California Trip - driving down

We had a fabulous little reunion with my parents and siblings at Disneyland. Because the costs of flights were so expensive, we decided to drive down. I'll admit that I was very worried about how that would work out (I hate road trips)! The boys were great on the way down. Antonio had a great idea of making each kid their own car box with new and special things. We picked up little toys and goodies and filled a box for each of them. They got to choose one thing from their box about every hour. It worked great! It kept them entertained which kept my sanity!

An interesting modification to a beetle bug that the boys thought was funny.

Mt Shasta was beautiful!

"You Only Live Once"

We stopped in Sacramento for the night. We ate at the Elephant Bar and got to sit right next to the large elephant coming out of the wall. Some of the kids had ordered macaroni and Antonio told them that the elephants butt was in the kitchen because it pooped out the macaroni. They all, of course, thought this was quite hilarious.

 

Getting the wiggles out before bedtime. The hotel had a big conference going on that weekend and I'm sure our wall mates were none to pleased to be sleeping next to us. We safely made it to Anaheim the next day and prepped for our awesome week at Disney!

 

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Cowboys

A friend of mine had an adorable first birthday for her son. It was an awesome party and decorated so amazingly with a barnyard/cowboy theme. The boys had fun dressing up and being silly.

Gambit is sporting his first mustache.

The Lone Ranger.

Ninja is looking eerily similar to Papa!

 

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Better late than never

I'm a horrible mother, but what's new? Rocket turned 3 last month (my baby!) and in the midst of life forgot to put up the pictures. He had a great little party and got lots of fun goodies. I'm still having a hard time comprehending that my little one is 3. He's so much fun at this age and has such a quirky little personality. He has a very funny smirk that he does sometimes that is totally identical to the one my dad does when he thinks he's being clever or witty. He always uses proper English when speaking, which I find funny because you don't expect a kid that small to say "I do not want to do that", instead of "I don't wanna". He still such a happy kid, in general, though his feisty little temper is emerging more and more. He tries so hard to keep up with his big brothers, and also likes to torment them, too. He will still let me snuggle him, loves to give me hugs and kisses, though he doesn't like to hold my hand very often. I'm so lucky to have him as my own! I love that kid!

Gambit was never far away, just in case his help in opening gifts was needed.

He got a balance bike from us. He loves it (those things are amazing in teaching kids how to ride a bike) and zooms all over the sidewalks.

This was Gambit's very sweet birthday card he made for Rocket all on his own.

 

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Look who's 32!

He's got a little more gray hair in the beard, and a little less hair on top overall, but still cuter than ever. Happy birthday Antonio!

 

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Ape Caves

Mammie wanted to do something together as a family on Memorial Day, but the weather wasn't expected to be very good. We all decided to go to the Ape Caves, which are lava tubes near Mt. St. Helens. It was wet, and a little cold, but it was really neat to climb through the caves. I definitely want to take the boys again, but not when it's so wet and soggy. We were all soaked through by the end and the boys rode home in their underwear because all their clothes were sopping.

Cousin Dee had the best ride.

 

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Happy Mothers Day to....me?

Antonio has been wanting (begging) to get some quads for the family. After months of research and his relentless need to bring up the topic every 1.7 seconds, he finally got his beloved quad on Mother's Day. I got breakfast in bed (which was delightful). He got a quad. Hmmmm. That one quad morphed into four within 10 days. One for me, and two small ones for each of the big boys. I stopped asking what the financial hit was eventually. I figured in this case, ignorance really is bliss. Despite my jesting, we have had so much fun out riding together.

Mouse (Athena and Falsh's daughter) drove Gambit around for a long time. They had fun.

 

Athena and Falsh have been kind enough to let us keep and ride the quads out on their property for now. We don't have the storage space or a trailer big enough to haul them all yet. It's been fun weekends of getting dirty, BBQs, friends, and happy memories.

This is the view from Athena's front yard. Gorgeous, isn't it?

Falsh even let me do a bit of target practice. Don't worry, the kids were in the house far away and not playing on the play structure :-)

This is how the kids wind down after a long day of riding. Poor Rocket was getting bounced all over. Again with the amazing view. I'd love to look out at that every morning!

 

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