm sorry about not posting. Thanks for visiting the Happy Halls!

Our Happy Summer

Hi! I'm back! Sorry I haven't posted in a while. I've had such a happy and busy summer! I've gone on lots of trips. My first trip of the summer was a trip down to California to visit my cousins. I went with my grandma, grandpa, and cousin. I had so much fun!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I went to the beach, the zoo, Disneyland, and Seaworld.

My second trip of the summer was to Girl Scout Camporee at Trefoil Ranch(it's a girl scout camp) for three days. It was sooooooooooooooooo fun. I think that it made our troop closer.

For my third trip, I went to Lava Hot Springs, Jackson Hole, and camping with my family. That was fun too.

Besides trips, my mom, Travis, and I had Girl Scout Day Camp. It was just at a nearby park. It was fun too. The theme was It's Your Story Cowgirl!

I've taken many pictures on all these trips but I decided to show you the best picture I took. (or at least my dad thinks it is the best.)

Polar Bear Eating Ball

Zoo (part of California trip)

This is going to be kind of a short post. I do have one more thing to say though. I'm starting something called the Happy Pumpkin. I have a pumpkin growing in the garden. I'm going to take pictures of it and post them. I hope you enjoy watching the progress of the Happy Pumpkin.

Week 1

Thanks for visiting the Happy Halls! Bye!

My Piano Recital

I'm not going to start with "I'm sorry I haven't posted in a while." I've started with that too many times. Today's post is probably going to be a short one. I don't have much to talk about. My grandma really wanted hear about my piano recital so I'm going to talk about that. My dad took a video of me playing my songs. That's something new. I've never had any videos on my blog. They are probably going to appear tiny but you can still hear the music. There isn't much to see except the back of my head anyway. During my piano recital, I played two solos and one duet. I've been taking piano lessons from Travis' friend's mom/mom's friend/primary chorister/neighbor since May 8, 2008. I've just sped on through. I pass off all my songs and practice almost every day. (You've got to give mom credit too. Without her I'd probably never practice.) I can't wait for you to hear my songs. I know you'll be impressed.

The first song I played was a solo. Midnight Dance it was called. It was quick, fast, and pretty easy to memorize. I played it note-to-note perfect. Here it is.

That was Midnight Dance. The next song was also a solo. It was called Sunset on Equinox Pond. I also played it note-to-note perfect. Here it is.

That was Sunset on Equinox Pond. The next song I played (Polka Dot Hop) was a duet. I did mess up a few times on that one and so did my piano teacher. Here it is.

That was Polka Dot Hop. Did you hear it when I messed up? It was my first piano recital. I have to say it was a pretty good experiance. I'm glad I'm done with all those songs. I got so tired of playing them over and over again. I'm glad you get to hear the songs I've been practicing for so long. I hope this was a happy visit with the Happy Halls. I hope you can visit again soon. Bye!

Our Happy Trip to Zion NP

Hi! I just can't believe I'm starting another post with I'm sorry I haven't posted in a while. But I am. Don't worry though. I've got a lot of neat things to talk about so I'll probably (I'm not sure) be posting more. I was wondering about what I should talk about on this post. Like I said I have tons of things to talk about. I decided that our family trip to Zion National Park was the top of my list. I mean it was sooo beautiful there and who doesn't want to hear about a happy family that goes on a happy trip to a happy place (all those happys sound kind of dorky). As you know I always have pictures to go along with my posts. When we went to Zion I forgot my camera so most of these pictures my dad took with his camera. Plus the memory on my camera was full. I just learned how to take videos with my camera. I took a ton of home videos (probably next weeks post). Let me tell you that you are about to hear about an awesome trip and see lots of awesome pictures. So here's how it goes. We drive and drive and drive and drive and drive and drive and.....let's speed it up a bit. We get to our hotel which was called Driftwood Lodge. It was a pretty nice hotel. Well after we (more like mom and dad) carried all their (plus Travis' and mine) luggage in and we got settled in. We took shuttle down to the park. They have a super neat shuttle system that goes through the town and through the park too. What's even more great is that it's free! Let me tell you we rode that shuttle a lot! The town shuttle stops at the entrance to the park. After that you have to ride the park shuttle. We looked around the visitor's center first. There wasn't much to see. Our family is a big camping/hiking kind of family. We love going to cool places such as national parks. We decided that we would go on the Emerald Pools Trail hike that day. We were sure glad we chose that one because it was sooooooooo beautiful. It was really pretty but we really only got one picture of the actual pools.

On the Trail

Sitting on a Log on the Trail

The Upper Pool

I actually took that last picture. There are three pools. The Lower Pool, the Middle Pool, and the Upper Pool (that's the one in the picture.). There are three waterfalls. Two at the Lower Pool and one at the Upper Pool. When we got to the Lower Pool I had to hold my dad's hand. We had to be right on time or we would get sprayed by the waterfall. You had to run until you were at least twenty feet away from it. The Emerald Pools Trail was way fun. I could have done it a million times. The next day my dad and I went on a horse ride. It was sooooo fun! My horse's name was Pretty Boy. Dad's horse was Leroy. We saw a wide variety of plants and animals. Why we even saw a wild turkey! It was sad when it was over. And again here are some awesome pictures.

Mounting the Horse: Way Hard!

I Feel Tall!

Hello There!

We stopped at Court of the Patriarchs.
(Court of the Patriarchs are three cliffs named Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.)

It got kind of cold when we came back from the horse ride so we swung by the Human History Museum. Travis and I were working on our Junior Ranger badges and to do some of the activities we had to go to the museum. We watched a video and learned some cool things about the park. Like did you know that Zion has over 270 different types of birds? And did you know that there is a snail the size of a pinhead that lives only in Zion? Way cool! The next day we went on a short hike to Weeping Rock. Later we went to the Narrows and did Riverside Walk. Zion was way cool. I just can't tell you everything so I'll show you pictures instead.

One of the Patriarchs

Checkerboard Mesa

View From Weeping Rock

The Narrows

The Zion Sign

Zion was really neat. I hope you get the chance to go there. And thanks for visiting with the Happy Halls!

Travis' B-day

Hi! I'm soooooooooooooo sorry I haven't posted in sooooooooooooooooooo long. Today I'm going to talk about Travis' birthday even though it was like a month ago. Travis' birthday is in February. We wanted to make popovers so Travis could have breakfast in bed but popovers take about 30 minutes to "pop over". Travis is an early bird so of course he was already out of bed. Travis opened his presents from us after his breakfast. Mom and Dad got him a few new R.P.M. power rangers. I'm like the expert on power rangers. It's not that I like them or anything I've just know a lot about them. Besides power rangers Travis really wanted a Webkinz for his birthday. I gave him the clownfish Webkinz. If you don't know what Webkinz are they're stuffed animals that come with a secret code that you use to adopt them at Webkinz.com. Travis had really wanted a Webkinz since I already had four and he only had one. After a while Mom and I went over to my grandma's clubhouse (that's where Travis was going to have his birthday party.) to set up. We were waiting for Travis to show up when a kid came! More and more kids came until finally the kid we'd been waiting for (the birthday boy)showed up. We started the festivities. It was a really fun party. All the kids seemed to like it. We played lots of fun games. There was strawberry cake with chocolate icing. (Travis' request) I have some great pictures.

The birthday king

Musical Parking Spaces

The Travis 600

Pit Stop (dinner)

Opening Presents

The Cake

Thanks again for visiting the Happy Halls. P.S. I'll try to get better at posting.

Girl Scouts

Hi! As I have started my posts many times, I'm sorry I haven't posted in a while. I really try to post every week but it seems like I post every few weeks. Today I'm talking about what's been happening lately in girl scouts. Our troop has done some really fun things lately. Of course it's girl scout cookie time. I've been out selling boxes. So far I've sold 206 boxes. That's a record for me. Not only has our troop been selling girl scout cookies, but we went to winter fest at Trefoil Ranch (that's a girl scout camp). It was so much fun. I have some great pictures.

In the basement of the lodge we did archery.

Here I am getting into position.

Getting a good aim.

We also went snowshoeing. It was so cool. I had never done it before.

Here I am. Do you see the snowshoes?

Here's Troop 354

We also did pottery on the second floor of the lodge. It was really fun. I made a mask for myself and a bowl with a snake in it for Travis. I also made a mouse for Minnie. By the time I got the second ear to stick to the mouse, an eye had rubbed off it.

Here I am. I'm an artist at work.

There were many competitions. There was a snow skulpting competition. There was a snowflake making competition. There was a snow painting competition (that was the only one we got pictures of) and many more we didn't enter.

Here I am with my beautiful picture.

The next picture you are going to see is of something so cool.

Look at the ice skulpture. Isn't it awesome!

The winter fest was so fun. Sadly, there was a little incident and I went home. Another girl went home too because she wasn't feeling too great. Thanks so much for visiting the Happy Halls. I hope you come again soon.