Reagan lost another tooth. No really ... she lost it out of her mouth and she then she lost it. It came out at school and then she tucked it into a pocket at lunch and lost it at recess.
She was worried that the Tooth Fairy wouldn't believe her that she lost a tooth. Not to worry, though, the Tooth Fairy left her a nice note saying that she believed her and she knows when a child looses a tooth. Yeah - all is well!
Cole lost another tooth this week as well. Whew the Tooth Fairy must be busy coming to our house twice in a week :)
Cole has lost so many teeth now that we have nicknamed him "Toothless". I don't know how he will eat with so few teeth. He tried to eat an apple the other day and couldn't even get it started. He had to have Reagan take the first bite and then he could gnaw at the bitten away part. Then, he asked me to buy corn on the cob and I questioned how he thought he would eat that. He just laughed.
Let's hope we are done loosing teeth for a while. Hopefully we'll give the Tooth Fairy a break from having to keep coming to our house :)
Say it isn't so!!! Reagan Nicole is 9 years old! I just can't believe it. The time has gone SO fast. Well, I'm not sure if we are still recovering from Spring Break or whether school has us focussed on other things, but this one sort of crept up on us. We knew it was Reagan's birthday and that we would be opening presents and celebrating as a family, but when it came to planning her party, we just didn't get it done. Every time I tried to talk with her about what she wanted for a party, she would say "Um...can we talk about that later?" Well, turns out that we have no plans at this time. I know ... I know.. she will have a party, but we just don't know when, where or what theme at the moment. Oh well, it's all good. Let's just celebrate with our little family.
Reagan's birthday fell on a school day, so, she had all of her regular studies. Plus, she had Activity's Days after school. They were working on a Mother's Day project, so, she didn't want to miss. Then, Cole had karate until 7. So, by the time we all returned home, had dinner and were ready to open presents, it was almost bedtime.
Before her birthday, I asked Reagan whether she wanted a cake or cupcakes or ice cream or cookie dough or whatever to celebrate her birthday. Well, she wanted to make cupcakes. So, that's what we did. We whipped up her cupcakes, put a candle in one and sang to her.
She is such a sweet girl who adds love and drama :) to our family. She is super creative and expressive and she is learning and growing each day. She is no longer a little girl - she it growing into a big girl and will soon be a young woman. (This mama can't stand it!) She is such a Daddy's girl, but also loves to be with Mom. We adore her!
Happy Happy Birthday Reagan!!!! We hope your day was as special as you are. Love you so much!!!!!
I've admitted it before - we have a problem....... we are addicted to Apple products. It's no secret that we are "all in" on Apple. We have almost everything they make, we try out any new products, we defend Apple in discussions with our Droid friends and family. We even own Apple stock. Well, when the Apple Watch was announced last year, we knew we wanted them. We waited patiently (well, sort of) for the release date and when we learned the date we could order them, we knew we would be up at midnight on that date. It turned out we were in Newport Beach on Spring Break the day we could order the watches. We set our alarms and were up at midnight so we could place our order. The watches were supposed to be available two weeks later. Well, it didn't exactly turn out that way. For some reason, very few were shipped. Ours looked like they wouldn't be delivered until May. We were disappointed. Then, the night before the release, we received a text that our watches would be delivered on the release day - the next day. We were so excited! If you know Steve, you know that he doesn't care much about "stuff". However, he cares VERY much about his tech. (Remember him waiting all night at the mall to get the iPhone 6 Plus?) He was like a child on Christmas morning. He was SO excited. We tend to order kind of a lot through the mail, so, we actually know the UPS guy and have his cell phone number. (This could be counted as another "problem" that we have.) We called him to see if we could meet him somewhere earlier on his route so that we could have the watches even a couple of hours earlier. Unfortunately, that day, he was in a meeting and couldn't call us back. Steve kept checking the front door and looking over our deck into Pepperwood to see if he could spot the UPS truck. Finally, around noon, the truck pulled up and our watches were delivered. YEAH!!!! We had already cleared our schedules for the day so that we could sit home and play with them. (I know - I know. I said "we have a problem".)
They are SO cool! They are a heart rate monitor, a pedometer, an altimeter, and a gps. You can make calls, read and send texts, read and send email, listen to music, see your calendar, see the phase of the moon, monitor the weather, track your workouts, and see your photos. It uses Apple Pay to pay for things, it is a hotel key for some hotel chains, it can see what the camera on your phone sees and remotely take a picture, and so much more. There are about 3,000 apps for the watch now with more coming. One app - the Target app - will let you put in what item you are looking for in Target and the maps app in the watch will guide you, in the store, to that item. SO cool!!!!
They have an 18 hour battery life, but we wore them out. We played with them for days. Oh - and one of the coolest things is that you can have a "friends" section on your watch where you can easily find the people you contact the most. If one of those "friends" has an Apple Watch as well, you can send them private messages. You can choose one of 10 colors and draw them a picture or word, you can send them taps (which you can feel when wearing the watch) or you can send them your heartbeat. Again - SO cool! This feature is Reagan and Cole's favorite. We lay with the children at night when they are going to bed. We alternate each night and when I am laying with Cole, he always wants to "send Daddy a message". He loves to draw circles and send Steve his heartbeat. Reagan, on the other hand, likes to draw words for Steve. I love that it keeps us close together.
Like I said - we have a problem. However, isn't realizing you have a problem the first step? So....... we're good!!!! We are loving the watch and after only a short period of time, we realized that we would really miss it if the watch was taken away from us now. Way to go Apple.... What's next?
Our grandson Stockton was baptized the day after we returned from Spring Break. We were able to go and support him on this big day. So many friends and family were there as well.
His paternal grandfather baptized him and his stepfather confirmed him. Rachel had put together a great slideshow with pics of Stockton's life. There were so many of his dad and he - we miss Kevin very much. Luckily, before he passed, he was able to write letters to Stockton and Annie to be read on special days in their lives. One of those days was Stockton's baptism. Stockton was able to read the letter from his Dad earlier in the day.
We are so grateful that we were able to be with Stockton today. Steve's parents were there as was Shannon (and Benton) and my parents. Too bad I only snapped a pic of Reagan and Cole with my parents. Apparently, I need to take more pics :)
This Easter was really fun to decorate for. I always love this time of year - with spring and colors coming back, with re-birth and new growth. All of what it represents is great and exciting.
I found some new, multi-colored, glittered eggs in two different sizes at Tai Pan. Well, I bought lots of each size and color. I was really glad to be replacing the plastic eggs that we use in the Easter baskets each year. They aren't a bright color and you can see the seam where they come apart. Yep - it was definitely time for a change.
Other than that, I'm not sure that we had any new decor. Again, I tried to recreate what my sis had done in years' past as I loved the way things were set.
Once again, Steve helped me with the decor that had to be placed above the cabinets or up high. Love him!!!
Of course, we had to have our spring colored - and very sour - gumballs by the front door. As it comes closer to the end of the season, we bag them up and tie them with a ribbon and start handing them out to teachers, friends and coaches :)
We made it to Newport Beach around dinner time. We checked into our hotel room and just relaxed. Our room was on the 16th floor or something like that. The views from our balcony were gorgeous. I looked over to one side and saw a big mall with a Nordstrom, Macy's, and Bloomingdales. Yep - this may be the place for us :) In addition, we were on the concierge floor, so, the hotel served appetizers for dinner, desserts after that, breakfast in the morning and snacks and drinks all day long. Cole was in heaven! He kept asking "So, we can just go and get snacks and drinks anytime we want? All day long?" We figured we would go for appetizers and then find somewhere to eat. Well, it wasn't necessary because they had so many options in the concierge lounge. They had fruit and veggies, salads, orange chicken, mini beef wellington, yogurt, cups of nuts, and more. By the time we sampled things there, we were full. We hit the sack as we had spent our energy earlier that day at the zoo.
The next morning, we slept in. By the time we got up and got ready, breakfast was almost over in the concierge lounge. I told Reagan and Cole that they would probably just have bagels and fruit or just something small. Well, I was wrong. They had fruit, pastries, bagels, yogurt, cereal, toast, eggs, bacon, sausage, potatoes. Seriously - it was a regular buffet. No need to buy breakfast - we were full. Next, Reagan and Cole wanted to swim, so we hit the pool for a few hours. They had a great time playing together (there were very few other people at the pool). It was a great day to just relax.
Later that day, we took a drive along the coast, just to see where we might want to stay another time. It was beautiful. We picked up some lunch and headed back to the hotel. Again, we just relaxed and watched movies until bedtime. Steve and I set our alarm for midnight as we wanted to order the new Apple Watch for each of us. You could officially order it at 12:01. I know - we have a problem ... a serious Apple addiction ;)
After ordering our watches, we went back to sleep and slept in again. Our hotel gave us a late checkout, so, we had breakfast, hung around the hotel, packed up and checked out. We went over to the mall next to the hotel to do some shopping for Reagan. Then, we headed back to LAX to catch our flight home at 7. (It turned out that our flight was delayed and we didn't end up leaving LA until 9:40, which put us back in SLC just before midnight. Oh well, nothing we could do about that.)
So, overall, Spring Break was great. If I had to do it again, we would spend only one day at Legoland and we would skip Six Flags altogether. That would have given us more relaxing time for the beach or the pool or whatever. Still, we enjoyed ourselves a lot, we enjoyed being with our friends and it was great to get away.
Let's go to the San Diego Zoo!!!! Our entire crew hit the zoo and we had a great time!
Our first attraction was to hit the bus that takes you all around the zoo. It was a double-decker and we sat on top. We got to see almost the entire zoo from up there. Then, it was a matter of deciding what we wanted to see up close. After the zoo bus, we took the sky cars over to the other side of the zoo.
We walked from there. We saw tons of animals - polar bears, reindeer, eagles, zebra, flamingos, koala, and so many more.
We were at the far end of the park and we started walking back toward the entrance, hitting every exhibit we could. We visited the aviary and saw all of the birds, we hit the reptile house - eeeewwww.
They have a huge elephant care center here and we got to learn all about that. We stopped for Chinese food by the panda exhibit and then continued on our excursion. Luckily, they had little people mover type things to go up the huge hill to the aviary and other exhibits. Cole and Sophia sat down and just relaxed while we moved up the mountain.
We rounded out our visit with the Tazmanian devil (not what I expected). All of the kiddos ... well, all of the adults too, were super tired. We did a lot of walking.
We hugged our friends goodbye and headed toward Newport Beach.
Back to Legoland we go! Since we were only able to see half of the park on our first visit, we figured we needed another day. This time, we went in the opposite direction on the park map.
After that, we ran into WyldStyle and were able to take some pics. Then, we hit the Lego Movie attraction. There is the actual set that they used to film the movie - which is one of our favorites! It was fun to see the buildings and the Kragle :)
We hit the Lego City area and many of the attractions were for little ones... like really little ones. So, we skipped all of those. Reagan wanted to drive in the Lego City. Steve tried to talk her out of it saying that it wasn't even as fun as driving our golf cart, but she insisted that she doesn't get to drive on street with traffic lights and other drivers. So, she and I waited in line for that while Cole and Steve went for a snack.
After that, we stopped at an attraction that shows how they build Legos. Then, we visited an explorers attraction where there were different artifacts made of Legos. We kept walking around the park and ended up back at the fort where Reagan and Cole had played during our last visit. Steve and I sat and watched as they ran all over that fort .... again! Then, Cole insisted we re-visit the Star Wars area.
We rounded out our day by re-visiting the Xbox area and the car racing area.
Since the first half of the park took us 7 hours on our first day, we thought it would take us a similar amount of time to see the rest of the park. Well, it didn't. We were technically done in about 2 hours. Oh well, after that, Reagan and Cole could re-visit some of their favorites. We left before dinner and chalked up that day as another wonderful day in our Spring Break. We are glad we visited Legoland, but it would have been a one day visit if we had arrived at the time the park opened. Good to know. For this trip, we've had our fill of Legoland.
Up early again as the sea lions woke us. No matter, though, because Reagan received some glittery money from the Tooth Fairy. Whew ... Just like with the Easter Bunny, we weren't sure the Tooth Fairy would know where we were. Reagan wrote her a note and she came through just like usual.
Our friends were going to SeaWorld and we decided to join them. As soon as we were through the gates, the kiddos headed to the mini pools where they could touch different kinds of fish. One kind would just suck on the kiddos' fingers. Not sure whether they were typically bottom feeders or what, but Reagan, Cole and Sophia were laughing and laughing.
The first show we saw was the animal show. They had dogs, cats, birds and a pig. These animals were trained to do crazy stuff. All of the kiddos really enjoyed it.
Next, we went to see the polar bears. They are such huge animals, but they look so cuddly. The exhibit even had a wall of ice so the kiddos could touch it and feel how cold it is where the polar bears usually live.
After that, we went to see the whales. They had white whales. They were beautiful. There were also penguins. When we left that exhibit, there was a photo booth. Reagan is such a sucker for those. She has always done them wherever we are at. Well, she and Sophia took a pic together and it is super cute.
Next, we saw the sea turtles and they had a cool thing where you could pick up a rubber turtle and try to move him around to make him swim through the water. Cole had to maneuver his around the rocks and past the other turtles to get to the end.
After that, we grabbed a snack and then we hit the Shamu show.
The Shamu show has changed substantially since I was a kid. The trainers used to swim with the whales, they would be thrown in the air by the whales and do all sorts of tricks. Now, the trainers don't even get in the water with the whales. The whales do tricks, but it is really toned down. Oh well, Reagan and Cole don't know anything different - they loved the show.
Next, we had to ride the roller coaster. It was a serious coaster! The ride takes pics of you and we weren't about to pay $25 for the print, but Steve took a shot of each of our pics. I had to laugh that all of us are screaming, except for Steve who is smiling like it is a walk in the park.
After that, we walked over to the other coaster type ride. We passed this rope climb thing that Cole wanted to try. We told him it was super hard and that he wouldn't likely win the huge stuffed animal prize (great parents, right?). Then, the guy working the game said "You just have to do like this ..." and he literally walked up the rope ladder. He made it look SO easy. So, Steve agreed to let Cole do it. Well, Cole fell right off. Then, both dads decided they could probably master this thing. Nope! Both of them fell off. Then, the girls decided to try, but same thing .... they fell right off. Me - on the other hand? I was the only one to keep my dignity in tact (and get pics of them falling off) :)
We made our way to the other ride. It was a sort of water ride where you are in this boat. We went up and then came down this huge slide (sort of like Splash Mountain at Disney). I thought that was the end of the ride, but then our whole boat was in a water elevator which took us up to another slide that came down. Totally unexpected and awesome!!!! However, by that time, we were soaked. We called it a day and headed back to the hotel.
Our friend, Vic, is a paraglide enthusiast. We were just a few minutes away from Torrey Pines glider port. So, we took a drive up there to watch the paragliders and the hang gliders take off. It was windy and pretty cold, but it was a gorgeous sight watching them take off. Vic wanted to join them, but didn't have his gear and it had been some time since he had flown. He was considering a tandem flight later in the week.
Steve took some video of the gliders at Torrey Pines.
By the time we left Torrey Pines, we were all hungry. We found a cool Mexican food place, but it had quite a wait. It was past the kiddos bedtimes by the time we ordered our food. They were all SO tired after our big day of fun. They barely made it through our meal before falling asleep at the table. Then, they fell asleep as we drove back to the hotel.
Another great day is done. Get some sleep - tomorrow we head back to Legoland!!!
"Mom on the Run" is the title that best describes me these days. After practicing law for 11 years, I had two little ones and am now a full time Mom and loving it. With a 14 year old and an 12 year old, life is full and crazy. Each day we "run" whether it is to the gym, shopping, guitar, karate, piano, school, lunch with friends, institute class, family activities or church functions. Reagan and Cole keep me crazy busy and we have lots of fun.
Steve (the love of my life) and I have been married for sixteen years and we live in Sandy, Utah. Playing with the kids is our most enjoyable hobby these days. We also try to fit in snow skiing, walking and hiking, and playing in our yard. We love to spend time with Steve's three daughters (and their spouses/kids). We traveled much more before we had our kiddos, but still try to travel when we can. If we are away, we can most often be found on one of the Hawaiian islands and we love to spend time at the beach.
