Disneyland!!!

On May 14th we headed down to California for a week of fun with my family. Everyone was able to go which made it even better! We all drove down on Friday the 14th, and we ended up renting a van and carpooled with Emily, Dave, and Bailey. We stopped in St. George for a little b-day party for Ashlyn, and then drove a little further to Prim, Nevada where we stayed the night at Whiskey Petes. We had a hard time finding our way to our rooms, and so we kept circling around the casino, until finally a worker asked if we needed help. We got quite the looks from people in the casino. I guess they don't often have large families staying in a casino, or maybe they just thought it was funny that we were lost. Who knows, but I still laugh at what we must have looked like wandering around in there.

On Saturday we drove the rest of the way to Anaheim and we ended up getting there a little earlier than we could check in to our hotel, so we decided to go to downtown Disney for awhile. Raylee loved the big Disney store there and was in heaven looking around at all the Disney things.

After we got checked in to our hotel, the guys and Leslie left and went to an Angels game and we just stayed back at the hotel, had pizza and went swimming in the pool. That night we went up to the roof (or firework viewing deck) of our hotel and watched the fireworks from Disneyland.

We stayed in a suite in the hotel which had two separate rooms and a little common room that connected the two rooms. Since we had two queen beds in our room Raylee got to be bed buddies with Leslie.

The guys brought a playstation and set it up in the little common area. They could be found here playing any spare second that they had.

On Sunday we went to the beach! The weather was definitely not the best, but it was still a ton of fun. Raylee was a chicken when it came to the water and this was as close as she got although she loved the sand and would have been content to play in it all day long.

I spent the whole time on the blanket holding Jackson while he slept.

Dave made a big hole so that he could bury one of the kids, but none of them wanted to so my dad decided he would be buried. He looks like a member of the lollipop gang :)

After the beach we went to the flea market near by which was absolutley huge! We spent hours in there and never ended up seeing it all.

Monday was our first day at Disneyland. I can't even tell you how excited I was to take Raylee there and I definitely wasn't disappointed! We of course had to get a picture in front of the castle. I was handing the camera to my mom to take the picture and I dropped it before she had grabbed it. It ended up cracking the case of the lens and started taking fuzzy pictures. I couldn't believe that I had broken our camera the first hour we were in Disneyland, but luckily Corey was able to fix it enough that the pictures weren't blurry.

The first character we saw was Buzz Lightyear and Raylee was definitely not to sure about him. She hadn't ever seen Toy Story so she had no idea who he was. The only way she would go up to him is if someone carried her. I was hoping she would be better with the other characters that she actually knew, but she never did get much braver.

Our first princess spotting was Princess Tiana. Raylee loves Princess and the Frog and loved seeing her although we never got to get her autograph. She talked about "Princess Tinana" for hours after that!

The rest of these pictures are just from Monday and Tuesday at Disneyland. Just a bunch of character and ride pictures! I only brought 1 hoodie and 1 pair of pants for all of us because for some reason I thought California would be warm, so that is why we are in the same clothes in every picture!

Raylee was attached to my moms side the entire trip! She didn't want to go on any ride with me or Corey if Grandma was available to go with! She wouldn't even let us push her stroller and would throw a fit if we tried! If she wasn't a grandma's girl before this trip, then she definitely is now!

There were a couple of rides that Raylee couldn't go on because she wasn't quite tall enough. She was pretty sad on a few of them since most of her other cousins were tall enough to go.

Probably my favorite moment of Disneyland was the Playhouse Disney Play. Raylee was so cute to watch during this play since she knew most of the characters in it. She was dancing and singing along, and really getting into it! For lunch one day, instead of going out of the park to eat we decided to get one of these turkey legs to share. It was huge and delicious!

Raylee loved seeing the princesses, especially her favorite princess Cinderella.

My mom and dad were nice enough to take all the kids back to the hotel on Tuesday night and let all of us go on some of the grown up rides.

On Wednesday we took a break from Disneyland and had another day at the beach. We started at a beach that had some tide pools which were really cool. Everyone had fun looking in them and seeing what creatures they could find including crabs and hermit crabs!

Then we went to another beach to swim and play in the sand. It was still a little chilly that day but we still had a blast!

The best moment at the beach was when we Jared and Baylen were in the ocean and we saw a seal right by Jared, so we were all yelling and pointing at them so they would look over at it, but they thought we were telling them there was a shark in the water, so they got out of the water as fast as they could!

The guys and Leslie had lots of fun playing on the boogie boards in the ocean.

I once again spent the time holding a sleeping Jackson. I guess there was something about the sound of the waves that lulled him into a deep, deep sleep!

On Thursday since it was our last day there we woke up early enough to get there for the opening which is when all the main characters come out to the entrance.

While were standing in line for Mickey, Raylee was waving to him and saying hi, but as soon as it was our turn she got super shy and wouldn't even look at him. The mickey was so cute and was playing peek a boo with her until she warmed up to him a little.

Then as we were leaving after our picture, he stopped me and started playing with Jackson, and then he gave him a kiss with his nose. So cute, although Jackson doesn't looked to thrilled about it!

We sent Raylee up to see Pluto with Ashlyn which she didn't appreciate. She went to stand by him for his picture and he put his paw on the top of her head and as soon as he did that she booked it out there as fast as she could. So we only got a picture of her on the run!

When Corey and I went to Disneyland 5 1/2 years ago we had some green cotton candy that we loved, and so we were on the lookout for it this time. Jared ended up finding it for us in downtown disney and it was as good as I remembered!

Since it was the last day we went back to the princesses hopin there would be different ones but the only one that was different was Jasmine.

And of course we had to get a picture by our letters!

I think Raylee was the perfect age to go to Disneyland for the first time and was so much fun to watch with the characters and rides! Raylee said her favorite ride was the Dumbo ride and the Hunny ride (Pooh Bear). She liked all the rides except for pirates of the carribean, and did a lot better than I thought she would. Jackson was an angel the entire time, and would only get sad when he was hungry. I kind of felt bad for him since he spent so much time in the stroller, but he did so good!

This trip was SO much fun, and went by WAY too quickly, but I loved every second of it!!!

5 Months

So, I am a major slacker and didn't take Jackson in for his 4 month checkup until he was 5 months. Oops! So, anyway here are his 5 month stats:

Weight: 14 lbs 5 oz (17th percentile)

Height: 26 inches (61st percentile)


And here are a few things about Jackson:

• He is still an amazingly good baby, but he is starting to be a little more vocal and let his thoughts be heard, whether they are happy or sad.
  
  


• He loves his sister and always has smiles for her, and puts up with quite a bit of smothering and smashing.


• He is always shoving something in his mouth, or at least trying to including: toys, blankets, hands, my hair and face, and anything else he can get his hands on.


• He always has scratches on his face and the top of his head because when he is either getting tired or just waking up he digs into his face or the top of his head and no matter how good I am at cutting his nails, he still ends up scratching himself.


• He is now wearing 3-6 month clothes


• He still wakes up in the night and it seems to be getting worse. It was just once a night, and now it can be up to three times a night much to my dismay.


• He still wears a swaddling blanket at night because if I don't put him in one, he ends up with a ton more scratches all over his head.


• He loves to play pat-a-cake, and almost always laughs like crazy when he plays.


• He has a love/hate relationship with the floor. He likes to be on the floor, but he has learned to roll over from his back to his tummy, and so he tends to get stuck on his tummy which he does not love.
  
  
  and a lot of times he gets wrapped up in his blanket which gets him even more frustrated.

He loves to sit in the bumbo, especially when that means he gets to be where the action is. He likes to sit in it up in the kitchen while Raylee and I eat lunch or while I am making dinner etc.

We recently got out the little einstein activity center. He likes to be in there, but we still have to put a blanket in there with him so he doesn't flop around too much. He especially likes to bounce in it.

And we just gave him rice cereal for the first time right after he turned 5 months. We let Raylee feed him, and I was surprised at how well he did although he got tired of it after like 5 bites and started gagging on it. Now he doesn't really like it at all anymore and spits it out everytime we try and feed him.

I seriously can't believe how big he's getting, but we are loving every minute of it!

Pictures

I finally went and got the kids pictures taken. They didn't turn out fabulous, but there were a few cute ones!

Two Little Monkeys!

Raylee and Jackson got matching pajamas and Raylee thought it was so cool. She said "Mommy, Raylee Jackson have matching jammies. Take a picture!" I think she's starting to realize those picture worthy moments!

In this next picture Raylee was saying, "Jackson, you gotta mile (smile)!"

I love my two little monkeys!!

Easter and a Special Visitor!

Easter this year was SO much fun. We did lots of partying for most of the week before Easter because my Grandma Whipple came to visit us from Oregon! She arrived on the Tuesday before Easter so we went down that night for dinner and it was the first time she had seen Jackson.

On Thursday we went down to my parents house again and this time we had a girls night out. We left the guys at home watching the kids and we went out to dinner at Zupas (SO good!) and then we went to see The Last Song. It was so much fun and I think I need to do this more often:)

On Saturday we started out the day by going up to Tremonton for their Easter Egg hunt. Totally worth it even with all the snow! Raylee came out of there with 12 full size candybars! Then we went to Corey's brothers house for awhile.

Then we headed out to my parents house for some more partying!

We played Easter Bingo.

We dyed Easter Eggs. For little kids it works really well to put the egg in a wisk, just in case you were wondering why Raylee is holding a wisk.

All the girls used malted robin eggs as lipstick and gave ourselves blue lips.

We decorated cupcakes andsugar cookies.

And my dad took Raylee and Ashlyn on horsey rides. As soon as he was done Raylee would climb back on and say do it again. I think she would have kept on riding the "horsey" all night long!

On Easter morning, Raylee was really excited to see that the Easter Bunny had brought her a new trike! She rode it in the kitchen all morning long.

The Easter bunny also hid some egss with candy for her to find. She did really good and only needed a little help finding them!

After we watched conference we headed down to my parents again. After a yummy Easter dinner, the kids got to go om a scavenger hunt to find their Easter packages from grandma and grandpa.

Then later that night we had our second annual egg cracking contest. Everyone dyed an egg on Saturday, and on Sunday Corey made a bracket and everyone got to compete with their eggs. Two people would go against each other and you just hit the ends of your egg together and only one of the eggs will crack.

I won last year, but this year Emily won it and became Captain Egghead and got to take the awesome trophy home!

We had an amazing Easter, and it was so much fun to get to spend so much time with my Grandma!

2 Months and a Blessing

Our cute little Jackson turned 2 months on the 14th of March. Time is just flying by and we are loving every second of it! We took the little guy in for his two month check-up this last week and the doctor said everything is looking good besides him having a double ear infection as well as another cold. I think the poor kid has been on some type of antibiotic for half of his life. Anyways, here are his stats:

Weight: 11 lb. 10 oz. 24th percentile

Height: 22 1/2 in. 25th percentile

A few things about Jackson now:

He is really cuddly, which I am loving!

He moved from newborn clothing to 0-3 month clothing right at about 2 months

He is a pretty smiley baby. You don't have to work too hard to be rewarded with one of his gummy grins.

He is a really good baby. He really doesn't actually cry very often. He will usually just grunt when he is hungry or wants some attention.

He loves his binky!

He has some really cute rolls on his thighs.

We call him our little owl, because he coo's a lot and when he does it always sounds like an owl.

He will usually sleep for a 5 or 6 hour stretch at night. I wish it was longer, but I'll take what I can get.

He just started laughing and it was so cute! He's only done it once, but we are sure working hard to try and get him to do it again.

He loves Raylee (even though she can be a bit smothering) and always has lots of smiles for her.

He has a really cute cry and sad face. I know its bad but sometimes when he is crying I let him cry a little longer just because I think it's so cute.

Jacksons Blessing

We had Jacksons blessing on Saturday, March 20th. Our bishopbric was nice enough to let us do his blessing outside of our Sacrament Meeting so that we wouldn't expose Jackson to all those germs. We just had it at our church with our families, and it turned out great! Corey did a wonderful job with the blessing, and then we had a dinner afterwards in the gym. I think Raylee was a little confused because her cousins on both sides were there and she wasn't really sure who she was supposed to play with! My mom was nice enough to make Jacksons blessing outfit, my grandma crocheted his booties, and Coreys grandma crocheted his blanket.