Family Vacation, Day 8-9

Saturday, November 5-Sunday, November 6, 2011

We left California Saturday morning, but decided to stay the night in Vegas before heading home on Sunday.  The weather was a little better, but still chilly.  But the pool in Vegas was warm, and the kids LOVED the pool.  Heather and I sat in chairs with towels over us as blankets and watched them.  We just lounged...after a week of "Go, go, go"-ing, it was a nice change.  We ate dinner at Marie Calendar's where Spencer only wanted cornbread if there wasn't corn in it.  (What?)  We left Sunday morning, and headed home, and that was the end of that.  An uneventful drive (Good news!) except that if I hadn't followed Megan into the same rest stop bathroom stall after she was done, someone would have gotten a brand new iPod Touch in there after us!  (Oh, she'd have been SO sad...!)  

Heather...

Fun things about bringing Heather on a vacation:

• She taught my family about puns...Apparently we don't use them enough in our house, because they weren't sure at first what a pun was.  They're good now.  And still practicing!
• I love the things Heather gets excited about.  She's like a kid, only she always listens and does what you ask.  (She's not naughty at ALL!)
• She is very laid back...No agenda.  She goes with the flow.
• Heather does this awesome thing on vacations where she just brings a small notebook and writes down little notes all day...Funny things someone said, or what we did, things we laughed at.  Reading through those is such a fun reminder of things that usually get forgotten by the time you get home to write them down.
• Plus, Heather is just awesome.

Some other fun Heather stories:

• Heather and Lee were sitting in the Ferris Wheel (which they both hate!) and every time our car would slide in or out, Lee would grab onto Megan and Sydney's legs and squeeze.  At one point, Heather's hand was on Megan's leg...so he squeezed her hand instead.  Heather...No flirting with my husband!  (And Lee, no flirting with my sister!)
• When we were changing to go swimming in Vegas, Heather pulled up a dining chair right outside the door so when we opened it she was sitting RIGHT THERE!
• In our Vegas condo, Lee and I were saying goodnight to the kids, and when we walked out after and headed toward our room, Heather was in our bed calling Lee.

I just love Heather!  She is really fun to spend time with.  She is thoughtful, she's funny, and she loves STUFF...It doesn't matter what it is.  There is just a joy and delight to everything she does, and I think it is contagious.  She makes things more fun for all of us!  Thanks for coming with us, Heather!  

Family Vacation, Day 7

Friday, November 4, 2011

Our last day at Disneyland!

Do you just love the face Sydney is making here?  Her "Um...Okay, if I have to stand by the Storm Trooper...!" look.

So not a ton of pictures today!  It had rained overnight, so everything was wet when we got there, but it wasn't raining.  We had about 3 hours of dry time to go around and do our favorites one last time...And then it just started to POUR!!  The bummer was that it rained so much we got soaked and were cold and miserable.  The up side was that by then, we had already done everything, and most things more than once!  So we stood looking longingly at the park for just a few more minutes, and then we decided to go back to our room, get dry, and just rent a movie or something...Which we did.  And it was delightful!

This probably won't be nearly as funny to everyone else as it was to those of us who were there, but I'm putting in here anyway!  We felt bad that because we had kids in the living room AND in the room where Heather was sleeping she had to go to bed when they did.  So we started inviting her into our room when we put the kids down so she could join us for some dessert and a little TV.  (Usually Food Network...)  Luckily, the room we were in had a random chair...which I pulled away from the closet and closer to the bed, so she could see the TV better.  That first night, Heather looked over at us sitting in the bed while she was sitting in a chair next to the bed and said, "This is kind of awkward."

Thus a new joke was born.  From then on, we would invite her into the awkward room to sit on the random chair.  We have since texted her pictures of the chairs in our bedroom at home, with dessert sitting on the table, telling her she was late for Awkward Time...!

(Don't you just love Heather?)

Family Vacation, Day 6!

Thursday, November 3, 2011

Day 4 of Disneyland!

Eeyore! 

Sydney! 

My cute hubby! 

We had lunch at the little western cookout place inside Disneyland.  They called all the kids up to help sing Davy Crockett.  MOST of my kids were nice enough to stand together for this.  Tory, however, picked the OTHER side of the stage!

  

See?  You can see Sydney, Megan, Spencer, and "Hat-Hat".

  

And there in the back on the left you can see Tory...

The one thing Michael wanted to do every time we passed it was to go into the Wilderness Explorer Camp (From "Up") and earn his badge.  We put it off for a few days, but today we finally caved!

The had different stations where you had to do different things (rope climbing, watching for different animal foot prints, swing on a tire swing, etc.) and when you finished them all you would head to the ceremony where they'd make you Wilderness Explorers!

Here's Russell! 

So now we're officially Wilderness Explorers!  Go us.

Family Vacation...Bad news!

Tuesday when we went outside to the car for lunch we noticed a puddle under the car.  We weren't sure if it was coming from our car or not, so we moved it to a different spot before we went back inside the park.  When we came out, the puddle was there again.  We drove to a gas station where a super nice guy came over when he saw our hood was popped and was giving us advice on what he thought it was.  Then he pointed to a repair shop across the street and said they could fix it.  We wrote down the name of the shop, and I called first thing in the morning.  So the one hiccup to Wednesday is that Lee and I dropped Heather and the kids off at the gates of Disneyland, then dropped the car off and walked back...only to repeat the process later that day when the car was all better.


I sure hate car repair...But at least we were able to get it fixed without taking a chunk of our vacation to do it!

Family Vacation, Day 5!

Wednesday, November 2, 2011

(Day 3 at Disneyland, and Sydney's 13th Birthday!)


Syd's GOOD birthday stuff was at home in her bedroom.  But we did bring a few things with us so she'd have some little gifts to open.

(Just wanted to tell you that Michael (I'm sure Heather started it!) called his hat "Hat-Hat" the whole trip, because his hat is wearing a hat!

We followed Rhoda's advice, and as soon as we got to Disneyland we went to the City Hall building and got my Teenager a Birthday badge.  Then they gave the rest of us "I'm Celebrating!" badges to wear.  This was me, helping her be excited.  (She was totally playing it cool...for like 5 minutes!)

The kids sitting in the FAKE teacup...
(Syd wearing the "It's My Birthday" ears we bought her!)

Sydney, Megan, and Heather in the REAL teacup!

Tory and Spencer...

We tried to get in line to see Jack and Sally, but we were told the line was closed.  Tory was super mad..."How is a line closed?"

And true to birthday magic, we saw Sydney's favorite princess on her birthday!

From our position in line, we were laughing at the boys.  They did NOT want to see Cinderella!  Here they are waiting for us across the moat...

Here they are waiting for us across the moat...Closer up.

Heather said, "But what if you want a picture with JUST Cinderella...?"
That Fairy Godmother just pops right in there!

Two of the cutest little troublemakers ever!

(Most of) My kids with Aladdin!

My kids made Heather take a picture with Aladdin...Then teased her the rest of the week about how that was her true love...sigh...!

Yay, Goofy!

Family Vacation; Day 4!

Tuesday, November 1, 2011

We started day two at Disneyland at California Adventure!  We took some more pictures by some favorite signs:

(This was Spencer's favorite ride...I love the face he's making in this picture!)

(Okay...This face, too!)

This is me, posing just like Minnie...but without the hat.

This is what Daddy and Spencer think of the Tower of Terror!  (Spencer is doing thumbs-down, Lee is doing "We sure have a drag...")

A close up view of Spencer's dislike...

My Adorables:  L-R:  Sydney (12...until tomorrow!), Spencer (7),

Tory (10), Megan (10), and Michael (6)

Yay...A picture with Heather!  (I was sad to discover she stepped out of most of the good pictures...That Heather...!)

Waiting for "Muppets 4D!"...

Beautiful Megan!

The boys with Handy Manny...All the big kids ducked out of the way, like it would be so embarrassing to be in a picture with him!  :D

The Green Army Men from Toy Story took to the streets for a few minutes...

As did Phineas and Ferb...If you don't know who they are,

you are missing out!  

Grizzly Rapids, side 1

(Spencer, Michael, Daddy, and Megan)

Grizzly Rapids, side 2

(Tory, Heather, Me, and Sydney)

Michael didn't want to wear his sweatshirt OR tie it around his waist.  He preferred to put the hood on under his hat.  Then he walked around all day calling it his "Girl Hair".

Such a beautiful princess!

Back at Disneyland...This is ToonTown!  By far the most visually entertaining.  (But lousy when it comes to rides...There are two, I think?)  But GREAT scenery!

Jail, with the rubber bars...

Playing drums...

MAN I have cute kids!  :D

(And then sometimes, just SILLY kids...!)

I'm pretty happy with this one!  :D  Worth the wait in the line at Mickey's House!

And we finally got a picture of this sign!  The letters flip and change into pictures, so it only says the word "Disneyland" for a little bit before it changes again.  I watched Sydney try every time we walked from one park to the other, and she would groan because just as she set up the shot, it would change.  Lucky for us, Dad stepped in.  Whew!