Perfect Ending

I came across this picture which happened on our trip. It was one of my favorite moments. They had been in bed for all of 5 minutes. Of course I had to share it.

The Magic of the Kingdom

Here are our final vaca photos . We had a great trip together and the weather was so nice that we stayed an extra day just to swim in our pool. This is a picture of our kids with our friends that ended up going down to Florida also.

The Browns. We love em.
Mike and Charlie

Maggie and Jane

Charlie trying to appear miserable

Jane & Mags

Jane, Charlie & Mags

Here we can talk about the joys of a wish list. It's great because my children aren't begging for things all of the time but there is still the constant question of "hey mom, can I put this on my wish list." I always say yes and they always seem to get excited about it.

Minnie, Jane, Maggie, Mickey & Charlie

Whole Clan

Animal Kingdom

Animal Kingdom was great but I didn't get many photos there either. Highlights were the Safari ride, the wild rapids ride which Maggie was able to do, she got soaked, and of course Charlie's favorite.... Mt. Everest. We capped the day off with dinner at Rain Forest Cafe.

Character Crazed

We have many highlights from our trip but some of the extra fun was that our neighbors were down in Florida when we were and so we were able to join up with them for two of our days. I didn't take my camera along but was able to get a few shots on my phone. Sadly I seemed to miss any pictures of Miss LeighAnne. And most of this post exclude Charlie too. He was way too cool to stop and take pictures with the characters. Woody, Mike, Kimber, Jessie, Mr. Bill, Jane, Maggie &William

Rabbit, Jane, Maggie & Alice in Wonderland




Jane, Chip, Dale & Maggie




Handy Many, William, Maggie & Jane









I happen to love this video of Jane, Maggie and William watching the Beauty and Beast play. It captures why it's so fun to take your kids to Disney.

Family Fun

We decided to take advantage of a little school break in January and drove down to Florida to live it up. One of our stops was Sea World. This is my husbands magical world. He always told me that if he didn't have a family he would be a marine biologist. He loves the ocean and animals in it. Shamu.

And if you click on the picture to make it bigger, you'll find Mike in a big yellow slicker and Charlie in a red shirt. They went for the splash zone. The girls and I were not so adventurous.
Charlie, Jane & Maggie



Mike signed us up for a little one on one with the dolphins.

We were able to hit Sea World on two different days. The weather was perfect. We loved the shows. We ate dinner with the sharks. They had some great rides that we had to miss out on because Charlie wasn't quite tall enough.

Beach 2011

Sadly, we were only able to make it to the beach one time this summer. We went in September and the weather and company were perfect. Simply, we love the beach. Love it. Charlie, Jane & Maggie
Charlie, Christopher, Ainsley, Ben

Mike and Charlie

Charlie, Jane & Mags

on the couch that mom made

One stop at Planet Pizza with the Yanz family.

We couldn't resist the sign.

Last But Not Least

Back to Utah where we had a cousin swim and my sisters house. Julie (my niece) and Jane

She will be the one who receives our children if we die. This is not a joke. I'm dead serious.

(and for the record that is our official last will and testament.)

Momma and Kevin (nephew)

He will want me to say that he is my most handsome nephew but I will not say it without compensation.

Fortunate for us Mary brought Mom down so we could see again. She braved the cousin swim but was probably sweating bullets.

Taylor (great nephew), Mary (sister), and Mallory (niece, she just might be one of my favorite people to spend time with in the world.)

Dad finally joined us and we went to stay full time at Grandma and Grandpa Croslands.
The girls robbed some of Grandma's manikins of their hats.

Jane and Maggie


Grandpa Ivan and Maggie on our July 4th celebration

Grandma Helene and Mags
We partied with the Croslands until I'm certain that they were saying, "seriously, just go home already." It seemed that we had a barbecue every night.

Uncles Andy and Matt

They came the day before we left. We don't get to see them enough and I'm always left wanting more time with them.

Charlie, Uncle Richard, Baby Boston, Jane Grandpa Ivan and Mags

partying at Aunt Leslie's. Boston is the youngest grandchild and he just celebrated his first birthday.

Ada and Uncle Richard

This is the only picture that I got of her. She is the first Great Grandchild in Mike's family.

She is a delight.

She's posing with her Grandpa (mike's brother)

Kate and Charlie

Charlie thinks that Kate is his cousin. They share the same Aunt Anne and Uncle Richard but not related. Kate lives in China and Charlie thinks that is so cool. Every time he sees that something was "made in china" he thinks its awesome.

Jane, Aunt Anne and fake cousin Abigail

Mike and Charlie

We had a great time out on the boat with family. The trip was another great success. Back to real life.

Idaho

The kids were in heaven while visiting family in Idaho. You'll see why from these pictures.Back row: Mason, Braden, Courtney
middle row: Aysha, Allie, Annika, Brinley, Jane, Charlie

Front Row: Allie, Aimee, Dakota, Adam

Cousin parties galore, it was awesome. On this day we went swimming at the Meridian pool and then had dinner at Michelle's. The cousins played with puppies and ran around outside.

Jane, Courtney, Maggie
Jane has two favorite cousins on my side of the family. Courtney is one of them.

My cute nephews Jim and Zach. Both humble and sweet. Oh wait maybe just one of them is humble but both are pretty sweet.

Jane, Allie, Maggie, Charlie, Brinley

Jane on the zip line (only attempted on flat ground)
My brother put up a zip line from the top of his house down to the bottom of his yard.

Maggie screaming her guts out. Only on flat ground.

Charlie had a hay day on the zip line.

Introduced the kids to Dad

Aunt Michelle's dog, Lady, had eight golden retriever puppies before we arrived. Perfect. Enough for everyone to play with.

Spencer, Charlie and Lady

Charlie and Spencer bathed in mud. Then they thought they were invisible of course. I believe the quote out of my sons mouth was..."Aunt Michelle, my mom would never let us do this at my house."

I would like to rebuttal with.... The only mud to be had would be from someones flower bed.

Maggie

Jane, Brinley and Mags

The girls tried it the very next night. I think that they had forgotten that we made the boys hose off in the freezing cold hose. They finished off the hosing with a warm bath.

We also enjoyed visits with my sisters, Nona and Mary and Mom had us over for visits and swimming. Many more cousins than I took pictures of but boy, we had fun.