The Beach

At the end of April, Jon ran in his 2nd Ragnar for the year, in LA. I decided that I didn't want to just sit around here at home, while he was out having wild, crazy fun. So I talked my sister into coming with the kids and I to LA. We stayed with some friends from law school, which was so much fun (I know that Jon was jealous that he barely got to see/visit with them). But the highlight of our trip was going to the beach. Savannah was the most excited to go. She ran down to the water right away and started playing. Unfortunately, it was very windy that morning and so it was quite cool. And of course, about her 2nd or 3rd trip down to the water she tripped and got all wet and sandy. This made her upset and she whined for a good long while because she was cold. She did get over it towards the end of our stay though because it started to warm up. Melanie was quite the opposite. She insisted that she wasn't going to get in the water and so she wouldn't even wear her swim suit to the beach. But we'd only been there for about 20 minutes when she decided that she wanted it on and was down playing in the water too. She had a great time and was a good helper on our castle! Spencer loved everything about it...being outside, the water, and the sand. No matter what I did, he was always sticking his face in the sand and he constantly had it in his mouth. We seemed to be continually trying to wipe it off of his tongue. But he loved every minute of it.My sister, Andrea, just wanted to build a sand castle. After a little time in the water, we spent most of our time working on our castle. It was complete with moat and had towers in the corners where the water could go under them. The castle was basically 3 boxes stacked on top of each other. But it took us quite a bit of time to accomplish it. And it was a miracle what we did get done, because we kept running into this little problem...Yeah Spencer, he was all over the place and oh so helpful. Here he is sitting in our moat. But overall we had a great time and can't wait to go back again. Here's our little crew down by the water. Bet you didn't know that my girls are pirates! Arrrr!

October Break

So the girls loved Disneyland so much that we decided to go back for October Break (along with about half of Arizona). It was certainly a little more crowded than we had hoped for, but we still had a fun time. Of course we took just a bunch of pictures, but what else do you do when you spend 4 days at the happiest place on earth? So I tried to narrow it down to just some of our favorite and least favorite moments.

Savannah's favorites: Seeing all of the characters. There were so many out, we probably did pictures with less than half of them. Princess Aurora is one of Savannah's absolute favorites.Since it was Halloween time, then they had a bunch of villains out too. She also got a picture with the Old Hag from Snow White. Melanie's favorites: Her absolute favorite ride was It's a Small World. We went on it 5 times! She really just loved it! We went to Mickey's Trick-or-Treat Party on Friday night. Melanie loved that she got to sit in the stroller and people gave her handfuls of candy. Her absolute favorite part was getting to see Cinderella that night. We looked for her all week and finally found her at 11 pm on Friday night. Melanie was so happy that she couldn't even take her eyes off of Cinderella. Melanie also does an excellent job of picking out exactly what she wants at Disneyland. She picked out a Minnie Mouse Polly-Pocket kind of doll. She absolutely loves it and was so happy that I let her play with it that night while we were waiting to watch the fireworks, that we ended up not staying around for.My favorite parts: I love Snow White. I was totally happy to actually get a picture with her this time. My only complaint, I think that we saw her 3 or 4 times, because they just released her movie. And of course I loved when Spencer finally fell asleep on our first day there. Yeah, he didn't take a nap and was awful for the last 4-5 hours or so.And you have to be totally impressed that we managed to get Spencer to sleep on the 2nd day while we waited in line. Unfortunately, this was a short lived victory. He woke up the second I tried to put him in the stroller.Jon's favorites: Getting into the main park an hour early for one Magic Morning. You can't really tell, but they were the only ones on this ride! It was nice to be able to go on about 5 rides in 25 minutes! Everyone's favorites: Hanging out with old law school friends and their girls that we don't get to see nearly enough. We were so happy that they would let us stay with them and then come and go with us to the park a few of the days! We all loved the parades. Got to love that Pixar Parade. Where else are you going to see flames coming out of a baby's head and think that it's totally cool?Jon also commented that he thought that the army guys were pretty cool. Then the Celebration Parade at the Main Park put Mickey and Minnie right in front of us. Definitely a nice way to see them up close and personal. And the parade was so interactive that Savannah loved it. Melanie was kind of scared to death, but she was that way a lot on this trip. I ended up holding her during the parade because the characters were a little to close for her comfort.
Our least favorite parts: Standing in line! It's always such a pain and Spencer always ups the level of difficulty.Oh yeah, did I mention that we went on It's a Small World 5 times? Some of us were a little sick of it by the last time or even 3 times before that. We also hated taking sleeping children back into California Adventure for the Trick-or-Treat party. Yes, we were the ones taking sleeping kids back into the park. Yeah it was fun, but Melanie slept almost the whole time and refused to go on any of the rides. Thankfully, Spencer stayed with our friends and was asleep the entire time we were gone!And Melanie claims that she was excited to see Aurora again, but it was just too funny, because look at her little face. She's thinking: "Aurora, get out of the way. Cinderella is standing right over there!"

It was such a tiring and fun trip. We were glad that the kids pretty much done with the colds that they had the week before, so we could enjoy everything. I think that this is the only picture of all of us together. We had a good time, but I think that it will be a while before we venture back again.

Vacation Day #3: California Adventure

You're probably wondering how long our vacation was...but lucky for you, it was only 3 days. So here is the last of my ultra-long posts. I hope that you enjoy all of the pictures.

We were quite excited to get to go to California Adventure. Jon and I have never been and so we weren't quite sure what to expect. We did get some input from friends on what we should try to go and see, which greatly helped. This was Melanie's favorite day of all the days! We got to the park right as it opened and our first stop was the Toy Story ride. We were all entertained my Mr. Potato Head, who was telling jokes and talking to the crowd. All of us enjoyed the 3-D arcade game ride. Spencer wouldn't keep his 3-D glasses on, but he still really liked the ride. Then we headed over to Ariel's Grotto for lunch. The girls had wanted to see all the Princesses. So we made reservations at Ariel's Grotto, which guarantees you'll meet Ariel and 4 other princesses. Savannah and Melanie were very excited about meeting the princesses and could hardly wait! Ariel was the first princess we met. The girls were only slightly disappointed that she wasn't a mermaid, but they got over it quickly. The girls were given stickers and tiaras along with their menus. Savannah quickly put the stickers all over herself. And Melanie proceeded to put the stickers all over the table. Whatever keeps them happy, right? And Spencer was just a good little guy as usual. He was sporting his Chip and Dale shirt that day, that Melanie had picked out for him. He really enjoyed his lunch of grapes, goldfish, and macaroni. The first princess to come out was Cinderella! This is Melanie's favorite and she was so excited to get to see her. Then came Belle. The third princess was Snow White. She was so sweet and stopped and talked to Spencer for a minute. She was my favorite princess when I was little. I know that I have a picture of me and her at Disneyland when I was about 5 or so. I wish that I had got a picture with her too! Maybe next time! And the last princess was Princess Aurora. This is Savannah's favorite, so we were glad to get to see her too. I'd also like to point out that the girls got to meet every single princess on their shirts. What more could you ask for?Our elaborate dessert tray was as good as our lunch. Jon's favorite was the white chocolate seashell; I really liked the brownie, of course. After lunch we headed over to see a show and found a few more characters along the way. Melanie was still a little scared, so only Savannah jumped in this picture with Handy Manny. But then Jon really wanted to get in the picture with Mr. Incredible. Look, there's 2 Mr. Incredibles! We missed the show that we were going to go to and ended up going on the Monsters, Inc. ride. This turned out to be Melanie's favorite ride. It was really funny because at the end of the ride, while we were waiting to get out, Roz said, "Young lady in the second row, the little monster in your lap is really cute." It was too funny, because I was sitting in the second row with Spencer in my lap. After that, we went and saw Turtle Talk with Crush. My picture turned out awful, but this was really fun to go and watch. It was live animation, so Crush was letting people in the audience ask him questions. It was hilarious and afterwards Jon said that he was "still geeking out about it." My favorite part was when he said that he had 65 kids and suggested that one of the ladies should try it. Then a little girl asked him what his kid's names were. "Of course there's Squirt, then there's the twins, Mary Kate and Ashley, John, Paul, George and Ringo..." He proceeded to name off a bunch of groups and then added, "Crush Jr., Crush Jr., Crush Jr., ...about 35 Crush Jrs." We all got a kick out of it. After that we went and watched a musical kind of performance about the "Magic of Disney." It was fun and we got to see Mickey, Woody, and Cinderella again. I was so glad that the girls got to see Mickey Mouse and we didn't have to wait in an enormous line either! I was just so proud of Melanie for not having any worries about getting a picture with Mickey! We then went over and watched Mickey Mouse Club House Live. Both girls were excited about this. We didn't have the best seats though, right in front, but off to the side; it made it hard to see. But, Savannah liked seeing all of the Playhouse Disney characters. Melanie enjoyed seeing it all too. Thankfully, Spencer finally fell asleep and took a nap during this, unfortunately so did my leg and I had the hardest time getting up when it was over! We then headed over to the Bug's Life area. They had a bunch of little kid rides, and the girls only kind of liked them. Jon and I learned that we don't even like the smaller version of Disneyland's Teacups; those little Ladybugs are just as bad! Spencer also got to try his first bite of Cotton Candy! Yummy! After this, Melanie insisted that we go back and ride the Monster's ride. So I had to get a picture of them in front of Boo's door! It's is so huge! The day was quickly coming to a close. Savannah and I snuck in a ride on a small roller coaster and also the jellyfish (like the Tower of Terror for little kids) while Jon manhandled the other two. We called it a day after that and headed back to the bus stop. Riding the bus was so much better than parking in the parking structure and riding the tram! Savannah really wanted a picture with one of the large cones that was at the bus stop. Of course, Melanie wanted one too. This day ended much earlier than the one at Disneyland, but the kids were all still happy and so it made a really nice end to the day! Bye Disneyland! We hope to visit you again soon!