Sewing Class

My old ward (Ellsworth) is doing a sewing class.  I'm still in the loop enough that I'm able to attend the classes.  I finished my first project, a pair of pajama pants.  I decided to make them for Croix since I've been making baby legs for Maizy.  I let him pick out the fabric and he picked out a pirate print.  I was able to cut them out at class and sew most of them.  I had to measure Croix before I could finish.  When we woke up the morning after my class I was going to the bathroom and he came in and put the fabric, including the almost completed pants on the floor and says, Mommy you forgot to make my pajama pants!  I showed him how close they were to being done and told him I needed to measure him before I could finish them.  He then told me I needed to finish them that day!  I had enough fabric left over to make him an eye patch.  He loves them!  Wore them the whole day.  I love that he loves them!!  I'm so excited to continue learning how to sew better!  I have way too many crafts in mind!

California Date Night

We went to dinner the same place we dined 8 years ago the night Brent proposed.  It was fun to sit in the same restaurant as we did right before we officially decided to spend the rest of eternity together. They did not have creme brulee and I really wanted some for dessert, so we walked down the street a little to another restaurant to see if they had any. They did, but were already closed. They went above and beyond, not only did they serve us despite being closed they brought out roses and a candle to the table! So we enjoyed a wonderful dessert next to a cozy fire!


After two days of amusement parks I literally hurt everywhere, even my hands, I'd never felt so old!!  Showering was as ready as I was getting for our date, Brent must love me a lot!  I had wet hair, and no makeup.  As we walked from one restaurant to the other I was shivering because I was cold.  My love put his arms around me to keep me warm.  On the way there I said it was a good thing Brent wanted to go on this date so bad, and that I love this sort of romantic sweet thing so much, because under no other circumstances would I have left the house as tired as I was.  As we rode back home Brent asked me if it was worth it.  I said it was worth every shivering step!  And it was. We made memories that will last a lifetime, ones we will tell our Grandchildren about some day.  We had a moment that doesn't happen to real people, that kind of stuff only happens in movies!  Eight years ago I wouldn't have thought it possible but now I realize how little my love for Brent really was.  It has grown so much over the past eight years, through all we have experienced together.  I'm so glad I made the best decision of my life that night.  Eternity is not long enough to spend with him!  He is the best thing in my life!  Oh how I love him.  More then I can put into words!!

Beach and Los Angeles

Friday we woke up to cloudy skis but were determined to go to the beach.  We layered up and headed over.  It started sprinkling on the way.  It was SO SO SOOOO windy. But we were determined to go to the beach.  We got out of the car hit the sand and didn't make it very far before the kids made it clear they were done!  So we took a couple quick pictures and headed back to the car.

Croix had gotten a pinwheel as a new toy for the trip. he wanted to take it to the beach and see what it would do there.

I just spun super super fast and never stopped.

Doesn't it look cold!

She did great despite the cold wind. I love her blue eyes!

After the beach we headed back to my sister's and loaded up. We said goodbye and set off for LA. It should be a two hour drive, but LA traffic is horrible. It felt like it took forever. Finally we made it to my dear friend Amanda's house. She had a baby two months ago and I have dying to meet her. Little miss Zara was so sweet! It was so fun to see my friend as a Mommy. I'm telling you, becoming a Mom changes you, for the better. It is amazing. The most wonderful thing in the world, to hold your own child. Ah love, like you've never know! We hung out with her all afternoon/evening. Croix enjoyed playing with her step son Omari, who is 11. No biggie to Croix, he was just a friend. He was such a good boy! I was so impressed with how polite he was. In fact when we left Brent said, "That Omari is one good kid!" I agree. I got a picture of all the kids together before we left. It will be great to show them in 10 years or so!

Past bedtime we left Amanda's and went to Travis and Stef's house. We quickly set up the room and put the kids to bed. I was so tried I could have gone to bed with them, but it felt a little rude to invade someones home with out even saying hello for a while! Uncle Travis was great and read the kids their bedtime story. The next morning Maizy woke up at 6AM California time. I was beyond tired, she was happy as could be.

Croix and Maizy had fun climbing around on Uncle Travis.

Travis and Stef have two fur babies, Taz and Pepper. Croix was hesitant to meet his furry cousins (he's a little skittish around dogs these days)

It didn't take him long to warm up

and before too long he was laughing and smiling.

Searching for something for Croix to play with Travis and Croix found a motorcycle helmet.

I'm quite sure if there had been a strong gust of wind it would have knocked him over.

It was worth every mile of crying kids and traffic to visit Amanda and her family and Travis and Stef!  Croix cried as we left  because he didn't want to leave.


The drive home was pure misery. Croix did fairly well He started asking "are we there yet?" over and over at one point.  Brent and I just looked at each other wondering if there is some secret kid club where they teach kids all the annoying little things. Maizy was beyond done being in her carseat. She cried almost the whole way home. We had to stop several times to let her out. One of the stops was for dinner. It was at a truck stop place. They had tables with plastic table cloths on them. Croix took it upon himself to set the table. He found the plastic wear and napkins and put them on the table. He had picked out a spot for everyone. It was adorable! He even did the Vanna White hand gesture to show us our spots! This kid never ceases to surprise, amuse and fill with love!

We were all so happy to be home. While we were gone Marilyn, my friend I trade housekeeping with, came and cleaned. It totally rocked my world to come home from a long, tiring vacation to a sparking clean house! If only it had stayed that way! Ha! It was a lovely vacation, both because we did lots of fun things and got to see some wonderful family and friends! Croix is already planning his next vacation!

Zoo

In the spirit of keeping up and then catching up, today we went to the zoo (Thursday).  My brother and nephew were going to go to the museum with us, but my friend invited us to go to the zoo.  Since the weather is awesome we decided to go to the museum another day.  It was a little crazy because of spring break, but manageable.  We had lots of fun looking at all the animals.  Croix and Seth had a great time!  After we had been there a while and started to get warm we hit up one of the splash pads.  (Sorry for the crappy cell phone pictures)

Just because it's so stinking cute, here's the back of Maizy's swim suit!

She had fun splashing in the water.

Croix thought it was so fun too. Although he did not like the cave!

Seth loved everything about it!

They love each other!

It was warm enough I even went for a walk through the water!

While the boys played at the little farm park Maizy ate some baby food, it was all she would eat. She refused her bottle the whole time we were there. She also only slept for fifteen minutes from when she woke up until three in the afternoon!! She didn't even fall asleep in the car on the way home! Little turkey! She was exhausted!!!

There were these giant birds that look like over sized pelicans. We never did figure out what they were.

Our single stroller works for two kids quite well. Especially since they love each other so much!

I was trying to get Maizy to look at me by saying her name. Croix, trying to be helpful turned her head for her. She was not a fan.

We stopped at Brent's work on the way home so say hi to Daddy, since he works just across the street from the zoo. By time we got home we were all wiped out! It was a long hot day at the zoo. But so much fun!

Pampered

Today has been a great day, minus the headache I've been fighting all day. Brent worked some overtime. Croix woke up bright and early so I did what any responsible parent who stayed out to late the night before would do. I turned on Netflix and went back to bed and went back to sleep until Maizy woke up! We had a good lazy morning of stories games and imagination. When Brent got home we went to downtown Mesa for a really cool festival. It was lots of fun. Our friends met us there and Croix had a blast running around with them. We built legos, made instruments, and experimented with all sorts of things they had.

Then this afternoon I had a 90 minute hot stone massage followed by a pedicure. Brent got a groupon for me and pestered and pestered me until I booked it. I love that he loves me enough not only to get it for me but also to make sure I use it! It was a great massage (which being a therapist is hard to fine) and a nice relaxing pedicure. The headache never went away. After the massage it was worse. By time I got home I decided it was a migraine. I'm pretty sure it's from too little sleep, (up till almost 1 last night, Maizy was up for a while at 5 and Croix was up at 7) and not enough water. I ate some dinner when I got home and tried to sit as still as possible. We were watching our friends little boy and when they got here I should have laid on the couch but I got up and acted fine. Why?!? What would have been wrong with laying there? I'm weird. Anyway after they left I was going to go to bed. I went to mark off my goals for the challenge and realized I was just a little short on water and needed water for my headache anyway, so I chugged a glass. Then remembered I was 1 serving of veggies short. So I chugged a glass of V8. Then I threw up! What a crappy end to a great day. I'm praying it was just from the migraine and not a flu bug. I'm hoping for a full nights sleep and to feel better in the morning. I'm going to finish this "journal " entry, read my Scriptures, read my lesson for tomorrow and go to sleep!

Spring Break Splash

Croix is on spring break, from preschool.  Not such a big deal but I still wanted to do some fun things.  Today we went over to Grandma Marilyn's and brought our sprinkler.  We played in the water and blew some bubbles.  Croix loved it!  He was laughing and giggling.  Maizy was not a fan of the sprinkler and would cry every time it hit her. I moved her just out of it's reach and she was happy to watch.  I also picked her up and went through a few times to keep her cool, she didn't mind that at all.  Croix and I had fun running through together.  It makes me so anxious for our grass to grow.  We just put down seed on Wednesday and I don't think it can grow fast enough!!  then we won't have to go anywhere to have a little water fun!

After a while Croix got cold, he is so my child.  So we just laid on a towel in the sun.  Brent came over after he got off work and played with us for a minute.  Then he and Croix went grocery shopping while I put Maizy down for her 3rd nap.

Brent and I are about to head out to a concert, Seconds to Breathe.  We have a baby sitter, who is not family, coming!  We really need to do this more often!  I'm excited!  In preparation for our date I.....took a nap!  LOL  Bet you thought I was going to say got my hair done, or did my nails, got a new outfit.  Nope!  This old lady needed a nap!  The band doesn't go on stage until 9:45!  Well we're off to have a fun night!

PS, I'm not ready for it to be summer yet!  It's 80 in my house right not :P

Legoland

The next morning we let the kids Croix sleep in, Maizy woke up at 7 AZ time (6 CA time) the entire trip regardless of what time she went to bed).  Croix slept until 9:30!  I'm pretty sure he would have kept on sleeping if Maizy hadn't needed to go down for a nap.  When Croix finally woke up and he and Jon had matching PJ's.

We finally got loaded in the car and made our way to the park.  It was forcasted to rain all day and was already raining, so we stopped at walmart on the way to pick up some ponchos.  They were out!  So we hit up Sports Authority, they were out of the cheap ones!  But we have coverings from the rain.  They ended up being so handy.  It was pouring when we got there.

None of the rides were running because it was raining. I prayed really hard that we would be able to ride some rides, Croix was so excited about the rides! In the mean time we went to a little area where Croix could build with legos.

I think he could have stayed there the whole time (But I also thought that about the entire park, every time we had to leave one area and go to another I thought but he loves this so much, I think he could stay here all day!)

Croix got to go to driving school and get a drivers license. It was pretty hilarious watching him try and drive that car!

He started driving and then drove straight into the middle!

He finally go tthe hang of it after a while and managed to drive around the whole track, once!

When we got to the top of this big slide Croix said he was scared and didn't want to go.  I kind of forced him!  I said I'll hold your hand the whole time, and I did.  He did fine and had fun!

HE went on this ride, that I fibbed and said he was 4 so he could ride it. Then i was a little anxious that maybe I shouldn't have done that, what if he fell off! He looked so bored the whole ride (minus this moment when he rode past us and flashed a bored smile)! No need for concern!

I told him that's where bad people used to do time outs, that's his sad time out face!

There was a giant dinosaur egg, so he climbed in and pretended to be a baby dinosaur!

Penny pressing was cool

This guy freaked Croix out, I had to go stand next to him with Croix, he wouldn't leave my side!

Croix's expression here is priceless

!

We had so much fun at Legoland! Croix loved it so much more then Sea World. In fact funny thing. First thing when we get to Sea World Croix spotted a map and insisted he needed to look at it. We went over to the map and he looks at it and says...."Hummm...Where's Legoland on here?". He was more excited for Legoland and lived up to all his expectations! I was so impressed with how brave he was! He went on a roller coaster, a real roller coster! When I asked him waht he thought he said, "it was a little scary, but I liked it".  He is definitely my child!  He went on the roller coaster with Brent, I went on it with Crystal and I was shocked after riding it that he didn't come off crying, it was intense (at least for a three year old)  with drops and banks and jerks.  Such a brave boy.  When I was on rides with him and he'd start to seem scared I'd just go WOOO and he would start smiling and laughing.  The rain only lasted a little while and ended up being perfect!  There were no crowds.  Sometimes we walked right up and onto a ride.  When it was done the operator would ask if we wanted to ride again because there was no line.  I think we rode every ride Croix was tall enough to ride!  It was so perfect!  It was an awesome day!