Ali gets braces

At the end of January Ali got Braces!

Here is her last picture without them on:

 Here she is with her braces on.  She looks so cute!

Ali takes her braces wearing very seriously and we can find her brushing her teeth, flossing and rising her mouth with mouth wash several times a day.  She also is very careful with what she eats and tries to keep her bite plate in all the time.

Annika's Family Party

For our family party we celebrated Annika's birthday a few days after her actual birthday.  She loved opening the presents and had some pretty funny faces.  

 Here is her cake.  I can admit it wasn't my best work or anybody's best work but Annika loved that it was a castle and that is all that mattered.

 She said, "I have two monies."  She was super excited to have money to spend again...  Since then she always wants to know where her money is even when she has already spent it.

 She loved that this little dog made noise.  It was very fun for her to open it.

 Annika really liked this dress and apparently PaPa did too.

Our First Snow!

When we woke up there was less than an inch of slushy snow on the ground.  But it was snowing  hard and I was surprised to find out that we had school.  We bundled the kids up and Cameron decided to take  them down to the bus stop.  A few minutes after he left the girls were back and they had to walk because Cameron got stuck.  It took Cameron about a half hour to get himself unstuck from the snow.  About that time I became concerned because I figured the kids would miss the bus and they had not returned yet.  I called the school and sure enough they had missed the bus but they were not home yet.  I sent Cameron out looking for them... he made the mistake of taking the car he had just got stuck in to get them.  He was able to find them at the bottom of our hill hiding under a tree.  I am not sure why then did not walk home except that it was snowing too hard and they were not sure whether they had missed the bus or not.  Cameron headed home only to become stuck again in the snow.  The kids walked the rest of the way home and peeled their wet clothes off of themselves and warmed themselves in front of the fire with hot chocolate.  Obviously at this point we realized they would not be attending school because we couldn't get there.

Ali and Ashling decided we should make cookies since they didn't have school.

 About 45 minutes later Cameron came inside defeated with the car still stuck in the snow.  Later a neighbor had to drag him out of the snow.   It all would have been fine if they would have plowed but 10 inches of slushy snow makes it very hard to drive around on... especially on steep hills.


Later the kids went back outside and played in the snow.

We received a lot of snow that day and when we woke up in the morning we had about 18 inches, blue skies and a snow day!  Funny how the no school day was when we had beautiful blue skies and they had us go to school when it was impossible to get there.

Annika's 4th Birthday

For Annika's Birthday we decided to take her to Disneyland along with her friends that also have passes.  We got the other kids ready for school and then we went together.  The girls all dressed up as Belle.  Annika got the dress new for her birthday and the other girls had those dresses from before.  

 We got to go on the flying tire ride that I have never been on before.  It was fun... but would be more fun with more people who are bigger on the tire.  It works by throwing your weight around and Annika and I did not have enough of it to throw around.

 The main purpose of going to Disneyland was to eat at Ariel's Grotto.  We were waiting outside for it to be time.

 Here they are in from of the ferris wheel.

 The girls looked so cute for the picture they take and try to sell you for thirty dollars.  Mine is not the best but you get the idea.

 I love the decorations in the grotto... especially the lights.

 In this restaurant you order whatever you want and the food is the same price.  It is all good.  They bring out a big appetiser tower and bread that is very good.  I wish I had taken pictures of the food but I was too busy enjoying it.   The princesses walk around to each table.  Since it was Annika's birthday they also said Happy Birthday to her.  What a great way to spend your birthday being greeted by Princesses.

 After that we went on the Merry go round.  This is still Annika's favorite ride at the park.

 We then got to use fast passes to Ride Cars.  It was so much fun... again!

 We also rode on California Soaring with fast passes.  This is Annika's other favorite ride.  She loves it.  She screams and enjoys each part of it.  After that we headed over to Disneyland.  There were lots of characters to meet and Annika and Addie loved it.  Annika just loved Pluto.  He was her favorite character and she couldn't stop laughing as he hugged her.

 We met Minnie Mouse... we were the last ones who got to see her before she left.  Thanks for waiting Minnie!

 We then got to meet Alladin.  He showed us the world....

 We also got to see a re-enactment of the Jungle cruise by the staff since the jungle cruise was broken.   They pretended they were each of the animals and scenes from the Jungle Cruise.  We had a pretty good time with that.  We then went to the island and played around all the caves.  It was all fine until Annika didn't come out of the cave with them.  She was lost and we went looking for her.  A man called my name and then said Annika's mommy and Daddy.  I was impressed that she could give a stranger my name and her name so that he could help us find her.  Thanks to the stranger who helped us get back together!  She was only gone for a minute but it was scary to have her lost.  Those caves are not my favorite and we left soon after.

Annika wanted to ride the train so we rode that over to Toon Town.  She was unwilling to ride the roller coaster there and I didn't make her since it was her birthday.  We then ate cupcakes and then rode the tea cups and the merry go round at Disneyland.

 Our last ride was dumbo.  Annika loved that she got to hold the feather by herself

 Here is a picture of us together.

 Annika had some birthday money and she shopped the entire world of Disney store and finally decided to get this kitty.

Joshua Tree

We were sick for an entire week after Christmas.  One activity after another that we had planned was canceled and we spent our time in bed, sitting by the fire and laying around.  The whole family got it and we ended up having to cancel the New Years Party we had planned.  Finally by Saturday most of us were feeling better and only still coughing here and there.  We decided to go to Joshua Tree to get out of the sick house and into the sun.  It was a nice day there and about 55 degrees which was way warmer than it was anywhere else in nation.  The sun felt so nice.  We invited two families to go with us out there.

Mostly the adults would get the opportunity to climb and the kids were encouraged to boulder around and to run and play.  They would rather find treats to eat.  Cameron chose to climb with his pack on so that he could set up another climb when he got to the top.  

 One of my friend's had her first climb ever that day.  She did great climbing a  Joshua Tree 5.6 which is never easy.

 The Belay slaves of the time...

 AJ made it to the top and Cathy is almost there!

 She made it!  Good job!

 Cameron is climbing a 5.10A.  He did a great job and made it to the top... twice!

 Ali and Jarom were pondering what else they should do.

 The little kids enjoyed rock climbing around just as much as the adults.

 Ashling begged for a turn and got one at the end of the day.  Since she didn't have climbing shoes it was a little too hard for her to finish but she managed to hang on for so long that her legs hurt whenever she walked for a week!