Disneyland & Carpinteria Vacation

For reasons unknown to me, I was itching to go on a lot of vacations this year. Maybe it was because it was too difficult within the first year after having LaRae. 3 kids under 4 was no joke and I lost my mind. So I (maybe a bit prematurely) planned all kinds of trips for 2017. The first one started on January 7th- Disneyland and Carpinteria. Two of my top 5 favorite places. This was a wonderful, memory-filled trip, but boy were we tired. 

The kids did pretty well on the flight. The boys were really good and happy with their tablets in hand. Sheehan and I just passed Rae Rae back and forth between us as she was the most restless but it went better than I expected. We got our rental car and went straight to the hotel which had a shuttle stop that took us right to the park. I thought we were going to be in the clear of crowds until we arrived and saw a sign saying Disneyland was closed due to being at capacity which is rumored to be around 80,000 people. I have never been when it was so packed. It was a Wednesday afternoon! I underestimated how many college kids would be at the park. Needless to say the week after New Years Eve was not a good time to go. We made the most of it though. We went to California Adventure and enjoyed all the little shows and the littler kiddie rides that were perfect for our Lincoln, Vance, and Rae anyway. The boy's favorite ride was the Mater spinning ride. You can see in the pictures just how packed it was. It was even rainy which usually means an empty park and that didn't even deter the crowds! We stayed as late as we could before heading back to the hotel. My Mom joined us and came in late Wednesday night. She slept in the next morning while we went back to the park to go to Disneyland. 

We went as long as we could on Thursday until the kids and us were ready to crash for naps. So we went back to the hotel and crashed for a couple hours. When we woke up it was dark out. My Mom offered to watch Rae Rae who had come down with a cold while we took the boys back to the park. We thought we would stay as late as the boys could handle knowing the park closed at 11:00pm. We stayed away from the popular rides except we did waste a solid hour waiting to just get IN the line for Peter Pan and gave up. We still managed to get on a good amount of rides including Pirates of the Caribbean and the Nemo submarine ride. We watched lots of the shows again and were able to catch the parades both nights. Lincoln saw the autopia ride and was set on riding it so with 15 minutes to spare to closing we got on the ride. The boys were awesome. We are going to wait a few more years to go back again. Lincoln now tells us I love you more than Disneyland which is the highest of the "I love you" tiers. 

We drove to Aunt Michelle's house Friday morning to pick up her motorhome she let us borrow to take to Carpinteria Beach for a couple days. It was a record-breaking rain week so the unusually warm weather we've had the past decade came to a screeching halt in time for our trip. Once again though, we made the most of it because we are on vacation dang it and we are going to smile and be happy!

The kids didn't mind the cold but they were busy playing in the sand with their toys and shovels. Then we started a fire to warm us up and wouldn't you know it a thunderstorm blew in and it hailed...On the beach...So we ran inside the motorhome out of the pelting hail and decided to watch a movie, eat and go to bed. The boys thought it was great. I lost my ability to keep up the positivity at this point but got it back the next day after a good night's sleep. 

Regardless of the chillier weather we still got our Reyanldo's burritos and milkshakes from The Spot. the boys loved digging for sand crabs and exploring the tide pools with Sheehan. 

 On our final beach day, we finally had that warm sunshine I was just dying for. My Aunt and Uncle came and joined us for the afternoon and evening. Sheehan and Aaron drove the motorhome home while Michelle and I drove the kids home. Vance and Rae zonked out but not Lincoln of course. 

You can see in the pictures that when the time came to fly home Sheehan and I were absolutely exhausted. So was it a fun trip, YES. Would I recommend it with 3 kids under 5, NO! But we survived and we smiled and the kids were so, so happy. 

December 2016

There was so much fun to be had in December and I just have to throw it all in one post. Get ready for lots of pictures. Sheehan is the Young Men's President and the Young Men's presidency was one of the auxiliary's picked to help with the Ward Christmas Party. So we were BUSY getting everything together and ready for that. It ended up being a really nice night and I got compliments on how good the night was overall. We had a slim budget of $300 so even though we had the dinner slot for the church building we did breakfast for dinner and had everyone come in their PJ's which was not an idea loved by all initially but ended up being appreciated when parents could just put their kids straight to bed after the activity was over. We had the young women make snow flakes that we hung across the cultural hall and we pinned pictures of Christ on the walls. We had the young men build a puppet theater out of pvc and I made the fabric panels. We had the Young Women use the hand puppets as a brother in our ward read an abbreviated version of the nativity in the scriptures. This is the third Christmas Ward activity we've basically been in charge of in the 6ish years we've been married.

Ezra was sneaking food all night. I kept catching him as I was coming and going. He is so cute and funny. Love that big boy!

My Mom bought Lincoln, Vance and Ezra matching Christmas Ninja Turtle Jammies. They looked so cute in them.

Julianne bravely wanted to make sugar cookies with the little cousins. Of course, Ez boy was eating a little dough as he cut out the cookies. He's the best. Lincoln takes cookie-making very seriously and loves to bake anytime he can.

Later that night we had family dinner at Devin and Julianne's house and Lincoln decided to take the camera and snap some pics. We decorated the cookies the kids made earlier that day. Kiley is obsessed with Rae baby so she is constantly wanting to hold her and carry her around. She even happily offers to change her diaper. Rae is starting to get herself around enough that she doesn't want to be held all the time but sometimes she still likes to snuggle next to someone. She does like to sit with me and watch tv and eat snacks.

We had a wonderful visit with Grandma Shanda and Grandpa Don Furniss. We always enjoy their company. Shanda is so sweet to us and to the kids. All of us get her warm smile and compliments and it makes all of us feel really good. We showed her the boys favorite books Pete the cat that has songs to read/sing along with the books that are spunky and fun. We love them and the boys love to dance to them.

Annie Thomson has a wonderful eye for naturescapes and snapped this beautiful pic of some recent snow up in the canyon. I love it! 

We just love our Rae Rae baby. She is such a little light and spark in our family and we all just adore her. She gets better and better as her little personality blooms and shines for us. I thank Heavenly Father every day for sending us her sweet spirit to be a part of our family. 

Lincoln had his school Christmas program. He is extremely shy and has been shutting down in group settings. Sometimes even hiding under the table and refusing to participate. His teachers have been so sweet and gentle with him. They gave him a part in the Christmas program holding up a prop and none of us were sure he would do it but he did! He didn't sing and practically smushed himself as much as he could into his teacher, Mrs. Frost's, side but I'm proud of him for staying up there and we got a couple bell shakes out of him. Sheehan and I both were teary-eyed as we proudly watched.

Lincoln and Vance are little buddies and love to hang out together all day long. Vance gets sooo bored when Lincoln is gone at school. He gets so excited when it's time for Lincoln to come home. 

Rae Rae is 9 months old in her cute little sweatsuit. Buying clothes for her is just a dream. I love it a little too much if you ask Sheehan. 

I love the pictures of Vance holding baby Rae. I took several pictures one after the next and captured these two back to back. One second Rae looks wide-eyed and scared. In the next picture, she is smiling. They both have the sweetest faces. 

We spent a family night with our Perry cousins at the Train Shoppe in SLC. They had the little, indoor train decorated for Christmas. Lincon and Vance both loved every minute. They love anything with their cousins and so a train ride with their cousins is just as good as it gets. 

After going to see a bunch of drive-thru Christmas lights as a fam we decided to surprise Ian at work at In-n-Out. Poor guy was bombarded by our crew but it was fun to embarrass him.

We went bowling as a family traditionally on New Year's Eve. Rae had the cutest outfit in my opinion. Colleen was able to join us for some of the festivities this year and we were happy to have her. 

Christmas morning the kids slept in! It was fabulous. We caught Santa in our living room! Vance received a bunch of tools and a tool bag and a tool bench. Lincoln really wanted Pokemon balls, a Nerf gun, board games, and so many other things. All of his bounty is laid out on the blanket he also received as a gift. Rae Rae got Little People Cinderella characters. She liked eating them. :)

We went to Grandma Bev's for a traditional Christmas dinner and games. We all look forward to our time together at Grandma Bev's and playing our dice Christmas gift game. 

We set some time aside to specifically focus on Sheehan for his birthday! This year was the big 3-0!!! I love him so much. The kids do too. He's definitely a favorite around our house.

LaRae's Christmas outfit may be even better than her Christmas Eve outfit. I bought this Christmas dress soon after finding out we were having a girl.

We've had a sitter come 2 days a week for a couple of months to give me much-needed breaks. Sad for us but happily for her she got married and moved on from our little family. We went to her reception and Rae was our little third wheel. I love the father-daughter picture of the two of them. 

The next party was New Year's Eve! We hosted the family at our house this year. Zach made our very own ball drop hanging above us in the group picture. Since we are at a stage where all of the cousins are little we celebrate New Year's Eve with the east coast at 10pm. Colleen was still visiting so we got the kids to bed then went over to our Neighbor's the Kammeyer's for games and the real countdown to New Year's Eve.