Summer 2010

Summer started early for us this year, Caiteyn's last day of school was May 21st (thanks to the three furlough days that the school district had to take!). The first month of summer was pretty cool, literally, as our temperatures were in the high 70s/low 80s which didn't make swimming all that fun because it was just too cold! We had lots of playdates, free movies and the girls tried a gymnastics class for the first time and LOVED it. By the time the cruise came around, the rest of the summer flew by :( We were able to squeeze in a couple of river trips, which is always a fun time, and some swim playdates once the weather warmed up; we pretty much lived in the pool for a while there. We managed to only have a couple of pajama days (this is when we spend all day in our jammies, well, because we can) which is pretty good considering last winter break we had about five pajama days with fifteen days off of school :) We had an awesome and very memorable summer and I'm so sad that it is over...




This summer Carlie was FINALLY able to ride Big Thunder with the help of her 'high heels' and she had so much fun. As soon as we got off, we stood in line to ride it again...

Merry Christmas!

I hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas!

With all the craziness of Christmas morning, I wasn't able to get a picture of the girls together, actually I really didn't get any decent pictures (I think it is time for a new camera!)..these two are the best I got. Again, I hope everyone had a great Christmas holiday surrounded by family, friends and love!

Overdue post!

WOW, I can't believe it has been so long since my last post. We had such a short summer this year that we were trying to fit in as much as possible and well, I guess I got lazy on the whole posting thing. We didn't do any traveling this summer, but we spent many hours by the pool, hanging out with friends, taking the boat out on the river and of course, visiting the "Happiest Place on Earth". Here are just a few pictures from the summer...

Over the summer, Caiteyn decided that she wanted to play soccer this fall and so we signed her up for AYSO, the only problem, she also wanted to try out for the dance team at her studio. After talking and thinking it over, we decided that she would do both. Soccer is from August to November (games don't start until the middle of September) and dance is a year long commitment. So far things have gone really smooth; we make sure homework is done when she gets home from school and then on Tuesday and Thursday we have soccer and Wednesday and Friday we have dance. She seems to handling the schedule well and I really wanted to give her the opportunity to find what it is that she loves.

This summer also brought some bad news for our family. My dad was diagnosed with Adenocarcinoma of the Esophagus in July and after being told that it was an aggressive, fast moving cancer, nothing was done for WEEKS! This past week he finally had an endoscopic ultrasound and liver biopsy done and we were so happy to hear that the cancer is contained within his esophagus. This means that surgery CAN be done along with radiation and chemo. Please keep my dad in your prayers as surgery has a long recovery and of course, chemo and radiation are never easy on a person.

Quick River Trip

This past weekend we decided to take the boat out for a quick trip. I had plans that I committed to on Sunday that I needed to be back for, so Friday after Caiteyn got out of school, we packed and then drove 250 miles to where the weather was warm and beautiful (unlike the nasty weather we have been having around here for the last couple of weeks) to spend a day out on the water. The girls love playing in the sand all day and telling Mike "go faster Daddy" when we are driving around on the boat. Summer is my favorite time of year...

Caiteyn driving the boat as we went through the no-wake zone in the gorge.

Carlie having her turn to drive the boat.

Carlie hanging out at the bow of the boat.

A long boat ride always knocks Carlie out!

Lake Isabella

This past weekend we took a trip up to Lake Isabella to try out some fishing. There was a fishing derby that was going on and we did manage to catch one fish, but unfortunately it wasn't a tagged fish that would have won us some money...oh well maybe next time. Here are a couple of pictures from the trip...

Christmas Eve and Christmas

Here are some pictures from our wonderful Christmas Eve and Christmas...

Carlie LOVES La La (a.k.a. Sleeping Beauty)!

Can you see the joy on her face?

"La La!!!"

Santa brought Carlie a new baby.

Santa brought Caiteyn a Barbie house.

I hope that your Christmas was just as special as ours was...Merry Christmas!

Thanksgiving

I hope that everyone had a great Thanksgiving! The girls and I spent the week at a campground that we belong to (which is what we do every year) and it was very relaxing. My parents were up there as well and Mike was able to spend some time with us between his work schedule. The girls love playing in the dirt and watching the squirrels gather nuts and jump from tree to tree. Here are a couple of pictures from the week...

I have so much to be thankful for, as I do every year, and know that I have a very blessed life! This time of the year always gives me butterflies because of all the excitement the holidays bring...

Happy Holidays!

oh...enjoy the Christmas music; I had fun putting it together!

The Ridgways

On Tuesday I had the pleasure of meeting the Ridgways; for those heart families out there, this is Angel Eden's family. I have been following their blog for a while and I was excited to learn that they would be visiting Disneyland for a couple of days, I thought it would be a great opportunity to meet each other. I contacted Keisa and we set up a time that we could meet. As soon as Ainsley and Caiteyn met, they became best friends. They planned out our day down to what rides we would ride next...they had a ton of fun together! Emerson and Carlie had fun getting to know each other as well and hopefully next time the Ridgways visit, Emerson and Carlie will be tall enough to ride on some of the bigger rides with their sisters. I had a great time getting to know Marcus and Keisa, they are really great people, and I look forward to spending time with them again when they return in January.

Here are a couple of pictures of the girls together...

Waiting to get on Winnie the Pooh

Not the best picture, but at least they are all sitting down...

Fun with our cousins from Colorado

As I mentioned in one of my previous posts, we had relatives visiting from Colorado and so we took advantage of their trip out here and went to Disneyland. My cousin has three girls, Miranda (10), Maycie (3) and Emmy (1), so I knew that Caiteyn and Carlie would have a ton of fun with them. Caiteyn spent most of the time going on the big rides since she had Miranda and Mike to go with her. The rest of us hung out and watched the parade and waited in line to meet the Princesses (Caiteyn made sure that she didn't miss that!). We had so much fun that the next day we decided to go back after Caiteyn got out of school to meet up with them again. I only wish that their stay was longer so that we could have spent more time together...

Here are some pictures from our visit...enjoy!

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Del Mar Beach at Camp Pendleton

This past weekend my cousin Jeremy, who is from Colorado, graduated from the Marine Corps. My Aunt, Uncle and cousins flew out to watch his graduation and so we took advantage of being able to spend some time together. We headed down to Camp Pendleton Thursday afternoon and stayed at the base campground that is right on the beach; it was beautiful. As soon as we got there the girls wanted to run down to the water so I grabbed my camera and we walked down to do some shell searching and play in the water.

The first thing Caiteyn did was grab a stick and start writing our names...

I told Carlie that she was too far in the water, but she refused to listen to me. Right after I took this picture, she fell and this is what she looked like...

But she was still all smiles...

and Caiteyn was too.

Congratulations Jeremy! Thank you for dedicating yourself to our country; we are proud of you and your accomplishments.

Sea World

Yesterday we took the girls down to San Diego to visit Sea World. We took Caiteyn a couple of years ago and she seemed the right age (2 1/2) to enjoy all the animals so we thought Carlie would enjoy them as well; we thought wrong! Just like everything else, they are SO different. Carlie would be interested in the shows for about two seconds and then start climbing anything and everything that she could. I think the only thing that she was really into was the 'Pets Rule' show which has dogs, cats, pigs and birds in the show. I think my favorite show of the day was the Shamu show that they had during the day (they also have one at night called 'Shamu Rocks') named 'Believe'. It was just a very touching story about having a dream and going after it. I have to admit that it made me tear up a couple of times and I'm not sure if it is because I have a soft heart for animals (and these animals are truly amazing!) or because of the message. Either way it was a beautiful show and had a catchy tune that Caiteyn sang for the rest of the day. Here are some pics from the show...

Waiting for the Shamu show to start.

While Carlie took a nap, Caiteyn and I walked into the penguin exhibit and I was surprised that she knew two types of penguins in the exhibit. For those Noggin families out there, I thank Go Diego Go! for that. That channel is the best! While Carlie continued to nap, I took Caiteyn on the ride Journey to Atlantis which is a water ride and roller coaster in one. Within the first ten seconds of the ride you hit a 60 foot drop and let's just say that Caiteyn didn't handle it so well. She was supposed to go on the ride with Mike after, but she refused saying that it was too scary. I explained to her that when we go to Disneyland (which is supposed to happen Friday) to go on all the big rides that they will be just as fast. She said that she won't be afraid of those rides, and is still insisting that she will ride Splash Mountain when we go...we'll see! Here are some more pics from the day...

Because the park is sponsored by Anheuser-Busch they had a beautiful Clydesdale that you could have your picture taken with.

We were killing some time between shows and Mike saw this... He wanted to try and win one for the girls but I explained to him that they would end up fighting over Elmo and that he would have to win two. I told him not to waste the money because a little dollar toy would turn into a twenty dollar toy. It cost one dollar for two tries and wouldn't you know, he won an Elmo on the first try. Now we were stuck trying to win another...
I was happy that he was able to win another one, as was Carlie (because the first one was Caiteyn's), and in all, it only cost four dollars! Way to go Daddy!!!

As close to Shamu as they could get.

Overall it was a fun day and hopefully the next time we go Carlie will be more interested. Here are two more pictures that were taken at the end of our day (I promise they had sunscreen on all day, the sun really got the best of ALL of us!) and about 45 minutes later they were both knocked out.