Disneyland Fun

I know, I know.... these collages are on here 2x, but the ones below won't let you click to enlarge, and these will...I can't figure it out but until I do I'll just leave these up! The post really starts below....

OUR DISNEYLAND ADVENTURE
September 14-19th, 2009

Get ready for a major overload of pictures!!!Above are Parker and Emmie as we walked in through the bright & shiny D-Land gates on Monday morning. Parker glowing with anticipation....
Emmie.....SOUND ASLEEP.

That's right. Right next to the marching band!

Our week at the Happiest Place on Earth was full of excitement, big smiles, exhaustion, and a few (to be expected) break downs. Overall, it really was so magical! There is just something about Disney that makes for an incredible experience. Watching Parker and Emmie's faces light up at every turn was absolutely priceless and we definitely created some memorable moments!

10 of our FAVORITE THINGS on this trip.....

(in random order!)

10. Meeting Disney characters!
Parker was so excited to get everyone's 'autograph', and the cute little book he had them signing also provides a place to put each character's picture above it. He is going to love looking through it once we get the pictures developed!

9. The Tiki Room!
This is a show of dancing and singing birds and Parker and Emmie loved it! Chris and I loved the A/C that accompanied the show! :)
Also a favorite in that neck of the woods was Pirates of the Caribbean. Parker referred to it as the 'scary' ride and told us the first couple days that it was his favorite.

(Keep reading to find out what quickly became his true #1)

8. Turning 30 at Disneyland! (That's right - I said T-H-I-R-T-Y!!!)
Celebrating my birthday at the park (Tuesday, the 15th) was so much fun. I was given a Happy Birthday button to wear with my name it and every time a Disney employee spotted my button, they would say, "Happy Birthday, Michelle!" For some reason it was just fun to have random strangers constantly yelling out "Happy Birthday!". Plus they gave me a $72 gift card to use on merchandise in the park. I totally recommend going for your big day. It was really, really fun!
After our day at Disney, we went to the Cheesecake Factory (now just down the street) for dinner. I was blessed to end my Big Day with some Oreo cheesecake.
Now THAT is something to celebrate!!!


7. Feeding the ducks in Critter Country at lunch time.
Parker loved this when we did it with him at 20 months, and he loved it at three!


6. Finding Nemo!
We only went on this twice due to lines, but Parker and Emmie both really loved it!

5. Toy Story Ride!

There is a new Toy Story ride over in CA Adventure, and it is sooooo much fun! We went numerous times and it was definitely a top favorite!

4. Emmie meeting the characters!


Her face would just light up every time we got close to a character. Some kids were afraid of them... Not our Emmie. She was grinning ear to ear and would try to grab their noses and even attempted to eat a few of them....! (Surprise, surprise.:))

3. The Pixar Parade in CA Adventure Park!

This parade was soooooooooo well done! The kids loooved it and the choreography was amazing. Definitely a highlight!

2. Parker meeting his beloved friend, Mickey Mouse.
Parker has been infatuated with his buddy Mickey for about a year and a half now. He was Mickey for Halloween last year, is a HUGE Mickey Mouse Clubhouse fan, sleeps with his two Mickey's every night.... you get the idea. We've been talking about meeting Mickey all summer and he was really looking forward to it! Luckily, we had several run-ins with Mickey during our stay. It was very exciting! :)


1. What was Parker's favorite ride you ask??? None else but
THE MATTERHORN!!!
That's right, my (barely) 3 year old looooved one of the fastest rides in the park! He went on it four times, and it would have been a lot more but the lines were long. This was the only 'big' ride that he was tall enough for....can't wait to see what he thinks of Space Mountain in a year or two!

Amidst all of the excitement, by the end of the day (like 5:00!) our kids were more into DREAMland than DISNEYland. It was such a fun trip, but truly exhausting for all of us!

We are so grateful that we could go and spend such adventurous, quality time together.

We LOVED it and can't wait to do it again! :)

All About Cali Part I

We just got back from California last Sunday. We were gone for almost ten days and had such a great time! I feel like family vacations are a true necessity in that you really get to spend quality time together. You know, meaning those oh-so never-ending, obnoxiously continually beckoning chores of laundry, cooking and cleaning are simply just not a worry! WHAT A RELIEF!!! Just good times and making memories is the focus.

Seriously, what is better than that???

So we are a little CRAZY and decided to DRIVE! It actually wasn't so bad- it only took us ten hours total, and the $1500+ we saved by not flying and renting a car was definitely worth it!

The nicest part was that my Mom and Stepdad live in St. George, so we stopped there for a night on the way there and back. It was nice to see them and a great break from driving, not to mention a nice place to stay overnight!

Here are the kiddos doing one of their favorite activities -- playing in Grandma's Jane's guest tub!

That was Friday night, September 11th. On Saturday, we left for LA, where we stayed for a night at my Uncle Mark and Aunt Susan's home before heading out on our Disneyland adventure.

A little sidenote for the family history....

My Uncle Mark (my Dad's brother) is the founder and CEO of WET Design, a firm that designs and makes fountains all over the world. He is truly a creative genius! He has done numerous fountains for Disneyworld and Epcot Center, many of the water features around the LA area including at The Grove and the Watercourt at California Plaza, not to mention works spanning from Hong Kong to Madrid. Probably his most famous water feature however, is the Bellagio Hotel fountain in Las Vegas, which you may also know by it's four-minute scene in the movie Oceans Eleven. Locally, he did the fountain at Gateway in downtown Salt Lake that all the kids love to play in, he did the 2002 winter olympic games huge spiral torch of glass and water that was lit during the opening ceremonies, and his current local project is in the works is for the new downtown Salt Lake City project by Temple Square.

Phew! Just to name a couple. :)

Mark is genuinely one of the most humble guys you'll ever meet. I've never heard him boast about any of his work, even when they obviously deserve some sort of recognition and praise! In fact, most of the time we have to really coax him to get him to tell us much about his projects, as world-renowned as many of them are!

We are so proud of my Uncle Mark and continue to be awed by the many talents and the inspiration he has delivered all across the world.

We were honored to get to stay in their guest house for a night and Parker and Emmie looooved playing with their two kids (their second cousins), Harrison and Madison. Parker gets along great with these two and had such a fun time playing with them!

Thanks Mark and Susan for letting us be your guests for a night and for such great accomodations! :)

Next we were off to Anaheim for six nights! I will post the Disneyland excursion separately, but the other non-Disney adventure we had was going to

NEWPORT BEACH!!

On Wednesday morning we took a break from the parks and headed for the beach, sand and sun.

We all had the best time and the kids totally loved it.

Parker looved looking for seashells with Dad, and Emmie couldn't get enough of the water. She would scream when I would move her away from the waves hitting her little legs.



An excited (and pretty cute) little explorer at Pirates Cove (Newport Beach)Emmie also looooved the sand! No, I'm telling you, she REALLY LOVED THE SAND! EW!

For the girl who puts EVERYTHING into her mouth, why wouldn't she try a mouthful of

sick, germ infested, birdy pooped-on, fishy-smelling DIRT?

UGGHHH!!! LOL

We still love you, Emmie. :) Despite that little incident that unfolded before my camera-catching lens, we still loooooved our morning at the beach!

If I lived in Cali, I think I'd have to arrange for play dates at the beach at least weekly! I might blind fellow beach goers with my glowing white skin as I did on this trip, but eventually I might just end up with tan.

*Sigh*

I think it's been at least a good 8 years since I had one of those... :)

Haircuts for two please

We just got back from a way fun, 9 day trip to California today. (more about that later...!)Parker and Emmie were going to be meeting Mickey & friends and we didn't want them looking shabby, so the day we left I took the kiddos in for haircuts.

This was a special event for Emmie, as it was her monumental, very

FIRST HAIRCUT! :)

Here they are in their before picture:Wild and crazy!

Emmie was a little nervous to cut her luscious locks, but she took it like a big one year old and sat bravely as the hair stylist snipped away, giving her a cute slight stack in the back.

Ahem...

Drum roll..............!

THE FINAL PRODUCT:

Ta-Duh!

My reaction?

I love it! Finally got rid of those uneven ends!

Her reaction???

"Hmmmm.... I thi--ink I like it....it might take some getting used to....."

Finally a slight smile....
"Yeah, okay. I think I do like it!"
Such a girl I tell ya! :)

And as for Mr. P.... he's always happy to get his haircut as long as he gets to watch a movie, play on the slide and get a balloon and sucker on his way out the door.
We love Cookie Cutters!
Too bad I don't think I can afford it much longer now that I have to pay for TWO kid's cuts!

First day of Joy School!

Parker started Joy School last Tuesday.

He was very excited to wear a backpack and meet his new "bends" (friends).

I was very excited too!

Are these little guys cute or what?!

They learned about the letter "A" this week and about animals and participated in lots of fun little activities over at Zach's house.

They had a great time and we are looking forward to the year!

We all scream for ice cream

We had a party for Emmie's birthday 2 days before the actual big day, so on her REAL birthday, August 25th, we decided to let the Birthday Girl have her very first taste at ice cream,

and we made a trip to Cold Stone.

For a girl who LOOOOoooves to eat, she wasn't so thrilled with her Pink Lemonade sorbet. (I will testify however that it was soooo yummy!) I think she was a little put off by the cold.....She was still a super happy girl though to be on a family outing.

The one in for a REAL treat, however, was this little boy:

OH MY! He was in pure HEAVEN!!!
Can't you tell by the mesmerized look on his face?

This kid sat digging and savoring his double chocolate icecream with mixed in oreos and gummy bears on the side (that he meticulously lined up on his chocolate feast) in almost COMPLETE SILENCE for a good 15 minutes! Let me just tell you----THAT.NEVER.HAPPENS!

with our chatterbox, never-sit-still little Parker!


I suppose Cold Stone does have that magic effect on people.
I guess we should have made this outing for HIS birthday, not Emmie's....

Thanks, Em, for giving Parker a little bit of heaven on your birthday!

Who am I kidding? We all benefited from the outing!