Meeting Mickey at his house

This was one of the coolest parts of our trip for me. We went to Toontown Tuesday night after the rain let up a little. There weren't very many people in the park, so we really didn't have to battle crowds at all. It was great. We went through Mickey's house, and everything is totally kid-friendly. They could touch and play with everything they saw. Stephen loved being able to get down and run around inside. Then as you think you're nearing the back door of the house, they have you wait in a little room. Then two families at a time they take you into a smaller room and then open a door, and there's Mickey!!! Kaymi immediately ran to give him a hug. It was so intimate because there really weren't very many other people around, and we didn't feel rushed to get our picture and then be done. It was very cool, and I think that Stephen and Kaymi both enjoyed it. I know that I did!

Princesses

Kaymi is not really into BEING a princess (in fact, when we pretend, she usually wants to be the hero/prince in the story and tells me that I'm the heroine/princess) , but she does love the stories about all of the Disney princesses. At Disneyland they have an area called the Princess Faire, and at certain times throughout the day they have special events there. One that we loved was the story telling. The princesses actually come and tell their own stories. They lay out little rugs on the floor right in front of the stage where everyone can sit and listen. It was just like story hour at the Library-- it was that intimate! We got to hear Mulan and Belle tell their stories, and afterwards Kaymi got to go sit on the Princess Bench to have her picture taken as well. Then she got her own little crown to decorate with stickers and wear. We could have listened to stories all day, she loved it that much. We also saw Snow White, but by the time it was Kaymi's turn to take a picture with her, she was totally scared. Everytime we saw a character or princess, Kaymi would ask if she could go give them a hug.

Crazy Characters! (not just the Disney ones)

We got to see so many of the Characters while we were there. It was so fun! Kaymi loved most of them. Although, when Captain Hook tried to kiss her hand she wasn't so sure about him. She just looked up at us like, "What is he doing!?" We had a hard time getting Stephen to look at the camera during most of the Character pictures because he was way too interested in looking at them.

Fun in San Diego

These pics are from the San Diego Zoo's Wild Animal Park. I really liked that this park was almost out in the middle of no-where. It was nice to see that places like that do really exist in Southern California. It almost had a "foresty" feel to it. It was great to be in a park that was a lot less crowded for a day. One of our favorite things about this park was being able to hear the lion roar. As it got dark the lion began to roar and did so multiple times throughout the night. It's a sound I've never heard in person and that I only enjoyed because I knew that he was behind a BIG fence. They had a great carousel that we had fun riding as well. Kaymi HAD to ride the lion. She was pretty insistent. It was so cute. I wish that I had a picture of it, but our camera was really acting up toward the end of the trip.

The dolphin show and the Shamu show at Sea World were AMAZING! We also saw the sea lion show (which Kaymi is still talking about because it was so funny) and the pet show. Did you know that you can train cats to do amazing things like walk a tight-rope UP-SIDE-DOWN!? We had an amazing day because we just walked from show to show. We got to see everything that we wanted to see without having to rush at all. And the clydsdales (sp?) were amazing. They are such beautiful animals. I don't have a picture of this, but we got to feed the dolphins. It was pretty cool. You hold your hand palm down over the tank and they come right up to you. We got to touch them and throw little fish in their mouths. The whole Sea World experience was incredible for me. Seeing the things that they can train these magnificent creatures to do really brought them to a different level for me. It helped me to see more clearly just how amazing all of God's creatures are. Anyway, Sea World was definitely a highlight for all of us.

Our first BIG snow of the season!

It snowed so beautifully on Saturday that we couldn't keep the kids inside. Neither of them have snow pants yet, so we didn't stay out very long. But they both loved playing in it. They both love the outdoors so much, even when they're practically freezing to death. Our neighbors built a little snowman out front, so Kaymi had fun adding to that as well.

Christmas Tree--Take 3!

Well, here's our THIRD tree of the season . It's beautiful and we love it. We just hope that this one actually takes up water. We've gotten our tree from the same place for the past 3 years and haven 't had any problems before. We just seem to have really bad luck this year. However, we were totally impressed with their customer service. We called to tell them that our 2nd tree wasn't drinking water and they told us that they would swap it out again, no problem. But our major dilemna is that we don't have a truck. We've been borrowing Andy's dad's truck but didn't want to bother him again for a third trip. We explained this to an employee named Scott, and he told us that he would bring us another tree and take the other one back. So, we went to pick out another tree. When we got there we liked a bigger tree than we'd paid for, so we asked if we could pay the difference. Scott told us that he would take care of it. So, not only did he bring our tree home for us and take the old one back, he also gave us a nicer tree than the one we originally paid for. His level of customer service went above and beyond what we even hoped for. If any of you need a great place to buy your tree (don't let our bad luck disuade you!), we'll tell you where to go. They've really taken care of us.

Andy's sister, Lindsay, came to dinner the night that we decorated tree #3, so we got to have her here for our fun.

Here we are in front of our finished product (hopefully). We hoping that the "third time's a charm".

Here's Stephen "helping" us decorate the tree. I'm not sure if he's putting ornaments on or taking them off!

Stephen's First Haircut!

This is the end result of our hair-cutting experience. It was most traumatic for me by far. Stephen's hair is so short! I wish we had a longer setting on our clippers. However, he looks happy and now he looks even more like his wonderful Daddy with his sharp new hair-do!

This picture was taken courtesy of Kaymi, our budding photographer. I look happy, but there were a few tears as I took the clippers to my beautiful baby boy's hair for the first time.

We finally decided that Stephen's long locks needed a trimming, so this is what his hair looked like before I started "trimming".

Technologically Savvy

Kaymi loves to "do her letters" on a website that we love. She has learned all of the letter names and sounds and can recognize a few words. I usually let her work on the computer like this only when Stephen is napping. But on this day I was cleaning the bathroom and decided to let her keep working on her letters after Stephen woke up. He just crawled right up and sat down next to her. When I came out to see what they were up to (it had been too quiet for too long, if you know what I mean), there they were both sitting quietly and getting along while learning the letters! I was so amazed that I had to snap a quick picture. It's amazing to me how technologically savvy these kids come.

Here's Kaymi and Stephen ready to go "trick-or-treating". Andy actually stayed here and handed out candy while I took the kids around to a few houses in our ward(Andy wanted me to experience "real" trick-or-treating). Kaymi caught on to the whole idea pretty quickly. She seemed to enjoy going from house to house. She even got to see her Nursury teacher, Sister Semidey. She was pretty excited about that. Kaymi also loved that Mele and Walter Semidey were dressed as Violet and Dash from "The Incredibles." Stephen just grabbed a candy bar from his pumpkin and chewed through the wrapper to get to it right away. He was content to have me carry him while he ate! I'm not usually a fan of Halloween, but I have to admit that I really had fun this year. I've never gone "trick-or-treating" in a neighborhood where you can actually walk from house to house. (In Idaho we had to drive from place to place because everyone is so spread out there!) It was so much fun! We saw a lot of our friends along the way, and a few homes in the ward were so "decked out" that it was like one big party! After our rounds in the neighborhood we headed back home to get Andy so that we could go out to Spanish Fork to see Grandma and Grandpa Soderberg.

This was our family pumpkin! We carved this one together, but we painted 4 small pumpkins as well. Kaymi really loved cutting out the eyes and the nose with me.

We've joined the 21st century!

Like many of you, we've finally given in to the blogging pressure! I was so inspired by looking through some of your blogs tonight that I decided it would be a fun way to keep in touch with so many of you. So, hopefully we'll learn how all of this works quickly and have our page up and running soon!