Disney World in a nut shell

For Christmas, my parents decided to take our whole family to Disney World. AWESOME! So last week was the week, and this is my "short version." Drive to New Harmony Wed. night. Forgot plane tickets, drive back to get them. (I only had to go to Filmore cause Reece decided to meet me half way, thanks hun.) Return to Dad and Moms house 12:30 a.m.. Get up early Thursday morning to drive to Vegas to go to the airport. Stand by flights are a little stressful, but overall we got all the flights we tried for on Thursday.

Grandma brought lots of fun things for the kids.

Vegas to San Antonio, 3 hour lay over (maybe more, I stopped counting after the first showing of Happy Feet.)

Still watching Happy Feet?
I think we were all a little tired.

San Antonio to Orlando, great. Arrive Orlando 10:30 p.m., get rental cars. I was pleasantly surprised when I found out my "mid-size" car was a mini van. Lots of space for a great price. Friday was great we did some driving, some shopping, and some swimming. The Hotel we stayed at was great. It's my parents time share, and so there was a full kitchen and dining room/living room. Plus two rooms. There was also another room 2 doors down that was for Stan and Mavis and Fam. Sharley got to sleep on the couch in the big room while Dad and mom had the room with one bed, and Reece and I got the room with 2 beds. My Aunt Missy, and Uncle Matt were also on the trip but they booked their hotel at Disney's Animal Kingdom. Spoiled! j/k.
O.K. So everyone is in Orlando by Friday night (minus Reece, his flight gets in Sat. evening) So Saturday we go to Epcot. Fun but not my favorite.

Silly, but still cute

These three girls were so cute. Mavis made all of them little fairy costumes. Thanks May.

Here's Missy in her commemorative shirt. Yay!

First ride inside that big ball you see in all the adds for Epcot.

There was a garden Festival while we were there. Cool stuff made out of Shrubbery.












Lunch

Can anyone find Nemo?

Bruce

Here's our little Tinkerbell

Yes the kids are on a leash. That's Grandma walking Maley, and Jo-Jo.

Reece calls at 7:30 to tell me he has arrived, we're still at the park because I thought his flight got in much later. So Reece waits at the airport for about an hour until we can get there to pick him up. (Sorry Reece. "Brain, oh brain...where are you?")
Sunday, we took the day off and just lounged around the hotel (kinda by the pool :). Sunday was also Lauric's third birthday so we celebrated.

Gettin' ready to swim.

Where's Waldo, or I guess Isabel.

Captain Max

Don't miss the tiara on Isabel's head, while swimming. Awesome.

The hotel also had unlimited pee-wee golf for all of us. We played boys against girls, and the girls won. My dad says we cheated, and I plead the 5th. Matt had the highest overall score. You go boyeee!!!

Monday, was our official first visit to the Magic Kingdom. Woo-hoo. Very long day! First ride: Astro Orbitor.

Looking a little tired, but waiting patiently.

This is the shot I got while on the ride. Fire works at the castle.

The kids were all fairly well behaved. Here are the two little ones now,

First lunch... Then naps. :)

Waiting in line for the Snow white kiddie ride.

Chillin'

Dumbo

2 big apes!

Here's my little princess in front of the magic castle. She is wearing her hand made (by my mom) snow white costume (minus the cape, it was getting in the way.)

Here's all the little princesses.

One of our new favorite movies is sword in the stone. My kids were in heaven when they pulled on it and it actually started coming out. We have video, it just takes to long to upload so the pictures will have to do.


Tuesday was another relax day. We had to take Sharley to the airport because she had to get to Dallas for work. After dropping our little princess off, we headed over to Matt, and Missy's hotel. Very cool! Isabel fell in the hot tub, not quite sure if she fell in on purpose, but we'll have to give her the benefit of the doubt. After the hot tub incident, we all decided it was time for lunch so we drove to Costco for some pizza, hot dogs, and churros, mmm. Once we stuffed ourselves to the brimm, we headed back to our hotel to play and relax.

Next up...Disney's Hollywood Studios.
First thing we had to do was go check out Star wars stuff.

Here are some cruisers

Isabel looks like a real robot guy

Here was the highlight of the trip. The kids got to participate in a jedi training show. They (especially Max) were in heaven!

Here they are checking in for the show

got your pass, almost there.

Waiting patiently

Getting hot.

Getting their robes on

Padawan Isabel

Padawan Max

Let the show begin...

After the training both kids got these certificates:

Next up, Toy story 3-D ride. Awesome!

O.K. glasses on and ready to shoot at something???

After all the shows, and rides we needed to break for lunch.

Here's another flower presentation. Fantasia.

We got to watch a short performance of Beauty and the Beast.

Everyone was entranced by the show

Reece caught me taking pictures

The show was awesome! Everyone decided that it was one of the best things we had seen on the whole vacation.

Big ole' hat

Part of the park had all these huge city back drops.
How do you like this face...

Here's SanFran...

The highlight of Joe's day came when we saw Lightening McQueen.

This little boy was in heaven

Kisses

The last thing we did at Hollywood Studios was watch the Muppets 3-D movie. Here's all the goofballs in their glasses.

What a great day. The weather was perfect, and everyone was pretty happy. Joseph was extremely happy! He couldn't stop smiling. Here's the tram we took to our car, still smiling.

Cone head, or the next big star of Toy Story.

Thursday was our last day and we decided to go back to the Magic kingdom. There was more for the kids to do here. We probably should've stayed home because of the rain, but that's just not our style. Haha.

Here's the wishing well

and Isabel singing at the wishing well

One of Isabels favorite rides

Tea cups

Dumbo!!!

Here's a little clip of a little roller coaster we went on. Nothing compared to Big thunder rail road, or splash mountian, space mountian, or even the rockin' roller coaster. (Max and Isabel went on all the coasters and loved them all. They even went on the Tower of Terror, but this time they both said they did not like it at all.) Listen for what Max says at the end of the clip :)



Hat Fest

At about 3:00 it started coming down hard, they even had Hurricane warnings in the area. We decided to watch one last show to see if it would let up. We watched the Philharmagic. Another 3-D movie this time with special affects like smells and water and wind. Pretty cool! So after the show it had gotten worse, so we decided to call it a day.

Here's all the characters we saw. They weren't all in the same park but I'm putting them all together.

Mickey

Pluto. Poor Jo was frightened Just like his Mama.

MinniDonald

Goofy

Buzz

Tigger

Chip and Dale. Joe was lovin' it

here's Jo-Jo with Jo-Jo

Silly daddy

Fairy Godmother

Sleeping Beauty (Isabel said this was her favorite.)

last but not least Cinderella

That's all folks!

Without getting into too much detail, Friday was hellish, as well as Sat. The only good thing was being able to see the Waite's in Henderson and then of course finally getting to Orem where we got to rest in our very own cozy little home with our cozy little beds.
Thank you to all my family for a fun filled wonderful vacation. A special thanks to Sharley for providing ( P.I.T.A) airplane tickets, and admission into the parks. And all of this was made possible by the two people who always give us more then we ever deserve. Dad and Mom! I love my parents more than words can describe. They are always a phone call away, and I can always count on them when the going gets tough. They always make sure that my family has everything we need, even when they don't have enough for themselves. You two are the best, and I will in return always be here for you. Thank you for the wonderful trip!

And that, my friends, is Disney World in a nut shell. TTFN.

work out buds!

Here's my new work out buddy. Isabel loves when I do my p90x. She just jumps right in there and try's to do all the moves with me. She's so funny. She does like 3 reps and says, "this is a tough one, I need a break." On some of the moves she says, "this ones easy, I can do this one." Isabel, I love you!

Oh what a night

I missed my son's 1st, first grade program tonight. Boo. I was asked to participate in our stake program the ten virgins. I was asked Monday to do the part, but I had done it before so I thought I could handle it. Bwhahaha. I should've practiced more. I forgot the words to the song I was singing like half way through. Totally blank. Can we say "embarrassing?" What ever, I'm kinda over it, but wish I could've been at Max's program instead of forgetting the words to my song. Reece took some sweet videos of Max:
This is his part (his friend Morgan is first)


What he said was: Flying the flag upside down is a sign of trouble. This means someone needs help on the double. Like a ship that is sinking.

This next clip, I don't know what it was exactly, just the shortest one.

Yay for my little first grader!

After the play I had a basketball game. Luckily I didn't choke so bad during that. We won! Yay! My friend Sara was on like Donkey Kong. (Had to say it Sara.) Anyway, got some pictures to post, then off to bed.

I told Reece to try to get an action shot. This is me putting on my Jersey before the game. :)

Here's my cheer team (minus Reece), they wanted to shoot some hoops during half time.

Here's the team:
(top left to right) Chris"tre", Noelle "baller extraordinaire", ME, Kaylene "The Beast", Monica "tall girl #1", (bottom right to left) Kim "Coach", Sara "THE baller", Valene "Tall girl #2, Carol "tall girl #3", "Sha-zam", "Mask"chelle. Love you guys!

Goof "ballers", Oh wait I mean "Sprinkles!"

Peace out!

Joseph is 2!

This post is mostly for family who could not be here with us. Hope this helps!

Joseph did not even comprehend that it was his special day. We sang to him all day, and asked him how old he was. No reaction. I did however get a reaction when I brought out his presents. After Dad got home, and we ate Joe's favorite dinner (pizza,) I brought out the two little gifts we got for him.

Here he is opening:

Cars underwear. Here we come Mr. Toilet.

here's video of the next gift.



After unwrapping the car, we had to quickly remove it from the box so he could fully enjoy it.



I also decided last minute to actually make a cake in my tiny oven, and invite a few friends over for cake and ice cream. "Happy birthday to you..."




Some photo's:

Joe was not afraid to dig in, just wondered if it was really o.k. to do it.

Joseph is a sweet spirit! Since his birth, two short years ago, he has brought nothing but joy (and a few tantrums.) We hope he'll continue to grow and learn, and keep teaching us by his loving example. We Love you Joe-boo!

Randomness

Last week I put Izzy's hair in this little concoction so that it would get super curly.

Mission accomplished:

Here are a few shots of little Joe. He loves masks.

Power Ranger

Bat man

Here's his new outfit for Church. (Matches his scar :)

These last shots were taken just minutes ago, as all three kids found a new mode of transportation.

"Ride em Cowboys!"

(Not implying anything sweetie.)

Saturday is a special day

We have had a pretty relaxing Saturday. I love days when you don't have to be anywhere, and don't have to worry about getting out the door as fast as you can to be on time for something.
Not only did we clean the house this morning while dad went to the hospital for a bit, but we also made these amazing videos while Jo-Jo took a nap.

Hope you enjoy. We certainly did!

I love my crazy kids!!!

Super Sunday

Last night we got to go to Donny and Sara's house to watch "the big game." What a sad day for the Colt's. Just when you think everything is going great.... interception.
That's fine! As you can see from the picture, we are a bay area family! I grew up in San Fran, and Reece grew up in Hayward. I love the Niners, and he loves both Niners and Raiders. I don't think you can do that, but he says he can do what ever he wants to. Go figure, oh and... "Go Niners!"

Book fair

Today we got to go eat lunch with Max at school.

This week at school is the book fair. Max wanted to buy a star wars book, so I told him if he read it all afternoon today, we could get it. This month at school is a reading contest, and Max is going to try to win.

Day 2, and we already have 2 hours of reading. Pretty good bud, keep up the good work!

Update: Max got top reader in his class the first week. Way to go little buddy! All the hard work payed off. Max got a coupon for a free dinner, a free taco, and a free game of laser tag. He also turned in his hall of fame reading chart, and received a free book. Max, you rock!

on the mend

Here's the boy. We're finally seeing some healing and he couldn't be happier.

Love you sweet boy!