Goin around

This morning when I woke up I looked to see what the photo of the day was for today.

"somewhere you went"

Sounds like fun. It made me want to go somewhere warm and sunny, and preferably Hawaii.

Right.

I thought about the errands I needed to run and figured they would suffice. Then Grace woke up and stumbled into our room with one eye sealed shut.

I knew where my photo was going to be taken at that moment.

Doctors office.
No beach.
No errands.

Just hanging with our favorite doctor. (we really do have the best pediatric office)

Our appointment was at 10:30. When he came in, declared it pink eye and sent the prescription over to the pharmacy, I told him he must see
it a lot. His answer...SEVEN patients already this morning and the majority were heading to the same pharmacy.

Wow.

At least we didn't get to miss the pink eye party.

Blogging from my phone?!

Leave it to having to be off my feet today and bam!! I figured out how to post on my blog with my phone. I knew it existed but never bothered to find out until the option of getting things done wasn't going to happen.

May I just say how cool it is when you find yourself an AwEsOMe doctor? Sure I am in pain but I will SO go back to him in a heartbeat. He took his time, answered questions to things I didn't even go in for, and hooked me up with a prescription for Josh to give me ice cream and sympathy! My mom brought in dinner and my favorite cookies. All in all, besides feeling completely unproductive, it has been a good day. Well not completely unproductive, I did blog. :)

March Photo A Day

Middle of April and I finally got my March photo a day page done. Not bad. It is better that the {years} I am behind on actual scrapbooking. :)

I learned my lesson

I debated writing about this on my blog. It is personal, it isn't something I put out there for pity. I had decided I wouldn't write about it but then I stopped and thought again that I should.

I had two moles pop up pretty suddenly on my side. I had kept an eye on them and kept putting off my 6 month skin check. I always thought "I'll do it tomorrow" or "I really should get that appointment made." but never did. Suddenly one night it hit me "GO GET YOUR SKIN CHECK" but of course I had to wait since the office was closed.

I made an appointment the next day but it was 3 weeks out. I went to my Mom's house to help get things ready for my brother's farewell and somehow the topic came up and I burst into tears. I just wanted to ignore it and pretend everything was good. If I didn't go in, no one would tell me otherwise...right?

My Mom got on the phone and somehow pulled off an appointment for the next Wednesday with the other dermatologist in the office. The rest of the week was a long one. I was grateful for my brother's farewell, family in town, and plenty of things to do to keep my mind off all of it. The night before Austin left for the MTC, Josh, my Dad and Austin gave me a blessing. It was just what I needed.

The next day I met with the doctor. He asked about my previous surgery and commented on my plastic surgeon who is also in the same office. I told this dermatologist about how much I loved this doctor and what a great job he had done. His reply: "His patient happiness record is higher than mine and he has raised the bar so high here. It makes it tough." HUH?! Okay.

He ended up doing a biopsy on one of them and told me to come back in three months with the other. He also commented that spending so much time in tanning booths is not a good thing. HUH? I have NEVER been to a tanning booth. I have "layed out" THREE times in my entire lifetime. Was he blind? Could he see that my white skin doesn't tan? I didn't like being told that I did this to me. I didn't. Even if I did...a lecture? Really?!

My appointment was on a Wednesday and there would be no way to get results before the end of the week. Monday morning I called the office. The MA answered the phone and I asked if I could get my results. Her response was "You should get a letter in the mail." I am dying here people...I can't wait for mail...I wanna know! I asked if she could tell me. I don't want to play the whole "I had melanoma card" to get her to understand but she got quiet for a minute and said "well it is negative, you are fine."

I hung up the phone completely relieved.

The pathology report arrived the next day.

It said that basically that it was severely atypical and that there were some strange cells but that it was too early to confirm the presence of melanoma, but that it had been completely removed.

I am so happy it is all gone. I wonder what would have happened had it not been removed sooner. I am so glad that I got in.

So here is my soapbox.

1. Find a good doctor
2. Make your appointments early enough you don't have to go to a crap doctor (also so you don't have to have said crap doctor get to see all your bits and pieces too. One doctor for that is enough.)
3. Get your skin checked!!!
4. Wear sunscreen
 And last but not least...
5. Know your skin. If you have anything you wonder about...get in!

I am stepping off said soapbox now. :)

Thanks be to Pinterest

The night before Conference I realized I needed to come up with an idea for entertaining the crazy littles. Last October I planned nothing and as a result we heard NOTHING. {Please tell me we are not the only house...}

So I hopped onto Pinterest and I know I had pinned things for conference that might be able to help. (Sidenote: does anyone else have a problem with going to Pinterest to find a previously pinned idea only to get sucked in? I swear I was just going for a dinner recipe, next thing you know it has been 30 minutes and I have yet to even get to that folder. :)

ANYWAY...
There was an idea to fill cups with treats and every time a that word is said you can take a candy from the cup.

This, my friends, was a brilliant idea. BRILL. IANT.
You get the idea.

My kids have NEVER been so quiet during conference in their entire existences. They even shooshed each other and said "I am trying to listen to conference." I wanted to pinch myself to make sure it was real. They even remembered what was said and everything.

They laughed so hard because there was a couple of talks where they hit every single word we had. They kept saying "Can they see our cups?" "They must want us to have candy!"

I think I smell a new family tradition?!

We did make a couple of rules right out of the gate. You cannot take treats when it is the prayer and you personally had to hear the word. You couldn't just grab because you see everyone else. (and believe me...they were the candy police)  I also gave them bags, too much sugar in the first session and there will be no way they will sit for another one. We even talked about making it so that the first person who hears the word is the only one who gets the treat. Maybe we will try it for a talk or two and see how it goes.

At one point Hayden took the game so seriously, he stood right in front of the speaker so he could hear every single word. Haha...that boy...he cracks me up!

We didn't pull out the candy game until Sunday morning but Saturday afternoon they were completely set on finding Uncle Austin in the MTC choir. He reported the Wednesday afternoon before (yep, same time as cutie David Archuletta) but wasn't in the choir that day. We did spot David a few times though...I guess he can sing? :) hehe

So thank you pinterest for helping me get conference in our house in peace!

February Photo-A-Day

Two months and I am still going!

I had a friend ask if I was following the photo-a-day list that is all over the web. (You take a picture based on the word or topic of the day) and the answer is sometimes. :) I have found that there were some days that I had other things that I wanted to remember for the day rather than the topic that was "assigned".     

It has gotten to be a family thing around here. The kids are always asking "Am I your picture of the day?" or "Can this be your photo of the day?" So a few of them were actually taken by them. This makes me love this project even more.

Cali Trip...part dos...

There have been pins and needles that you have been sitting on waiting for this post right? I am so very sure. Ha. :)

Disneyland is one of our family's favorite destinations. We are far from "experts" but we have learned a thing or two in the years that we have gone. The first one...go in February.

Our shuttle driver confirmed our theory. Who would know better than the guy who spends his every day driving families to and from the happiest place on earth day in and day out? February and September. (Although you could not have paid me enough to have gone on leap day this year...I heard it was nothing but lines everywhere) The longest we waited in a line was 20 minutes and that was for the Finding Nemo ride and the Toy Story Mania ride.

So while I type I will stick in little things that we did that made the trip easier for the family. So when you go, maybe something will help you out too!

One day I dream of staying in a Disney hotel (The Grand Californian isn't too shabby :)
We have taken note of several of the hotels around the park and we usually stay at the Portofino Inn. This time we stayed at Embassy Suites and we loved it. We tend to favor hotels that have extra space, you know for kids to sleep and such. :) Both hotels have two rooms, one for kids, one for the parents. These types of rooms also come with the fridges and microwaves so that you can store food and drinks.

Get in line early. In February, early means about 30 minutes before the park opens up. Peak times I have heard you have to get in line earlier than that.

Miss Grace didn't remember Disneyland at all the last time we went. This time was a pretty big deal for her.

I hate overly planned trips. Yuck. Day to day life is so overplanned that on vacation we just like to go with the flow. It makes me wish we were always on vacation! :) We bounced from ride to ride and had a blast.

We did use an app on our phone to check times (Walkee Wait time was the most accurate and it is a free download) to see if we needed to grab fast passes.

While I was waiting for Josh and the kids to come off the Indiana Jones ride I spotted me a celebrity:

Jason Ritter. (You know, John Ritter's son...also on Parenthood and such...)
He saw me looking at him funny cause at first he just looked familiar and then I recognized him. He gave me a wink, put his sunglasses on, and went on his way. My brush with a celebrity. I live a charmed life :) hahaha!!!

Anyway....
One of our all-time favorite rides...Hollywood Tower of Terror. Well, everyone BUT Maddie. One ride in and she remembered she hated it the last time we were here.

So thank goodness for Aunt Ashley who saved her from going with us again...

So note that I am holding on to Grace's leg. For some reason I think my strength would be enough to hold her in if the strap should ever fail. Also note...Austin (Top right) is also not a big fan of this ride. He did scream like a girl at one point. BUT...to his credit he did go a second time when the ride operator said there wasn't a line and we were free to stay and ride again. I can also harass him here, he is leaving on his mission in a few weeks and I need to be able to torture him while he can read it!



So while you are at Disneyland you MUST and I mean MUST get a Dole Whip. They look so good, no?! They taste even better. You won't be sorry one bit. (That is, unless you don't like pineapples...then you would probably regret it)

We always plan a character meal while we are there. We have done Ariel's Grotto twice and since we had free breakfasts at the hotel we decided to try Goofy's Kitchen for dinner.

The characters come and spend time with the kids during the dinner. Minnie ended up being our absolute favorite of the night.  She came back over to dance with Grace when the music came on and insisted on having her picture taken with a very shy Hayden.

Notice...he did get in the picture with Sleeping Beauty.

Dinner is buffet style and there is something for EVERYONE. They even had PB&J pizza. I wanted to take my camera over and take pictures of the food because it was incredible just to even look at. I did draw the line and decide I would look a TAD bit crazy. I should have just done it. :)

We ended up stuffed and made it back to the park just in time for the parade that night:

 Grace about died when she saw her idol:

We also discovered that 2.5 of us do not do well on the teacup ride.

Maybe it had something to do with a certain guy named Josh yelling "we aren't going fast enough yet"...all smiles but man my head was spinning for an hour.

The second day we were ready to get back to it!

PICTURE. OVERLOAD.

One day Hayden will love me for taking these pictures. I have no idea what was with him...maybe he thought that pictures with characters was no longer "cool"...???

The kids saved their pennies for all the souvenirs they would want. No joke...the second we walked in they wanted to drop their chunks of change on the first things they saw. We made them wait. At the time they thought we were horrible, mean, heartless parents but when they found the things they LOVED and couldn't part with they were glad they still had their dollars. Buy your crap on the way OUT of the park for the day so you don't have to lug them around. That is unless they wear them on their heads...

World Of Color is a must. A BIG must. In the summer it is offered at two times. When we went there was only one nightly show. You have to get fast passes over by the River Run ride because in order to get into the roped off areas you have to have the tickets. We were told by a Disney worker that the bridge is an awesome place to watch the show. She was right. However, we met a nice family from Utah while waiting and they had seen the show before. They said to try to get right by the lake because when the water shoots up it is amazing how high up. Where we were was really cool because we could see the entire thing. Guess we will have to go again! :)


The show was at 8:15 and I will admit...by this point in the night we were exhausted. The walk to the shuttle was a LONG one but like I said, the show made it worth it.

The last day I promised Grace that we would go up and meet Rapunzel. The brochure said that Rapunzel was at the Princess Faire during certain times. So we booked it over and Josh and Hayden headed over to Toon Town because they didn't want to stand in the FOREVER long line. I don't blame them. As we waited in line I swear there are Moms that think that meeting a princess means dolling your kids up like Toddlers and Tiaras. Good grief. A woman in front of us was NO JOKE was putting mascara, lipstick and blush on her 4 year old. She wasn't alone, there were others. Us, on the other hand, are on vacation and our messy ride hair is just going to do.

One of the parents in line asked the Disney worker if Ariel was inside and the worker said "we aren't allowed to say which princess are inside, we can only guarantee you will meet at least three."

Guess who wasn't there...
Yup. Rapunzel.

Darn it.

Grace was a good sport and they still had fun. So if you have a little girl wanting to meet a "certain" princess, good luck!

(the princess were so sweet...except Jasmine. We watched as girl after girl got a basic smile and a "you can exit that way" so when we got there she only would take a picture with Grace. Maybe she wanted to just fly off with Aladdin??)

We did get to meet Mickey! (Darn PhotoPass photographer...this was the best we could get!)

We spent the rest of the day making sure we got to everyone's favorite rides at least one more time.

We also made it a tradition to have our family pic taken in the same spot every time we go.

2007:
aka: the year of disgusting "natural wave" hair. someone shoot me if I ever try that one again. Not to mention the hideous sunglasses. I could go on and on...........

2009:

Look how big my littles have gotten!!!

This is our "freaky" eye pic but a pic none the less...

We did talk Josh into going on the Ferris wheel. If you have a fear of heights DO NOT get a swinging cart. We didn't know the first time we went and we all about had a heart attack on that one. We did survive this time around.

It was an awesome fun-filled three days. There is just something about Disneyland. The kids all kept hugging us and thanking us for the fun family vacation. That made it all the more worth it. A chance to get away together and make memories, while they still want us to be around. :)

California...part 1

So I have no idea how many "parts" there will be to this! It was a week long vacation and it was a much needed break from the everyday craziness. The kids were so excited and kept asking me "How many days until we leave?" so we made a countdown and every day they would take a mickey off. That was the end of that question 359 billion times a day! ;)

When the day FINALLY came, we loaded up and headed out on the LONG drive. Actually I can't complain. They were really good travelers. We stopped in Vegas for the night and the kids loved getting to have a sleepover with their cousins.

 The next morning we loaded back up and finished the drive. Two of my favorite highlights of the trip are hitting my favorite location...yup...Zzyzx Rd. Maybe I should build my dream home here before everyone else does?

 My absolute favorite part of the drive is the curve that turns you from the desert view (as shown in my Zzyzx Road) into these beautiful green mountains.

We had debated getting a hotel by the beach or just staying put in one hotel for the entire week. Josh had hotel points and we decided rather than load and unload a bajillion times we would just stay in one place. Looking back I am so glad we did. Our hotel was perfect.

We stayed here:

It is one mile down the road from Disneyland, right across the street from Target (yay!) and they feed hot breakfasts every single morning. They would stuff themselves silly and wouldn't be hungry until late afternoon. We would usually eat a late lunch/early dinner and they were good with snacks. They have a shuttle just for this hotel and it only took us minutes to get there. It was worth every single penny.

Little sidenote: the CHA (the crafty convention as we started calling it) had all sorts of vendors and bloggers staying there. Guess who I met...yup...Heidi Swapp.We used the same elevator ;) hahaha!

Anyway...back to the vacation stuff....

We decided to head to Universal Studios the first day. Their marketing team is some kind of crazy. For the same price as a day pass you can get an annual pass and come back as many times as you would like for the rest of the year. The very same price. ??? So we are now proud annual pass holders for all of those days we go to Universal Studios. Which is like every other weekend so we just saved ourselves a TON of money! :)

I am fully convinced that if H?%$ has a freeway running through it...it will be the I-5/101

Seriously. The Devil's Freeway.

California drivers...they are crazy, crazy people. I had at least 4 heart attacks on the way through LA. It was a fun mix of almost hitting cars and almost getting hit. Oh. My. Gosh. I should just ride blindfolded the next time. Josh kept telling me to not make any noise because I was freaking him out. I was looking through pictures and laughed because this photo doesn't look like it is bad at all. Looks can be deceiving people.

 We did arrive in one piece. I was never ever so happy to be off a freeway ever in my entire life. I should have kissed the ground.

Of course you have to get your picture taken in front of the spinny globe thingy...Hayden didn't get the memo though because he told me there was NO way he was going to stand there. He was on this trip though...promise!

Maddie loved the telephone booths in old England...

and we found the car from Mr. Bean's Holiday. We love us some Mr. Bean!

I wish this would cure the itch I have to go to England. Sadly, it did not. Good try though Universal. Good try.

We also took a scooter ride through Paris

and hung out with the "locals"

Josh even tried to feed the dinosaurs by the Jurassic Park ride...

They wouldn't eat a single one of them!

We made sure to hit the Backlot tour. They showed the soundstages for a ton of shows including CSI and Parenthood. I wanted to jump off the tram and go take a peek. Come on, wouldn't you?!

My good lookin' men:

Maddie is growing up. I told her to put the glasses on for a picture and she looked at me like I was crazy. They have to stop growing up. It is starting to kill me.

Josh and I decided we would have a "camera war" with the photos...(I hate/loathe that stupid point and shoot camera. It won't focus, it does crap exposures...I could go on and on but Josh loves it.

Mine:

Josh:

Maybe now he will at least think about getting a new one? There was a LOT of blurry ones from his little beauty but he did pull off a few good shots. :) I can say all of this because I am the one who writes this blog and he will probably never ever read this! hehe

HIS: (I am not surprised they are all of the cars from movies)

More of the tour:

They had characters all over the park and we asked Hayden which one he would like to meet the most. His answer was SpongeBob. We were walking down the road and who did we happen to run into? Yep. SpongeBob. Funny thing is that Hayden got so embarrased and nervous he hid behind Josh. Maddie met him for Hayden. Silly kid.

As we were heading out of the park there was a taxi from a show. We were looking at the map and Hayden was inspecting the lock on the car. A "policeman" snuck up behind him and told us to shhhh. He stood behind him until Hayden turned around. He about peed his pants when he saw the officer standing over him. He was such a nice guy that he posed for a picture for us. What I wish I would have gotten is a picture of the 12 Asians taking pictures of this too. They took pictures of Hayden and Grace all over the park. They couldn't get enough of the light skin and blonde hair combo.

It was a great day. The park wasn't overly crowded (even though you would think with all of the annual pass holders it would be), the weather was FANTASTIC and we had so much fun together.

Hayden must have thought so too because he reluctantly got in this picture. At least he is there! :)