Wednesday, May 27, 2009

Disneyworld Pictures










Tuesday, May 26, 2009

April/May Pictures



























April/May review and vacation report







Our household has kept busy busy busy lately and once again I have neglected our blog.
Here's a brief rundown of our latest shenanigans (however you spell it)
Jason is still working. He was able to take a week off recently for our family trip, but otherwise work keeps him busy. He is in his last year of school as well and thinks he will be on the deans list soon. Yay! He has decided we need to get outfitted for camping so that has kept him busy checking into tents and sleeping bags. Fun stuff! I can't wait to roast marshmallows, so I'm all for it. :)

Me- I planned our trip and then spent the next month making outfits and bows for the girls to wear for it...sounds silly I'm sure, but I had fun and it helped countdown the days until our trip. The girls received a number of compliments on their cute clothes and a few suggested I start selling clothes once they found out that I made their stuff. I have a new calling at church. I teach sharing time once a month. I am totally happy with my new calling...It means 15 minutes of work once every 4 weeks....not a bad gig.

Kristin is plugging away at the last couple weeks of second grade. Her school already did field day and she got third place in something but I don't remember what event...I'll ask her when she gets home. She started piano lessons in May and seems to enjoy them. She will head to Idaho mid June for a visit.

Jenna is our little fireball...she keeps us entertained, the house in need of clean up/repair and lots of giggles. You can actually see the path of destruction as she makes her way around the house each day. She test her boundaries often and Jason and I keep battling her in hopes she will calm a bit before she hits her teen years.

Sadie was 13.4 pounds at her 4 month check up. She is happy, healthy and growing good. She has started eating baby food and has pulled a few faces, but overall seems to like getting more than just formula to eat. She has discovered her hands and her voice. She is constantly gumming her fists and squawks every waking moment that she does not have her pacifier in her mouth. Jenna leaned on her at a restaurant last week and Sadie let out a humongous blood curdling scream you wouldn't believe came out of her little body. She is sure to let us know when she needs something.

Our trip last week was to Disneyworld. We had been kicking the idea around of going this fall, but had some last minute scheduling conflicts and decided that if we are going to do it we better just go so we went for it. We surprised the girls by waking them up at 3 am to go to the airport...they knew something was up, but didn't know what or when it was happening. We got to the airport and flew to Orlando. The girls have never been to Florida so they had no idea where we were going until we got on a Mickey Mouse bus to take us to our hotel. We stayed a Port Orleans riverside and were happy with the scenery and accommodations. We wandered the grounds the day we arrived and unpacked our suitcases. After resting a bit we wondered back to the check in building and let the girl watch some cartoons while we sat with Sadie. It wasn't more than 15 minutes until Grandma and Grandpa Reed showed up and surprised the girls again. Jason and I knew we needed reinforcements now that we are outnumbered so we conspired with Grandma and Grandpa to come to Florida with us. It was fun to have to big surprises in one day for the girls although their reaction was a little disappointing. They were more than happy to go back to watching their cartoons. I think they were a little overwhelmed by all the change by this point.
Overall we had a fun trip...kinda....for what we paid I hope we can come out of it with good memories of our 'adventure'. It rained most of the week. I'm not talking little april showers I am talking jump in the shower for 20 minutes fully clothed and then take a walk. We were drenched. I am sorry to say we didn't see a single parade or any fireworks because we were dodging waterfalls or trying to get back to our hotel in time for our shoes to dry out in time for the next days walking.
The highlights:
I took the girls to have dinner at Cinderella's Castle. That was a fun experience and I took some pictures to share of meeting Cinderella and where we ate.
Kristin and I bought oysters in Japan at Epcot. Kristin's pearl was an average size white pearl that we had put on a piece of jewelry to turn it into a necklace. She had such a fun time that when we went back a few days later I talked Jason into buying me two oysters to make an earring set. We chose an oyster that was growing some whiskers and Jason picked the oyster that was front and center in the tank. They opened the first oyster and told me what a lucky day I was having. My first oyster had 'twins'. 2 pearls almost identical in size and color and perfect for turning into earrings. We laughed that we had already bought 2 oysters and now we didn't need the second one, but we opened it anyway and the worker was shocked...she told me once again how lucky I was and showed me the silver blue pearl found in the second oyster. Apparently silver is the rarest color and to find two pearls in one oyster and a silver pearl in the other was not an everyday occurrence. We went ahead and had earring made with the twin pearls and I now have a silver blue pearl necklace. Jason can breathe a sigh of relief, he can skip anniversary shopping this year.
Jenna Lover pirates of the Caribbean and requested to ride it twice. We were concerned that the haunted mansion would scare her, but she requested to ride it twice too. She loved the shows and meeting the characters. She met Mickey, Minnie, Aurora, Belle and Cinderella.(twice!) She found a flower on the ground that had fallen off of the trees while we were waiting in line to meet Mickey. She gave it to Mickey and he wanted it in his hat band so he could wear her flower the rest of the day. She was really cute with the characters. She made quite an impression on Grandpa...

Kristin wanted to ride all the big rides. She rode the rock n roller coaster, the big thunder rail road, test track at epcot, expedition Everest and had a great time. She loved the petting zoo at Animal Kingdom and and was thrilled to pick out her oyster at Epcot.

Poor Jason was miserable most of the week. Too many people, too much rain. He told me at least twice that for what we spent we could have rented a cabin in the woods for 2 weeks and not seen a single person at all. Hence the camping gear shopping. Oh, well...I think camping will be fun too, I just wish he had a better time.

The down sides...
the rain
the lightening (almost earsplitting at some points)
keeping 3 kids happy and not whining
tracking down the diaper bag that was accidentally left on the bus in the pouring rain.
eating dinner at 9:30 at night one night because we couldn't find a restaurant with an opening.

Hopefully we all will have some happy memories in the end. I am glad we were able to do this for the kids and hope they will remember the time we were able to spend as a family and with grandma and grandpa.

Pictures to follow...as soon as I unpack the camera.