Weeds! Weeds! Weeds!

Okay taking a break from vacation blogs...

While we were on vacation unfortunately the weeds were not.  We got home and oh boy what a discouraging sight our garden was.  When we left it was weed free.  But this is what our entire garden looked like when we got home.

There were NO weeds in this garden two weeks ago.  So I was sad to see the rapid growth.  If only our peppers had been the ones rapidly growing.  

So Daryl soaked the garden to make weeding easier.  I went out there yesterday afternoon and started to get to work.  While I was working my friend Natalie came by.  Really I was watching her kids while she went visiting teaching.  Anyways she saw our plight.  And crazy as she is she decided that for Family Home Evening her family was coming to weed with us.  And they did.   It turns out that Natalie really likes to weed.  Our plan for Family Home Evening was weeding as well.

It was a ton more fun to do this job with friends and with all the kids help we managed to only kill a couple of plants.  We had fun chatting and it seemed to take no time at all.  So as usual I am so thankful for all of the wonderful friends that Heavenly Father has blessed me with.  I'm thankful for Natalie and her family for all their help.  Here is what my garden looks like now.

Disney Day 2

Day two was more exciting than day one just because the kids knew where we were going now.  I have this friend April who told me to buy Disney gifts here in Boise and then give them to the kids at the hotel so that I wasn't tempted to buy the really expensive stuff in Disneyland.  So I did.  I got Emma a Cinderella princess dress, and Gabe a Mack and Lightening McQueen.  I was really glad because the princess dresses were $65-75.00 each at Disneyland.  I paid $19.99. Yeah!   So of course Emma had to wear the princess dress to Disneyland.  So here we are at the start of our day.  Thanks to Noni for the Minnie and Mickey ears.

The first thing we did was go to Playhouse Disney.  It was really exciting to see the "real" Little Einstein's, Handy Manny, Tiger and Pooh, and Mickey and friends.  I thought Gabe was going to jump out of his pants when he saw the Little Einstein's.  I have decided what is magical about Disneyland is how excited the kids are.  It was really fun to see them so thrilled. 

After that we walked up to toon town where we got to see Pluto, walk through Minnie's house, and see Mickey.  I thought that Gabe was going to hug Mickey all day long.  He was very excited.  We also rode the roller-coaster.  Gabe had his arms up in the air the whole time.  I'm such a proud mom.  My little thrill seeker.

Me, Emma, Gabe Gracie, Sam & Daryl & of course Mickey Mouse!

(Gracie and Sam are cousins)

We were really blessed to share this whole experience with my parents and sisters and kids.  Emma and Noni (my mom) have a special bond.  Emma loves to spend time with my mom and was just happy to walk beside her and talk to her and share her excitement.  I'm also very thankful to my parents for providing us the place to stay at their timeshare.  Oh and sitting with kids while we went on rides.  That was a huge help.

We left Toon Town to go to the Princess coronation.  What a trip.  Emma was beside herself.  When Belle came out in her big yellow dress this is how our conversation went:

Emma: "Mom, I need a big princess dress."

Me:  "You have this big blue dress right here."

Emma: "I need a bigger one like hers."

Me: "Oh dear I'm in big trouble."

Gabe was just mesmerized by the beauty of Belle and was completely paralyzed.  He was in love I think. He just held onto her dress and walked beside her.  And I just laughed.

Emma did keep running into Cinderella and now thinks that Cinderella is one of her best friends.  I love the princesses.  Especially mine.

We went to go see the bugs life show.  It's a 3D show with lots of special effects.  I won't ruin it for ya but it was a crazy show.  Emma was fine until she put her 3D glasses on.  Then she started to scream these blood curdling screams.  Gabe on the other hand liked it so much he went back to see it again.  He did scoot as far back as he could in his seat.  Emma want's nothing to do with that again. 

The kids loved the pixar parade so much that we did it again.  Gabe woke up just as Lightening Mcqueen was driving by, thus the cranky look.  Emma was so workin it in her princess dress. Everyone just kept talking to her especially the characters in this parade.  It was fun.  Whenever someone would call her princess she would just let them know that she is Princess Emma.  Which she is.  Hopefully she'll remember that when she's a teenager. 

We took Emma on Soaring over California.  If you haven't been on that ride it's pretty cool.  It's like you're hang gliding or something and you fly over different areas of California.  You can smell the forests of Tahoe or the orange fields.  It was cool.  Emma was ecstatic.   Everyone should get to ride with her.  It made the ride for me.  

This is the end of the day and our dear princess is completely wiped out.  She's with her cousin Sam.  Gabe was totally hyped at this point.  I think our day was a success.  We had fun and I'm so glad that we got to do this.  It really was a dream come true for me.  I love having kids!

A day at the beach!

What would a trip to Southern Cal be without a trip to the beach? We drove up to Huntington Beach and pretty much had the place to ourselves.  It was quite amazing.  Okay really it was a little cool.  Like a high of 70 degrees.  But we had fun.  And I decided that Huntington Beach probably was a fun place to grow up Aly.

Emma the water is the other way!!!

Emma racing the waves

My little body boarder

Gabe had a blast in the water.  We couldn't get him out, the waves would go out from under his feet and he would just giggle and giggle.  Daryl kept pulling him over waves on the body board and the boy was wearing a perma grin.  He loved every minute of it.  I made him get out for a while to warm up, but he just couldn't stand it.  I finally told Daryl that we were going to have to leave or Gabe would never stay out of the water and he was going to by hypothermic.  The funny thing was Gabe standing out of the water just shivering all over and I was asking him, "Gabe are you cold?"  His answer, "No mom, I want to go back in."  Only you could hardly understand him through his chattering teeth. 

Emma loves to run from the waves.  She loves the race I think.  Daryl had dug a big hole in the sand and Emma spent most of her time trying to fill it up with water.  The best part of this was that she was carrying her bucket full of water up a little hill and dumping it.  This little exercise tuckered that poor girl out.  Yeah for mom!.

I love that my kids will jump in and do whatever we're doing.  They will try out the waves, or rides at Disneyland.  They really seem to have no fear.  Don't get me wrong there are things that scare them but they are pretty adventurous and I love that about them.  

New Glasses!

Okay, sorry for the delay in vacation info.  So the day after Disneyland we woke up early.  When I say we I mean Emma and Gabe. In order to not wake up everyone we went outside to walk around the resort.  Of course we went out sporting Mickey and Minnie ears and both kids towing their big mylar balloons from Disney.  Gabe's was a giant Pooh bear (he shocked us both by picking Pooh instead of Lightening McQueen or Mater) and Emma's a giant Minnie mouse.   Emma loves Minnie because she has a big buntinki (hair bow in Russian)  like Emma. Those two brought about a ton of smiles and were just so happy with their Disney spoils.  

After that great fun we spent most of the day getting some new glasses for Emma.  They are sassy red glasses.  The funny thing is that we can not get her Minnie ears off of her.  So she is proudly wearing the Minnie Ears and everyone just keeps smiling at her.  She really is a delight.  Emma is such an example to me of living life to the fullest.  She loves life and is so very excited about trying things.  She's so fun.  

So the guy at Lens Crafters puts her new glasses on her  and she shouts, "YEAH! I can see!"  Everyone in the store laughed.  It was great.  So off to more vacationing.  That night we cooked dinner for my family.  We were in California with my parents (it was their time  share we were staying at), my sister Lindsay and her son Sam, my sister Jesse, her husband Kenny  and their daughter Gracie.  Mostly this day was a chillin' day.

Travel Posts

I'm posting things by the day that they happened sorry we're so late getting the fun to you. I'll try to hurry and get them done. Thanks a ton...Casey

We're at Disneyland WHOO HOOO!

Our first day at Disney was a huge success. Our first ride was Pirates of the Caribbean, which Gabe decided that he would like to go home. Emma thought that the pirates were singing a beautiful song for her. We left that and went on Splash Mountain, which Emma loved until a rogue wave hit and soaked her. But she did want to go down the waterfall again. Gabe loved the Winnie the Pooh ride. Although I'm a little concerned that Pooh was on some sort of acid trip when he was dreaming.

We played on Tom Sawyer island and climbed Tarzan's tree house. That was Daryl's "favorite" part of the trip. Okay just kidding we thought the tree house was much better as the Swiss Family Robinsons tree house. We went on the safari cruise ride. Here is a picture of Emma right before she looked over the edge and lost her glasses in the water.

I looked up and she was just sobbing that she had lost her glasses and that could I please help her find them. I felt so bad. She spent the rest of the ride looking for them. So her hero of a dad called Dr. Cleverly's office and they said to go to Lens Crafters and then they'd send the prescription. We called, and they got the prescription and called and said they would have to try and find the lenses because her prescription is so strong. And they did! So we would be getting those glasses on Tuesday. Okay back to Disney land!

The exciting thing to me was that my husband who doesn't ride rides was riding rides. Daryl loved the Indiana Jones ride and Pirates of the Caribbean. It was fun to sit in front of him and Emma on Splash mountain. Soooo I sent him to ride Thunder Mountain Railroad with Emma and I stayed with Gabe and Gracie (my niece). He comes back and says, "That's a rollercoaster ride!" I say, "I know isn't it awesome!" and he says it was okay. Emma on the other hand LOVED it! The rest of the day she asked to go back to that one. She is a total adrenaline junkie. So here's proof, Daryl rode the rides I know not too exciting but here he is on the Dumbo ride.

Emma had that thing going up and down the whole time. Whatever we can do to make the ride more thrilling.

After Dumbo we went to the Fairy Princess pavilion. The kids made their crowns and Emma got to see a "real" princess she was pretty jazzed and it wasn't even one of THE princesses. Here's some pics.

Prince Gabe

Emma & the REAL Princess

Okay the highlight of my day was the Pixar parade. I wish that everyone could have seen the excitement on Gabe's face when he saw Lightening McQueen and Mater. So Lightening McQueen opens the parade and I thought that Gabe and Emma were going to just lose it. They were so excited. I don't know that words can explain. But my entire family just wanted to watch them. Gabe was the first to see Mater and he about jumped off of the trash can he was sitting on. (I know kind of gross but at Disney they are very clean) So here is the picture of Gabe when he first spots Mater. Look close he's across the way sitting on the garbage cans.

What's amazing about Disneyland is the drug that hits as soon as you hit the car. Both kids crashed with Mickey and Minnie ears intact. They had a great day. It was really fun. When we got back to the hotel they woke up just long enough for a few pictures.

Okay so they were tuckered out. YEAH! So was mom and dad.

Side note Emma woke up in the middle of the night, found her Minnie ears and asked Daryl to put them on her. We're not sure how as it was pitch black in our room. She loves those ears! Can't wait for the rest of the week!

The exciting thing to me was that Daryl rode the rides. The only rides he didn't ride were the Matterhorn, and California screamer. He love the Indiana Jones ride and Splash Mountain. It was fun listening to him as he rode the rides.

Disneyland Here We Come!

So we finally left on our trip! For those of you who don't know what's been going on...here is the scoop. I've had this intense pain on the right side of my abdomen. After lots and lots of testing it was discovered that I have some issues that need to be fixed by surgery. I have some fibroid tumors on my uterus and some cysts on my ovaries and my endometriosis is back really bad. So we'll deal with that later.

On to the really fun stuff. We left on Friday at about 3:00 and drove to Las Vegas. We drove as far as Costco (to get gas) and Gabe started crying and saying that he wanted to go home. In fact it wasn't until tonight that Gabe decided that he would like to stay and play here in Cali. We had hopes of sleeping in but Emma had a different plan. So we got up and looked around a little bit and got on the road.

We got to stop by and see Daryl's Nana and let her meet the kids. It was really great for them to meet her and for her to see her great grand children. We left there and traveled to New Port Beach. We attended church and did some family activities today. It was really fun for Emma to see the ocean for the first time. She had a blast throwing rocks into the ocean. She kept saying that she had to have her swim suit. A difficult thing to understand when we're walking pass the pool and along the beach. I had to promise that we will swim and play more at the beach.

Tomorrow we're off to Disneyland and are very excited. Well the kids and I are excited. I'm sure Daryl will be more excited tomorrow. Just kidding he's excited too. Till we have more to write.

M-I-C-K-E-Y MOUSE!