What on Earth Could Make Disneyland More Fun?

Celebrating this cute little four year old's birthday (Ruby)
With this family (the Butlers)

We've talked about all going to Disneyland together before but when they told us they decided to go for Ruby's fourth birthday and invited us to join we had to go! We are blessed with great friends that make Disneyland so much fun for us. We've been traveling there with a combination of the Palacios/Hurd/Marz group for years and always had a great time. The Butlers were no different...so much fun to be at the Magic Kingdom with.

We arrived Friday night and met at the hotel for some swimming then off to bed for two days of Disneyland and California Adventure fun.

We had a great, exhausting time both Saturday and Sunday. Traveling with Lulu (and George for that matter) was a dream and we might take her along on every trip from now on (no matter where we go). She is tiny and can easily fit into a suitcase. What a helpful cute girl. Both of our girls LOVE her and want to hold her hand and sit by her all the time. There is a great photo of Abbie and George in the collage as well. George tried to teach Abbie how to play the hand slap game so every time we sat down to eat, those two could be found playing that game while waiting for their food. We finally met a group that could eat more treats than we can. However I realized this morning that not one of us got a churro...

General Disneyland/California Adventure Collage

Parade Collage

Character Collage

Once again, Ariel was the cutest Princess or character we met. She is just absolutely darling and so, so nice and sweet with the girls. Ruby wasn't quite ready to meet all the princesses but I'm sure she will be up for it the next time we go. We also found something new (can you believe it! We thought we knew about every single attraction in Disneyland)...the entrance to Sleeping Beauty's castle where you can see the Sleeping Beauty story as you walk through the castle then there is a separate screening room for the actual movie. New? Quite possible because I have truly never noticed it before. Charming. Absolutely. Just another reason to love the Happiest Place on Earth.

Thanks Butlers for including us! We had so much fun. I've never laughed so hard.

What's For Dinner...

Well tonight it was Sloppy Joes, veggies & dip and popsicles. My kids generally eat at home pretty well though not at other people's houses. A lot of people asked me after my eight week recipe challenge if I was going to post more recipes. Honestly, I hadn't planned to. But lately I've had other people ask me what I serve for dinner and it got me thinking, maybe someday my kids will wonder how mom planned the family's meals. Several blogs post their versions of "Menu Planning Monday". I've never felt inclined to do this as my blog is simply for family and friends to keep up with our lives and to print into books each year as our family scrapbook. But the more thought I've put into it, the more I've wondered if I did post what our family was eating for a certain week, if maybe the kids would be able to look through it when they are grown and get some ideas on how to plan for their families.

So, just in case my kids ever care I am going to start posting our weekly meals. I shop on Wednesday or Thursday so I plan meals from Wednesday to Tuesday of the following week. I will skip Spring Break as we'll be out of town the majority of the time and start the following week. Feel free to skip over this weekly post. I don't have any expectations that anyone at all cares about what we eat but if someday even one of my three children (or their spouses) look back on it, it will be worth it.

On a totally separate note, this is a photo of Daisy with baby Ryan. He looks cardboard and sad in the photo but that only lasted for the second I was taking the photo (go figure). Daisy likes to rub his head and his tummy. Abbie likes to hold him too. But I think I love to snuggle him the most. Watch out Sam...I read your blog and I know you are vying for "Favorite Aunt" status. I might not have been there at his birth and I may not get the killer deals on the Gap sales rack but I could quietly sneak away with the title!

Spring Soccer

Spring soccer season is in full swing. Kyle started practicing a few weeks ago. This photo was taken at his first game last Saturday. He is playing with the Eagles for the ?th time. I've lost track of how many seasons Kyle has been playing soccer now.

If you are interested in catching him in action, here is the 2010 game schedule. All his games are at Anthem Hills Park.

Saturday, March 20th - 10 a.m.

Saturday, March 27th - 10 a.m.

Saturday, April 10th - 3:20 p.m.

Saturday, April 17th - 3:20 p.m.

Saturday, May 1st - 10 a.m.

Saturday, May 8th - 10 a.m.

Saturday, May 15th - 10 a.m.

Monday, May 17th - 7:15 p.m.

On a separate note, the girls are outside playing in the backyard while I type this post and finish dinner. I just noticed Daisy walking by with my brand new basil plant. Hmmmm. I don't think she will do it much harm but I don't want her getting in the habit of carrying my plants all over the yard. Thank goodness Trader Joe's had a ton...she looks to funny to stop.

Bad Hair Day

Every year about this time, Kramer gets his hair shaved for the summer. It helps him stay cool during the hot season and gets rid of the few tangles he gathers during the year. Even though we try to brush him out regularly, his body is just the tangling type and it gets some no matter how hard we try.

Anyway, it was that time again so Abbie and Daisy accompanied me to drop him off. They were both distraught on the way home...so afraid he would be sad without us and worried about him. I gave the people specific instructions about what he needed so I wasn't worried...may I should have been.

He went in looking like this:
And came home looking like this...yikes!

They always shave his legs and body but they usually just trim up his face and the top of his head. Not sure why they cut his entire face so close and then left a tuft of hair on the top but geesh...bad hair day.

Abbie was sad for him and kept asking what happened to his "feathers" and Daisy just kept saying, "Hi Doggy! Where's Kramer Mommy?." It took her hours to believe it was Kramer. She started crying because she wanted Kramer back. it was a tough afternoon. She finally saw him jumping in his dog house and realized that it was her dog (no other dog jumps like a bunny).

Poor guy...we hope it grows in quickly...at least around his head.

On another note, we fell victim to Day Light Savings Time today. Which wouldn't have been so terrible except baby Ryan was getting blessed. So neither Tripp nor Kyle made it into the circle. We realized what happened around 9:15 and thankfully were dressed and ready to go. We arrived during the blessing of the sacrament and hoped they decided to do the blessing after but no luck. We feel sad, foolish and sorry. What morons. Anyway, failed to get any photos at the brunch either so if you want to hear about the day, visit Lindsay's blog. I'm sure someday, maybe, I'll laugh about this but not today. Or possibly anytime soon. Hence this post, you can read about what creeps we are and not ask me about it. Thanks