Tuesday, June 30, 2009

wands at the ready










2 wands $50.00
3 hours spent searching for clues
5 flights of stairs climbed over and over
slaying the dragon
priceless

amazing marketing


willy the wolf


bear paw



this place really has their marketing down......solid and it is all directed at kids. first their is the ice cream/goodie shop.....full of everything your little heart could desire. then their is the slurpee machine!!!!!! holy moly, my kids wanted a $6.00 slurpee.........i told them they could mix their own flavors at target for $1.50!!! Then their was the girls spa, it was adorable inside, but at $50.00 for a mani or a pedi we decided to skip that. the list just keeps going on and on. the one thing we did decide to splurge on was a huge dessert for the four of us. while we were out on our wand quest we looked at one of the menu's for the restauraunts and saw this awesome campfire dessert. it was not really worth ten dollars, since it was basically a mountain of whip cream, but it was a memory and the kids had fun sitting in the restauraunt and shooting things with their wands.


beartrack landing


ready to get soaked?


syd and noah in the middle of the big splash


noah trying to pull water onto me


relaxing for a brief moment before heading down another slide

super excited and happy


sydnie on alberta falls


noah on alberta falls


so we spent the better part of 6 hours swimming after we arrived at GWL. We headed straight to the big splash playstructure and slid down the slides there, but decided to move onto bigger and better things........alberta falls, river run and tornado!!! it is amazing how time can go so quickly when you are swimming and having fun. i will admit for me personally it took a few minutes to be comfortable going down the bigger slides, because i am not comfortable with heights and you have to climb stairs to get to them. but once i went down the first time it was easy. noah and i did alberta falls together and syd and thad went down together. each time we hit the pool at the end both of the kids would fly off the end and into the pool while we floated over the top of them on the intertube. by the time 6 hours had went by we were starving and ready to eat some pizza and figure out the rest of our evening. i was feeling a little water logged and the kids were anxious to start the magicquest adventure.


(ps - decided to just take my point and shoot into the water park in case i got wet. it was hard to not get wet and the lighting in there was horrible. but my camera survived and i got a few shots to prove we were there)

we are here!!!




so the plan was to tell the children that we were going tent shopping today and that we were going to head to portland for the day and if we could not find one there, we would head to washington to this "tent" store we had heard about. the kids were told to grab their ds's, a book and a craft to do in the car so that they would not get bored. we told them that we packed our lunch so that we could have a picnic somewhere and if they were good we had somewhere special we wanted to stop. they did not even question us. they were excited to go over the bridge into washington and they were happy to get a chance to play their ds's uninterrupted for a couple of hours. sydnie wanted to know why we were going to the washington "tent" store first, but she totally bought into our story. finally we took our exit and i asked the kids if they were getting bored of being in the car? they replied yes and i told them that we were finally at our destination. they both looked up right as the great wolf lodge came into view! they both screamed and immediately starting saying thank you mom and dad for bringing us here!!!!

Monday, June 29, 2009

sneaky

we are heading out to the great wolf lodge tomorrow morning......the bags are packed, the food is in the car and the kids have absolutely no idea that we are going!!! i spent the evening running around finding new swimsuits for each of them and buying some fun treats for our vacation. love road trippin' and spending time with my family. now we just need to come up with a good reason why we are heading out so early and play up the trip to washington as something else.

Saturday, June 27, 2009

the bri bri man


last night a group of us went to see our favorite comedian. brian regan. i have been looking forward to this for months.......it did not disappoint. i think my face still hurts today from all the laughing. unfortunately my good friend julanne and her husband are not in this picture, but they joined us for the show! years and years ago i went to see jim carey before he was jim carey......that was a great evening as well. i love that brian regan can be so extremely funny just delivering a line. it is not crass and rude and over the top. it is just funny and everyone needs a good laugh...........

Wednesday, June 24, 2009

a pile of memories



you all know that i am a scrapbooker.....but i have not scrapped in two years! i have done the occasional picture here or there, but i had not printed any photos in years! when costco ran their 9 cent pix sale a month ago i spent hours pouring over photos and picking which ones i wanted to scrapbook. i was rewarded with a huge pile of photos sitting on my desk, torturing me with the desire to scrapbook again. everytime i walk into the art room i feel them calling to me. begging me to let my creative spirit out! but they have had to wait as life has been busy and i have been tired. but today, today starts the creative bent. the inner me. the walk down memory lane. i am going to tackle this pile of family memories and i will scrapbook again! let's see how far i get, i only have two days to really dig and tackle it. but the way i see it is once i sit down and let the juices flow, the easier it will be to just sit down any time and work.

Tuesday, June 23, 2009

just the two of us


all of our dating and married life.............this is the face i get in pictures! it is a very rare moment that i get a smile or a serious face.........it is usually the zoolander! curse you ben stiller!!! seriously. i sit and smile so nicely and i think we are taking some good pictures and then i see these??? he wonders where noah gets his inability to smile at the camera, take a look at these honey. he he.






wait........there might be one with a smile??


yes!!!!! oh wait, my eyes are closed! oh well, we tried.

Monday, June 22, 2009

he




is a complete goofbal.............but i love him.

Sunday, June 21, 2009

she






is so amazing. smart. funny. goofy. mature. a reader. creative. artistic. music lover. bff. disney affecianado. drawer. cursive writer. volleyball. basketball. bide rider. color blue. club penguin. webkinz. trampoline jumper. hard worker. saver. shopper. chocolate milk drinker. cook. chef. baker. pastry. helpful. she is the coolest nine year old i know! love you!

Saturday, June 20, 2009

Early Father's Day Treat


so here it is in all of it's glory........the first of 12 father's day fast food treats!!!

i will admit that this one was done by me. the sydster is doing all the rest as i type this out. my dad and mom decided to drop by for few minutes today and since we won't see them tomorrow...i decided to give him one today!

it was a fairly easy project, but i learned that i really need a tip in my bags to make the icing turn out looking like lettuce and piped on the right way. but it still looked adorable and i am fairly certain that my dad left our house on a complete sugar high!

and another my bad............these were suppose to be a suprise for thad tomorrow, but he saw the website pulled up and knew what we were doing. oh well................he will get to eat his tomorrow and pretend that it is the first time he has seen them. he he.

another successful mother/daughter project completed!!!

Friday, June 19, 2009

why do i get myself into these situations?


this morning i was surfing blogs and decided to check out the bakerella blog....uh oh!!! my darling nine year old immediately ran over and decided that we needed to make ms b's newest creation for fathers day!!!

http://bakerella.blogspot.com/2009/06/fast-food-fun.html


so it looks like i better get baking those cupcakes and brownies today! so that we are ready to make them into fast food father's day extravaganza!! anyone else want to join in? we could have a bunch of little girls over here to make them?? seriously!!! it would be fun.


Wednesday, June 17, 2009

"the club"


this summer we signed the whole family up to go to the courthouse gym! the kids have the opportunity to go swimming whenever i feel like taking them and thad and i can use the workout gear and take classes. but i will be honest and tell you that as i sat out at the pool last summer and this year...i suddenly was hit by a memory. when i was a kid i always wanted to be "that" kid who got to go to a private pool or have summer vacations where you went to sunriver or black butte. i never grew up doing those things and i question myself now..........do i want my kids growing up feeling that they are privileged? do i want my kids to think that they get everything they want?

i watch these young kids who go to the club and most of them don't know what it means to be privileged, they just know they get to swim whenever they want. but once you hit middle and high school........it does make a difference. i don't want to have little snobs on my hands, but we have been blessed to have this membership and i really hate to lose it. i guess it is my job to make sure they understand that we are not about this world, but we are blessed to be able to do somethings and we need to have the right heart and attitude about it.


Tuesday, June 16, 2009

books, books and more books


on tuesday julanne and i ran up to the scholastic warehouse sale in pdx. the sale is designed to liquidate titles that they used in sales this year and won't be using next year...so typically everything is 50% off! last year we totally scored and got a whole box full of books and i only paid $40.00! but i am pretty sure that the guy took an additional 50% at the very end.....which meant that i got books for $1/$2.

this year was a little better because we knew what to expect, but there were so many books! I was excited to buy book two and three in the 39 clues series, we have been reading book one at our house and the kids love it. then i had my hands on the "land of elyon" series, but they were still going to be $5.00 a piece...i decided to check them out at the library instead.

i was super excited that syd chose some books that were different than her normal cat or dog books! i kept handing her books to check out the back of and she kept saying yes. needless to say i had to make some decisions when we got to the end. i put back several cookbooks that i had my hands on, but ended up keeping my paula dean calender (that had recipes) for $1.00!!! I also bought book 6 in the harry potter series!


noah got lots of educational books....volcanoes, 7 wonders of the world, 50 states and i ended up putting back his beloved star wars comic because it was only 25% off. he also got some geronimo stilton and stink books! he kept picking up books and handing them to julanne and telling her that her boys would like to read this!!! oh boy. he was super excited too.

it was an expensive day, but one i was looking forward too. now my kids don't need to go to summer library to check out books...........we have so may here!!! but both of my kids love to read, so it is worth it.

the state of play

this morning i was talking to my son. he is seven. he is all boy, but yet sensitive. he is completely obsessed with his new lego battles ds game. i know this about him. i know that when he gets a new game, he needs a solid week of playing before it gets out of his system. noah finally returns about 8 days in. he comes out of his video game coma and rejoins the land of the living. i accept that and have learned that i am fine with him playing non-stop for a couple of days......as long as he rejoins us.

so back to this morning. noah and i were talking about the fact that i did not want him to take his ds in the car today while we drove to portland with ben and evan. he then proceeds to tell me that he would share his ds. he is very good at sharing. he would show them how to play and that he shared yesterday with his friend karston. i told him that i wanted him to have some time to talk to his friends, have conversations...not just have their nose in a ds the whole time. he looks me straight in the eye and tells me that that is for adults....boys just want to play, like legos, video games and forts. not talk!!!!!

i thought it was absolutely adorable and frankly the truth!!!

Sunday, June 14, 2009

girly, girly fun


blurry, but i love their smiles


peace


bff's in their little ae outfits


she is a goofball, but i love her



stormtrooper glasses



the bangles


as syd would say "yo, hippy, hippy yo!"


shutter shades



as we sat in claire's waiting for sydnie's ear piercing, we took some time to try on all the fun accessories and take some pictures. the girls had such a good time just being silly and trying stuff on. i don't normally go to claire's too much.....we have so much jewelry and lipstick and we make it a special treat to go there and pick something out. so it was extra special for syd that i let her try stuff on!!! ( i know, i am mean)

after we left claire's we headed over to american eagle and syd was super excited to see if she could fit into anything in there. the sweater she is wearing is from ae and she loves it. so we decided to have a little fashion show. we only took in one outfit, matching of course. the girls were a little hesitant to come out and take pix together, but they still had a blast. they both wanted to buy the scarves. it was just a fun afternoon of silliness and being a girl.

Saturday, June 13, 2009

so grown up!

claire's......excited and ready to get her ears pierced


the chair


still excited


now the anxiety is kicking in


find the placement


reassurance from the bff


the moment


after......so grown up


the day finally arrived when syd decided that she was finally old enough to get her ears pierced. she is nine and a half. i had always told her that she could not get them pierced until she was 10 years old and responsible enough to take care of cleaning them everyday. at one point there was talk of her going with all of her cousins to get them done, but they all got their's done much earlier, so we waited until the right time.

in first grade there was some talk of piercing, but that was all forgotten when she watched "parent trap" one afternoon and saw how much it hurt for the character to get her ears pierced by a needle at camp! as the years went by more and more of her friends were getting theirs pierced and she would talk about it, but was still not ready. but when her bff got hers pierced, that was it, she could not wait anymore. i told her that i would take her as soon as school was out and that could be her year end "good report card" gift.

the day of the big event we picked up the bff and went to see hannah montana the movie and laughed and giggled and sang along. then we headed to claire's to pick out the perfect pair of earrings. she was suprisingly calm and excited about getting it done. she looked at the dangly earrings, dreaming of the day when she could wear sparklies and be completely girly, girly.

then came her chance to sit in the chair. she popped right in. smiles everywhere. then a little anxiety hit, that is when the bff reached out and took her hand to reassure her that it would all be okay. i was just there to take pictures apparently. she did not even flinch, blink her eyes or well up at all. she was so brave. her ears did not even turn red! it was just like any other day in the life of syd, except now she had something sparkly in her ears. it did not even feel that weird she said and she slept on them with no problems. she cleaned them without getting queasy, like me. she made herself a calender with six weeks on it, so that she could make sure that she was cleaning them enough. i don't even need to remind her!

i guess she is all grown up now, no more baby, just a sweet girl.