Our Family Vacation--Days 1 and 2

On Monday May 30th (Memorial Day) our family set out on a long awaited family vacation.  We flew from Denver to Newport News, Virginia.  It was Finn's first time on a plane and he did really well.  He fell asleep on take-off and slept for the first hour and half of the flight.  The last two hours he was awake, and crawling all over me.  We played with some toys and some games and hoped the plane would fly faster!  :)

Reid and Kai were sitting one row ahead of us and on the other side.  I could hear Kai talking almost the entire time to the lady sitting next to him.  She was very gracious and good to Kai.  I think I heard her say she used to work at a preschool.  Poor thing probably didn't expect to be doing that again on a 3 and half hour flight!

We landed in Newport News, which is a smaller airport, and the kids ran around a bit while Reid collected luggage and our rental car.  Kai was very nervous about the idea of a rental car ahead of time, but once he saw our red Grand Caravan he got excited.  Now he says he wants a minivan at home, too.  One day, buddy, one day.

The kids in the mini-van.

The first thing we needed to do in Virginia was get ice cream.  The minute we stepped off of the plane it became apparent that we were from Colorado.  We left Denver in perfect weather--70s, sun shining, PERFECT.  On the jetway in Virginia you could feel the humidity, all of about 50% of it, and the 90 degree heat.  Uggghh!  Chick-Fil-A shakes here we come!

After our stop at Chick-Fil-A, we headed to our hotel on the beach in Virginia Beach.  I was happy with our choice.  This is the view from our hotel room.  You can see the beach is a bit "crowded" from Memorial Day traffic.  The rest of the week was a lot less "crowded".  It was a perfect time to go to an east coast beach as it was warm and summer had started, but the kids were all still in school back East.  So, the days were fairly free of traffic and in the evenings it would pick up a bit (after work and school traffic).  It really was a great beach week!

That night we looked around just a bit and got ourselves a small dinner at Subway.  We decided to do our best to keep the kids on Mountain Time and so every one settled into bed a bit before 10pm!  Amazing!

What was also amazing was that the first night the kids did great.  They slept quite well and woke up around 8:15 or 8:30am Tuesday morning.  They were well rested, so we got dressed and headed down to the complimentary breakfast in the hotel lobby.  After some yummy food we were ready to hit the beach.  This became our routine for the week--breakfast, nearly 2 hours at the beach, clean-up, lunch, naps, and then an afternoon activity.  It was nice.

Tuesday morning at the beach the kids were testing things out.  At first they weren't sure how they felt about ALL of that sand.  And they definitely weren't crazy about the waves and the ocean.  But we tried our best to show them everything you can do with sand and water.  And we collected a whole lot of seashells.

Kai's first order of business at the beach was a sand castle.
He had been looking forward to that for months!

Finn and Daddy checking out the water.

Parasailing.  I really was wanting to try that, but it really wasn't an option with the kids.

After our two hours at the beach, we cleaned up and then headed to lunch.  We decided to walk down "Beach Street USA" to Wendy's.  Along the way we passed a stand renting out bicycles and checked the prices.  It was reasonable, so we decided that would be our activity after Finn's nap.  So, after a good nap for Finn we headed out in the early evening (around 5pm) and rented a bicycle.  It was more like a rickshaw and good grief was it hard to peddle!  We rented it for an hour and returned it after 40 minutes.  Reid and I were sweating and panting and were done.  The kids enjoyed the ride though, and we did get to see the south end of the boardwalk and a fun playground that the kids got to enjoy for 15 minutes or so.

That night my older sister Wendy was in town to meet with her wedding planner and florist (her wedding was the real reason of our trip!) and so we met her for dinner.  We had a fun dinner at Olive Garden before taking Wendy back to her car and the kids back to the hotel for bed.  It was a super fun day and we were looking forward to 2 more days at the beach.  The one sad part of our trip came that night, and I'll post about that separately as it did not directly impact our vacation, but it did make me more aware and cautious.

Anyway, the first two days were great and we were loving the beach!

Great Strides Updated

I just wanted to let everyone know that I added pictures from our Great Strides walk.  So, go ahead and check them out.

Also a blog about our beach vacation is coming.  I promise!

What Having Kids is Like

A friend from college posted this on her blog and I thought I'd share.  This article totally hits the nail on the head. For all of you that I still owe emails or a phone call, I love you, I really do.  Sometimes a mom just needs 10 minutes to herself!

TELL ME ABOUT IT ®

By Carolyn Hax
Wednesday, May 23, 2007

Carolyn:

Best friend has child. Her: exhausted, busy, no time for self, no time for me, etc. Me (no kids): Wow. Sorry. What'd you do today? Her: Park, play group .. .

 Okay. I've done Internet searches, I've talked to parents. I don't get it. What do stay-at-home moms do all day? Please no lists of library, grocery store, dry cleaners . . . I do all those things, too, and I don't do them EVERY DAY. I guess what I'm asking is: What is a typical day and why don't moms have time for a call or e-mail? I work and am away from home nine hours a day (plus a few late work events) and I manage to get it all done. I'm feeling like the kid is an excuse to relax and enjoy -- not a bad thing at all -- but if so, why won't my friend tell me the truth? Is this a peeing contest ("My life is so much harder than yours")? What's the deal? I've got friends with and without kids and all us child-free folks get the same story and have the same questions.

Tacoma, Wash.

Relax and enjoy. You're funny.

Or you're lying about having friends with kids.

Or you're taking them at their word that they actually have kids, because you haven't personally been in the same room with them.

Internet searches?

I keep wavering between giving you a straight answer and giving my forehead some keyboard. To claim you want to understand, while in the same breath implying that the only logical conclusions are that your mom-friends are either lying or competing with you, is disingenuous indeed.

So, since it's validation you seem to want, the real answer is what you get. In list form. When you have young kids, your typical day is: constant attention, from getting them out of bed, fed, clean, dressed; to keeping them out of harm's way; to answering their coos, cries, questions; to having two arms and carrying one kid, one set of car keys, and supplies for even the quickest trips, including the latest-to-be-declared-essential piece of molded plastic gear; to keeping them from unshelving books at the library; to enforcing rest times; to staying one step ahead of them lest they get too hungry, tired or bored, any one of which produces the kind of checkout-line screaming that gets the checkout line shaking its head.

It's needing 45 minutes to do what takes others 15.

It's constant vigilance, constant touch, constant use of your voice, constant relegation of your needs to the second tier.

It's constant scrutiny and second-guessing from family and friends, well-meaning and otherwise. It's resisting constant temptation to seek short-term relief at everyone's long-term expense.

It's doing all this while concurrently teaching virtually everything -- language, manners, safety, resourcefulness, discipline, curiosity, creativity. Empathy. Everything.

It's also a choice, yes. And a joy. But if you spent all day, every day, with this brand of joy, and then, when you got your first 10 minutes to yourself, wanted to be alone with your thoughts instead of calling a good friend, a good friend wouldn't judge you, complain about you to mutual friends, or marvel how much more productively she uses her time. Either make a sincere effort to understand or keep your snit to yourself.

A trip to the Zoo

One of the things that we decided to do this year was to get a family membership to our local zoo.  We bought our membership last month when they were offering discounts and decided to make quick use of it.  We left our house early on Friday morning (the 27th of May) and got to the Zoo right after it opened.  It turned out to be an absolutely perfect morning for the zoo!  The weather was just a bit breezy, so we opted to wear our jackets.  And we had gotten there early enough that there really wasn't a crowd yet, and the animals were awake.  We had a really good time and I was surprised that it didn't wear me out like I thought it would.  I'll definitely be looking for another cool-ish day to take the kids back.  Kai loves the giraffes and so we also bought a giraffe frequent feeding card.  I was surprised that he really did want to feed them this time and he almost did it without dropping the food!  We did end up stopping for a picnic lunch right before hitting our last building (the monkey house) and Kai was so nice to share his sandwich with a chipmunk!  We had such a great morning that both kids even took a nap on the way home.  Yay!

Feeding the giraffe his lettuce.

I could not figure out why the giraffes kept licking the observation deck.

The giraffes are right there!  Finn is SO scared of animals he just cried and screamed the whole time.

Playing at the children's play area.

Finn was looking for Kai!  So cute!

I don't know why he is looking so concerned here.

Kai with the moose.

Hopefully soon Finn will be big enough to know to stand still for these kind of pictures.

This peacock was hanging out right next to a group of female peacocks.

While at the bird exhibit Finn ended up getting soaking wet in this pond.  I'm fairly sure one of us got pooped on, too!

Kai learned how to pet a baby wallaby.

Kai wanted a picture here.  Isn't he so handsome?!

Finn was sizing up the monkeys.

Did I mention Finn doesn't like animals?!  He wanted nothing to do with sitting down next to the glass that was next to the gorilla.

Once he calmed down he realized it was pretty neat to be just a foot away from a gorilla.

In with the New

Remember this?  Well, our new deck was finally finished on Monday May 23rd.  It was a long 6 week process, and we're happy to be done.  I'll say it again (as I know I've said it before), I strongly dislike contractors!!

This was the end of day 1 where most of the deck was taken down.

It really unnerved me to have doors that led to certain death.  We put bright orange tape on the locks to make sure the kids didn't try to jump out the windows.

Our new deck!  It's slightly larger than our last one and has a glass corner to protect the grill from the wind.  Well, it sort of does its job!

Up on the deck.  It's even great to walk on it barefoot.

The boys have enjoyed having the new deck.  Finn likes to go out and play first thing and Kai loves the view.  Now we have to figure out what to put on it!

Thunderbirds

For those who don't know, we live just a few miles away from the United States Air Force Academy.  Every year at the end of May they hold graduation services that are always capped off by an air show from the Thunderbirds.  The normally practice for a three days or so before the show and then they have a good 15 minute show that they perform for graduation

In the past, the Thunderbirds have flown right over our house, I mean RIGHT OVER it.  Graduation was on Wednesday the 25th this year, and for some reason they seemed to be staying more toward the south of us and turning around over the mountains instead of over our field.  Kai and I waited on our deck (another post!) for about an hour before the show began.  Admittedly, I was a bit disappointed as we could hear them much better than we could see them.  But Kai was still super excited.  He loved the Thunderbird show and even said it was the best part of his day.  He said a few other cute things about how great it was, but I forgot to to write them down.

The Thunderbirds flying in formation.  Click on the picture to make it bigger and you should see it better.

In formation again.  Click to enlarge, again.

There was one point where the planes went straight up into the clouds and then would fly straight back down.  Kai called the place in the clouds where the Thunderbirds reappeared a "hole."  That was almost immediately followed by, "If Jesus were to step on that cloud, He'd fall through."  [About a 30 second pause]  And then the Thunderbirds would be in trouble!"  He made me laugh.

Next year (as long as Finn's not napping again), I think we'll drive down to Lockheed with Reid.  His building is right across the street from the stadium, so we're thinking maybe a picnic and an airshow in the Lockheed parking lot sounds like fun!

Great Strides 2011

On Saturday May 21st our family participated in our first Great Strides event to raise money for Cystic Fibrosis.  We were blessed to have over 30 people from our ward come out to support us in our walk.  I was also touched by the people that donated to the cause and helped us raise money.  We were by no means even in the neighborhood of the top fundraisers, but we really didn't put that much effort into it, and we were greatly blessed by friends and family that care.

One of the first things I noticed when we got there was just how many people had turned out.  The official count they gave was 745 people, but I think that was based on the people that officially checked-in and I know not everyone on our team did that.  My guess is that we were much closer to 900 people or so.  There were 50 teams represented.  That's a whole lot of people per team! 

The walk took us on a nice scenic route through a downtown area of the Springs.  It really was a beautiful day and a beautiful walk.  And for the most part, the boys did pretty well with the walk.  Kai loved that all of his friends from church were there and he walked a ways with them.  After a while he joined Finn in the double stroller.  Finn wanted to get out of the stroller but he didn't get the concept of walking with the group.  He thought it would be more fun to just run the other direction.  So, unfortunately, he had to go back in the stroller.

Kai before the race with our hometeacher's children--Cassidy and Max
Kai LOVED having all of the teenager's attenetion!

Finn and Momma waiting for the race to start.
I'm SO glad I got a haircut.  Look at that hair!

Kai and the Chick-Fil-A cow.

What a wonderful ward we have!  This is most of our team.  Another family showed up right after we took the picture.

Walking for a cure!

Finn, Kai, and Reid crossing the finish line.

Waiting in line for lunch from Quizno's and Chick-Fil-A.  The rose sticker indicates that Finn has CF.

Eating lunch.

There was a fire truck for the kids.  Of course, Kai enjoyed that!

Kai got to try a firefighter's helmet.

Before the walk began there were free bagels and pastries.  And after the walk there were sandwhiches from Chick-Fil-A and Quiznos, as well as cookies.  I was also impressed by the constantly full drink coolers that were there the entire day.  After the walk, people ate lunch, mingled, and listened to the band and announcements.  Our family played at the playground for a bit.  It was a good day for everyone.

The Great Strides walk in Colorado Springs raised an amount just shy of $133,000 this year.  What an awesome site!  It was amazing to see the lines at the pavillion.  The longest one by far was the donation line where people just waited in line to pay money and write checks.  What a wonderful thing for everyone!