Universal Studios- Our trip

I'm starting to realize I'm posting too many pictures- are you totally bored with our trip now? Sorry! Here are just four pictures at Universal Studios. It's always Jeff's favorite park.

Meeting Curious George. Jojy was SO excited (although you can't tell in this picture), he has books, toys and several shirts of George. Jeff said, "Do you think Curious George ever wears shirts with Jojy on them?". Hahaha!

Meetins SpongeBob. Truly a dream come true!

Good thing Rick went with us, or we wouldn't have this photo. Thanks Ricky!

Good baby- Our trip

This is how the baby spent the trip- being perfect. And sweet. And happy. I just love this little face. Also, thanks for the hat Laura! It was perfect!

More Disneyland- Our trip

1 and 2- We turned around to see Jojy looking at the map of the park. It looked so funny! Like he even knew what he was doing.
3- Uncle Sucker bought the boys suckers while he waited for Jeff and I and the big boys to finish on Splash Mountain. Jojy LOVES lollipops.
4-The boys spent their own money on buying these Buzz lasers. It was Nanos and Bear's money, but they made sure to budget buying one for Jojy too. Good brothers.
5,6,7- Buzz Lightyear ride. You try to get targets in this ride with Laser Guns.
8-I took a picture of the picture of us. Not good resolution, but if you click on it, you may be able to see that Bear thought he was going to die.
9- Happy boys.
10- SO SO tired. They actually fell asleep on the side walk waiting for a tram to take us back to the hotel for a nap.
11 and 12- On Dumbo.
13- This rented stroller are designed for one child, NOT three.
14- The baby fit perfectly in Daddy's jacket when it got cool.
15- Posing with the White Rabbit.
16-Trying to pull the Sword from the Stone.

Rick and Nanos hand shake- Our trip

This is one of the ways that they discovered to pass the time while we waited in line...again, and again...and again.

Uncle Wicky- Our trip

We were SO glad to have Rick with us. Me, the kids, but especially Jeff, because if Rick weren't there he'd have no one there to laugh with at all their inappropriate comments. Sigh...even though it was awesome, I can really tell I'm the only girls in this group sometimes. :-)

The second picture at the fountain was taken right before Rick got chewed out by a California Adventure park employee for lifting Jojy over the fence and standing him on the fountain wall. Another person nearby was surprised at the employee's overreaction, but was soon to be absolutely shocked when Jeff (who had been some distance away) walked over to Rick and said "Excuse me, sir. I CAN NOT believe you would put your son on that fountain. That is unbelievably inappropriate! I'm shocked." Hahahaha! The woman's jaw was on the floor. At least they gave a her a good story to tell her friends later about the poor guy who kept getting bawled out by strangers. Ha!

Thanks for coming Rick- if only to be Jojy's ride. This trip was a total fast pass.

St. Patrick's Day- Our trip

We've never taken much time to meet characters, mainly because I thought the kids didn't really care. Guess what? THEY DO. They loved this! The baby was so funny with how fascinated he was by these giant neon animals. Look at his reaction! I think he looks the cutest in the Winnie the Pooh photo. (click photo to enlarge)

You'll notice all my boys and Jeff and I are in green. How could we not? It was still St. Patrick's Day- even in Disneyland.

Disneyland Day #1- Our trip

Because we were able to have two days in Disneyland, we took the opportunity to do things we never considered a priority before- like going to the Aladdin story telling. It was cute, and the storyteller was sarcastic and funny.

Climbing up Tarzan's tree house.

Rick thinks that Tarzan's reflection in this mirror makes him look somewhat like a homicidal maniac. I have to agree. It was rather creepy.

With Grandpa Gary, Grandma Judy, and Uncle Rick with us, each kid had a partner. Nathanael stuck to Grandpa like glue, they really had fun sharing this experience.

Just because I wanted to- Our trip

I have a serious weakness for kids pajamas. When I saw these soft cotton jammies at Costco for $7 (ish) I just couldn't help myself, I HAD to get them. Now you can see why, they looked so cute in their jammies, I almost ATE them. Look at the hilarious size difference between Nanos and the baby. Hahaha!

One of the only photos you'll see where Jojy is looking at the camera. Keep a look out for it as you view these, it's a disorder I think, he CAN'T look a the camera. I should consult a doctor.

The first night there- Our trip

First, I would like to point out that although I'll post a lot of pictures, it won't be anything near the 357 photos I took on this trip.
Also, to view these pictures in chronological order, start from the "And we're back" post and read up.

My parent's both grew up in So. Cal. so a few days before we got there, they arrived to visit with my mom's family (but mostly to be with us). My brother Rick also flew down from Iowa (where he is in law school) to play with us for his spring break! Yay Uncle Ricky! Jeff and I call him Uncle Sucker. The first night we were there, we all met up and walked through Downtown Disney and had dinner.

My Dad and Rick thought that putting the children up in high dangerous places was a brilliant idea. Thanks guys. At least it made a cool picture.

This was Grandma's idea- "stack them on top of each other next to the Lego Giraffe"- Bear bear in the middle cried that he was falling the whole time (even though Uncle Rick and Grandpa were both holding them up).

This was one of those "Mom, take a picture!" moments. How could I not? They were so cute and happy.

Our trip...in the beginning.

We decided to drive to California rather than fly, well, because, we're crazy. But more than crazy, we were too poor to afford the air fare. Here are photos of all of us on the first leg of our drive, when we were bursting with excitement and long before the children realized that the long hours in the car would be absolute misery.

And we're back...

We're home from California! I know I left all of you hanging, poor little dears, crying for want of blog posts, so not to worry, you'll get to see what we did while we were away.


Here is a photo we took at the San Diego temple on Easter Sunday. I set it up with just the timer on the camera. Not perfect, but it's cute...kinda like us!

(You may notice the boys aren't wearing dress shoes- when we went to church you could see exactly which families were visitors on vacation because all their kids were wearing sneakers...hehehehe. Seriously, we packed nearly everything we owned, I couldn't stomach the thought of packing a separate pair of shoes just for a part of one day.)

Gabey Baby

Sweetest Little Baby in the Whole Wide World...it's true, he is.

I decided to give Gabey a little baby photo shoot. This was tricky, since, well, he's not smart yet and has no idea what's going on. I must have made every bizarre sound I could think of to get his attention- and none of the tricks from my old Kiddie Kandids days helped at all. But still, he's beautiful and I love any picture I take of him.

I love the clarity in his little eyes in this one.

Look at that sweet pouty lip.

Aside from his perfect pink smile, check out this kid's lashes.

This is a perfect Gabey grin. Not his biggest smile, but his most common. You can't tell me that he doesn't look like the most perfect pleasant baby you've ever seen when you look at this photo. Well, I suppose you could say it, but you'd be lying. You don't want to be a liar do you? Then you better not say it.

Another thing I love about him (besides his patient, content, and jovial demeanor) is that even though he's not very fat (which I love in babies), he's perfectly soft. Just a few fat creases and dimpled knuckles. When he's just in his diaper I just want to scoop him up and bury my face in his neck. His naked state is what inspired this photo shoot.

Holly tagged me....

Tagged!!
Three names you go by:
1-Mom
2-Chelle (by my mom and sisters)
3-Sweetheart or Girl (by my cute hubby)

Three things you are wearing right now:
1. New bronze colored shoes
2- ill fitting jeans
3-hand me down shirt from Sara that I love

Three of your favorite things to do:
1-Cuddle with my husband to watch a movie
2- Go on vacation
3-Have girl's night out!
4-take photos of my babies- they're SO photogenic!

Three things you want very badly at the moment:
1- A new house- our two bedroom isn't cutting it anymore.
2- To be on vacation. Do you think I can wait until our trip on March 15?
3-A nap- the time change and sick baby that didn't sleep have left me EXHAUSTED.



Three favorite pets you have had/have
1. Ummm, I had a cat named Sheba as a child- she was mellow and sweet.
2-I got a cat named Ooba when I was 18- she lives with my brother now, I married a man that's allergic to cats.
3- We had froggies when our oldest was about 3yrs. They lived in their own little eco system in a tall vase with a plant. I think they lived off the moss and algae. Then they disappeared slowly. I realized later that they had jumped out of the vase, died, dried up to little raisins and I vacuumed them up. I figured it out when I was about the vacuum up the last one and realized we hadn't had raisins for months- upon inspection of the raisin I discovered the awful truth- but it's kinda funny now.


Three things you did last night:
1. Ate dinner with the fam.
2- Folded laundry with my cute Jeff.
3-Paced the floor with my sick baby until 1:15am.


Three things you ate today:
1. Grapenuts cereal
2-Ummm, diet coke with lime
3-Buffalo chicken and steamed carrots from Harmon's deli- yummmmm

Three people you last talked to:
1. Jeff
2-my sis Laura
3-my SIL Katie

Three longest car rides:
1. To California countless times
2-To St. George with my best friend to go sing at a homecoming of a guy we'd met 2 weeks before. We even stayed with his parents! Yeah, she ended up marrying him. Awwwww.
3-Rick and I drove to a wedding in Georgia. That took FOREVER.


Three favorite holidays:
1. My birthday- my Jeff has gotten very good at planning fun dates for us.
2-4th of July- I don't know why, we don't have exciting plans ever, I just love the patriotic feel or something.
3-Christmas! I love having 6 straight weeks of cinnamon and clove smells and instrumental music and love.

Three favorite beverages:
1. Dr. Pepper
2-water? I do like water.
3-Hot chocolate...mmmmm....comfort food.

Looks like Nate

Jeff's brother got into a bit of a scrap with a friend (some friend) and ended up with a swollen face. But that's not what I'm here to talk about. Nate has been telling me forever, okay not forever ( I tend to exaggerate), but for months that Gabey looks just like him. He even got out his own baby pictures to compare- there is a remarkable resemblance. It became even more apparent though when Nate's face was swollen because his eyes and the bridge of his nose were puffy, he had a lack of definition and they really did look even more alike! It was very funny to me so I took this photo. Now picture Nate with fatter cheeks. What'dya think?

Rough and tumble little boys.

A week and a half ago, during a pleasant Saturday visit to Grandma's, Jojy decided he had gone far too long in his life with out visiting Instacare. His wish came true after falling against the edge of the fireplace hearth and cutting his brow. It wasn't deep, but it pulled open a bit over his brow, and since it was on his face, we decided to have a doctor make the call about needing stitches.

The doctor decided he did need stitches, but because it wasn't severe, we didn't need to go the children's hospital to have him sedated. Whew! THAT would have taken forever.
Jeff sat with him and held on the bandage with the numbing gel, and told him stories to keep him still. What a great daddy.
Jojy was sweet and precocious with the nurses, and aside from a few minutes of crying, pretty patient during the stitching. He didn't like being strapped down and unable to rub his eyes when water got in them.

When the job was done, he wiped his tears and said "Thank you, Doc'or". Awww! He's so cute!! Luckily a scar in the brow isn't too obvious and even a little masculine, so when he's older he can make up stories about how he got the scar chopping wood, or hunting, or saving a drowning woman.