Wednesday, May 23, 2012

graduation day

my sweetheart boy "graduated" from preschool today. watching him up on that stage singing his little heart out, trying to remember the words, kicking his nervous feet, melted my heart. i swelled up with pride that only a mother of a three year old can know. my baby is growing up. he is my treasure and i hope i show him i love him enough everyday, even though i get frustrated with his "come-here-mom, i-wanna-show-you-somethin'" stories that i hear a hundred times a day. congrats big boy, but please don't grow up too fast, you are still that baby of mine.
as he walked up the stage to get his diploma, his teacher asked him what he wanted to be when he grew up... the major trend among this group were race car drivers, my sweetheart boy said, "santa claus". he had been thinking about it very hard as he was in line, and all i could think was, just like jeromy.

Tuesday, May 22, 2012

ring of fire

naila and reese
we went down south this last weekend and had so much fun! we went and visited kyle and jan, and met roxie (max's wife) and naila for the first time. i really loved her. we had fun together for a couple of hours. i loved watching reese and naila play tag.
we went ghost-town hunting, and to zions for the day.
jovi hiking in zions
jovi took a bath in the sink
 
i went out one night to see if brad and reese were coming to bed and found them both fast asleep.
on sunday night there was a solar eclipse, there hadn't been one in about 23 years and kanarra of all places was named the "sweet spot" by NASA. That pretty much meant it was the best place to be to see the eclipse in the united states! pretty crazy. kanarra had a whole festival set up, there were about 3,000 people that traveled to our little town. we ended up having a mini family reunion. aunt darlene and a lot of her family came, and aunt carolyn and a lot of her family came. it was so fun to see everyone and to catch up. i especially loved talking to my cousin julie. she is really an inspiration to me. she is so knowledgeable about so many quirky things and i love it. she also remembers the funniest stories. so fun to catch up. 
solar eclipse
shadows that the eclipse created
my dad was rocking those glasses!
i went down to the festival, which was small compared to something up here, but for kanarra there were tons of people. i bought a T-shirt that has a picture of the all women fire department ladies running to their truck. it's pretty much the most awesome shirt ever. i hope one of the ladies on it is my grandma ethna, because she was one of them. and she was awesome.

Monday, May 21, 2012

california 2012

jovi loved eeyore from the beginning. we stood in line to see him and winnie and tigger while all the brave ones went on splash mountain. eeyore let jovi love on him and kiss his nose and grab his fur while we waited in line.
jovi and her new bff. she even got to bring a stuffed version home.
shanea, jovi, tigger and me. tigger loved jovi too! i could not believe how much attention this baby got at disneyland!
mom fell on our way to disneyland and hurt her ankle pretty badly. luckily she and my dad both rented jazzy's. it was awesome because they got to ride and rest when they needed to, and we got to go to the front of the line quite a few times. we can't complain about that at all. my dad was a bit of a crazy driver and ran a few people (including me and some poor woman) over. he is still a truck driver at heart!
reese bought that little giraffe all by himself and has been attached to it ever since. I loved that he was holding her hand while he was asleep.
brad and me in tomorrowland
brixton and reese with the star troopers
  lauren and hallie
our second day we went to venice beach. that morning brad took my mom and dad to the emergency clinic to get her foot checked out. it wasn't broken, but it was majorly bruised and swollen. so we didn't get to the beach til late afternoon. reese and brixton had a blast in the water. brixton even got all dressed in his clothes and then jumped back in. luckily we had some pajamas he could wear. venice beach was totally interesting. there were some very diverse people there. i could have sat and watched them all day.
i know this picture is silly, but i kind of love it!
daddy and his girl
brad and kade
reese buried
the next day we went back to disneyland!
mr. incredible!
flexing those muscles!
reese loved pluto. he still has his baby pluto from our last trip and sleeps with it.
debbie, shanea and log in a bugs land
mikey, hallie, shanea, log, brad, jovi drew, half of debbie, me and reese's leg. 

while we were waiting in line to see mickey mouse reese told me he had to go potty and said he couldn't wait. i literally ran down the board walk with my double stroller looking for a bathroom, but by the time we got there he had peed everywhere... like a gallon. it was disgusting. luckily, being the prepared momma that i am (haha), i had an extra set up underwear and a sweatshirt. (don't mind that it was like 85 degrees or anything.) so that is what reese wore until brad came back from the roller coaster and took reese back to the hotel to get changed.
hallie, drew, snow white and log
that night we went to goofy's kitchen for dinner. it was seriously so much fun. it was a buffet and had kid friendly food and reese wolfed down a giant plate of spaghetti. i was so glad because he seriously just wanted to snack the whole time and refused to eat dinner and had thrown up twice in the middle of the night.
reese and chip
minnie, jovi and me
minnie was our favorite character. she came out a few times and was a major flirt with the boys. she also grabbed reese and made him the head of the conga line.
minnie came back one last time to say goodnight to jovi
we also met chef pluto
daddy doing a reese face
fairy god mother also paid us a visit
that night we went to world of color and both of my babies passed out. they were so tired. 
reese is a crazy driver just like mr. toad!
the next morning we got up early to go to magic morning. we did most of fantasy land before anyone else even got to the park. 
then we went to toon town and met mickey.
 
daddy and jovi in toon town








on our last day in the park we kind of took it a little easy. we went in and shopped for souvenirs. and then we all kind of did our own thing as individual families. we went to california adventure and took reese on the toy story mania ride. we bought reese mouse ears that he wore for about ten seconds. at the end of the day we all went to main street and sat together to watch the parade. it was a good end to an awesome vacation. 
this is the face he made when i told him to smile "normal". haha.
cali jovi
our family
this trip had some amazing moments. we came together as a family, a big family and our little family. we lived without wi-fi. we ate together and slept together and laughed a lot. 

there were also heart breaking moments. it saddens me so deeply that this will be kade and terra's last family vacation. to know that this chapter of their life is closing and that their family will never be repaired. divorce isn't just hard for the immediate family, it's hard for all of us. terra has been my sister for fifteen years and now things are changing. i hope they find happiness on their new trails of life. it makes my heart ache.

i also was very hurt by someone very dear to me on this trip. my niece, who i haven't seen in over a year moved to california just a few days before our vacation. we all begged her to come and see us, spend the day, meet jovi. she came, but she only came for about an hour, and that hour she made it very clear that she didn't want to be there. she said very hurtful things, she said she hated being there, she said she came only to see her brothers. she was mean, and she has written off this side of her family. and i am hurt, because i love her to the moon. i have defended her to the death, but now, i have seen a side of her that i didn't know was there, and i wish she wouldn't have come. so i could keep pretending that she cared about me like i have cared and loved her.

i love my family, they are the most important element in my life. sometimes i forget that, sometimes i get selfish, i want my own time, or i want something more. but on vacation i forget about money, i forget about eating healthy and school and messy houses. it is a much needed break for bonding and coming together and i am grateful that this time i was able to share it with so many people that are dear to me.