Saturday, March 29, 2008

Mega Bubble Show

Today we went to the amazing, the fantastic, some might even call it "unbubbleveable" Mega Bubble show! Okay I wouldn't really call it the most spectacular show in Vegas, but we were able to go for free, and the kids really enjoyed it. My sister-in-law Katrina called us this morning and she had gotten free tickets and invited us to come along. So the show consists of this man, Fan Yang, who basically blows different kinds of bubbles for about an hour. How many different kinds of bubbles can there be you ask? Well not really many different kinds, but there were a lot of sizes. and at the end the whole theater was filled with floating bubbles. It was enough to keep Dalin in his seat for a good 45 min., and that is saying something. Afterward we walked around Planet Hollywood for a while (which is where the show was held) then had lunch at this tasty restaurant called Tacone. I really enjoy the sandwiches there, but the sides and smoothies leave a little to be desired.

This is the room full of bubbles. I know, very exciting!

Today is my niece Abby's birthday, and yesterday was her sister Emily and her mom's(Aunt Danette) birthday as well, so after we left the strip we were off to a fabulous Hannah Montana party. Really only the kids stayed for that because it was date night for Chris and I (it was Aaron and Danette's turn to watch kids). Where did we go you ask? Back to the Strip of course! Chris loves to be in crowds and there are plenty on the Las Vegas Strip on a Saturday night, so we walked among the tourists for a couple of hours mostly just people watching. Chris took me to an outlet mall first, so I would feel obligated to join him on his walk. I do not like crowds, and I think aimless walking can be done closer to home to save gas, but I got to be with my sweetheart, the weather was beautiful and we did see some interesting characters along the way so it was a nice time.

Thursday, March 27, 2008

Procrastination

We had a primary activity today, mostly because it is the end of the quarter, but that is beside the point. The theme was "I am a child of God" and we had three stations that went along with the lyrics of the song. For "has given me an earthly home," we decorated graham cracker houses, "lead me guide me walk beside me," an obstacle course and, "teach me all that I must know," we made a FHE packet. I was in charge of the houses. We had planned this activity a couple of weeks ago, but when did I decide to get things together? This morning of course! Around eleven last night I was looking up frosting recipes and I read that you should let the frosting holding the houses together dry for at least an hour before you decorate them. I had planned on letting the kids build and decorate the houses, but we didn't have that kind of time, so I ended up making thirty little houses this morning. Today was also Aiden's turn to bring snack to preschool. He was supposed to bring something to go along with the letter of the week, U. Once again I knew of this weeks ago, but when did I decide on something? Again this morning, so among the houses I made some U-shaped cookies. So now my kitchen is a disaster, but I guess I can get to that tomorrow:)

Saturday, March 22, 2008

Look How Tough I Am

Now that our site looks more "cute" I feel like I need to show off how tough I am. What better way to show off your toughness than to showing how many people you could "take in a fight". Ok so they are only five year olds, and I can only take on 18 at a time, but I do live with 4 kids that are under 8 so that must count for something. How many kids can you take in a fight?

18

Thursday, March 20, 2008

Time for a Change

When we first became part of the e-blogger community I picked what I thought was a stylish template. Chris worked on it for about a week to customize it and make sure the pictures would fit and the corners were rounded (it is much more difficult than it sounds, I hope you all appreciated it). The more I looked at my choice of color scheme, more so the wallpaper part of it than anything, the more I thought it looked like something one would find in a home where an old lady with a lot of cats would live. As I don't have any cats, (the way my back aches puts the old part up for debate) I decided it was time for a change. I don't want to be unappreciative of all of the work Chris did, but I just couldn't take it any more. I came across a website, cutestblogontheblock.blogspot, and I found something that better suited me. So here we are, a little more cutesy, but much more comfortable.

Sunday, March 16, 2008

Goin' to the Chapel...

and my brother got ma-a-a-a-rried. On Saturday my brother Brandon joined the land of the married folks. The weather was pretty blustery and surprisingly cold. Two days before the wedding was the hottest day of the year but the temperature dropped more than twenty degrees by Saturday. The reception was held outside and it was cold. The good thing about having a big family like mine is clean up goes super fast.

The newlyweds Brandon and Cara

This is an attempt at a picture of my whole family. One of my brothers is missing, so we get to try this again.

This picture makes me laugh. This is my dad and Cara's stepfather. My dad wears this tie to church every week, no matter how many ties we buy him for Father's Day. You can't really tell but there are six eagle pins for his six sons who have earned their eagle scout awards (Austin's working on making it seven). Cara's stepfather has 12 children (I don't know how many sons) and the pins on his lapel are eagle scout pins. I think they felt a sense of kinship.

Saturday, March 15, 2008

Writers Cafe

Kaylee's school had the students write a composition and their teachers chose one from their class to read their story in an assembly for the school. Kaylee was chosen to read her story called "Kimono Dragon on Horseback." The first little bit didn't get recorded, but here is most of the reading.

Thursday, March 13, 2008

Fever in the morning, fever all through the night

Last week Kaylee came home from school with a low fever and sore throat. I gave her some Motrin and she was good to go back to school the next day. On Monday Ashton and Dalin had low fevers and soar throats, so I figured it would be the same as with Kaylee. Tuesday was even worse and their temperatures were above 103 once the Motrin wore off, and they still had a temperature even when the medicine was working. Feeling like a terrible parent, I finally took them to the doctor on Wednesday where their temperatures were both normal, and there were no other symptoms. I swear taking my kids to the doctor is like when we take our car to the mechanic, everything is always fine when we finally get there. It was some sort of virus and they both feel a lot better today. Ashton went back to school and Dalin is back to his rascally ways. Aiden has started complaining about a sore throat so hopefully we don't start all over again.

In other news, we bought a swing set to add even more to our tiny back yard. It was a pain in the neck to put together, most of the bolts were to short, and none of the nuts fit on the bolts. Once we got the right hardware it went a lot faster. We still have to anchor it down, but the kids are good about not swinging to high yet. Their having fun with it but we'll see how popular it is when the weather is hot, hot, hot.

Sunday, March 9, 2008

Waldo Ultimatum

I found this combination of a couple classics. Kristen is a big fan of the Bourne Supremacy series and I remember the Where's Waldo books as a kid. Should make for a great movie!

Monday, March 3, 2008

Grand Canyon

On Saturday Chris and I were able to go on a tour of the Grand Canyon's west rim. Some of our friends (Rick & Mollie Gillespie) have a sister/sister-in-law who works for a company that puts together helicopter/boat tours of the Grand Canyon. Ricks birthday is this week so Mollie's sister comped her four tickets and they invite us to go. It was so super fun! We took a small plane (it only fit 21 people and that included the pilot and co-pilot) to the grand canyon, then we rode a helicopter to the bottom, rode a boat down the Colorado river, then took the helicopter back to the top. There were ten people to be divided up into two helicopters, so Chris and I weren't able to ride down together. The plus side of that is Chris was able to ride in the front of the helicopter so he had excellent views. The down side was at the top the guide told us we would all meet up at the bottom and be on the same boat. Someone failed to mention that to the boat driver, and he kept trying to convince Chris in his heavily Japanese accented English that he needed to leave without the passengers of the other helicopter. Chris won out and they waited for us. It was a short boat ride, but the guide was pretty funny even if I could only understand about half of what he said.


This is the plane, helicopter and boat that we rode on.


Chris thought this was a cool sign.

When we got back to the top we took a bus to a couple of points on the west rim. It was the 20th anniversary of the opening of the west rim so there was cake everywhere we went. The first place we went called Eagle Point, had a sky walk which is a walkway made of glass that goes about twenty or thirty feet over the edge of the canyon. It cost $26.00 a person and you couldn't even take your own pictures so we passed on that one. We went to a spot called Guano Point to have a buffet style lunch and it was pretty tasty. The wind was getting pretty strong and it was getting colder so all of the people with jewelry booths were packing up to leave by the time we got there. The weather had been pretty good up to that point so I guess we were lucky that we were on our way back.


Our friends Rick and Mollie and a fantastic view.


Tipi's


Mmmmm, Guano!


An aerial view of Hoover Dam
Chris' sister Megan was nice enough to watch our kids for us, and she took them to a Leonardo DaVinci exhibit that has been here in town for the last month. Ashton and Aiden liked it well enough, but Megan thought Kaylee would have liked it even better if she had gotten to spend a little more time exploring, rather than keeping up with her brothers and sister. Even Dalin found something he liked so it was a good day for them too.

Saturday was our date night as well, so Megan dropped our kids off at my brother's house and Chris and I were able to have a few more kid free hours. I felt a little guilty because our kids hadn't seen us all day, but I got over it pretty quickly. There was a Jazz basketball game on so Chris watched that and I took a nap. It was great, I would enjoy more dates like that.