Spring Vacation

Back in January, Charl found a pretty good deal on airline tickets to Atlanta so we took advantage and booked a trip for the last 10 days in March. Charl was anxious to get away and this was a good time for him to take off work before his "busy" time started. We were hoping to escape cold weather in Utah and enjoy the warmth of the south, but the weather didn't cooperate as we had hoped. We spent 3 days at the beach in Panama City, FL and it rained about 85% of the time we were there, but we still were able to do some fun things. Nonetheless, my parents were excited to have us and so were the Kangs. I'll do a short summary of each day and add corresponding pictures.

Thursday, March 19: Travel day. The kids did pretty well on the flights. Anders only had 2 fits on the first leg of the flight out and he managed to crawl under the seat and come out in the row in front of us. The lady kindly handed him back to me. We landed at 12:30 am, so we didn't make it back to my parents until 2 am.

There's our plane. Getting ready to board in SLC.

Cool little playground in the Dallas airport. It was sparse at 9:30 pm.

Holly's looking a little tired. But this was a nice break.

Anders on the suticase slide.

Friday, March 20: We slept in and just stayed around the house and let the kids play. I didn't take any pictures on this day.

Saturday, March 21: This was a full day. We went with Granny to Kohl's to exchange a dress and I found a white sweater for Holly. Then we drove up to Amicalola Falls (about 45 min. north of my parents house). Anders loved seeing the waterfall. We only spent about 2 hours here because we had to get back in time for Charl and I to go out to dinner with my friends Ginny Hemsley, Jeff Holleran, and Jonathan Edwards. We ate at a BBQ joint. I had ribs, Charl had beef brisket. Then we had ordered cheesecake to go from another restaurant and went back to Jonathan's house where we could visit some more.

Granny pushing Holly up the path leading to the Amicalola Falls.

This is the platform where the stairs begin. Holly and Granny stayed while the rest of us climbed to the top.
175 steps up to a platform just below the top of the falls. They're almost there.

We made it.

This is the very top of the falls. We drove the car up to this lookout. Look at the beautiful north Ga. mountains. It was late in the day and a little overcast, so the picture doesn't do it justice. This is the start of the Appalacian Trail.

Another view from the top. Anders really did love these waterfalls. He talked about them a lot.

Charl and the boys (Kyle & Anders)

If we could only figure out how to make our backyard look like this!

From the top of Amicalola Falls...A better view of the mountains.

This is where we ate dinner.

Sunday, March 22: I took Charl and the kids to my old ward instead of going to my parents ward (they overlapped). It was fun to see some old friends and some of the kids I used to teach in Sunday School.

Monday, March 23: We drove out to Jennifer and Sherman Moore's house to spend the evening with them. We got to see their new home and Sherman went all out and grilled us steak (fillet Mignon)...and it was the best steak we've ever had! I took a picture of Sherman cutting the tenderloin that he got from the meat market, but for some reason my camera lost that picture.

Kyle taking Anders drinking and driving in the Dodge Viper .

Charl shooting some hoops. We played a game of horse...I forgot who won.

Charl and Holly on the porch at the Moore's home.

Holly checking out the dog, Lola, in the arms of Ryan.

Kate & Jen.

Tuesday, March 24: We went to the Stidsen's for dinner and we celebrated Dwight's birthday. We had more steak. Good thing it's my favorite food!!! Stephanie and Eric just had their 3rd daughter (Ansley) a month earlier, so it was fun to hold a newborn. Stephanie, Eric and Dwight were the first people I met when I moved to Atlanta.
The kids played in the "soon to be" flower bed in the Stidsen's front yard. Holly ate the dirt and Andersen stole the older girls pails and shovels. (Holly, Anders & Mia)

This is a cool tree in the Stidsen's front yard. I took a picture of Rylan on his 4th birthday sitting in this tree and it has always been one of my favorite pictures. So, I posed Anders in the same tree and he actually smiled for me.

Anders and Alexis (aka: Alex & Lexi Lou)

Dwight holding Sara and Eric holding Ansley.

The whole gang.

Wednesday, March 25: Charl and I went to meet with my financial advisor...exciting, I know. But I was able to withdraw some money to pay for the built-in cabinets I'm putting in my kitchen. I can't wait!!! (Now I'll have a place to hide the clutter!) I made dinner (fajitas) for everyone and we spent the evening packing for the beach escape.

Thursday, March 26: The 6 hour drive. The drive went mostly pretty well except that during the last hour of the trip Anders kept hitting Hanna in the face. She was sandwiched between Anders & Holly in the back row and I think he just wanted to get out. Hanna was trooper for putting up with him. (On the drive back, we put Anders in a captain chair so he couldn't reach anyone.) We arrived in the late afternoon and it was raining, of course. We checked in and the kids went swimming for a little bit, then we went out to eat at the Olive Garden. It was a long wait to get our food and Anders threw a pretty LOUD fit. It was a little embarrassing...I'm mean everyone turned to look at him. So we hid out in the bathroom for a little while and played in the sink.
Hmmm...should I get in the water??

"That was fun."

Friday, March 27: More rain! Tornado warnings, too. We swam in the morning and then we went to Gulf World. This was a perfect thing to do on a cool, windy, rainy day. We saw a sea lion show, a dolphin show, a bird show and a reptile show. The kids got to pose with the sea lion and Rylan got kissed on the head. Julie had the sea lion kiss her too nearly 15 years ago. It was a different sea lion, however that sea lion still is at the park, but he's retired. The shows were every bit as good as Sea World and because it's a small park, you really get up close to the animals.

A dolphin stamp. Now he can see the shows.

Waiting for the Sea Lion show.

I forgot the Sea Lion's name, but he could do lots of cool tricks.

Posing with the Sea Lion after the show. He kissed Rylan on the head.

Waiting for the dolphin show to start. Holly couldn't wait...but she had a good nap.

Look how close we are to a dolphin.

Saturday, March 28: Heavy winds and rain captured the morning. By 1 pm, it let up a little bit and we decided to go to the outdoor pool anyway. The water was a little cool, but tolerable. We moved over to the hot tub and that felt great!. After 20 min. in the hot tub, the sun broke through and it got warmer. We made our move to play in the sand. Granny brought down the sand toys and we got to build sand castles and walk and run on the beach. The beach was closed, so we couldn't go in the water because it was too dangerous. That was fine by me because it was too cold for my liking anyway. After we got cleaned up we went to the outdoor mall and ate dinner and browsed the shops.

Me and the kids in the kiddie pool.

Hanna is fleeing to the big pool.

They had play equipment on the beach for the kids.

Playing in the sand. This is what we came here for.

R & R

Future Lifeguard.

Jogging.

So sweet.

The girls.

Just playing.

Let's go surfin' now...

Sunday, March 29: Beautiful sunny skies, but chilly (55 degrees). We walked down on the beach one last time to take some family pictures, but it was rather windy and the kids didn't really cooperate...what's new. Then we drove home and did all our laundry and packed, again.

Hold still and look at the camera...not a chance!

Sadly, this was the best shot we got.

Monday, March 30: Back to the airport. Anders threw another fit getting out of the car because he wanted to keep Kyle's favorite green car. This tantrum must have distracted me! We quickly unloaded and I was trying to control Anders while Charl was dealing with 2 suitcases and Holly in a stroller. We said a quick goodbye to my dad and he took off. With Anders kicking, hitting and screaming, we barely make it into the ticketing area and that's when I realize...my purse is in the car...heading north on I-85. I called my dad's cell phone numerous times, but of course, he couldn't hear it. So, if you're wondering if you can get on a flight without a driver's license or picture ID...apparently you can if look innocent and desperate enough, though I don't recommend it. When I got to the security checkpoint, they called a special TSA agent over. I explained the situation and he says, "I need something with your name on it." I'm thinking, duh! it's all in the purse, in the car, heading back to Alpharetta. Then I remembered that I had a copy of our marriage certificate in the diaper bag. It had my name on it...he said, "that will have to do." He let me go through the screening, but I had to be "patted down". That was a stresser!!! My mom overnighted my purse to me the next day. All is well!

Valentine's Day 2009!

Last year I tried taking a cute picture of the kids on Valentine's Day. Well, I took a lot of pictures, but the kids didn't have the same idea of "cute" as I did. This year, I thought I'd give it another try, but this time the camera is to blame. It died. For the past few months, it has been acting up, but it would mostly work. Now it is really dead, so I have no pictures for this post.

This is how the kid's day went:

Andersen got a special present from Mommy. I bought him a Lightening McQueen car a few weeks ago, but Charl didn't want me to just give it to him for no reason, so I used Valentine's Day as my reason. I love this little boy and I knew the car would make him so happy and Valentine's Day is for making the special people in your life happy. We should have bought him one at Christmas, and for whatever reason, we didn't. (He got a set that had Doc, Sally, Chick, Mater, Filmore, & Guido.) He's been obsessing about the McQueen car ever since because 2 of his cousins have the car and he was always so sad when he had to leave it behind when he went home. Now he has real races between McQueen, Chick, and The King.

Holly spent the day miserable suffering from a bad cold. Her nose was non-stop dripping. She started running away from us as we'd chase her with a tissue. She didn't have an appetite and was really fussy, however Motrin did give her a little relief. On a positive note, one of her top teeth broke through. A few days shy of fourteen months...and now 2 1/4 teeth...doesn't make for easy eating. The other 3 top teeth should hopefully pop through any day. Oh, I did get Holly a little gift, too; some cute hair barrettes.

This is how Charl and my day went:

In the morning, Charl decided to make us all some waffles, but we were out of pancake mix. He looked in a cookbook and found a recipe and made some delicious waffles. I don't think I'll ever buy pancake mix again...these were sooooo much better. After breakfast, I had a basketball game at the church. Charl stayed home with the kids...if Holly wasn't sick, they probably would have come to watch. It was the first round of the Stake Tournament and we won. Next week, we will have a much tougher opponent...the team we lost to in the finals of the Regional Tournament last year. Then we just had a lazy day...I think everyone napped except me, but I should have napped. I think we were starting to catch Holly's cold. We decided to get take out, so we went to Chili's. I had Monterey Chicken (my favorite) and Charl got a steak, but we shared and got the best of both. Andersen got pizza and chocolate milk while Holly wasn't really interested in eating. I was going to make some cinnamon rolls or mint brownies to go with our take-out, but that never happened. I can't believe we had a Valentine's Day dinner without dessert, specifically chocolate...I think that is a sin! (I'm typing this a few days after Valentine's and I definitely have Holly's cold. When I'm better, I'm going to get my chocolate!!!) Charl got me flowers...red, pink, and white tulips. They are very pretty today now that they have all opened up. I always tell Charl not to spend money on flowers, but he loves giving them to me, so I'm happy to enjoy the beauty they bring into our home. Thanks! I love you, Charl.

A Day in the Snow.

It snowed last night/early this morning, so I decided to get Andersen out of the house in my attempt to divert him from his latest obsession...watching CARS all day long. I put his hat and gloves on (the coat remained on the steps in the garage) and he made his way out of the garage and down the driveway...
but he didn't get very far before he slipped and landed on his bum. Converse probably aren't the best snow shoes. He said, "It's icy." The gloves are too big, so he eventually ditched those.
He actually slipped twice, but then he got the hang of it. After I shoveled the driveway, I attempted to build him a snowman. I've never made one before, so I figured the smaller, the better.
Here he his looking at the snowman...not totally sure what to think of it.
Then he decides to befriend the snowman,
and pick it up,
but his head falls off. He's still content on carrying the remains, but...
he only gets to the garage before the body falls off and crashes to the floor. This sent him into hysterics, so I quickly rebuilt "Frosty". The newly repaired Frosty found a new home on the back deck so Daddy could see it when he got home from work. (didn't take a picture of that.)
He was soaking wet from his falls, so when we came inside I stripped him of the wet clothes and he warmed himself up under some blankets. I went and made him a sandwich and when I returned to get him, he was...
sound asleep!

Holly loves...

...clapping,

...being sweet and cute,

...standing on chairs,

...sitting in chairs (especially ones that rock),

...reading books,

...sucking on her binki,

...rummaging through the garbage,

and eating what she finds.

These were just some random pictures I had taken over the last week, mostly because I thought she was wearing cute outfits, but they really depict all the things that Holly loves right now.

Holly in Blessing Dress 1 Year Later

One year ago today, we blessed our little Holly Ann in our living room because there was a massive snow storm and we weren't sure everyone would be able to make it to the church on time. (Some wards, like Layne's, canceled church because they couldn't keep the parking lots cleared.) By afternoon time, the skies cleared and the temperature rose, the roads cleared, and everyone who was supposed to make it, did. I didn't want to reschedule the blessing because my mom was here visiting and I had a ton of food prepared. In the end, it was a beautiful, happy day.

So today, being one year later, I decided to dress Holly in her blessing dress and take pictures. It was a little tight across the chest, but other than that, it fit pretty well.

February 2, 2008

February 2, 2009

Holly loves to sit and spin in the rocking chair. Look how mad she got when I tried to make her stand.