Teach my kids how to be cool.

Teach my kids how to be cool.

I have been putting off telling about out latest family vacation, but something happened today that inspired me to post.

Let me start from the beginning and end with the cute story.

So a couple of things seemed to magically fall in place:

1. Jake got a $200 ticket on the Utah/Nevada border for not changing lanes when passing a cop pulled over on the side of the road. (YEAH). He had to appear in court to contest it before July 15. Not so magical, I know. Keep reading for magical part.

2. My friend Amy bought a house in St. George (an hour from the Utah/Nevada border) and wanted to invite our family down for a weekend with them.

3. New Kids on the Block was playing at the Palms in Las Vegas July 11. (Vegas is just over an hour from St. George).

It was obvious fate was encouraging our families to vacation in St George that weekend, have Jake contest the ticket while down there, and Amy and I road trip the hour or so to Vegas from there for the concert.

The only thing holding us back--it seemed--was the $150 tickets to see NKOTB. A little steep. Even for my crush, Jordan Knight. The obvious solution? Hold an online bake sale. I am not kidding.

Here are some of our awesome goods:

We earned exactly enough in our bake sale to pay for the tickets. Meant to be right?

No.

Nevada only hears traffic cases on Wednesday mornings at 7 am. We would have to go down on a Tuesday and stay the night, which would mean an entire week off work for Jake. Not going to happen. Intentional by Nevada State, I am sure. And Criminal.

Then a whole series of horrible events transpired which started with kids puking in the car on the way down and ended in Amy and I leaving the concert during the opening act to make it back to St. George to be with her 2-year old in the hospital. Yeah.

We're still recovering a little bit. But if nothing else, we did get a few cute pics from the weekend:

Indoor swimming in the neighborhood since Amy had to stay at the house with her still-puking child.

Ice cream at Blue Bunny!

Zions National Park- Going to find us a lizard!

The appropriately-named hike, "Weeping Falls". Our friend's daughter, posing for the photo in front, was feeling sick again.

Sand Hollow! I loved the bright red sand.

Super-pretty scenery!

AND this is as close as we got to the New Kids. This was the opening act. We made it about 2 minutes into it before had to rush to the hospital.

Don't worry, her son was released the next day and fully recovered. Amy gave me these from the boutique as a consolation:

Now for my super cute story!

Taylor hung a birthday party invitation on the fridge today. She used the magnet of Jordan Knight. She pointed it out to me and said, "You know why I picked him?" I said, "Why?" She said, "Because he's honk."I said "He's what?" She said, "What is the word you use when a boy is handsome?" I said, "Hot?"She said, "Yeah, he's hot."

YES!

Then Chase came over and said, "Do you want to know which one I think is hot?"I said, "No."He picked Jordan too.

What can I say, they have great taste.

Find Love.

Find Love.

Ten years of finding and re-finding love again... and again. A Major, major feat. :)

Ten years ago today:

How can I not love this face?

Breathe in Spring.

Breathe in Spring.

Can I tell you how much I love spring? Park lunches, golf lessons, afternoons weeding in the sun or reading on the balcony, and evening runs? Ah, I love it all. Despite the occasional snow day in-between. And the seasonal allergies from breathing in a little too much spring.

Here is our spring break in photos:

Kite flying in the circle!

Hannah Montana and Optimus Prime take flight.


Jake's kite-flying skills were far superior to mine. When I was helping all the kites did was take flight enough to whip around and hit us in the face.

Easter!

Egg decorating

Getting Ready for the Easter Bunny

The kids let me know it was neccesary they write him a letter.

And leave him treats.

Their attention to detail paid off-the Easter Bunny left them a plethora of Webkinz.

And then in the spirit of Easter, I then made them pretend they love each other.

To end the break, the kids had their cousins over while their parents went to Hawaii (enter jealous, contemptuous growl here).

We battled the big kids at Classic Skate. My back was sore from picking spilled kids up off the ground. Taylor falls, er, a lot. She was sooo excited to be there, as you can see.

They were treated to an at-home beauty salon and about a million other different craft projects.

Snacked every 30 minutes. I think there is some sort of law that the more kids you have in a house, the more often they get hungry.

And when Mom couldn't take it inside anymore while it rained and snowed outside, we went to multiple playlands and bounce gyms.

Happy Spring everyone!

Stay Young.

Stay Young.

I haven't posted yet this month and am headed out of town to turn 30 in style (more about that later), so here are a couple photos from the last month. Did you see last week's "How I Met Your Mother"? I so felt like Barney after raving it up all night here at the MC Hammer/Vanilla Ice Concert/80s Dance Party. But I hope I keep doing these things anyway no matter how old I get.

Get Outside.

Get Outside.

I haven't been updating my blog lately and my mom blames my facebook addiction. She may be right. But the reason I give is I feel like all I have done the first two months of this year is what you see in my previous post--look outside at the cold cold snow and wish it was warm again.

Of course that's not completely true. We've done a few fun things despite the bitter cold. I have a hard time believing it, but here is some picture proof (and excuse the raw photos. One thing that was definitely not fun was losing all my favorite programs on my computer to a facebook virus):

Dinosaur Museum=Fun. (Minus the tantrums, of course)

Goofing off at home=Fun.

Making Valentines for class friends=Fun

Chase setting the microwave on fire by cooking his magic potion for 30 minutes in a plastic cup=Fun.

Oh wait, no. That wasn't fun at all.

Living Planet Aquarium=Fun.

(Scary stingrays= still fun.)

Watching Taylor's uncanny ability to communicate with fish=fun.

Finally taking our yearly family snapshot=er, well, kinda fun.

Going to the Children's Theater=Fun.

We also took our fun neighbors to the Draper Temple Open House and then flew down to Gila Valley for the temple groundbreaking there and those, fine, were fun.

Still, not as fun as summer. Isn't it time yet? Darn you groundhog, coming out on the only sunny day of the season!

Appreciate Utah Winter.

Appreciate Utah Winter.

I don't like cold. And I miss the south often. But mornings I look out my window and see this are something to appreciate too:

(Granted I took this picture from inside my window because there was no way I was walking out in that if I didn't have to)

Keep Traditions.

Keep Traditions.

My family was in town for Christmas this year and I absolutely loved it. We started a lot of new traditions and re-started some old ones. Here are some of them:

Christmas Books.

We don't put our gifts under the tree until Christmas Eve so it looks a little bare all season. This year we started putting all of our Christmas books under the tree and every night the kids could each pick one for me to read to them. Chase's favorite book was a "Search and Find" (like I-Spy) book my mom gave him last year. After picking it two nights in a row and delaying bedtime almost an hour each time, I had to tell him it wasn't really a book, but more of a toy and he needed to pick another one. After he'd run his con on me, he turned to any fresh face he could find:

Chase and Great-Grandpa with the Search and Find book

Chase and Pops with the Search and Find book

Chase and Uncle Andrew and Taylor with the Search and Find book


Chase and Uncle Todd with the Search and Find book

Before most of the family arrived on Christmas Eve, we put on the Christmas music and turned the living room into a dance floor. I like this as a tradition:

Taylor and Pops

Taylor and Great Grandpa

Taylor and Chase were the main entertainment pretty much the entire night. They starred as Mary and Joseph and also signed "We Wish You a Merry Christmas". Chase had learned this at his Preschool program and taught it to Taylor. He was a total ham. I have no idea where he gets that. Here is a picture of him at his preschool program:

A tradition we re-started this year is a sugar-cookie making contest on Christmas Eve. As a kid, I remember some wild sugar cookie concoctions. This year was a little more tame but I was impressed with the creativity all the same:

Andrew and Todd

When I told my brothers to pose with their cookies, they simultaneously did this. I also have a picture of the end-product of Andrew's cookie but it is inappropriate for the web.

My Dad skipped out during the sugar-cookie making but returned later to throw together the token 3-D cookie pictured here. It's no 2-foot cookie tower, but respectable nontheless. When he was gone was also when a surprise visitor showed up at our door---Santa! I have some super-cute video of this but I can't find the cord to hook the camcorder up to the computer. Santa was also nice enough to accompany me to my neighbors' houses that night to deliver some Christmas goodies.

Another new tradition I am fond of is the making of the Gingerbread House. While Jake and I went to his work party, my mom made these with the kids. She even provided gingerbread house-making outfits:

Nana and the Kids

(Taylor still does not like having her picture taken)

The kids were allowed to eat it the day after Christmas. (Matcing PJs also compliments of Nana)

Some traditions from the holiday I don't want to keep:

*Jake puking his guts out all Christmas Eve and not leaving his bed.

*Jake pulling his back out on Christmas and not leaving his bed.

*So much snow Christmas morning we couldn't make it to the family photo, which was the kids' present to our parents.

*Taking impromptu family photos when I just got out of the shower:

(Out of like ten photos this is the only one where one of my brothers isn't intentionally sabotaging the photo by grotesquely rubbing his belly or chest hair)

Merry Christmas to all! (Late and also because I didn't get any Christmas cards sent this year).