A few pictures from my phone

Best taco lunch date!

 Liv working hard at gymnastics

Go Fish obsession

NCAA Football game obsession

New Scripture study guide

More fun emails and pictures from Ethan

Favorite Fruit Freeze's from Taco Bell.  The workers here love my kids and mix up all different kinds of creations for them.

Open Gym night!

FHE Passover Dinner in preparation for Easter.  This was a fun experience and the kids learned a lot. Trying all the different food was fun.  Some food the kids actually liked, but most they weren't too sure about.  They were all good sports and tried everything and we had a really neat dinner experience.

This is a picture I snapped this morning as the kids were heading out to get on the bus.  It makes me laugh because Ethan has a baseball mitt in his hand to bring to school, while Cole has a football and soccer ball.  All last night the kids were out playing basketball.  I love that they love playing and can have fun doing anything.

Choir Concert

Last night Liv had her choir concert.  She did a great job!  She even put on her own red lipstick :)

Cole has been learning how to play the recorder :(

Ethan isn't currently doing anything musical, but he does send me funny emails throughout the day.  Today's emails was this image.

He also likes to make pancake and waffles.  This was last nights dinner courtesy of Ethan.

The Weekend

Saturday morning started bright and early with 8 am hospital rounds for Shawn, 8am gymnastics for Liv, and 8am Futsal tournament for Ethan and Cole

The boys both played 3 games and Ethan's team ended up winning the tournament.  Cole wasn't so happy about that :(  In fact it was funny because the first game they played against each other.  It is crazy trying to root for the right team when you have a son on both.  

Liv's gymnastics ended at 10:30 and then Shawn took her to a rollerskating birthday party for the next few hours. 

Cole had a championship play off game for his indoor soccer team at 2pm.  It was a tough game for his team and they ended up coming in 2nd place.

We went with Cole's friend and his family to get ice cream after the soccer game.

We had a house showing at 4pm.  No, we are not selling the house.  Our builder likes to bring people through our home to show off some of the things they can do with their homes.

Ethan went over to one of his friends (from our old neighborhood) and played for a while that afternoon.  

Shawn and I decided we wanted to try and go out on a date.  We rented a movie for the kids and headed out around 6pm.  After stopping at 3 different restaurants with incredibly long waits, one was even 75 minutes, we ended up at Chipolte.  We made up for it by stopping by the Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory and brought home 4 deluxe caramel covered apples to share with the kids.

Sunday we had a special Stake Conference.  We were privilege to hear from a general authority and a member of the seventy.  We were pretty exhausted by Sunday afternoon so we didn't do much besides relax and watch a little basketball.

Shawn was on call this whole weekend so he was running around seeing babies at the hospital Saturday and Sunday also.  

The weather has been pretty nice lately, but this morning that changed as we actually had some snow!  It's melting and hopefully will be gone soon.

Shawn and I are heading to Chicago tomorrow to go to the temple (and hopefully stop by IKEA on the way home).

Lately....

All three kids spend this past weekend throwing up :(  It was a bad, but we are all still alive.

I signed the kids up for summer school for the first time.  We've heard such great things about the summer school program here and decided to give it a try.  It doesn't actually even sound like school to me, rather lots of fun!  Here are the classes the kids choose.

Liv:  Poms & Dance, Tennis, American Girl Dolls, Ugly Dolls, Hiphop Dance, Game Stop, Crafty Kids, Get Your Kicks

Cole:  Lacrosse, Chess, Golf, Rocketry, Lego Robotics, Field or Games, Hiking and Biking

Ethan:  Hiking and Biking, Football, Computers, Speed Strength Conditioning, Lacrosse, Ultimate Frisbee, Football, and Rocketry

The boys have a Futsal Tournament this weekend, as well as Indoor Soccer Championship playoff games.

My friend and I took our daughters, who also happen to be best friends, to see Cinderella Wednesday night.  The girls had a blast.  We went to the Bistro theatre so we ordered pizza and had a fun night.

Shawn's best buddy from High School stopped by for a visit Tuesday night.  He was in town for an auto auction and it was great to see him.  We need more visitors....hint hint :)

It's starting to warm up a bit.  The kids have been playing outside, riding bikes, playing on the trails and in the forests that surround the neighborhood.  Looking forward to Spring!

Disney Bahamas Cruise!

We just returned from an amazing Disney Cruise.  We had a wonderful time.  Amazing food, entertainment and service!

Day 1:

Flew to Orlando and boarded the ship.

It was raining when we left Florida

 The first night we ate at the Enchanted Garden Room.  The food was amazing.  

Dad:Ahi Tuna, Scallops, and Asparagus soup with crab

Mom: Cucumber Spring Roll, Berry Salad, Asparagus Soup with Crab, and Roasted chicken

Ethan: Lobster Ravioli, Asparagus Soup with Crab, and Sea Bass

Cole: Mushroom Tart and Mac and Cheese with vegetables and steak fries

Olivia: Salad, Asparagus Soup with Crab, and Salmon with roasted veggies

We had the same servers and room attendants the whole trip.  Our room host was Nyoman and he was from Indonesia.  Our server was Pong (really his name was much longer than that, but he said we could call him pong).  He was from Thailand.  Our assistant server was from Indonesia also and he told us to call him Juni.  It was amazing to see all the different countries represented in the servers.  Over 60 different countries.  Many of them left their families behind and are here working on the cruise ship for 5 months at a time.

After dinner every night we went to a live musical show.  The first night the boys were feeling a little sea sick.  Liv and I felt great.  The entertainment was amazing also.  

Day 2:

We docked this morning in the Bahamas.  We got up early and took a catamaran boat to Blue Lagoon Island.  

Our first big adventure was swimming with the dolphins.  The kids were totally freaked out at first.  When the worker asked us all the jump in with swimming dolphins we looked at her like she was crazy, but it was so amazing!

After playing with the dolphins we got to do a "foot push".  Where the dolphins push you across the water.  Definitely the highlight of the trip.  A video at the end of this post has this all recorded.

After swimming with dolphins in the morning we spent the afternoon playing on the beach.

Then took a ferry back to the boat and went swimming in the pools and went down the waterslide.

Dinner this night was "Pirate Themed" and we ate at the Royal Palace.  

Dad:Escargot, Onion Soup, and Roasted rack of lamb

Mom:Breaded and Fried Brie, Onion Soup, and Oven Baked Salmon

Ethan: Iced Lobster and Jumbo Shrimp, Onion Soup, and Crispy Roasted Duck Breast

Cole: Breaded and Fried Brie, Mac and Cheese

Liv:Breaded and Fried Brie, Pear Salad, Chicken Kabobs

 Our room staff always left fun towel animals in our stateroom with chocolates.

We went to a show after dinner again.

Because it was Pirate Night on the ship, we had a fun Pirate themed party on the top deck followed with fireworks and dancing!

Day 3:

Castaway Cay.  We docked early that morning and took a tram off the boat to the beach.  The first thing we did was go snorkeling.  The boys jumped right in and had a blast.  Liv didn't love snorkeling, but was a great sport and kept trying.

After snorkeling we played on the beach.  We had a wonderful BBQ lunch and then headed to the other side of the beach to try out the waterslides.

Shawn and I enjoyed Pina Colada's while we watched the kids play.

The cruise ship has an ice-cream machine open 24 hours.  We consumed ridiculous amounts of ice cream over the past 4 days!

We went back to the ship and spent some time relaxing and playing games before dinner.  The ship has ping pong tables, basketball courts, mini golf, shuffle board and tons of other activities.

I've talked a lot about the food, (tonights dinner included black truffle pasta, tomato tart, serrano ham and olives, filet mignon, salmon, soup, salad, and much more) but haven't shared too much about the desserts.  They were just as amazing!

Pong always did magic tricks at dinner and fun things to entertain the kids.  This is a picture of him making minnie mouse ears on Liv.

We watched our last show on the ship tonight and then went to bed.  We had to eat breakfast and leave the ship by 6:45 so that we could catch our flight.

Day 4:

Back to reality.  This is what I woke up to the morning after getting home.  Boooo!

I've also compiled a little movie of all the video I took while on the cruise.  It's 7 minutes long...sorry!  But a fun way to remember our first cruise.