Seattle

Dave and I thought that since we can fly for free wouldn't it be fun to fly to Seattle for the day, take the kids to the science center and fly home that night. My parents could come, we'd all ride the bus and wouldn't it be fun. Weeelll this is how it really went. Our first mistake was not leaving until the 9:30 flight because you know how good we are at getting places early. Although we'd been warned that the Seattle bus system could be time consuming we still assumed we'd just hop off the plane and onto a bus. Um no. Let's just say if you are ever planning to take the city bus from the airport, plan on waiting a while. You wait for the right bus number. But some busses just flash that number to taunt you and aren't really going where you want. Then when that magical bus does appear, its full. On the bright side its really cheap and the people were super friendly and not at all scary. I had some prejudice that Seattle bus riders would all be scary. But hey this is Seattle and there are a plethora of tree huggers riding the bus around. Also gas is like $4.40. So we made it downtown and got lunch at the variety pack that is Pike Place Market, waited some more for a bus and went to the Science Center. Now some people on the bus had made mention that there was a big parade downtown that evening so we should have been prepared. Imagine our surprise when we show up at the bus stop (I had carefully mapped out our every bus route the night before) to find a notice announcing its closed for the parade. And every other bus stop for many, many blocks. Replenished with diet Coke, we finally found a bus stop with actual buses to take us to the University District to meet my sister for dinner before she goes to work. We of course took a bus that left us with a hike to the shopping center leaving us a whole 40 minutes to visit Chrissy. Then the fun began. Realizing that my printouts won't due us any good thanks to the parade, I call the busses little hotline to route us to the airport. Now its 7 and we leave at 9. The guy on the phone laughed at me! He said I'd be lucky to make it in time for the last flight at 11 to Spokane. He says (laughing the whole time after he heard my kids shrieking in the background) my best bet is to book it a mile to UW medical center in like 10 minutes and bus to Bellevue, then the airport, skipping locked up downtown. Now his mile was more like 2 and we had a large group. After booking it there we of course miss the bus by a mile. By this time we were all in a spectacular mood and looking forward to the possibility of spending the night at a hotel with nothing. I was, of course the only one with a toothbrush, we were running out of diapers, and we didn't have Tag (Greg's precious blanky we never should travel without.) We were exhausted, stranded at a bus stop, and Carl's ostomy bag exploded. Good times for all. Luckily we caught a bus to Bellevue and found that there was still another bus to the airport, in 45 minutes. For entertainment we had a local couple drinking on the bench alternating between needing a room and needing someone to call the cops to break up the fight. In the end the police showed up just as our bus did. Having been up to date on their COPS viewing, they hopped on our bus like they were heading to the airport anyways. I'm smart enough to know they were just avoiding arrest and they probably weren't going to tone down the R rated language or the fight club for us (they had been beating each other up minutes before). But not smart enough to know when to shut my mouth. There was no way I was going to ride for an hour with those fools. So I hike up front, stick my head in the drivers little cubby, and inform him that his latest passengers are the drunken, violent idiots that the police are running around outside looking for. I said it much nicer I swear. Crazy black lady gets all drunk up in my face yelling at me about kicking my butt. I think the only reason she didn't was I had Connor in the pack and she was sober enough not to hurt a baby, (like I said not too smart.) She starts telling the driver I'm drunk and I don't know what I'm talking about. Now my mom's getting all mad, I can tell she's getting ready to jump up, and yells "she's not drunk, she's a Mormon." Crazy black lady wasn't impressed. Finally some other lady backs me up to the driver so he shuts the door and starts honking for the police. Just like COPS only no exciting background music. Relieved, we rode to the airport just praying we'd make the last flight out. We ran through the airport like fools, throwing our shoes back on as we ran and barely made the last flight. Luckily Dave was able to smooth talk (yes Dave) the customer service guy into sticking us onto the flight at the last second even though we'd booked a different flight. Needless to say it was a fun day but I think we've learned a lot of what not to dos. And I'm pretty sure my Dad doesn't want to come next time.

Disneyland

I know you've all been on the edge of your seats waiting for me to update my blog with vacation photos. I can't seem to ever find the time. Even when I think I do, I'm constantly interrupted by emergencies like she's touching me and I can't get Barbie's clothes back on. Now that I've successfully redressed Ken for the 50th time today I may have a spare 5 minutes.
We had a really great time in California. We scheduled our flights so we'd get in early the first day and leave late the last day so we'd have the most time possible. We got to go to Disneyland for 2 days with my parents and Aunt Tish, Uncle Joe, and my cousin Christopher. We had a great time there. Hailey was beaming practically every second of the day. She seemed to love everything. Greggers was horrified by most of the rides except curiously for Pirates of the Carribean. Seeing Lightening McQueen and Mater at the Pixar parade was probably the highlight of his little life. Kenzie seemed to have fun, but she seems to have entered the teenage years early and spent and fair amount of time complaining and sulking about tragedies like its too hot, too cold, hungry, full, thirsty, tired you name it. I felt like that cruise commercial where the mom is trying to get a picture of the girl's elusive smile. All in all it was very fun and worth every penny.
Our family at a waterfall in California Adventure Park. Note Dave's ultracool wheelchair thanks to a recent work injury.
Greggers in his Mickey Mouse hat waiting for the electrical parade.

Tim and Jackie (and my cousins head), cutting the cake. They had a really beautiful ceremony at a vineyard outside of San Luis Obispo. Tim seemed so happy, it was so sweet.

Look Paulitz's do dance! (alcohol helps)

The kids at Redondo Beach

The girls in front of Sleeping Beauty's castle during our afternoon girls time. Every afternoon the boys would go nap in our hotel across the street and the girls would go play for a few hours. A lot of this time was spent stalking princesses, and getting every penny sucked out of me in special "princess" stores. They have this neat Princess Fantasy Faire in Fantasyland that is really cool but the store is designed for suckers with a high credit limit. I watched many parents spend 3 tanks of gas on princess outfits and hairdressers that will fix your daughters hair like a princess for $30 and up. I'm either really cheap or really smart, notice my girls are still wearing their walmart specials not $200 worth of Cinderella costumes. We succumbed to the temptation only slightly.

Connor loves his Mickey Mouse ears!

I think this was the single best moment of Greg's life. The Pixar Play Parade started with Lightening McQueen and ended with Mater. I wasn't fast enough to get a picture of his face when Mater first came out, it was like shock and awe and the second coming all in one. I thought he was going to spring tears of joy.

Hailey loved the parade. The had a lot of great floats from the Pixar movies that the kids really loved.

My family, uncle Joe, and Christopher with "Mickey Mouse Club House" as Greg calls him

Outside the Winnie the Pooh ride, also apparantly scary

I guess Gregs not the chosen one today

The girls on the Go Go Coaster in Toontown. Its not that big but they were so proud to go on a rollercoaster. Hailey especially was so excited and wanted Maddie to see her on the big roller coaster.

Greg at Manhattan Beach. He has an interesting strategy for attacking the ocean. He takes big handfuls of sand and clenches them in his little fists. Then he stands in warrior pose (like yoga) and waits for the wave to get to him. Then he furiously throws the sand at the ocean and turns and runs screaming so it can't touch him. Eventually he gave up his assault on the sea and tried to get as dirty as possible.

The girls with Ariel.



This is the bathtub water after the kids played in the mud one afternoon. Obviously it took a couple of cycles to get them clean.

Kenzie finally learned to ride her bike without training wheels. Way to go Kenzie!

Greggers showing off his stitches. You can't really see them but he got 3 stitches after he took a bad fall at the park last week. He thought it was a spider on his head and kept trying to get it off.

I'm guessing somewhere along the way here you've gotten to thinking geez there's a lot of pictures here, who does Liz think she has pictures of, Brad Pitt? Obviously I think my kids are adorable and took hundreds, these are just the select highlights. Hope you enjoyed.

Do you know who this guy is?

We didn't. Here's our random actor sighting from California. Jon Lovitz. I was leaving after checking out the local tourist attraction the men's bathroom (not a guy)at the Madonna Inn in San Luis Obispo and in walks this guy. After having the "hey isn't that guy on something" conversation he came back out and asked us if Connor was a doll. He was sitting in his car seat motionless with those gigantic wide eyes of his. In a moment of stunning genius I asked "hey aren't you on something or something." He took a moment to reply (probably to make sure I hadn't with a field trip from a special school) and said he's on SNL, A League of Their Own, and the Benchwarmers. To ensure him of our amazing intelligence I replied "Ohhh...yeah" That's all I could come up with. But then hey we continued on having a conversation about is my son a doll or a baby, so maybe he needs a special group too. I'm sure our hey are you on something was a huge ego boost to an actor and all. But hey he probably makes a bazillion dollars a year, so he can go home and hug his many, many dollars for reassurance. While the rest of us check out free tourist attractions we once saw on the Travel Channel (the men's urinal is a waterfall!!). Thanks to Mandy for telling us who the heck this guy is. I'll post vacation pics soon.

White trash or hillbillys?

Before we take off to California for Tim's wedding, let me leave you all with this little tidbit. Tonight we decided to go to Pizza Hut rather than cook since we are leaving early tomorrow. It was fairly crowded and as usual we were attracting a fair amount of attention because our kids were the noisiest there. So I look over and there's Hailey, with her shoes off, feet up, chewing on her toenails! In a restaurant! While she's eating! I tell Dave to look at his daughter and he yells Hailey what are you doing? Like its no biggie she says "I broke a toenail." And goes right back to chewing! Augh that is just so gross!
This makes me wonder, are we white trash or hillbilly's? I never notice other peoples kids chewing away on their broken toenails during a meal...or ever.

Busted

So I just checked Nik's blog and apparantly I've been caught giving away valuable memorabilia. Sorry to say but I live in a 1200 square foot apartment with 6 people. Some things have to go. I got merciless on the last move what can I say? Honestly (sorry Nik) but I haven't worn it since your wedding. Its a bit nicer than my usual skirt and whatever shirt sort of matches ensemble. And if you recall I had just had a baby and was fat. Thankfully it has been too big ever since. Too bad for me that they stuck it in the front window. I thought it would just randomly go away and Nik would never be the wiser. I guess I should have waited until we moved then gave it away to a thrift store on in Hillyard where Nik will never go. I still love you Nik.

Hannah Montana

Hailey and McKenzie are suddenly very into Hannah Montana and High School Musical. The other day Hailey put on short skirts, high heeled sandals, and a belt around her shirt and ask if she looks like the mean girl on High School Musical. Suddenly its all teeny boppers and not princesses. This video came about when we checked out this fantastic cd from the library the other day. Its some day of Barbie music cd. Which means its basically someone else singing top 40 songs from 4 years ago with a lot of pictures of Barbie in "rocker" clothes. Lucky for me Hailey has decided that this is the greatest cd EVER! She put on this show the other day for the entire cd. Hard to believe someone this uninhibited is my kid.

Eat your heart out Jane Fonda

Hailey likes to do my workout videos with me in the afternoon. The other day we topped off our workout outfits with a coat of hot pink lipstick and took some pictures (sound familar Nik?). Hailey's so funny. She gets out a little stool and a toy that looks a little like a weight and flails her arms and legs along with me. I'd love to say that she really looked so ridiculous next to a super coordinated sports star like myself, but I imagine we look about the same. Our limbs flailing wildly, quite obvious we can't keep up with the chirpy blond marching through the steps without difficulty. This embarrasses McKenzie to no end. See we have this big picture window in our living room that faces the parking lot and street. Which means that every person coming and going, and stopping to get their mail, can see the two of us jumping around like idiots. The other day she says to me "mom you know all the neighbors can see you, right." I replied that I don't really care. She was quite appalled by this and went and hid somewhere else. Once some kids from school came by and looked up into the window, I was expected her to post a sign proclaiming she was adopted.
Hailey showing off her moves.

Me and my girl

Speaking of cheesy smiles, these two are Hailey's runners up

I'm not sure what this face is about

Hailey and her friend Lily on a school fieldtrip to the Jump and Bounce

The kids and their cool new shades

My boys having a tickle fest at the park


Here are some pictures from Hailey's preschool graduation in Spokane. They had caps and gowns and played the graduation song. I thought it was pretty cute, but judging from Dave's snickering I think he thought it was a bit over the top. Hailey seemed so pleased that her new school teacher had something special to say about her. They just loved Hailey. They say she is, and I quote "such a good listener and so well behaved, she's so good with the other kids she shares really well" Um are we talking about the same kid? I'd swear she needs a hearing aid.