Disney World - October 2018

The first week of October we decided to take one final trip to Disney World before our annual passes that we got as Florida residents were going to expire. It was kind of sad to not live 3 hours away anymore! Instead we had to drive to Albuquerque (4.5 hours), long-term park, fly to Orlando, rent a car...not quite the same, but it was really fun to be back in Florida again!

Since we arrived at about 3am on Monday morning, we decided to go to Hollywood Studios the first day. We never can spend a whole day there, so since we planned to sleep in and get a late start, it was a perfect place to go on that day. While Andy took Kylee and Ally on Star Tours, Skyler and Colby went to meet Olaf. Colby was not thrilled!

The kids were really excited to go to the new Toy Story Land that opened this summer. We'd been seeing the signs for it the last couple of times we went, so it was fun to get to go once.

The new slinky coaster was just as fun as we thought it would be. Ally was so excited that she was tall enough to go on it, and the line wasn't actually horribly long. Also, since Colby is too short to go, we were able to get a rider swap so the older kids each got to go with Andy and then again with me.

While Andy and the older kids were in line for the slinky coaster, Colby and I went to try out the other new ride - which I don't remember the name of. It was a spinning space thing. It made me dizzy, but Colby had a fun time (despite his face in this photo!).

When we left Hollywood Studios the kids were tired, so for the first time ever we actually took a tram back to the parking lot. Andy walked with Colby in the stroller, and they arrived at the car at the same time we did (because Andy runs fast!).

We ended up eating at Sweet Tomatoes twice while we were in Orlando because we love it...and I had coupons. We don't have a Sweet Tomatoes anywhere near us in New Mexico, so we hadn't been there since we left Florida.

On Tuesday we went to Animal Kingdom, which is one of our favorites. At the petting zoo Ally was convinced that the goats were mad at her, and for the first few minutes she just ran away from them crying. Finally we convinced her that the goats were NOT out to get her, and then she enjoyed brushing them.

This time they also had some other animals out, including a couple of pigs.

We had fast passes for the safari ride, and just when we were almost finished it started raining a little bit. By the time we got off the ride and walked towards the exit, it was pouring. People were running for cover everywhere, but it wasn't cold at all. I realized that the safari ride line is all covered, and the jeeps are also covered, so we decided to see if we could just go on the ride again while it was pouring. There was no line at all, and we walked right on. It was fun because since it wasn't quite so hot as it usually is, lots of animals were out.

Skyler was tall enough to try Everest this time, and we convinced him to do it. He was TERRIFIED, but he went anyway. I took a video of him riding it and the whole time he was like "I hate this. I hate this. I don't like this. AHHHHHH!" But then he agreed to go again when it was over, and he was disappointed that he didn't get to go more than twice...so I guess in the end he liked it? Kylee discovered the beauty of single-rider lines, and went on this ride 7-8 times.

All the kids love the Kali River Rapids as well. I took them on it once, and then Andy took them with the rider swap pass. Then we went again when the park was just about to close because there's never a line at night. Nobody wants to risk getting wet when it's dark!

Skyler was also tall enough to try the Whirly rollercoaster (I don't remember the name!), so Andy, Kylee, and Skyler went on that while Ally, Colby, and I went on the Triceratops spinning thing. I love trying to take pictures of Colby. He grimaces and yells "Cheeee!"

Wednesday we went to Magic Kingdom, then Thursday to Epcot, and then Friday back to Magic Kingdom. By the end of the week we're always so tired, but at the same time it seems too short! I will miss living in Florida because it means we won't go back to Disney nearly as often. I just love seeing how happy the kids are there.

Last time we went I convinced Skyler to try Space Mountain and he HATED it. Like an "I'm never going on this again" kind of hatred. This time I convinced him to give it one more try. He made me hold onto him the whole time, which made for an awkward ride for me, and he was still terrified, but I was proud of him for giving it another try.

While the older kids were riding the Goofy Coaster (Ally's professed favorite ride, aka Barnstormer), I let Colby go play in the splash pad area. I didn't want him to be miserable when all his clothes were soaking wet, so I took off his shirt so that just his shorts would be wet. He had a BLAST. This kid loves water so much, and thinks it's hilarious when it shoots him in the face.

I think I have more photos of Colby than anybody else because he was my pal while the bigger kids went on rides with Andy. On Friday we went on Dumbo 5-6 times in a row because there was no line at all so we could just get off and then get right back on. Finally I got too dizzy and had to give up.

He also loved that he got to go on his own horse on the carousel.

On our way home they changed our flight and it made for a loooooong trip! We had to get up at 3am to get to the airport in Orlando, then we arrived in Denver and had to wait 5.5 hours for our connection. Then we flew to Albuquerque, and then we still had to drive 4.5 hours home. Andy I were awake for like 22 hours straight, and we were tired. Definitely wishing at that point that we could just drive 3 hours and be home...

September 2018

As I was uploading pictures to create this blog post I started thinking about how different this September was from last year. Last year was the crazy month where we evacuated from hurricane Irma, missed a ton of school and church, and went on a couple of job interviews. Who would have thought that a year later we'd be settled in New Mexico, which was not even on our radar back then?

Andy had the week before Labor Day off, so we decided to take the kids out of school for a couple of days and make a trip to Colorado to visit the Sugiyamas. We left after school on Wednesday, and made the 8 hour drive up to Castle Rock.

While we were in Colorado we did a little bit of hiking walking. What we discovered is that when you go with a bunch of little kids, you move at a snail's pace and it can't really be considered exercise! We went to the Castle Rock stairs, which are a mini version of the Manitou incline (which I still want to do someday!). Colby wanted to walk up all the stairs by himself, but when you're his size those stairs are HUGE. After he got up to number 20, Andy picked him up and carried him because otherwise we would've been there all day!

It's so fun when the cousins get together. Connie's kids are all pretty close in age to our kids (minus Kylee), so they love to play together.

Another day we went to the mountains and walked on a trail that went along a river. The kids had fun collecting sparkly rocks. They all had their pockets filled with them, and then they opened up a store so that they could trade with each other, too.

One night we went out to dinner with our friends who live in Denver. They were running a little bit late, and after a long day of shopping, touring a candy factory, and more shopping, Colby was LOSING it. He laid down on the ground and just screamed.

However, when he got his after-dinner ice cream, he recovered quickly.

While we were in Colorado Andy decided that we should look at cars because our Acadia was starting to struggle and we didn't want to dump any money into it, especially because we had already decided we needed more space as well. Andy thought we should get a Suburban, but I just couldn't agree to drive such a humongous car. Finally we decided that if we got an SUV with three rows (8 seats), it would give us the extra space we need because we could have 3 kids sit in the second row and put the double seat down in the back. So...we started looking, and talked to Andy's friend (who manages service departments for car dealerships) about which one would be best.

Eventually we settled on a Honda Pilot. They were clearing out their 2018 models to make room for their 2019 models, so for the first time in our lives we bought a brand new car. Connie was nice enough to watch our older kids so that we could just take Colby with us. It ended up taking ALL DAY, but we got a new car!

We traded in our Acadia and drove home from our trip in our new car. The only bummer was that we didn't end up leaving until almost 5pm, so we didn't get home until 2am, and the kids had school the next day and Andy had work, so it was a little crazy!

The weekend after Labor Day we had Stake Conference up in Roswell. Since it is 75 miles away and the adult session was on Saturday night, we decided to get a hotel and make a whole weekend out of it. On Saturday morning we went to the free Roswell zoo/park. It was pretty fun. They had several cute little animals.

When we first got there the bears and mountain lions weren't out, but then when we were almost done a guy on a golf cart drove by and told us he was about to go feed the bears if we wanted to come watch. So we walked back over there. He dumped a bunch of fruits and veggies all over the bear cage and then let them out and we got to watch them eat it.

Then he dumped piles of raw hamburger in the mountain lion cage right next door, and we got to watch them come running out to chow down also. It was really cool to watch them eat.

The park also had an old carousel that you could ride for 50 cents each (free for Colby and Ally), and the kids always love carousels.

They also had a train ride for 50 cents that went around a different part of the zoo. Overall we spent about 1.5 hours there, so it's not huge...but who can beat free?!? And the kids had a fun time.

One morning Colby woke up WAY too early. After we walked with the older kids to the bus stop he was playing with his legos on my bedroom floor. Suddenly I realized he was being awfully quiet, and I looked down to find him sound asleep with his tiny baby bum poking way up into the air. It was so cute! So I turned off the lights, shut the blinds, and left him to take a nap for awhile.

Princesses Anna and Belle came to visit our house one day.

Colby LOVES to sit in the hammock.

Recently we've caught him a few times sleeping under his bed. I'm not sure how he gets in there because it's pretty low to the ground and his head is huge...but he does. And then he can't get out, so when he wakes up he cries until someone comes and grabs his feet and drags him out backwards.

The last weekend of September Andy signed up for a bike rice at Bottomless Lakes State Park up near Roswell. It was called the Tour de Ocho Millas - and was exactly what it sounds like - an 8 mile loop that you are supposed to do as many times as you can (up to 8) before noon. We woke all the kids up at the crack of pre-dawn to drive up there.

I wasn't riding this race because I'm horribly out of shape and someone had to watch the kiddos. When we got up there our friends found out that the person they had asked to watch their kiddos while they both rode wasn't coming after all, so they asked me if I could watch their kids too. Even though there were about 100 people riding, we were the only ones there to cheer at first (later on a few more people showed up), so we set up our chairs in a line at the start/finish line.

There was a little 1/2 mile boardwalk nature trail across from where our chairs were, so after a couple of hours when the kids got bored of cheering for the parents we went and walked around it. The kids found this little stream that was about 2 feet deep and really really clear and clean. They dipped their feet in it and said it wasn't as cold as they thought it would be. I'm not sure where such a clean stream would come from in the middle of the dessert, but it was pretty cool.

Andy ended up finishing all 64 miles (though he said he totally died on the last two laps), and he even managed to beat both of the friends that he went with, even though he hasn't raced in years.

The kids had fun making up cheers for all the riders passing by. Below is Skyler and his friend Thomas shouting "You are awesome, so am I, you're as fast as a butterfly!" (I'm not sure how fast butterflies are in real life?!...but they made it up all by themselves and then shouted it at every WOMAN who went by. They had a different cheer for men, because "Duh. Boys are not butterflies.".)

Skyler started playing flag football, and his team is the Atlanta Falcons. His friend is on the Detroit Lions, and they had a game against each other one day. Neither of them are the star of their team by any stretch of the imagination, but they try so hard and have a blast doing it! Also, their jerseys are legit! They're like actual little mini NFL team jerseys. They even have the NFL logo on the back.

This last photo is just a random picture of Colby enjoying a donut, because I think it's cute that he just sets it on the table and then nibbles it.