Back from Summer 2015 road trip!

The boys and I are home! We drove 11.5 hours from Louisville today. We made two QUICK stops and we were so happy to be home. We hugged Dan a bunch and the boys ran around and released pent-up energy. We had such a memorable trip, both in Kentucky and North Carolina. I have SO MUCH to report.. about things we did and memories we made and also about things I have realized about Elijah in the past two weeks. 

In a nutshell.. We miss my dad and stepmom and the Karrs so much. We made some unforgettable memories! Elijah, Sammy and I are feeling sad tonight but also happy to be reunited with Dan and to sleep in our own beds.

The boys and Gramps dressed up as cows our first morning in Charlotte to get a free breakfast from Chick-Fil-A. Aren't they cute?!

We have been continuing on a low dose of Straterra for Elijah's anxiety and thankfully, he is still responding well. Overall, he did SO great on vacation. We had a few incidents but nothing catastrophic. While we were at my dad's, E slept in a very dark and cozy walk-in closet and I think that helped him get a few great nights of sleep in a row. Depending on how the next few nights go, I may think about putting a bed together in our closet. Anything to help!

More later! Must sleep!

4th annual waterpark adventure

Elijah in his "factory!"

Dan and I wrestled about whether or not to take our annual waterpark adventure this year since finances are super-tight, but we decided to just do it. We began this tradition before Sammy turned one, so this was our fourth year! We did a lot of reminiscing about previous years and how much we all enjoy this tradition.

I love capturing this photo every year. The boys peeking in, anticipating the fun as we check in..

The first thing we do every year is...JUMP ON THE BED! The little boys and I jump our hearts out and Dan pretends to be mad. "Daddy, LOOK! We're JUMPING ON THE BED!" "NOO! No jumping on the bed!" This continues until our leg muscles are weak. I love how happy this makes our boys. 

Another "tradition" is climbing up to the top bunk (this year it was Elijah's bed...his first time sleeping on the top bunk!) and taking a photo.

Our "first supper" with poses.

Sammy continued the jumping by JUMPING ON THE COUCH!

And posing, multi-socked, with feet on table!

"Sammy, give your brother a kiss!"

Waiting to get into the waterpark.

Elijah has always loved water and waterparks (minus being splashed in the face). He gets super excited about coming here every year. He anticipates it and loves it more than any other kid on the planet, I promise. Every time we drive by this waterpark (which is often), he excitedly says, "MY FACTORY! There's my factory! When oh when oh WHEN can we go back to my factory?!" 

Once we get inside, he runs around in a systematic pattern. As I mentioned, he does not like being splashed in the face and he becomes very anxious about it. He calculates when the big bucket is going to drop water over the splash area and plans his fun around that. The math that must take place inside his head!

Gradually over the years he has become braver, which has been so fun to see. The first year, he waded in the 4-inch pool. The second year, he went down the baby slide. The third year, he went down the little orange slide. And this year? He went down the twisty blue slide all by himself! AND he went down one of the "big" tube slides with either Dan or me, which he LOVED! He was literally all over the place, wanting to go down the big slide and go around the lazy river and swim in the wave pool and play in the kid area. He was never still.

Sammy? Wanted to do NOTHING. This photo captured one of the only moments when he left his chair.

We think it mostly has to do with his independence and not wanting anyone to tell him what to do. I know he would have fun...he HAS had fun doing these very things. The first day, Dan and I worked so hard to get even a single toe of his into the water. The only thing he would do without screaming was snuggle his swim towel.

The second day, we decided not to say a single thing about getting into the water but it did no good. He loved wearing his goggles on his head, but refused to get close to the pool.

Last night after our waterparking, we headed over to the MOA to ride a few rides and have dinner. The ferris wheel is one of the rides Sammy will tolerate (only if he sits with Mama), so we rode that before dinner.

At the boys' request, we had dinner at the Rainforest Cafe. The boys enjoyed the monkeys and butterflies and the rainstorm.

The boys took a calming, warm, silly bath before bed.

And enjoyed a bit of a movie.

Snuggle time with my boys!

We had two hours to spend at the waterpark this morning before checking out. As expected, Elijah ran around the place like crazy. Sammy sat in his chair and munched on an apple.

We had an amazing adventure! We went out for our typical IHOP breakfast afterward and also experienced our typical super-tiredness after that. We got home and literally went promptly to bed and slept for 2+ hours. All of us.

We are thankful for this experience! We love our boys so much and we cannot wait for next year's waterpark adventure.

Porta winter getaway Year #3

The boys and I took our winter vacation, which took place 10 miles down the road from our home. This is our 3rd annual trip there, and we always have a blast. The first thing we always do when we get into our hotel room is...JUMP ON THE BED (against Daddy's wishes)!!

What? Leaving Mama so soon?!

We did have some disappointment upon checking in. The waterpark was to be closed for most of the time that we would be there. :( Elijah had been talking about his "water factory" for weeks and weeks, so Dan and I felt terrible. 

Thankfully we found this out while the waterpark was still open, so we threw our suits on and ran down to the water to spend a few hours there.

Sammy still does not like it! :( This was what he looked like for most of the time. "Mama, it's ferry (scary)!" Isn't his scared face so stinkin' cute?

Dan and I were proud, though, because he eventually came around. He even went down the little water slide a few times all by himself! Progress!

He was happy to take a picture with Mama on the sidelines!

As usual, Elijah ran around the place like he was born and lived there. He absolutely and totally loves this place. Dan and I took turns running around with him, tubing on the Lazy River, playing on the slides and in his "factory" and splashing in the pools.

Thankfully, we improvised well with the news that this was our only time at the waterpark. The Mall of America is two blocks from the hotel we were staying at and we happened to have a handful of Nickelodeon Universe points. Perfect!

But first, we took our annual post-waterpark bath. Sammy got into the bath willingly this year! Last year he watched from the sidelines.

Handsome boys.

In the bath realm, we have made worlds of progress with Sammy. Hopefully by next year he will be running into the waterpark excitedly! 

We ended bath time with a brother smooch!

Nickelodeon Universe was tons of fun! One of our first rides was the carousel. 

We took a family ride on the ferris wheel! (Look at that happy Elijah face.)

Sammy (as of one hour ago) said this was the highlight of his trip. "Sammy, what was your favorite part of our trip?" "Riding on the ferris wheel with MAMA!" :) He would not sit by anyone but me on the ferris wheel.

Elijah loved bouncing in the giant pineapple. He loved it so much that we went back two or three times so he could jump again. Except, every time we went back it was closed. Sammy was very worried about this (he himself wanted nothing to do with the pineapple). "Elijah's pineapple is closed! Oh no!"

Another thing I will always remember from this trip is Sammy's quoting of movie lines from the Willy Wonka movies. Every morning he woke up saying to the rest of us: "Good morning, Starshine! The world says 'hello!'"

He would also occasionally hold up his cute little palm to us and say, "No no no! This is nothing dangerous!" He is filled with wit and he loves to make his family laugh.

In between waiting for "big" rides, we rode little rides..

Including, ahem, Mama.

We had a memorable and fun lunch at Johnny Rockets.

Shakes, fries and all!

I would say the boys had a pretty amazing adventure.

They were both beyond exhausted when we got home today.

As always, we are extremely grateful for the memories.

Have a great week!

Waterpark Adventure 2012

We had a blast on our little vacation. We are all exhausted, but it is so worth the memories. There is nothing better than seeing pure joy on my boys' faces and enjoying quality time with them. Spending all of this time at home lately makes me enjoy away-from-home time immensely!

Re-charging on our way to the hotel!





We took this same photo last year when we first got into our room.



And the retro version:



Wrestle time!





Rest time for Sammy.



And for Fox.



Sammy, calling some friends.



And Elijah watching a quick show.



Elijah could not have loved the waterpark any more than he did. He was on cloud 9! For the first time, I can tell you that Elijah was full of adventure and not afraid of anything at the waterpark. This boy was all over the place, and did not stop to rest for even a minute.



At one point while I was sitting with Sammy (more on that in a bit), I watched as Dan chased Elijah from slide to stairs to slide to pool and back and forth and up and down. It was comical! But it also brought happy tears to my eyes. Our boy who has never been much of an explorer is now exploring with confidence! Proud proud proud.







And then there was Sammy. He latched his arms around my neck for almost the entire time we were in the waterpark. We got him to dip his toes in the water a few times, but he always ended up wanting to be held again. He still isn't feeling 100%, so that might have something to do with it. Mostly, I think he is a SHY kid, and he definitely needs to feel certain about his surroundings before being comfortable.





Against Dan's wishes, Elijah and I had jump-on-the-bed time back in our room. :)



We took a cute bath photo of the boys on this same vacation last year, so we decided to do it again. Except, Sam had issues with the bath. You see, our little Sammy is a very particular little guy when it comes to certain things. If his bath water isn't just perfectly the absolute perfectly perfect temperature, he will SCREAM HIS HEAD OFF. So apparently I got the temperature wrong because he would not allow us to put him into the bath. He did want to play with the toys from outside, of course.



And the retro bath photo:



I will close with a few interesting things that came out of Dan's and my mouths over the past few days. :)

"Sammy, please don't run with a knife in your mouth!"

"Elijah, please remove the fox from the microwave!"

"Sam, please stop licking yogurt off of the letter Z!"

"Elijah, please don't cook that man!"