One More Disney Day!

Do you know what my Mommy did without me?! She went to Disneyland on LEAP DAY! (Which is why we've backdated the post!) She and 6 of her friends took off from our church at 8 pm on Tuesday night and drove to a small hotel next to Disneyland. They arrived at 2:00 in the morning and basically slept for maybe 3 hours and then got up and hit the park at 6 am!

You see, Disneyland was having a party for Leap Day. They were going to be open from 6 am to 6 am. My Mommy casually suggested it to her friend, Sarah, in front of other people and the idea spread like wildfire. Mommy was all for it except for the fact that she had a wedding to be helping with. But she persevered and they found five other crazies to go with them. They split hotel rooms and gas from one van between them all, Mommy paid for meals with her annual pass, and they tried to get discount tickets (which didn't work and led to us being a little late getting into the park and being very angry at some man named Jules) to help everyone keep costs low. They even were able to have an EIGHTH friend join them because she happened to be visiting her hometown, 15 min from Disneyland! Mommy and her friend, Sarah, surprised the gals with a room at The Grand Californian that opens onto California Adventure. Both of them had always wanted to stay there and it was well worth it and a beautiful hotel that came with these nifty fast passes!

She came home tired but glowing from her 40 hours with friends! They didn't quite last in the park all night because wouldn't you know it...it hit MAXIMUM CAPACITY at about 11:30 pm. That's right. It didn't hit full until after decent people go to bed. Plus most of them were Moms whose dream vacations included nothing but sleep! She giggles frequently and keeps talking about how much she loves her friends in her ward. I still feel like I haven't spent much time with her because then she was running around trying to make up for being gone for the wedding but I love her and her Disney enthusiasm anyway. Just so long as she takes me next time.

Curly Girls

Guest post by Mommy:

I was introduced recently to a new way of living by my amazing sister in laws. I actually think Margaret told us about this method and the book a few years ago but it was tried and didn't really stick. I don't remember even trying it. I certainly didn't read the book anyway! Just before Christmas though, Rachel happened to have in her possession the new edition of this book:

"Curly Girl" by Lorraine Massey.




And she said she was going to dive into it and even buy the products. I am talking about hair, people. Curly hair. My in laws also have wonderful curly hair on their side. I so wish I had a picture of Pete in high school scanned on my computer. His curly hair was impressive. Anyway, I digress. Rachel was going gung ho and I had a few minutes to myself at her house and started reading. I had straightened my hair for this quicky trip up north and was instantly shamed for doing so in the book. Now I don't think I should have felt shamed but I did. And so I decided to embrace my Curly Girl and go for broke. Okay maybe not broke...I didn't buy the products because they are a bit expensive but I decided to not straighten my hair again and use the other methods for doing/taking care of my hair.

And I have LOVED it. I find it kind of freeing. Besides, Becca and Eric are well known and loved for their fantastic curly locks. I wanted in on that. It makes us unique. If you really start looking around, the curly people are out numbered. Or actually more truthfully, according to Ms. Massey, we appear outnumbered because nobody knows how to love and care for their hair properly.

I still have trouble spots on the top of my head with hair that wants to be straight but it's not like my straight hair didn't have it's issues.

Anyway, it's been 2 months of curly hair and it was time to document it! So this last visit up to see my ladies, I made sure we got a picture! I just love these fellow curly girls, even if I am envious of Rachel's gorgeous ringlets.

Food Facts

A couple strange facts about my sister and I when it comes to food....

I LOVE MUSTARD. Mommy and Daddy have kept it to just traditional yellow mustard but I will dip my hot dog BUN in mustard over and over. I will eat plain mustard sandwiches. If you want me to eat vegetables, dip them in mustard please!





And Cara? Man that girl LOVES her salads. She really does. She loves them. She will come and sit on anybody's lap to pick off their salad. She's wild about lettuce. (I simply cannot relate.) It doesn't matter what the dressing either. She'll eat lettuce plain. Sometimes she gets a little picky about what's in the salad besides lettuce but not often.

Cousin Times! And lots of it....

We just spent a wonderful weekend with our Preslar cousins! We drove up to their house in SLC really really early on Friday morning (we're talking we were there by 10:00 am!) And then we didn't leave until Monday morning. It was GREAT. We spent three cozy nights with them and played played played. Nothing special, just lots of time together and it was simply delightful. We went grocery shopping, to the zoo, to Aunt Margaret's house, to church, just very very ordinary things but it was just so special to just be together. We even went to bed at decent hours every night! (That included the adults on two occasions!) We also got to see Oma and Apa again which was fun.





Oh we did buy a new stroller! A great friend let us borrow hers for Disneyland and we decided we just wanted one. And it turns out most people love them so much they don't go up for sale very often on Craigslist or ksl.com. And this way it was nice and shiny and new!



In fact, we were so excited about the stroller, none of us really wanted to get out and explore at the zoo!

Unfortunately they didn't get as much snow as Mommy was secretly hoping but it did snow Saturday night and Sunday morning there were a fresh couple of inches to play with.

Of course Mommy is happy to be back home in sunny St. George but it was a great weekend and we were only bummed because Daddy had to fly out to San Francisco for work and didn't come home with us. We'll see him again on Thursday! Love you Daddy!

Tidbits...LONG post

Since returning from Disneyland, we've kinda been in recovery mode. Kind of. The very next day after returning to home, we welcomed an addition to our family...and after many name changes, we'd like to introduce you to "Chester"



You'd think we could find a decent shot of him awake. The problem? He doesn't hold still if he's awake, but he does LOVE to cuddle and fall asleep on your lap. He's a terrier about 18 months or 2 years old...and he has a bum paw that was a birth defect but he's so sweet and only needs a little more training on that whole "where to tinkle and poopoo" thing.

And that first weekend we had him, we also had Aunt Angie's dog, Bruce, stay with us. Boy going from one, to two, to three in five days was a LOT OF DOG to handle!



It was also so pleasant last Friday that we kiddos got into our swim suits and ran through sprinklers and colored with chalk with the neighbor kids for a couple of hours!



The nice weather led to an incident between me and a grape slushy and the car....I slipped while trying to get in, the slushy had no lid, Mom came around the car and found me dangling half out of the car with my head toward the ground, grape slushy all over my face and what does she do? Start laughing and grab her camera. At least she wasn't mad about the car!





AND THEN...Oma and Apa came to visit the same weekend we had Bruce staying. We had fun on swings and eating at the fire restaurant. I was so brave this time and stayed for him to light the fire and everything!





Oma was the BEST. She played "Little Mermaid Salon" with me. We pretended to get all dresse up. She even got me in my pjs and then she read lots of stories to me. In fact, I didn't want to leave her side even though I couldn't keep my eyes open. It was so nice to see her and that guy who plays tricks on me and pretends not to know my name...who is he again?! Just kidding, Apa!



And just in case you are wondering, after a random inventory check on Grandpa Gordon...he has FIFTY SIX ties, including 3 bow ties.....

Forget much?!

How could Mommy not have noticed? She must have just been too excited to tell you about Disneyland but our last post about our Final Day at Disney was our 400th post! Holy cow! We have been at this for almost 5 years! And Mommy is still missing stuff.

For example...did you guys know that I have been rappelling? Yeah, no. You didn't. Grandpa took me out for a special hike with just me and him to meet up with one of his new doctor partners and that guy's little boys. As an extra special treat, Grandpa taught us all how to rappel! The boys were fighting over who got to go first so Grandpa and their mom decided that it was ladies first. I was a little nervous according to Grandpa but I did it and even asked to go again before Grandpa took down all the stuff. Daddy panicked a little when he heard the story but Grandpa is very safe and was belaying me from up top. It was so much fun.

Final Disney Day...

It was a good thing we left earlier than midnight on Friday because Saturday's Disney Day started out even earlier! The park opened at 8:00 am which meant we had to be out of the house by around 6:45....My body woke right up and started moving. The others....not so much.



This Disney run was not as exciting...they had early morning hours for others (which started at SEVEN..) and so there were already people in when they dropped the rope. We still managed to hit 8 rides in the first hour. INCLUDING PETER PAN and Space Mountain for both Mommy and Daddy. I'm so glad the first hour was so great because after that the crowds were even bigger.

At lunchtime, however, I accomplished something that I have ALWAYS dreamed of. That's right. Disneyland Annual Passes. Dream come true. Angels singing. I'm so excited.



And then we were able to have a delicious lunch with my Grandpa and Grandma at the Rainforest Cafe. They had already been so great to let us stay at their house and it was so nice to visit with them. We also joined them the next day for church and another quick lunch and that was a treat.

Before heading back in to the parks at lunch, we also decided to buy the girls their souvenirs so that we would be able to just head home at night. A slightly off decision only because then they wanted to carry their loot with them EVERYWHERE.



But we finished up our final day at Disneyland and had a wonderful time.

Favorite moments:
-Duh, getting my passes!
-Cara being freaked out at the Rainforest Cafe until she had a nap
-Siena and Cara choosing our last ride to be Pirates of the Caribbean-TWICE in a row! They even tried putting their hands up on the drops. Funny story. We got stuck before the first drop for like 10 minutes and weren't sure if the ride was going to be fixed. Siena kept laughing at the skull that talks because he kept saying the same thing over and over.
-Knowing I get to go back
-Making the decision to leave when the girls got sleepy. I always complain about the parents keeping their children in the park way too late when clearly they need to sleep and I actually didn't prove to be a hypocrite!