Disneyland!!!

Our family went to Disneyland the end of October and had a wonderful time. We invited my mom and dad to go with us and I really think the kids enjoyed having Grandma and Grandpa there. We totally ran them ragged but I think they had a great time. The kids loved the rides and we all enjoyed all the wonderful Halloween decorations at both Disneyland and California Adventure. Disneyland always goes all out, no cutting corners for them.
The boys loved the Grizzly River Rapids and rode it several times. I think they wanted to get as soaked as possible.

We all love the new Toy Story Mania Ride, it was very fun and we all could ride it so that was a big plus. You collect points by playing these 3-D arcade games as you go through the ride. It was so fun, I could have ridden it all day long. We also like to see who could get the highest score. By the end Bryan and my dad were by far the best and they wouldn't let us forget it.

The teacups was Kate's favorite ride and she always insisted they get in a pink one. You should have seen her face it was priceless. She had the biggest grin ever. Of course Dad did the spinning and according to Kate he needed to go much, much faster.

We were also very lucky to have our niece Whitney drive up from San Diego one of the days. We miss her and loved having her spend the day with us.

We enjoyed the awesome Halloween Screams Fireworks show, the Disney parade and the Pixar Parade. I think Kate really enjoyed the parades, you should have seen how cute she was waving at the characters and dancing, it was truly priceless.

The boys got to finally attend the Jedi Training Academy and fight Darth Vader, how cool is that. It was definitely one of their highlights of the trip.

This is a Butterfly!

Here is a very funny and cute story courtesy of Kate.

We were in Disneyland last month (more to come on that) and while watching T.V. Kate and Nick were trying to decide what iCarly was dressed up as in a Halloween Special. Kate said "She is a bee, Nick." To which Nick replied, "No, she is a butterfly!"
While this conversation was taking place my dad was showing my mom this museum information in a magazine and Kate asked my dad if she could see it for a minute.
She took the magazine and said to Nick, "This is a butterfly" ( it was an artists rendering of a butterfly) and then she pointed to the television and said " that is a bee." Needless to say my parents thought is was hysterical and so did I.

My Lego Boy!! Nick!

Nicklas loves, loves, loves Legos. The kid can incredibly assemble 400 piece Lego set completely on his own. I find it so impressive that not only he has the patience to spend a couple hours doing it, but that he figures it all out so easily. Anyway the kid got a ton of Lego's for his birthday last month and quickly put them all together by himself (occasionally his friend Rhett helped) and he needed absolutely no assistance from his dad.

First Days of School!!

This year is a little strange, for the first time all of my children will be in school and all of them will be on completely different schedules. So far it is adding a lot of variety to my daily stay at home mom routine and I am so far enjoying it. Kate goes to preschool in the morning and Nick goes to Kindergarten in the afternoon which allows me a little alone time with both of them. That is so nice. All of them have fabulous teachers and I already know we are going to have a great school year!!











Alex is in the 4th grade this year, I seriously can't believe that I have a 4th grader already. I am feeling little old. Anyhow, he loves school and enjoys getting to see his friends every day. He is very much a social child.











Nicklas started Kindergarten and is really liking it.
He loves going to school everyday and learning new
things. He can't wait to read.








Kate, on her first day of Preschool. She was so excited, she
is glad to go to school like her brothers. It is super cute. Her
backpack is almost as big as her and is a princess backpack she picked out herself.

Palm Springs Air Museum

Following are a ton of photos and memories from a great week long vacation we took with my parents to Palm Springs the first week of August. My parents were kind enough to invite us to come with them and use one of their time shares for the week- it was awesome. We stayed in a really nice Marriott timeshare and enjoyed watching movies, swimming, visiting a couple museums and hanging out with Grandma and Grandpa- it was a fabulous and relaxing vacation. Thanks again Mom and Dad, we had a great time with you and can't wait to go back again.


We went to the Palm Springs Air Museum and it is filled with airplanes from WWII. They even had a small model replica of Pearl Harbor that had lights and told you the order of the attack on Pearl Harbor. It told you the damage on each ship, etc. It was really cool.

Alex standing in front of a P51 Mustang.

This is where the gunner sat on the B-25 Mitchell. A veteran that was a gunner was there on the day we visited giving the tour of this airplane. The space was very tight and you can see that the area the gunner was in was very small, but the glass and metal surrounding him was bullet proof and he could release directly out of it if he had to parachute out.


Kate and her Dad.

The boys got to go inside and tour a B-25 Mitchell. ( No, I do not remember the names of these planes, but Alex does. - that kid has an incredible memory.)

Grandma and Kate looking pretty as a picture.

Swimming, Swimming and more swimming!!!

Palm Springs is very hot in August- every day we were there the temperature was over 110 Degrees. Are we crazy? No way. We spent at least 2 hours a day at the pool (in the pool) and it was a blast. The kids months of swimming lessons paid off, and we all had a wonderful time playing in the pool. Grandpa had as much fun as the little ones- they played catch and did trick flips into the pool while catching the ball. Kate had a great time with the water wings on and her life vest. We really enjoyed just hanging out together and playing. It was my favorite part of the entire vacation - and my kids loved it also. Grandpa getting ready to make a throw.


Kate showing Grandma how she floats on her back.

Alex doing one of his cool trick catches.

Nick with trick catch.

General Patton Museum

As part of our fun in Palm Springs we drove about 45 minutes away to the General Patton Museum- it is literally in the middle of no where, but while touring found out it was where they trained soldiers for WWII. I know this vacation is sounding very much like a history lesson, but I happen to have a 9 yr. old son that is enthralled with WWII. He loves to read about it, watch movies about it, ask his mother who has no clue, dozens of questions about it. You have to take advantage of opportunities to feed the mind at this age- they sometimes are hard to find.

I really enjoyed this museum- it is so interesting to see all the WWII memorabilia- the place was packed with info and artifacts. You can learn so much interesting stuff.

Statue of General Patton and his Dog ( don't recall his name- sorry -Alex probably does).

This map is printed on silk to help withstand the weather. The green item on it is a clicker- the Army Airborne used this device when being dropped into enemy territory. They would click once and if a friendly was near they would click twice.

This is a wall left from a chapel that was at the Desert Training Base here, with

Grandma and Kate posing for me.

Here are the boys in front of one of many awesome tanks they had there on display.

Kate's favorite way to visit a museum.