What a fun, exciting, and sad week it has been! It is Ian's last week of pre-school at Kids Village :(
Monday started off with crazy hair day! Apparently that meant that he had to act crazy too...his poor teachers. Ian was very very excited to make his hair all crazy.
Tuesday was Ian's "unbirthday" celebration and crazy sock day.
Followed by hat day and school spirit shirt day.
Then this week he had his graduation program. After having a few days off from school he was so excited to go back and see his friends for graduation.
Ian and his best friend Kimball waiting for the program to start.
If you remember last years graduation program you will remember that Ian sang very very loud and kind of monotone :) As you can see he has improved! I do miss his loudness though -it was nice to be able to hear him. They sang a few of the songs they have been learning and working on throughout the year. Ian started off the program doing all of the actions and singing away...after a couple songs I think he spent more time looking around at everyone there. Until they started singing the baseball song -then he was ready to participate again.
During the program Ian and Kimball recited a nursery rhyme together. Ian apparently wanted to make sure everyone heard him.
Throughout the week Ian has been working on these cards for his teachers. Unlike many preschools Ian is blessed to have six wonderful teachers throughout the week. Miss Rebecca is Ian's homeroom teacher that he has everyday. They work on reading, spelling, writing, math, and a million other things. He absolutely loves Miss Rebecca and we are very excited that sweet little Aaron will have Miss Rebecca next year.
Miss Jimmie is Ian's science teacher he has had her for two years. While Ian loves all of his teachers he adores Miss Jimmie. What boy wouldn't she lets you play with bugs :)
Miss Robin is Ian's cooking and health teacher. We love Wednesday's! It means cooking class -some of Ian's favorites he made throughout the year were oatmeal raisin cookies, waffles, berry smoothie, and baked donuts. Ian did not care for pretty much anything with vegetables.
Miss Annalee is Ian's history and language teacher. She has taught Ian so much, it is amazing. He loves learning about the United States of America. As you can see he drew a picture of the American flag on the back of his card. Throughout the year I have also caught him singing songs in spanish while he is taking a shower. It always makes me laugh.
On the left is Ian's Music teacher. He loves singing and dancing in music class with Miss Christine. Some of the nursery rhymes he will come home and recite make me chuckle. Such as, "Jack sprat could eat no fat, his wife could eat no lean. Between the two of them, they licked their platter clean." I am pretty sure he know way more Nursery rhymes than I do. The card on the right is Miss Tori his art teacher. What kid does not love Art! The patience his art teacher must have. I getting anxiety thinking about a group of 4 year olds with paint, glue. and scissors. He always comes home with amazing projects and can name many famous Art pieces. I would name some but I don't know them -you would have to ask him :)
Miss Kathy is the director of the school. She knows all the children, parents, and pretty much everything there is to know. She comes in and helps in the classrooms when needed and is always making sure that the kids are having fun, learning, and enjoying their time at the school. She also helps with many of the fundraisers the school does. Ian still talks about the children in Ecuador. I also love that Ian thinks she sleeps there -it is true she is always there :) The picture he drew for Miss Kathy is of the two of them on the ski lift. Ian does skiing lessons at Sundance through the school and Miss Kathy comes along helps out and skies with the kids.
I can't believe he has finish pre-school.
Getting his diploma from Miss Rebecca.
So excited to be moving on to Kindergarten.
Congratulations Ian! Can't wait to see how much you continue to learn and grow in the years to come!
After returning from California we unpacked and finished quite a few loads of laundry and then the next afternoon headed down to the Wells house -a whole two minute drive it was rough :) Their parents were heading out of town so we watched over the kids while they were away. My kids were constantly entertained. I think we could have lived outside the entire week! They loved having someone else to play with and not to mention their amazing backyard. We can't believe that in just a few weeks they will be moving :( We told our boys and Ian could not figure it out. He said in the sweetest voice, "But why? Their house is perfect."
The boys loved running the kids around to their activities. Jaxon's football game was postponed so the kids had fun playing in the car while we waited for the game to start. I let them use their dry erase books -Aaron clearly did not understand the point of drawing in the book.
The boys also enjoyed begging Jaxon to play the drums for them. Finally after a few days of begging Jaxon broke and played the drums. Then he let the boys play the drums a little as well. As you can see they were in heaven.
We had a great time watching the kids. It was nice to have a lot of helpers around the house and the kids were great at putting up with my pregnancy bossiness ;) Hopefully one day we will all live close together again!
Let the adventure begin!!! We wanted to do something fun with the boys before this baby arrives in June. I have been preparing and planning forever to make sure everything goes as well as possible. So Wednesday afternoon, we picked Ian up from school and began our five and a half our drive to our first stop in Henderson, Nevada. The boys were excited to finally be leaving.
We had been in the car for a mer twenty minutes (not even out of Utah County) when Ian asked if we were there yet. After some explaining we thankfully did not hear that question again. The boys did great in the car and both had a nice long nap. They also loved coloring and eating all the yummy snacks they could! Ian drew pictures in his notebook of things he spotted along the way and throughout our vacation. I will post a few a my favorite pictures. We got into Nevada late that night and headed to bed, woke up enjoyed breakfast, and hit the road for another five hour drive to Carlsbad California.
Ian's drawings from our long drive (clockwise): digger, moutain with bushes, electric poles
The boys were so excited to be somewhere and not have to drive. We made it to Carlsbad mid afternoon and Tim took the boys down to the pool to swim and get out some built up energy.
We all loved the hotel! Plus, on the weekdays they had a complementary dinner which Aaron may have enjoyed a little too much!
That night after swimming and dinner we headed to the beach for the first time!
Ian thought the waves were amazing but he could not understand why the water tasted so disgusting. Aaron loved playing in the waves too until he was completely soaked. We were thinking they would be fine in their clothes and maybe get a little wet, no...they were soaked from head to toe. Aaron then realized he was surrounded by sand and was entertained forever.
We stayed and played on the beach and watched the sunset then headed back to our hotel for bed.
Ian's pictures from the day: apple, breakfast lounge, cactus, beach.
Friday, April 26th -Legoland
Apparently Aaron did not get the memo that a vacation does not mean sleeping in all the time. This poor little boy was already exhausted and it was our first full vacation day. Tim and Ian headed down to the delicious complimentary breakfast (the boys favorite part out of our vacation) and I stayed in the room while Aaron slept. I finally had to wake him up and we still managed to miss breakfast (thankfully Tim realized it and was able to save us some).
We then headed off to Legoland!
The boys were in heaven! Tim and I were looking at the crowds of people and the rows of school buses wondering what on earth we had gotten ourselves into. Yes, school buses :( We jumped into line on our first ride of the day -lego safari and after a 30 minutes wait the ride broke down. So we headed to a couple other rides then jumped into line on another popular ride. I will admit Legoland was great for the boys. A lot of the rides have play zones filled with legos that the line wraps around. The kids can play with legos while the parents wait in line. Since the line wraps around the play area you can always see your child- we all loved it!
After lunch we headed to the Star Wars section of the park. Then by about 2:30 we realized that park seemed nearly empty. All the school kids had left!!! We enjoyed going back through the park and riding some of our favorite rides again. Ian loved riding the big dragon roller coaster with Tim, while Aaron and I rode the smaller airplane ride over and over.
I was pleasantly surprised how much Aaron loved riding the rides. Thankfully he is just over 36 inches which is the minimum height requirement for majority of the rides. Yes, I clearly looked into that before we decided to go on vacation. So while they checked his height every ride he always passed and was excited to go!
We ended the day at the big lego shop. The boys have been doing extra chores around the house for the last month earning money for Legoland. Ian has been working extra hard because he wanted to earn a huge lego set. When we started shopping he decided he would rather get a couple medium size ones -he decided to hold up his star wars set for the picture. Aaron was happy with the big bin of legos (I think because it had a handle and he could carry it by himself).
Saturday, April 27th -Relaxing
After a busy day at Legoland both the boys slept in. We nearly missed breakfast (which was served until 10) again. They were even going to be early. We spent the morning relaxing at the hotel and playing at the pool.
We spent the rest of the day building our new lego sets, making dinner, and having a family movie. It was a nice relaxing day. I spent most of the day laying down with my feet up :)
Sunday, April 28th -Legoland Day 2
We started off our day heading to the Legoland sea life aquarium. The boys enjoyed seeing some ocean life they had not seen before but mostly wanted to go into Legoland and play with legos.
The rest of the morning we spent going on some of the rides we had missed the previous day.
We had planned on taking the boys to the Legoland waterpark but as you can see it was a little chilly. So we road some more rides and enjoyed playing some games.
Tim and Ian won this giant minion for Aaron. Yes, we carried that around the park the rest of the day. Plus Ian won a star wars stuffed Angry Bird.
The sun finally decided to come out later that afternoon so we lathered up in sunscreen to head to the Legoland water park. Poor Aaron has the worlds most sensitive skin. We are always battling eczema and about 30 minutes after putting on the hypoallergenic sensitive baby aveeno sunscreen (the only sunscreen that worked last year) he started having what appeared to be an allergic reaction or something. I brought non drowsy benedryl with me since we notice he was starting with hives after putting sunscreen on the day before. I am at a loss what to do with this poor boy. Clearly he needs sunscreen but everything seems to cause some type of reaction.
The water park was great! What kid would not love playing with giant legos in the water. Plus there were lifeguards everywhere! Not that I don't watch my children but an extra set of eyes is always nice when dealing with water. The teeter-totter pictured at the bottom right was hilarious. It had a small fountain of water spraying out the top then once the kids began teetering and tottering it shot water everywhere. They thought it was pretty funny too!
While the park stayed open late that night we were all exhausted. So we collected our prizes and drove to our next destination... Coronado Island in San Diego.
Here are some of my favorite drawings that Ian did of Legoland from the week. If you look closely at the Dragon roller coaster picture Ian is in the third row. You can see the side of his head and blonde hair -he is also the smallest one on the ride.
Monday, April 29th -Coronado Beach
We had one thing planned for Coronado and that was to play on the beach and relax the entire time. It sounded perfect. However, we woke up Monday morning and opened the curtains to see dark gray clouds and blowing trees. So we pulled out a Lego set and began building.
I think we checked the weather forcast every couple of minutes. We decided to go ahead and get ready for the beach since the sun was supposed to make an appearance late that afternoon. We made sandwiches, packed our beach bag, lathered up in sunscreen (with a dose of Benadryl for Aaron) then headed out the door.
As soon as the boys set foot in the sand they began looking for seashells. Then enjoyed playing in the nice soft sand. Aaron even took a little cat nap under the umbrella.
After lunch we had a blast running and jumping around in the waves.
One thing we did not expect was an air show directly above our heads. The US Naval Air Station is located on the North side of Coronado Island. It was not an actual airshow but there were times they would fly into the base in formation. It was great to watch and Aaron loved pointing out every single jet and plane that flew over our heads. However, after an hour and all the loud jet noises Aaron decided he had heard enough (as seen in the far left picture).
We spent a good hour trying to get all of the sand off our bodies that evening. Then walked down the beach walk to dinner.
The boys spotted this orange boat on our walk (not like it was hiding). It looks bigger than downtown San Diego.
They wanted their picture taken by it and were very cooperative ;)
After dinner the boys were able to pick what they wanted for dessert. With plenty of options they decided on overpriced marshmallows covered in sprinkles on a stick. Both of them ate the sprinkles off the marshmallows and were done.
Tuesday, April 30th -Coronado Beach
We woke up to see dark clouds again. It was a little frustrating especially because we knew back in Utah it was in the 70's and 80's. But we put on our jackets and decided to go walk along the beach looking for seashells. Wow -did we find some great shells. We even found a sand dollar! Which we had no idea what to do with because it looked like it was alive. Thanks to google we found that since it had washed up on shore it was dying, so we followed google's instructions and it is soaking in a container somewhere in the garage :/
That afternoon we headed back to our hotel for a quick swim and some downtime. It was a little cold with the wind blowing so we did not last very long at the pool. The boys still enjoyed jumping in.
That night we ate at the Coronado Brewery because on Tuesdays kids eat free! It ended up being the perfect place to go -full of families with kids, and a guy coming around making balloon animals for the children. Then we headed to La Jolla cove near downtown San Diego to watch the seals and sea lions.
It sprinkled on us a little but it wasn't too bad. The boys thought that the seals and sea lions were amazing. We even saw little baby seals.
That night we started packing up and preparing for our journey home. Which neither of us were looking forward too :(
Wednesday, May 1st -Homeward bound
We had loaded everything in the car the night before. So Tim and I woke up just before 4 am, had both the boys use the restroom then headed to the car for our 5 hour drive to Vegas. We arrived in Vegas just after 9 am. The boys did great and slept most of the way plus they were still a little drowsy and happily watch a movie till we reach Vegas. Tim's dad was in Vegas at the time for work and the boys were beyond excited that we got to see Papa.
We all enjoyed breakfast together. The boys were in heaven to have waffles covered in strawberries again like in Carlsbad. Aaron was also overly entertained with the kid wax sticks at the table.
After breakfast Papa had to head to a meeting for work so before we jumped back on the road for another 6 hour drive home we decided to take the boys to M&M world. As you can see they loved it!
We let each of the boys make their own small bag of colored M&M's. Ian choose yellow, gold, and silver. Aaron choose blue, purple. and gray. Then it was back to the car :/
I was amazed how great the boys did in the car- they do better driving then flying! Not long after being on the road for the second time did they both fall asleep. Originally we had planned to stay in Vegas Wednesday night and finish the drive on Thursday but we just wanted to be home and the boys were doing great so we continued our journey.
The second half of our journey was a little intense with 30 mile per hour winds pushing and pulling us on the road. We played dodge the sagebrush on the highway and still ended up getting hit a few times. The kids though it was hilarious and fun, us...not so much. We finally pulled in the driveway and Ian's first comment was we are home already? With driving time, food and potty breaks we had been traveling for around 16 hours!
I was sitting here realizing we did not get one picture of the four of us together. Then I remember the one picture I bought at Legoland and Tim thought I was crazy for getting it. We were all looking at the camera and actually smiling, that does not happen very often. Sorry I did not straighten the picture- it is late.
We had so much fun together as a family. Ian is already talking to Aaron about plan our next trip to Legoland and the beach. He keeps asking us when we get to go again. But that we should only go if we drive the same why we came home because it was really fast, and not the way we went there. Little does he know we went the same way both times :) He just slept most of the drive on the way home! Hopefully someday in the near future we'll be able to go again as a family of five!
