i've somehow convinced them the tulip festival is fun

This is our third year in a row going to the Tulip Festival at Thanksgiving Point and the boys still think it's a great time. It's pretty amazing given how many things they think are totally dumb and boring, but somehow I've managed to convince them this is a treat. Which is a real treat for me. I love going and walking through all the gardens and admiring the tulips and daffodils and sculptured gardens and everything. It's so great (and important) to find those things that moms and kids can both sincerely look forward to.

We went on Friday and although it had snowed on Thursday, the weather was great, and perhaps because it had snowed on Thursday, there was hardly anyone there. Our favorite spot is the secret garden. The boys love to play in the fountains (can you believe I actually had a comb in my purse?!) and I love to study the layout and figure out how I could create something like it in our back yard. I'm sure I can't, but it's fun to imagine.

Other highlights include feeding the fish (they were seriously jumping up and climbing on top of each other to get the bread crumbs)


and playing in the fountains in the Italian Garden.

The boys would drop a leaf in the top tub and watch it (slash help it) cascade down to the bottom. June had fun climbing up and down the stairs.

Lovely.

sunfall reunion

Last night we had a great time at Amy Gileadi's 30th Birthday BBQ Bash. Chris & Renae & Gunnar were in town so it turned into a partial Sunfall Festival reunion. It was great to see everyone again and so fun to have the kids together. Doesn't Amy look beautiful?! Huge bonus: they had a bonfire and we made s'mores! My favorite! Other huge bonus: having a dj in the family - the music was awesome and Gunnar had a great time showing June some of his grooves.

the big payoff

Remember all that hard work last fall planning, ordering, and planting hundreds and hundreds of bulbs?! And then all the hard work this spring spraying deer-off on the tulips every night at midnight?! And all the calls and messages and more calls to the city to get our park strip trees planted?! Well we are certainly enjoying the big payoff now!

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thank you,
the management

I'm going to Disneyland!

So last week was Spring Break and we figured it was high time we took the kids to Disneyland. So we packed up the car and drove out bright and early Wednesday morning. (Notice June's head wear.)

We had a wonderful time visiting with Grandma & Grandpa Wiley, Peter, Tommy, Stephanie, Brett & Natalie. Thank you to everyone for your generous hospitality and making time for us.

Highlights from the trip:

June:

• Taking her first steps and then wanting to walk around everywhere. She's not very steady and prefers having a finger to hold, but this was a big turning point for her to even be interested in walking at all. She loved all the low railings along the lines at Disneyland.
  
• Getting to know Truman the dog. June was in heaven chasing him all around the Wileys house. He was very patient with her - always staying just close enough to lick up her crumbs, but far enough that she couldn't quite reach him.
  

Oliver:

• "Big Thunder Mountain is the coolest ride ever." Oliver also loved the rockets, tea cups, flying dumbos, and riding the carousel all by himself. He shopped carefully for his one promised souvenir (we told the boys at the beginning of the day they could each get one souvenir that we'd buy at the end of the day) and settled on a silver chain necklace with a skull & crossbones on it (a la Pirates of the Caribbean even though the boys wouldn't go on that ride).
• Jumping on the trampoline (I jumped with him a bit and he tried to teach me some cool tricks, but turns out I've had a few too many babies to be able to jump anymore), jacuzzi time, chocolate drop cookies, playing with Peter & Tommy, realizing he's not afraid of Hobie (the giant horse-sheep-dog).

Brenden:

• Brenden's day at Disneyland got off to a rough start when the very first ride, the Jungle Cruise, startled him to tears (he hadn't figured out yet that everything was pretend and rides are on tracks, etc). It's hard to recover from that with your cousins and whole family watching, but eventually he got braver and more willing to try things and by the end he loved Big Thunder Mountain and the Matterhorn. He was even willing to try Space Mountain but the line was just too darn long. Autopia and the tea cups were also favorites.
• Other highlights - spending time with Grandpa & Dad, playing with Peter & Tommy, cannon balls into the swimming pool, chocolate chip cookies, go fish with Grandma, and jumping on the trampoline.

Sarah:

• A great hand carwash. As soon as we arrived in L.A. at 5pm, we unloaded the car quickly so I could make it to the carwash before they closed. Can't beat the quality or the price! Wish we could import some Mexicans to teach the kids at Supersonic a thing or two.
• A great pedicure - another priority for every trip to California (and another benefit of a cheap immigrant labor force). What a bargain. June sat (mostly) patiently on my lap while Scott and the boys went to the gun store with Webb. (could we get any more stereotypical in our gender roles?)
• My favorites at Disneyland were the turkey legs (seriously - turkey legs), helping June practice walking while we waited for the boys on the rides, watching the boys get over their fears and be willing to try scary things, spending time with family, listening to the DL Brass Band.

Scott:

• First and foremost, the beloved Montrose Cristo Sandwich from the Black Cow Cafe.
• Very close second, Disneyland Churros, the only true and living Churros.
  
• Driving 11 hours (twice), cleaning up after sick kids, protecting kids afraid of dogs, not going on most of the good rides at Disneyland, spending a fortune to not go on most of the good rides at Disneyland, entertaining kids, feeding kids, breaking up fights, ... oh wait - wrong list.
• Spending time with Mom & Dad, Steph & boys, and Brett. Can't beat that!

did you ever imagine?

Last week we had a representative from the lovely organization, La Familia, come to our door to sell us magazine subscriptions and to solicit advise on how to be successful in life. Andre was from Oklahoma he had distractingly horrible teeth and used to sell drugs and made poor choices and was just trying to improve his life so his 7-year-old daughter who lives with her great-grand mother in Colorado could come back to live with him. (Do you think I know too much about him? Scott thinks I humor these guys too much. I didn't, by the way, end up buying anything from him.) We stood on the front porch for a while and he asked me a couple questions which keep coming back to me.

1) From his perspective our life situation is the ultimate dream - cars, jobs, house, family, security, etc. He asked - when you were younger did you ever imagine you'd end up where you are today? I told him I didn't know or just didn't think about it or something. But truthfully, the answer is yes. I think I always figured I'd eventually have a nice house in a nice neighborhood with a nice family and a stable life. Is that bad? Does that mean I'm not as grateful as I should be? Is it ok to expect those things of life? Is it some sort of indication of where I came from that those things are given base-level life necessities?

2) What sorts of things did you do to achieve your success? As I was contemplating this broad far-reaching question, June peeked her head through the door asking for help to put on her new favorite toy:
The McDonald's worker headset. She likes to put it on and wear it around everywhere she goes. So it just struck me as a little ironic that we give our kids toys to pretend they're McDonald's workers, just as if it's a fairy-princess dress-up gown. I'm not sure that if we truly expected them to be McDonald's workers we'd think it was such a cute toy. So is there a connection here? I tried not to emphasize it too obviously for Andre.

a good idea, gone slightly awry

So yesterday was Sunday and the weather was beautiful and Scott was deathly sick in bed. In an effort to keep the house quiet for him (the extent of my nursing instincts) and also to take advantage of the good weather whilst keeping the sabbath-of-the-cul-de-sac holy (i.e. the neighbors have all decided bike riding is against the rules on Sunday, and while we don't completely agree we like to support the common values and don't want to be the trouble makers - i.e. Scott has already been reprimanded by the 4-year-old neighbor for riding his bike on Sunday), I decided to take the kids for a walk/ride on the Provo River trail up to Bridal Veil Falls. It was a great idea. We'd done it several times before and the boys were totally on board.

The only trouble is, along with all my pop-culture knowledge, apparently I have also stored all my navigational and geographical knowledge in Scott's brain. I realized as we were driving up there I didn't really know where to park. I remembered parking one time for something or other right at the mouth of the canyon near that gas station, so that's where I headed. I don't know why I didn't just think it through a little more, but I didn't. So that's where we started our journey.


The boys were very responsible bike riders. They'd go a comfortable distance ahead and then stop and wait for June and I to catch up with the stroller. They were strong and obeyed the rules of the road. We saw a really old car junk yard in the river (there were about 8 cars completely buried and overgrown - I'd love to know the story behind these!).


But an hour into our journey (all up hill) I realized I'd made a mistake and rather than being right around the corner from the falls, I had in fact parked about 4 miles away. We asked a few people on the trail how much farther and Oliver wanted to press forward while Brenden was ready to turn around. My O.P.D. kicked in big time and I was determined to make it all the way to the falls. I kept saying "we'll just go 10 minutes more then turn around" but how do you turn around at that point when surely we must be close now. We stopped for a break and threw rocks into the river. And then we kept going.


We finally made it to the falls. Oliver was so excited and exclaimed so genuinely "well it was a boring ride up but it's exciting that we finally made it!" We stayed a while and played in the water and miraculously managed to keep shoes and clothes pretty dry. We enjoyed the rest and then finally figured we'd better head back.


I kept telling the boys that it would be all down hill going back so it would be way easier. Trouble is they were nonetheless limited by my walking speed and I was breaking in new flip flops and June had had enough of sitting in the stroller. I realized pretty quickly we'd have trouble making it all 4 miles back before dark. But Christine didn't call me back and Rachel was in Phoenix and Scott was deathly ill in bed. Surely we could make it. I carried June on my hip most of the way pushing the stroller with one hand. Oliver never complained a bit. Brenden was in tears by the end - maybe a little bike-seat-chapped. We drank all our water and ate all our crackers but finally at 8pm we made it back to the car.

I'm afraid the boys will never trust me again when I come up with another "great idea."

p.s. Check out this lady crossing the river in her high heels! Very impressive footwork.

Discovery Gateway

Saturday morning Rachel called and (apologetically) requested a ride to the airport. Scott was due to work all day so I thought maybe we could work an airport run into an activity for the kids. We ended up going to the Discovery Gateway Children's Museum. This place is great. The kids had a great time and with the all-day pass we were able to take a couple shopping and eating breaks there at the Gateway and then do more museum-ing. In particular they loved the construction zone with the crane and foam blocks, the giant ball track,












the make-believe town with mini cars to drive around, and a cool water play area.























Upstairs there were even more hands-on activities with puzzles, magnets, build-your-own ball tracks, legos, wind tunnels and much more. This place is highly recommended. It can be a bit pricey (watch for coupons) and gets very crowded by the end of the day on a Saturday when there's a race ending at the Gateway, but other than that, go for it.











(plus June was happy to get to show off her new birthday skirt from R&C. Wish I could find one in my size!)

extreme bedhead

every morning

odds 'n ends

Just a couple quick things to note:


Charades
On Monday night we were playing Charades (modified version) with the boys and it was Oliver's turn. He stands up and then bends over and touches his toes and makes some sort of buzzing sound. We asked for some clues so he said, "you eat what comes out of me." Chicken? Cow? Nope. Turns out he was a snowcone machine. Of course the camera wasn't handy and he refused to do it again, so here is a live re-enactment of the moment.


New shirt
Oliver's been saving up his money for the past few weeks for a model motorcycle he saw at Target for $6. Yesterday he did his final job (I paid him $0.50 to shred a big stack of old tax documents) so we packed up his $6.32 and went to Target. We went straight for the toy isle and he found the motorcycle but then he started to have some doubts. He went through MANY other choices and finally he settled on a new shirt. He's been wearing it for 2 days straight now. I think that's really saying something when a 5-year-old boy chooses to buy a new shirt with his own money instead of a toy. What it's saying, I'm not sure. But something.


I'm the Proud Parent of a Wasatch Elementary Honor Roll Student
Time to get a bumper sticker! Brenden got to have lunch with the principal (McDonald's in the library) yesterday since his teacher submitted his name for the honor roll. We are very proud of him!

(p.s. don't you just love all these great school photos?! our school now does fall and spring photos. and you can't not get them, right? but what am I supposed to do with them all?)

the whole point

Yesterday marked a banner day. The fruition of our grand master family plan. The whole reason I ever got behind the idea of getting motorcycles in the first place. Oliver is finally big enough to ride his own bike, so yesterday Scott packed up 3 motorcycles and 2 boys and they all went off to do boy stuff for the afternoon.



At the same time, I packed up the stroller and June, and we headed to the Gateway for some quality girl time at Anthropologie. A good time was had by all, there were no injuries, and some great Spring purchases were made.

When we got home, June ate an avocado.