SLC 2012

Kasey will be on-call at work beginning June 14th {our anniversary} through the middle of July... Obviously, we are not too thrilled about this. This means that we won't be able to go anywhere for our anniversary, Mikenna's birthday, 4th of July {my brother will be home (2 hours away) from DC}, and to top it all off - Kasey's 10-year high school reunion in Oregon. Bummer.

On the upside, we were able to get out of town for a few days before our month-long lockdown. We ran the idea by our wonderful friends, the Santiago's {our families have become very close, we both have 3 girls close to the same ages and they live right next to us!} to see if they might want to join us for a few days of fun at Lagoon and the Hogle Zoo in Salt Lake City. Since they did decide to come and a full itinerary, we were unable to visit the many family members we have there... Sorry guys, next time!

We left after the husbands got off work on Thursday evening and arrived at the hotel around 11:30 pm. We got conjoining rooms so we could all hang out before and after our planned activities. Brittney and I weren't tired for some reason so we decided to go try to find a store to buy healthy lunches for Lagoon. Neither one of us wanted to feed our families greasy fair food as a meal. That was quite the adventure - Super Target was closed, we found another market that was closed, the tomtom led us to an alley and said that we had reached walmart {um, no!}, so we had to follow a map on my iPhone which was fun... We had managed to make a huge circle around it, only to find out it was just a quick trip on the interstate at the next exit! We had fun though laughing for the 2 hours it took! Then we had to quietly put everything away in the fridge without waking up our kids and husbands - not easy when you can't stop giggling at every crinkle and crunch as well as eachother. Friday morning, we went down to the continental breakfast only to find out they shut it down at 9... It was 9:15! So we had breakfast together at IHOP, then headed to Lagoon.

Just a few highlights...

This was Adiee getting prepped for the skycoaster. You know, when you pay an extra $30 for them to scare the pants off of you... I was worried about Adiee on this one. She occasionally has a fear of heights, but wanted to do this with her dad.

 She was SO excited! What a wierdo, this ride is absolutely terrifying if you ask me.

 NO fear!

Look at those baby blues! She is such a gorgeous little girl!

 No turning back!

"This must be what a bird sees." Adiee said this to Kasey as they are climbing to the top...

How sweet and innocent is that?!

They LOVED every second of it. Brave girl!

I was very nervous about what her reaction was going to be.

The girls in their coordinating ladybug/polka dot outfits.

So cute!

Isla enjoying her dip n dots :)

Mikenna and I are about to go on the Catapult, another X-treme ride. I really like this one!

She's so excited! Last year she did the swing and Adiee did this one with me.

Loved it!

Sweet Isla riding the helicopters!

Saturday we planned to go to the zoo. We had breakfast and finished getting ready. This day was a little more hectic, then we found out the zoo was about an HOUR away... We took the scenic route and drove through downtown SLC. Of all the times I've been there, I don't think I have ever been downtown. By the time we got there it was already around noon. Zoo parking was ridiculous, so Kasey and I opted to just pay for parking so we didn't have to keep trolling the lot for someone to leave. The weather wasn't as nice this day, an occasional chilly gust of wind really put a damper on the day from the get-go.

Our 3 beautiful babies!

Our 3 little "chick-a-dees" :)

Checking out the seals...

Mikenna played photographer with my phone :) Made me nervous a few times, could you imagine her dropping it in the water or in an animals cage?! That thing was expensive!

This picture was taken right after what was probably the worst moment of my life - Adiee got separated from our group. Kasey, Schnihder, and I all went running in different directons while Brittney stayed with the kids. I was running around looking for her and I physically couldn't scream her name, except once. I couldn't believe that it was happening, it didn't seem real at all. I don't think a minute had passed when I saw Adiee walking towards and talking with a zoo worker, she was calm but started crying when she saw Schnihder and I running towards her in opposite directions. I squeezed her and just started sobbing. I felt like such a horrible mom, and I held her hand while we walked back to where our group was. Kasey had to talk me through a full-blown panic attack - something I have never experienced before. I physically couldn't breathe, it felt like someone was squeezing my throat and I was breathing through an opening no bigger than a pinhead. I remember feeling like I was going to faint because I was crying so hard and fighting to breathe, being just so thankful that she was safe with us, and feeling like I was a terrible mom. Kasey made me feel better by saying that I wasn't a bad mom, this is something that happens sometimes {although, it's not supposed to happen to me...}, that Adiee knowing to calmly look for a person in uniform and to ask for help was just confirmation that she has good parents. But it's 2 days later and I'm still feeling very emotional about the whole ordeal.

It didn't take long for Adiee to recover, can you see the excitement over the giraffe? :)

I love this picture, and holy cow does Mikenna look grown up or what?!

Sweet girls!

We had lunch, shopped in the gift shop {Mikenna got an elephant mood necklace, and some slime with a tiger in it. Adiee picked a frog whose eyes pop out when you squeeze it and a glass frog sculpture. Isla picked a beautiful pink crystal sea horse necklace and a pen with charms on it.} and we called it a day by 3 pm. So we basically paid $60 for 3 hours of freezing our tushes off, and a scary experience I won't ever forget. After we left, we went shopping, to dinner, then went swimming at the hotel.

Look at that face!

 Having a great time!

Easy does it :) What a sweetie pie!

Sunday we took off around noon, Kasey had to get back to town so he could take on-call while Mike left on a business trip... Even when we aren't on-call, our weekends aren't always our own. We're still trying to get used to that. If you're visiting just this post, I posted 2 others earlier {one this morning, and one last night. Just FYI if you wanted to read those as well ;-)} Thanks for reading!

A Month at a Glance

I've been a bit MIA but for a good reason! I needed to take a break from all that Disney talk to let family who aren't as familiar with blogger to read up without having too much trouble (as those 3 posts took up the entire page). This is what the Brown Family has been up to since I last wrote...

• Our family went to Oregon a couple weeks ago to see Tennyson's high school graduation (from one end of the country to the next in a matter of weeks which is okay by me - I love traveling!). We had to miss my cousin Paige's graduation, which was a bummer. So proud of them both!

• End-of-the-school-year activities like field days, talent shows, etc... Mikenna's last day was June 7th! Mikenna and Adiee ROCKED the talent show by the way! What seemed like a 2.5 hours of Justin Bieber and Katy Perry's "Firework" on repeat (half the time you couldn't even hear the kids singing along!) Our kiddos walked on stage and they sang, The Little Mermaid's "Part of Your World" at the top of their lungs! Good thing they had the music playing in the background, otherwise they would've sang in circles for who knows how long! I laughed til I cried and got every moment on tape for Kasey to enjoy that afternoon. :)

Last day of 1st Grade... *sniff *sniff :(

• We broke in the ocean (a.k.a. lake, ha!) kayak! It was SO much fun, now I can't wait til mine gets here!! Good thing Kasey shares so well! ;-)

The girls had a blast playing at the beach/playground while we messed around on the kayak! 

My good lookin' hubby on his newest toy. I realized I had the camera in my pocket when I went out, so feet is all ya get! LOVE his goofy face - he makes me laugh! :)

• I've been blog surfing! I discovered the joys of blog hopping a few months ago, there are SO many creative, helpful, inspiring blogs out there!
• I've joined Pinterest, an addicting place to hoard those creative, helpful, inspiring posts that you run into! If you are wanting to join, let me know and I will send you an invite so that you don't have to wait for them to send you one. :)
• Yesterday we celebrated 7 years of marriage! As always we used facebook to flaunt our happiness to the world - sorry if we made you vomit... Haha! But seriously, couldn't be happier!!

I wanted to put this really cute Disney World one of the two of us, but I'm still waiting for my disc... It should be here within the next couple days (at least it better be)!

• We are taking the munchkins to Denver this Saturday to celebrate Miss Mikenna's birthday at Elitch's amusement park, which is today by the way! :-) She is SO excited, that crazy kid cannot wait to do the heart stopping sky coaster swing ride... She's just like her daddy! (ok, I kinda like it too... haha!)

• AND lastly, I have been on a mission to simplify and declutter our life!! I can't STOP!! So far in the last week, I have gone through every drawer, bin, box, cupboard, closet, and corner in our master bedroom, master bathroom, laundry room, living room, kitchen, as well as Mikenna and Isla's room. Adiee's is a whole 'nother ballpark - stuffed animals have taken over! No joke!

These 2 pictures are kind of embarrassing, but obviously they aren't kept on the floor. All of these cuddly little jerks are the reason for most of my temporary episodes of insanity and are kept on the top bunk in Adiee's bedroom, but we are getting rid of the bed and ALL of these besides a select few. These pictures are right before we started the sorting process, "after" pictures are unavailable at the moment because we are about to undergo round 2 of sifting through the keep pile to put more into the toss/sell/donate piles. They are doing great at understanding why we should give to those in need, make room for new stuff, and paring down to keep mommy's mental health intact. Ha! And I still have to go through the playroom and girls' bathroom.

I am a list maker and organizer at heart and crave order and cleanliness; with space being a serious issue in this temporary abode and I have been LOSING my mind lately with how much stuff we have accumulated over the past few years! And with Isla getting older, we have an obscene amount of baby toys, clothes, furniture, etc... to get rid of (among many many other things)! Wierd... we have big kids now (sort of, haha!) Going through all of our belongings with a fine tooth comb and getting ready for our upcoming garage sale to shed all this unwanted stuff has left me feeling liberated! My goal is to live more simply - less material and visual clutter and more functional, orderly, and beautiful surroundings in my life :)

Disney World Day 3

Saturday, May 7th: We went to the Animal Kingdom park on this day. Our breakfast reservations for Donald's Safari breakfast at the Tusker House were at 9:25 am. The morning went extremely smooth and all 5 of us were ready and out waiting for our bus at 8:30!

The bus took us directly to Animal Kingdom because the restaurant was inside the park itself.

Donald met us right before we were seated at our table. The girls were so excited! Breakfast was buffet style with jamba juice (and anything else we wanted to drink along with it.) They even had a special little section where the buffet tables were kid-size!! So cute!

Mickey Mouse came right to our table! How fun is that?!

Then came Daisy! Mikenna took note of her shoes! She thought they were neat and now wants some "fat high heels" too. Ha!

Then came Goofy! He started a kid parade right in the dining room! Gave all of them each a maraca and marched around the room!

Then he stopped by the table. Adiee had to go to the bathroom, she was missing Goofy! :( But I had a little chat with him and he kept giving me the thumbs up/thumbs down for him to come back so she didn't miss him! How sweet! It took about an hour and a half for all the characters to come in and visit with everyone.

When we were done eating, we set out to enjoy our day at the park. Outside the restaurant there was a man who was singing and Isla was hooked! He thought she was pretty cute, shakin' her tush and all! :)

Look who we found!! We were making our way to the Expedition Everest ride when Kasey spotted King Louie and Baloo from the Jungle Book in a little cove! We went up the pathway and we got there right before a whole slew of people started to form a line! Now that is some good luck! They saw us pulling up in the stroller and they came part of the way to meet us. King Louie got on his knuckles and right in Adiee's face! Wow, it was great! And there was also a park photographer up there so he got some great shots like these as well! :)

SO CUTE!! Our day was already 10 times better than the day before!

After we were done visiting with the Jungle Book characters we made it to Expedition Everest. The line was only about a 35 minute wait. So Mikenna and I waited in line, while Kasey had Adiee and Isla. He went and got fast passes for later. The wait went by pretty quick for Mikenna and I, the lines at the big attractions are pretty entertaining with lots to look at. This one had a yeti museum, and a room full of necessities if you were to actually climb the Himalayas. Kasey was in a spot that he could see the people in the coaster so when he saw us on it, he met us in the air-conditioned gift shop at the ride exit. He took both the big girls. Remember how I had to wait 35 minutes just for the line? Well that's the beauty of 'rider swap'. He got to go in the fast pass line. So I only had to wait about 15 for them to be done completely! While he was gone, I took Isla to get her a popsicle, played in the shade where he said he was, and let her play in the dirt. When they got out, he said that he couldn't believe that I was letting Isla play in the dirt. He spent the entire time that I was gone trying to keep them out of it (thinking I would go nuts if he let them get dirty! I don't know where he would get an idea like that?! Haha) They are kids, they are on vacation, and we decided to be 'go with the flow' parents to make the best out of our trip - I think I just proved that I was serious about that! Haha :)

With fast passes on hand, we started on our way to Dinoland U.S.A. and we noticed another character greeting cove. Though we had to wait in line this time, it wasn't too long. Plus Adiee asked specifically if we were going to meet Winnie the Pooh and friends, and Isla got really excited when I said, "I don't know, maybe!" There were more park photographers, so again there are more great shots of the girls here.

 Eeyore! He's adorable! 

Tigger!! They LOVED Tigger!

We stopped at a little fountain, the girls went crazy over it! It was pretty hot outside, so it was an opportunity for them to cool off. Plus Mikenna needed to wash off that Mickey Mouse ice cream sandwich goatee off her face! LOL

Isla doesn't usually go for things like this when she is in her clothes, but she made an exception with no hesitation! haha! It was that hot! While we were in the Dino-land U.S.A. area, we did the DINOSAUR ride. It was another ride that wasn't ok for Isla to go on, so Kasey took the big girls and we did the rider swap again. It was SO cool, a bit too loud, but it was really fun! Of course when I took the girls, Adiee had to go to the bathroom soooo bad she was almost in tears, but we were at the point of no return... In the seat, buckled, and ready to go! I felt so bad for her.

When we were ready for lunch, we ate at Restaurantosaurus. Cute name! Their kid's meals were served in buckets. Hamburgers/Hot dogs with carrots, grapes, and a juicebox.

Right after lunch, we hurried over to the Finding Nemo musical line since the previous showing was full. Kasey ran to park the stroller while the girls and I got in line. That show was wonderful!! This time it was me that was getting goosebumps! Ha! Mikenna had already filled up the memory on her camera, then she got ahold of my cell phone and took about 100 blurry pictures of the Nemo show herself. lol Isla was getting pretty tired, so she fell asleep. After the show, we promised the girls that we would go back and do the "Triceratop Spin" and I felt so bad because this was actually a ride that Isla could go on, so I tried to wake her up but she wasn't having it! By the time Kasey and the girls got off of the ride, it was time for us to go back to Expedition Everest for our fast passes, and we decided to head over to the "Kali River Rapids" (a 40 minute line) which worked out since Isla was sleeping. That ride got you pretty wet and we still hadn't gotten any of the pictures that I wanted done with the park photographers in front of the "Tree of Life" a 14-story tall, 50-foot wide tree in the heart of Animal Kingdom! But that didn't stop us, we went and got those pictures done anyway. I can't show the pictures they took yet...

With the park closing at 6, we decided that we were spent for the day. Our feet were KILLING us and we wanted to beat the crowd again to the bus stop. On our way out, we couldn't resist the "Discovery Island Trails" which took us all over and under the roots of the "Tree of Life", it was super neat! Isla didn't want to stand next to that commodo dragon (or alligator, whatever...) above for very long! Haha :) He made her nervous!

A rabbit carved into the tree root.

Look at all those various animals carved into the trunk! The girls really enjoyed pointing out all the different ones that they recognized! And this was taken right underneath it!

Our beautiful babies next to a waterfall under the "Tree of Life". We made a loop and then hobbled out of the park. We weren't the first ones this time, but the wait was only like 20 minutes. We didn't even come close to seeing all Animal Kingdom had to offer, not enough hours in the day!

The girls were so WILD when we got to the hotel room and all Kasey and I wanted to do was to take a short little nap! And do you know why they had all that energy?!? Because we let them all ride in the stroller! We had a 40 pound stroller, 20 pounds of cargo, and 100 pounds of kid that we pushed up and down, in and out, ALL over the parks for the last 2 days... Not to mention the fact that they didn't have to wake up until the last second in the mornings. But they did have a point... You can sleep when you get home to boring Rawlins! Haha :) We figured it was useless even trying, so we took them down to the food court for some dinner and then had the option to watch the outdoor movie, or go to the blizzard kiddie pool. They picked pool, total shocker there! They played their little hearts out while Kasey and I rested on the loungers and chatted with other exhausted parents doing the same thing! haha :) We finally talked them into being done at about 11!!