Summer Bucket List 2015

It's that time of year again! Time to set some fun goals for summer 2015! Mommy has had a list in progress already and we were able to check some things off during spring break and in May since the weather has been so nice and warm and sunny! We'll check back in September to see how many fun things we were able to do this year!

1. Beaches* (one new local beach we've never been to)
2. Parks* (one new park we've never been to)
3. Get Fun Drinks* (we've already gotten our fair share of frappuccinos and slurpees this season!)
4. Hikes* (we did Denny creek over spring break but want to do Franklin Falls and Rattlesnake)
5. Ferry Ride (hopefully to Bainbridge to go to the children's museum)
6. Wild Waves
7. Oregon Coast Trip
8. Berry Picking (we did strawberries but want to go back for raspberry season)
9. Sleepover at Nana's and go to Chase's Pancake Corral for breakfast
10. Late-night fire pit, stay up to star gaze
11. Train Ride* (we did the Snoqualmie train but we'll hopefully take the Amtrak to Portland)
12. Tolt River (Done twice already! And hopefully many more times this summer)
13. Seattle Great Wheel & Ivars/Pike Place Trip
14. Swimming at Charlotte's Pool
15. Putt Putt Golf
16. Water Balloons*
17. Ride Bikes somewhere fun (we rode around Greenlake)
18. Picnic and find cloud shapes (read It Looks Like Spilt Milk)
19. Watch Classic Movies (we watched Wizard of Oz in May, next is Mary Poppins)
20. Aquarium*
21. Fremont Troll* (and a second trip to the Ballard Locks)
22. Mariner's Game
23. Museum of Flight with Grandpa Mikey
24. September trip to Reno to visit the Fugals and go to the Air Races! (Maybe!)
25.  
26.  
27.  
28.  
29.  

*Star indicates a bucket list to-do I came up with all by myself! Mommy came up with the rest!

Daddy's Birthday

Happy Birthday Daddy! We had a wonderful evening celebrating daddy's birthday! We had a yummy steak dinner and then some delicious cupcakes and ice cream!

March 2015

We had a fun month of March. Pretty busy with the day to day routine but we managed to enjoy our weekends and have some fun after-work activities. We celebrated Aunt Natalie's and Grandma's birthdays this month. We also celebrated all the March birthdays including cousin Hayden and Uncle Mike with a little get together at Charlotte's house. We also Celebrated Lincoln's birthday with Pinwheel Day. During March we rode bike's at the park, had frozen yogurt dates, went to bouncy house night and celebrated Easter early with an egg hunt with friends. We moved our annual friend Easter egg hunt and potluck up early since the Fugals are moving (Boo!). It was rainy but we had tons of fun anyways!

December 2014

We had a wonderful December! Mostly celebrating Christmas and doing fun things whenever we had a chance. One of the first things we did was go to Snowflake Lane. We met Natalie and Charlotte and we had lots of fun. We always go on a weekday like Monday early in the season so it's not too crowded. We always have fun seeing the characters and watching the drummers and dancing in the snow. They seem to change it slightly every year and we weren't too impressed with how things were set up this season. They had the crowds go into the streets to get closer to the "dance line" instead of stay on the side walks near the drummers. But we decided to stay by the drummers so we could see them up close which meant we couldn't see the dancers. Oh well, hopefully they'll change things back to how they were the previous year.

Grandma, grandpa and mommy took me to get my annual mall Santa photo. It turned out really nice even though below is a horrible camera picture of the screen. They only give you hard copies unless you pay a bunch for a digital copy. We did some fun stuff at the mall afterward like the Disney Store and frozen yogurt.

On Friday the 5th, Mommy and I spent the night at Siena's house. We went down to play and babysit and we had lots of fun! I love my cousin Siena and baby Frankie! We played with all of Siena's fun toys and watched I Love Lucy and ate pizza! It was fun to sleep over and to sleep in Siena's big kid bed! The next morning, we woke up and had to leave fairly early. It was fun to wake up at Siena's house and play for a little before we left. We went straight to the Bellevue Club to celebrate Charlotte's 2nd birthday. Natalie reserved spots for Charlotte and me at the club's Christmas Party. It was super special because Casper Babypants was there to perform a concert. I decided to be quite a stinker and emotional for no reason. I would be perfectly happy and cooperative and then grumpy and cranky all morning. After the concert, Santa arrived and we took some pictures and got candy canes. Afterward, we went to Nana's house for lunch and birthday cupcakes.

The next weekend we went to the Bellevue Nativities. At the church building behind the temple, they have hundreds nativity scenes from all over the world set up and different musical performances. It was a wonderful way to make sure our celebrations focused on Jesus and the true meaning of Christmas. Afterward, we went stopped and Dairy Queen for Blizzards! Yum!

The next morning, there was a children's primary pajama breakfast. When we got there, all the kids went up on stage to dance and sing and "perform" the Nutcracker. We then ate a yummy crepe breakfast and got to go visit Santa. It was fun to celebrate Christmas with all my church friends!

On the last Friday of school before winter break, grandpa "volunteered" to be Santa for mommy's work. Mommy volunteered grandpa for the job awhile ago and grandpa was a very good sport! He did such a wonderful job. Everyone thought he made the best Santa and all the kids loved seeing Santa! Grandpa really was a trooper, he spent 5 hours in the costume indoors and sweating and visiting 8 or 9 different classes. What was really nice was that mommy's work treated them to lunch in the Bistro. Mommy hasn't been able to eat there yet so it was a fun treat! I think grandpa will be lucky enough to be Santa again next year!

We took our annual trip down to Coulon Park for Clam Lights. We ate at Ivar's and mommy got me a milkshake from Kidd Valley. We then walked around the park and along the water to see all the Christmas lights.

Mommy and I went down to Emily's house for our gingerbread house decorating party. I always have so much fun with all my friends. I especially had fun because the weather was decent and I got to play outside for a long time! I was perfectly content for a couple hours playing outside with all the big kids! I was still happily playing when it was time to go and I didn't want to leave!

We had a wonderful time celebrating Christmas! We had a lovely at Nana's on Christmas Eve. We has pizza for dinner which was super easy and casual and then we just spent the evening talking. It was an extra special Christmas eve because Nana finally brought back Christmas stockings! When mom was little, all the kids and grandkids got stockings at Nana's and Santa filled them with lots of special things. Mommy always remembers an orange and cream soda at the bottom of her stocking. When she got older and all the grandkids got bigger, Nana stopped doing stockings. There were many reasons but mommy blamed her big cousins for being too silly and trying to hang them on the ceiling. Anyways, every year for the past few years mommy always made a big deal to Nana about how much she missed the stockings and what a wonderful memory it was. Nana must have finally felt guilty enough and she surprised everyone with new stockings! Mommy thinks she finally talked nana into it by saying how much the great-grandchildren were missing out on special memories! Mommy was close to drying because of how happy she was! That was the best Christmas surprise!

We woke up on Christmas morning and daddy even came over to be with us to open presents. Santa was very good to me this year! He brought me the planes I've been asking for and Magnatiles and a new Big Boy Bed! Complete with Planes Bedding! How special! I got so many wonderful things from my family and it was so fun to see everyone else open their gifts. Santa had a very special surprise for mommy, a new bike! It's a cute turquoise beach cruiser bike and now we can ride bikes together!

We had yummy cinnabon cinnamon rolls for breakfast and then went to Nana's for the rest of the day. Santa filled our special stockings with soda and yummy oranges and candy and lotto tickets! Nana and Grandpa Dick got me a new doctor's kit and spiderman racecars. We had a fun day playing games and eating lots of food! Mommy felt perfectly fine pretty much all day but suddenly started not feeling well later in the evening. Just got a stuffy, runny, sneezy nose that came on very suddenly so we went home and went straight to bed!

The day after Christmas, we had plans to ride the ducks in Seattle. Mommy and I had to miss it last year so we were really excited to go this year. Well, mommy ended up being really sick in the morning and all day long! She had a fever and cold yuckiness and was super tired and barely got out of bed. We think she had the flu! She was sad to miss our fun evening but she was really happy that I still got to go. Grandpa and grandpa took me to meet Natalie, Henry and Charlotte. We had so much fun. What a special treat from Uncle Henry to take us all out for a fun trip! I really enjoyed riding the ducks and seeing the Christmas lights and the music and everything. We really enjoyed it and after the ducks we rode the carousal in downtown Seattle.

Over the weekend, we went to daddy's house to celebrate Christmas. We had a lovely time and it was fun to open gifts with them! We gave Grandpa Mikey a personalized luggage tag with my photo and some scotchmallows, and we made Grandpa Ali a wall calendar with pictures of me. They loved their presents! They also spoiled me with some fun new toys, a big Jake pirate ship and lots of new Duplos!

On New Years Eve, we went out to Mike and Cindy's house. We had a yummy dinner and Charlotte and I had fun playing with toys while everyone played a fun new dice game called Tensies. We went outside to do Pop-its and Uncle Mike came outside for awhile to shoot the potato gun with me. That was so much fun and really exciting! It was so loud and a fun way to celebrate the New Year! I was acting and feeling just fine until our car ride home around 10pm. I wasn't really acting sick but I kept saying that I was super cold and I was barely able to stay awake on our ride home. We went straight to bed when we got home and mommy thought I was warm and coming down with a fever. Mommy was assuming I was coming down with the flu bug she had a few days earlier but was hopeful it wouldn't be too bad. She got over her flu in just about 2 days. Oh well, we still had a fun New years eve and mommy was just happy that I wasn't sick on Christmas or any other important time. No better time to be sick than at a time when we can just stay home and snuggle and watch movies!

Disneyland 2014 - Photopass Photos

Disneyland 2014 - Day 6

Thursday, October 2nd

Our last morning in California. I think mommy was the saddest to be leaving. Our flight was around 3 or 3:30 which was really nice because we didn't have to rush to check out or anything. We even slept in to a decent time! We got all packed up and ready to go and then we walked to Downtown Disney and spent some time in the World of Disney store. We took our time strolling around and procrastinating since none of us wanted to leave. But it was also super hot out so we were a little relieved that we were leaving instead of spending the 95 degree day walking the parks! If we had to leave, it was a good day to go. On our way back to the hotel to get our luggage, mommy went and bought herself one last sandwich from Earl's for lunch. Yummy! Mommy might go back just for the sandwiches! We got our things and waited at our bus stop at the hotel. It was only about 11:30 or so when the Disney Express Lightning McQueen bus came, this time we took a picture!

We got to the airport with lots of time to spare and made to our gate quickly. We had a while to wait but I was happy playing on the kindle and taking a little walk. We had lots of snacks (the yummy chocolate chip cookie muffin bites from Earl's were the best!) and grandpa even got us a milkshake.

 

 

Our flight home was good and mommy felt a lot better on this flight then our flight down (she got a little sick flying early in the morning) and I watched Planes and was happy with my binky. I probably took a little snooze but we can't really remember. We landed and made our way to baggage claim. I was insistent on going to down the escalator by myself with my carry-on and long story short, mommy ended up at the bottom and I was stuck at the top and grandpa had his hands full with carry-ons and such. There was a really nice lady who helped grandpa and I to the elevator with all our things and mommy waited fro us to come down. We got our baggage and waited awhile for Grandma and Uncle Sam since there was so much traffic.

We got home and told them all about our trip and shared lots of pictures. We had such an amazing time and couldn't even imagine a better trip or experience. Grandpa had so much fun that he promised he'll never go back without grandma. We can't leave her behind again! We also know it would be fun to go with Charlotte and I also want to go with daddy. Daddy is looking forward to when I'm tall enough to go on all the big rides. Before this trip, it was 6 years since the last time she was at Disneyland and she knows she can't wait that long again! She loved it before but after our trip, she loves it even more! She hopes to go back in about 18 months (she'd go every 6 moths if she could!). she's knows that as I get older, we definitely can't go as often but she hopes to save and spend wisely so we can afford another magical vacation together again soon! She though May of 2016 would be a good time (after spring break crowds and before most schools are out) and a reasonable time to wait for our last trip. But as time passes, she doesn't know if she can wait that long! She also thinks it would be fun to go during Christmas time! Thank you mommy, grandpa and Disneyland for the most amazing, wonderful, magical trip!

Disneyland 2014 - Day 5

Wednesday, October 1st

We woke up early this morning and couldn't believe that this was our last day in the parks! Even though we were a little sad, we were super excited to enjoy every last moment and soak up every bit of fun and magic! We woke up bright and early to use our extra magic hour at California Adventure. Since Disneyland was closing that day at 6pm, we would be ending our day and California Adventure, so we planned for this night to be the night we saw the World of Color show. We had to go to California Adventure to get our Fast Passes for our World of Color seating. We got to the park around 7am and mommy went to get our fast passes and Grandpa took me to Cars Land. Even though we wanted to spend as much time as we could as Disneyland this last day and we had also had reservations at Minnie's Character Breakfast at 10am in Disneyland but we took advantage of our Magic Hour and the super low crowds at California Adventure for a couple hours. With Grandpa, I got to see Lightening and Red again, and then once mommy met up with us, we rode some rides in Cars Land. We rode Mater's Junkyard Jamboree a couple times and there was even a photopass photographer to took our picture while riding. Mommy snuck off to ride Radiator Springs Racers (I'm not tall enough yet!) and grandpa kept us busy while we waited. He even took me to buy new Cars characters from one of the shops.

 

We then strolled through park and got some yummy cookies from the Ghiradelli Bakery. We then rode Ariel's Under the Sea Adventure a couple times, there was no line at all! We decided to head over to Disneyland around 9:30 and hit up a couple photo ops along the way! (The Disney Photopass photos turned out way better)

We got checked into our Minnie's Breakfast a little early and immediately knew how much more we were going to enjoy this dining experience than Goofy's Kitchen. The characters were more available and the seating and atmosphere were so much better! We took a few pictures and then found our table and got our yummy breakfast. It was a buffet and we really wanted to fill up so we didn't have to stop for any food until dinner. We got to meet so many characters and had such a fun time at breakfast. We will definitely do Minnie's Breakfast on our next trip!

After breakfast, we went to Toontown for our last time. We rode the Gadget Coaster once or twice but the line started getting a little long (and hot) so we then headed to Mickey's house for a visit. It was fun walking through his house and it was a nice escape from the heat!

After Toontown, we wanted to hit up all our favorite rides! Teacups, Casey Jr., Pirates. We strolled through Frontier Land and Saw Jessie. We rode the Train around the park (with our yummy pretzels and frozen lemonades) and went to Pirates and the Haunted Mansion. The afternoon is a little bit of a blur and we can't quite remember everything we did. We did head back over to Tomorrowland at some point to ride Buzz's Astroblasters again, another favorite! We crammed so much fun in that I ended up falling asleep in my stroller around 3pm or so. Mommy and Grandpa strolled up main street and did some shopping. They happened to stumble upon a free bench at the perfect time and we stayed put to watch the Mickey's Soundsational Parade one last time. I was sleeping but woke up mid-parade. It was about 5pm by the end of the parade, we knew there wasn't enough time to go back and ride anymore rides, but mom and grandpa were so sad to leave! They were procrastinating a bit but we decided to head to California Adventure. It really was sad to leave. Every moment at Disneyland was so perfect and it made it so hard to leave for the last time!

 (Sorry for the sideways pictures)

At California Adventure, we first decided to go to Bug's land since we haven't had a chance to before. We weren't too impressed but we did have fun riding the Bug 'Em Buggies. It was bumper cars and grandpoa and I were in one car and mommy in another. It was fun crashing! We then stumbled upon the parade rout when people were started to gather so we decided to stick around. I got to run around with a few kids for awhile and play until the parade began. It's called the Pixar Play Parade and it was pretty fun! It had characters and floats from all the Pixar movies and all of the floats either squirted water or blew bubbles! We then went to Cars Land one last time and we finally met Mater! We've missed him until now but I finally got to meet him and get our picture taken! We then headed over to Pacific Wharf to ride the new Toy Story Mania ride. It was by far the longest line we had to stand in for our entire trip! Probably a good hour at least. Mommy can't even imagine coming during summertime now or another peak season where almost every ride would have a line that long! We were spoiled with short to reasonable lines on our trip! We really did come at such a great time. It was a "off" season because school just started so it really lessened the crowds but Halloween was just beginning so not a lot of rides were closed for refurbishment like they can be during true off seasons (like February). Anyways, it was definitely a fun ride worth waiting for. You wore 3D glasses and rode in a car while shooting "laser" guns at targets similar to boardwalk-type target shooting games.

As the sun started going down, we decided we needed to grab some food before World of Color. We did what everyone tells you not to do, we ate at meal time! Both restaurants we found were super busy with long lines but we didn't really have another choice. Grandpa waited in line while mom and I saved a table. I got a kids meal pack (cheese, applesauce, etc.)n and mommy and grandpa got yummy chowder bread bowls! Yummy! It was getting time to head over to World of color when Mommy realized she forgot to go to the Photo store to order our Photopass photos! Technically, the park was closing at 8 even though World of Color was showing at 8:15. She knew she wouldn't have time after the show to go to the shop before it closed for good! She decided to give it a shot and go to the store. Grandpa and I just strolled through Cars Land. It was pretty magical all lit up at night, just like the movie! Of course, mommy took longer in the store than she hoped it would take since a lot of people were stopping to get there photos on their way out of the park. She didn't finish up until after 8pm! She then ran to Cars Land and we all ran to the viewing section of World of Color and literally got there just in time! We managed to squeeze our way in and find a decent view. Grandpa put me on his shoulders so I actually got a pretty good view. Unfortunately, mommy couldn't see as well. But she would much rather have me see than her, so she was okay with it. It was a pretty impressive show and we're glad we had a night to see it. It was a pretty good way to end our last night. We took our time walking back to the hotel and strolling through Downtown Disney. When we got to our hotel, the headboard was lit-up with the firework lights and it was such a touch of magic. It also play "When You Wish Upon a Star." I think mommy and grandpa were both about to cry! They were sad it was our last night and that we were leaving but also so unbelievably happy at the same time. We had such an amazing trip. We are so thankful we had the opportunity to go on this amazing vacation together. Every moment was full of magic and we had the best time together. The only thing we'd wish for was just one last day!