SoCal Trip Part II - Disneyland

On Tuesday morning we headed up to Disneyland to meet up with Grandma Margie, Grandpa Brent, Aunt Sarah, and cousins Clara & Betty.  It was so fun to share our time at Disney with family!  We loved every minute of it.  I didn't take many photos at California Adventure - we were just too busy living in the moment!  Everyone had a great time.  Levi loved Carsland, and we got to follow Lightening McQueen down a road in radiator springs.  He was in heaven!

We've figured out how to strategically use stroller swap and fast passes, so we didn't wait in many lines, and the weather was perfect.  The girls and Levi all went and saw the Aladdin show, which was really entertaining.  At one point Prince Ali comes in on a huge puppet elephant, and Levi chanted, "More elephants, please!" for several minutes after that.  We managed to go on and see all the rides and attractions that we wanted to, and no one had  a major melt down.  We ate yummy bread bowl soup for dinner while the kids watched the Pixar parade from a distance.  Noah and Harrison both braved the California Screamin' roller coaster, and lived to tell the tale.  They both really enjoyed it, but said once was enough. The little girls loved Bugs Land, and Grandpa Brent had lots of fun going on rides with them.

Sarah and Clara on Lady Bug Bop.

One of the few pictures from California Adventure taken on Sam's ipod.  He took the girls on the carousel while Sarah and I braved California Screamin'.

 Grandpa also tried to take the boys on the Hollywood Tower of Terror, but they both backed out at the last minute.  We all went on the giant Mickey wheel together.  Harrison was not impressed.  He had read that it was like riding in a giant chicken coup, and couldn't get past that.

The next day we met up at Disneyland.  I resolved to take more pictures this day, and I managed to do that.  I'm still really bummed we didn't get a photo of everyone all together - I don't think I got a single picture of Grandma Margie or sweet little Betty.  We got this one on our way in - it's so nice the photographers at Disney will take one with your camera too.

Harrison was too busy looking at the map to smile for the picture.

Disneyland was a little less crowded than California Adventure had been.  Once again, we managed to not wait in many lines, and really enjoyed our day.  We had a bit of a scare at one point, when Olivia disappeared as we were going to sit down to have our Dole Whips.  She had just started heading in the opposite direction when no one was looking, and just kept on going.  Luckily Grandpa Brent spotted her little pink minnie mouse ears off in the distance, and took off sprinting to find her.  She had figured out she was lost at that point, and was in tears.  Thankfully it was a very short amount of time, and nothing a dole whip couldn't make her forget!
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The trauma of getting lost was easily soothed with a Dole Whip.

Levi discovered Cheetos on our trip.  

 Levi and the girls had fun meeting Mickey Mouse, and touring his house, and everyone really loved the small roller coaster in Toon Town.

Grandpa with Clara and Olivia on a train ride.  

Olivia may not have a sister, but she's got some great girl cousins to hang out with!

Teacups!

Clara loved the rides, and after watching a really cute live show about Beauty and the Beast, I asked her if she liked it, and she replied, "Yes, can we go on more coasters now?"  Our very last ride with everyone together was the Jungle Cruise.  After that, Grandma and Grandpa, Sarah and Betty and Clara headed for home.  We went and hit the haunted mansion (just Harrison and I, but it really wasn't scary at all - I think anyone could have ridden it, well, except for Olivia, that is...) and then pirates of the Caribbean, which everyone enjoyed for the most part.  We had just a few minutes before the park closed, so I ran over to Astro Orbitor with the 3 oldest, and we rode that as the finale for the night.  Levi was already crashing in the stroller before we left the park, and Olivia joined him on our walk back to the car.

In line at Astro Orbitor at the end of the day.

We grabbed everyone a churro as we left for the day.  Yum!

 We drove straight back to the Mitchells that night, getting in just after 10.  We went straight to bed to get rested up for our big day at Legoland on Thursday!

hometown parade

On Saturday we went to a parade in downtown Kennewick. It was cool. I was surprised how long the parade lasted.  It was almost two hours, which is longer than the July 4th parade at Grandma Margie's house. At the beginning of the parade, there were tons of horses.  There was the Sheriff's search and rescue band, many different local rodeo princesses from the surrounding counties, some from the local Native American tribes.  But by far the most interesting group of horses was a musical band.  In the picture below I got the big drum player.  I was most impressed with the horn section, several trumpets riding on horses.  They had their music clipped to the end of their trumpets.

In addition to the horses, there were lot of cars.  There were classic cars, like the group of Ford Mustangs, or the Cougar and Thunderbird cliques. There were some old Model A cars and Dick Tracy style pre-War beauties. My favorite car was a baby blue slug-bug convertible. I had never seen a baby blue car before, and I had always been on the lookout for a rare color slug bug convertible. We also saw the most rare license plate ever.  It was from Aruba.
As with all parades, the floats and walkers threw a whole lot of candy. We only heard about the parade about an hour before it started, so we were not really prepared with candy bags, but we were able to store the candy in our pockets and in the bottom of the stroller. It was mostly tootsie rolls and jolly ranchers. Other types of candy they threw included now and laters, hard candy, fruties, lemon heads, sweedish fish and other stuff. As you can see from this picture, the bottom of the stroller was pretty full of candy.

Some people did not give out candy.  The Little Caesar's van handed out coupons.  A local kids dentist handed out tooth brushes and plastic leis.

We were really fortunate that Levi was a super baby the whole time.  He was happy in his stroller and very quiet.

[Post co-written by Sam & Harrison]

4th of July

After we got back from the trip up to Bear Lake, we started making preparations for the 4th of July.  Harmon's Lagoon day was the next day, and so we tried to lay a little low on the 4th to save our energy for Lagoon.  We attended Farmington's parade, which the kids loved. 

All the cousins at the parade, except for Clara.  It's fun to have everyone together, as it doesn't seem to happen very often. 

Many of the floats threw out candy, so the kids all got a kick out of that.



  The rest of the day we had yummy food, and just played around with Family.  I think everyone was there except for Aaron, Amanda's husband.  The boys had fun shooting hoops with uncle Nathan's at the neighbors house, and the kids all enjoyed the pool at my parents house.

We watched several different fireworks shows from the comfort of my parents driveway, and then headed off to bed to get rest for the big day at Lagoon. 

The next day we headed off to Lagoon.  Every year, my dad's employer has a Lagoon day.  They offer discounted tickets to extended family, and my parents have been very generous in hosting all the grand kids (and us, their parents) every year. Beyond just discount tickets, the amazing part about Harmon's lagoon day is the amenities.  They have 2 huge pavilions set up just for them (you wear a wristband all day to get in) where they have all you can eat ice cream, cookies, cotton candy, watermelon, popcicles, chips, etc. and hot dogs and hamburgers for sale for just a dollar or two. We missed last year, as we lived in MD, and we didn't have another trip to Utah planned, especially since it was looking like we were going to move out west soon.  So we were excited to go again this year.  The kids all had a great time, and the adults enjoyed themselves quite a bit as well.  Some of us went to Lagoon-a-beach this year, and I think I'd skip that next time.  I guess I'm not a huge water park person, and it seems like a waste of time to be changing (and helping all the kids change) when you could just be spending time riding rides.  We did have a bit of scare with Harrison.  We had come up with a meeting place if anyone got lost, and what do you know, Harrison disappeared at one point.  He had us in a panic for a good 10 minutes or so.  I guess he got turned around, and couldn't find the front of the park where we were suppose to meet up.  But my dad found him somehow, and all was well again.

Here's some pictures to enjoy

Sam and Livie on the Carousel.