Thanksgiving, Disneyland, & more

Now look what happens when life gets really busy......you don't update your blog for a whole month! Good grief! Well, here's a bit about the chaos.

Thanksgiving was fantastic! Bob's brother Aaron and his wife Jen & their 2 kids came down from Utah to celebrate with us. We had a really fun time going to the zoo, playing outside in the beautiful weather, shopping and of course....eating! The kids all loved playing together and they kept each other occupied the whole weekend. Their thanksgiving activity was making "turkeys" out of apples and marshmallows on toothpicks. Even Cason got into it (because what kid doesn't like eating a ton of marshmallows right before a large turkey dinner)!?

After the Thanksgiving fun I celebrated my birthday by washing and wrapping hundreds of red potatoes for the ward party. Actually Channing did most of the wrapping, I did the scrubbing. We boiled them in huge tamale pots - 2 took up my whole 6 burner stove. It was crazy. What an exciting birthday! I know you all wish you could have such fun on YOUR birthday! (ok, it would have gone faster if Bob had been able to help, but he got the flu....and thus started 7 days of illness in the family).

By some miracle I escaped the flu (no one else did) and we left for Disneyland on Dec. 9th. We decided to cut back on gifts and give an experience for the family's Christmas present this year. We had a wonderful time! The weather was great; only a drizzle on one day. The other 2 days were beautiful. The kids rode on ride after ride and we were able to see the Aladdin off-Broadway show at CA adventure. It was wonderful and the kids (even Cason) were completely enthralled! Everything was decked out for Christmas and it was a really fun time for all.

Part of our fun was due to the fact that Bob's sister's family joined us at Disneyland. We had a great time hanging out. 4 adults and 7 kids. It was great! One evening we went to the Disneyland Hotel for dinner and ate at Goofy's kitchen. It was darling! There were several characters that came to visit us during our meal. Cason loves Pluto and he played with him in the lobby for about 5 minutes. It was adorable. A few princesses came to visit while we ate and Cameron absolutely refused to even look at them. He was soooo shy (can you even imagine that? I would have never believed it if I hadn't been there)! Cason loved all the characters (which surprised me because he's the one I expected to be scared of them).

We spent most of the 2nd day at CA adventure. The "big kids" and adults rode the rollercoaster (poor Cameron was just a few inches too short and sorely disappointed). Cameron and Channing both rode the rapids and the Tower of Terror. Those were really fun rides! We ate sourdough soup bowls for lunch at a cafe (very good)! In the afternoon we went back to Disneyland and got caught in the pre-parade (let's just skp that story shall we - nightmares don't often happen at Disneyland...). We were eventually able to make it to the Blue Bayou for my birthday dinner (see, I was smart - I waited until this day to celebrate)! We had a great table by the water and the food, atmosphere and company were wonderful! One of my all-time favorite meals right there! I was hoping it was as good as I remembered and it was (and just as pricey too)! LOL! We rode the Pirates of the Caribbean 2 times in a row after dinner. There was no one around. It was great. This became Cason's most favorite ride of all. I think he rode it 6 or 7 times. He cried when we got off becasue he wanted to go AGAIN! But we ran out to see the fireworks and we get to see it snow (bubble snow). It was so awesome!

Friday morning we ran into Disneyland and hit Toontown so we could see Mickey Mouse. The kids seemed really excited to see him and his house. There was a great little rollercoaster in Toontown that even Cason could ride on! It was really fun (and we went on it twice in a row because there was no line)! Yay! After that we hit Splash Mountain and then over to CA Adventure for Soarin' over CA and the Aladdin show (and the Muppet 3-D show which my brother said was hilarious....and it wasn't that funny....the funny thing was watching the kids try to grab the 3D images....now that was hilarious)! When we returned to Disneyland, the place had gone from calm to MOBSCENE. We could barely walk down mainstreet. Somehow we made our way to sit and wait for Fantasmic. We waited there for 2 hours because you couldn't walk anywhere else anyway. The kids loved the show and the fireworks afterward. And that was the last thing we did because 3 days in a row at Disneyland will beat you down and run you over! The kids were begging to go to bed.

In the end, it was worth it. Friday night made us want to never go back because of the crowds, but the rest of the time was really fun. Channing and Cameron dubbed Space Mountain their favorite ride. I loved everything.