Disneyland!

About a year and a half ago, our family set a goal to earn enough money to go to Disneyland in the spring of 2008. We had a few garage sales, sold things on Craigslist and put extra money away every chance we got. We originally thought about going on Spring Break, but found out air flight among other things, were less expensive in February. So we pulled our kids out of school and took them to Disneyland the first week of February. We purchased a 3-day park hopper. The first day we went to Disneyland, the second day we went to California Adventure and on the third day we went back to our favorite rides... a few in California Adventure, but spent most of the day in Disneyland. We had lots of fun and would do it again in a heartbeat.

Here we go! Notice Abree's headphones... plugged in to nothing... just feeling pretty cool.

Ok, so we're in Disneyland... what should we do first???

Toon Town was one of our first stops at

Disneyland.

It was our turn to meet some Disney royalty. As we turned the corner the first princess we saw was Belle. The look on Abree's face was priceless. She was in awe... she just knew that she was the REAL Princess Belle. Belle was so sweet with her. She talked to her, asked her questions, hugged her and held her hand.

Abree had a princess shirt on (with all the princesses on it), she had to point to her shirt and show Belle where she was on her shirt. Sweet Belle just played along.

We also met Briar Rose (Sleeping Beauty) and Prince Phillip. Treyson said to Prince Phillip, "I have a toy of you", to which the prince replied, "Oh my, how flattering."

California Adventure, here we come!

Right when we got to California Adventure we ran into Snow White. She was so sweet and soft spoken, just as I would have imagined her to be.

Mrs. Incredible! Abree kept wondering why the characters wouldn't talk to her. The guy who was taking photos for Mrs. Incredible said that she had a sore throat from yelling at her kids. It didn't totally satisfy Abree, because she asked almost every time.

Flick!

This ride was called the "Mali Boomer". It shot you straight up and then dropped you. And although it was fun, the "California Screamer" rollacoaster was Jason, Rylee and Taylee's favorite ride in California Adventure. Treyson, Abree and myselft chose NOT to do that one... way too scary for me.

Each night I would ask the kids what was their favorite part of the day or what was their favorite ride, Abree would always tell us, "the train". I guess she loved the tram that took us to and from the parking lot??? Who knew.

Disney's version of the Chineese New Year,

the "Year of the Mouse"... Minney Mouse and family.

We affectionately called Rylee the "Signature Stocker". She was on a mission to get every character autograph she could... even Mary Poppins who was really just out for a morning stroll, not really giving autographs at the time... but Rylee got one from her.

Daisy Duck was our parking friend. We parked there all 3 days.

RS Birthday Enrichment

We had our RS Birthday Enrichment night, tonight. Volunteers were asked to decorate and provide table service for each table. I signed up to do a table. I went with the Spring/garden theme. I borrowed Amber's brightly colored dishes and decorated with greenery, seeds, garden gloves and bunnies. I also made a candy-filled carrot party favor for each setting. It looked cute (if I do say so myself)and was fun to do.

SUPRISE!!!!!

On Friday, we gave Amber a suprise birthday party. My sister Tawnya and my brother Tyrel were the master-minds behind it all.

The set up- My mom took Amber to dinner, while at dinner I called my mom and told her I was at the church and that I needed some help with jump-starting my car. (My car has been having a little trouble, so I knew Amber would believe that I needed a jump-start AND I am the primary president, so Amber could also believe that I would be at the church doing primary stuff.) We all gathered in the primary room with the divider 2/3 closed. I was in the 1/3 that was open, at the piano while I waited. When she walked in I said, "Hi", that was the cue for Tyrel to open the partian and we all yelled, "SURPRISE!". Gathered were family, friends, co-workers, etc. She was shocked and overwhelmed.

The party- After the surprise, we gathered in the gym for the party. We had it all decorated with "Happy 30th Birthday" stuff. We all sat down and watched the video Tyrel had created. It was awesome. He interviewed lots of family and friends. They talked about why they loved Amber, words that described Amber and funny stories about Amber. He did an awesome job. It was set to music and even had sub-titles.

We had a display table set up with old photos of Amber and family. We had a little book people could write sweet notes to Amber. We had a money tree... or Amber's Travel Tree that people could donate for Amber's up coming BIG trip.

We had cake and ice cream and visited.

Waiting for Amber...

SUPRISE!!!!

Sweet notes from friends and family.

Amber's Travel Tree- money for her trip to

Switzerland and Germany.

Is 30 sweet or does it SUCK?

(Get it?...sucker, sucks.)

Happy 30th Birthday Amber!

My sister Amber turned 30 on March 6th. We invited her over for a yummy chicken enchilada dinner, cake and ice cream. It was fun to hang out and share her birthday with her.

Happy Birthday Amber. We love you!

Boise School District Elementary Choral Festival

Good job Rylee!


Capital Quadrant Concert

Rylee is in the Horizon choir this year. She recently performed a duet at the Music Festival and sang at this Elementary Choral Concert. There were 6 Boise elementary choirs and the Fairmont Jazz Singers who performed that night.

Here's Rylee and friends after the concert.

(Abree wanted in on the photo too.)

Happy Birthday Dr. Seuss!

I started doing a pre-school co-op with some mom's in my ward. At the beginning of the school year we organized which letters, colors, numbers and theme we would do each month. It just happened that we all had girls the same age, so there are only girls in the pre-school class. This has been fun, because we can go really girly sometimes. Our theme for next month is Princesses and fairy tales. Now, how fun is that?! ---Dr. Suess's birthday was on Monday- March 3rd. So we colored hats and did activities about Dr. Suess and the books he wrote. It was a lot of fun.

Here's Abree's pre-school class with their "Dr. Suess Hats" on.

We read "Green Eggs and Ham" and then ate some green eggs and ham. I was surprised how brave the girls were at eating the GREEN eggs. I guess they got the point of the story.

We also played put the green eggs on the green ham (basically pin the tail on the donkey).

We read, "Bartholomew and the Oobleck" and then made "Oobleck". This is crazy stuff. When you go to pick it up it feels solid and then instantanously it goes to liquid and starts dripping out of your hands. It's messy, but fun.

For a treat we had cupcakes (with crazy candles) and little "Cat in the Hat" hat cookies.