My parents left for home today. So since we were all home due to Martin Luther King Day, we went to the movies. First we stopped by California Tortilla (which I just LOVE). The kids did so well there. Definitely a restaurant to remember. We're now rating restaurants on "4 child friendliness". This one had large booths for us adults to block in the kids, and they easily fit 6 people. Plus Reagan and Ben loved the cheese quesadillas, chips and cheese dip. Ben even ordered a second. (Uh oh... almost time to skip the kids' meals with Ben!) Tommy ordered an "unassembled burrito" plate where everything was separated (sheer genius idea for kids, if you ask me!): plain chicken, plain shredded cheese, rice and tortillas (which they forgot to give us, but he wasn't as hungry as the other two kids). Not to mention all kids get a brownie to boot... which means Mommy gets one brownie (Ben hates chocolate). :-) They even had a low-fat burrito that I love: Havana Chicken Burrito. MMMMMmmm. Today was their lowest profit week, too. Which means they had a cool deal. Reagan got to shake up the magic 8 ball to reveal our prize. We got a Buy 1, Get 1 free coupon for burritos the next time we come. Woo hoo! We must go back now. BTW, for those unfamiliar with California Tortilla, get onto their email list. You'll learn of all their cool monthly specials. For example, one month they had free Poptart day! The kids loved that one!
After our long lunch, we headed over to the newest theater. We saw "The Pirates Who Don't Do Anything". I was a tad disappointed with the movie. VeggieTales usually have a Biblical story-basis or at least a Christian value being taught. The movie was just a movie about Pirates (who weren't really). Mike says there is a definite God symbolism in the father character. I couldn't tell... I think I was sleeping during his part (seriously). The plot was a little dry. Mike and I were unimpressed. Granted, it was a KIDS movie, so they weren't aiming for us as a target audience (but usually I LOVE Veggie Tales... gotta love Larry the Cucumber!) Ben and Reagan were pleased with it. Tommy was 50/50. On one hand, he didn't have a complete meltdown or anything, but it obviously did not catch his attention much. Fortunately with stadium-style seating, his walking back and forth between seats didn't interrupt anyone else's view but OUR own. He seemed a little bored though. I don't blame him, in a one-hour, 26 minute movie... I dozed off half a dozen times. :-) I woke up once to see him leaning over the chair in front of him, looking down at the child. Whoops! Oh well, at least the two older kids had a blast, and Tommy still felt special going to the movies. Besides we got to see the new theater and shopping plaza in our county... pretty cool! I found a bunch new restaurants to visit!
Monday, January 21, 2008
Sunday, January 20, 2008
A Trip to the Museum
Yesterday, we went on a trip to DC to see the Museum of Natural History with the kids and my parents. It was supposed to be in the low 30's, but I think it was a tad warmer (whew!) Somehow, my amazing husband scored us a 3 hour parking space RIGHT IN FRONT. Woo hoo, Mike! (OK... pure luck, but it happened.)
We had a great time looking at all of the dinosaurs, the Hope diamond, a huge magnetic stone (I think the kids spent 20 minutes throwing paperclips at it!), and so much more. I saw a pair of gorgeous huge earrings of Marie Antoinette. Supposedly through a genealogist cousin of ours, we are descendants of hers... think they'll give me those earrings now? Ha ha ha. Mike, Dad, and I enjoyed the photography exhibit. It amazes me how close to nature some of these photographers can come. My absolute favorite was probably the oddest one. It was a photo of the top of the water of a river. A lone trunk stuck straight up into the air, the only part of an elephant above the water and being used as a snorkel of sorts. Until I read the title "Crocodile Attack" and the description, I had no idea that the ripples around the trunk were actually a crocodile attacking the base of the trunk of the elephant. Apparently, it was trying to pull the trunk underwater, but the elephant was strong enough to make his way out of the river. The guide to the photographer said it was the first time he ever saw a crocodile attempt to attack an elephant! You just don't see things like this in suburbia. A friendly fox is the closest I get to nature. :-)
Tommy was a wild man, of course, at the museum... running left and right and straightforward at a million miles an hour. Fortunately that building is HUGE!! At one point, he turned around and said, "Come on, Nana! Are you coming or NOT???" Ok, that doesn't seem funny until you hear it from a goofy 3 year old who has just recently begun to speak well. He had the most fun in a section of bones. Apparently there was a pile of bones in one exhibit (I wasn't with him at this time). He said, "Oh man! This one is broken." My parents teased him that he needed to put the puzzle back together. He refused.
After this, we took a pitstop at a huge mall nearby. After lunch at Brio (my favorite restaurant), the kids had a blast going on a spending spree. Add Nana and kids to a mall, and I guarantee the kids will leave with a bag or two and a smiling face. They got 3 Webkinz (including the newest Love Frog and Easter Duck... two exciting finds) and much more. Tommy got a whole Cars set from Disney, which of course was necessary to add to his collection of hundreds of cars. LOL Mike and I had a good ol' time in the Apple store. The kids got their toys... why didn't we get ours? We did decide on the laptop we'll be getting next. :-) Which reminds me of the reason we need a laptop... our upcoming trip to China.
In case you haven't seen my other blog... we have FANTASTIC NEWS! We are matched up with an adorable girl from China. We'll be flying out this summer to pick up "Gracelynn"! For more detailed adoption news, check out www.ourjourneytofour.blogspot.com .
We had a great time looking at all of the dinosaurs, the Hope diamond, a huge magnetic stone (I think the kids spent 20 minutes throwing paperclips at it!), and so much more. I saw a pair of gorgeous huge earrings of Marie Antoinette. Supposedly through a genealogist cousin of ours, we are descendants of hers... think they'll give me those earrings now? Ha ha ha. Mike, Dad, and I enjoyed the photography exhibit. It amazes me how close to nature some of these photographers can come. My absolute favorite was probably the oddest one. It was a photo of the top of the water of a river. A lone trunk stuck straight up into the air, the only part of an elephant above the water and being used as a snorkel of sorts. Until I read the title "Crocodile Attack" and the description, I had no idea that the ripples around the trunk were actually a crocodile attacking the base of the trunk of the elephant. Apparently, it was trying to pull the trunk underwater, but the elephant was strong enough to make his way out of the river. The guide to the photographer said it was the first time he ever saw a crocodile attempt to attack an elephant! You just don't see things like this in suburbia. A friendly fox is the closest I get to nature. :-)
Tommy was a wild man, of course, at the museum... running left and right and straightforward at a million miles an hour. Fortunately that building is HUGE!! At one point, he turned around and said, "Come on, Nana! Are you coming or NOT???" Ok, that doesn't seem funny until you hear it from a goofy 3 year old who has just recently begun to speak well. He had the most fun in a section of bones. Apparently there was a pile of bones in one exhibit (I wasn't with him at this time). He said, "Oh man! This one is broken." My parents teased him that he needed to put the puzzle back together. He refused.
After this, we took a pitstop at a huge mall nearby. After lunch at Brio (my favorite restaurant), the kids had a blast going on a spending spree. Add Nana and kids to a mall, and I guarantee the kids will leave with a bag or two and a smiling face. They got 3 Webkinz (including the newest Love Frog and Easter Duck... two exciting finds) and much more. Tommy got a whole Cars set from Disney, which of course was necessary to add to his collection of hundreds of cars. LOL Mike and I had a good ol' time in the Apple store. The kids got their toys... why didn't we get ours? We did decide on the laptop we'll be getting next. :-) Which reminds me of the reason we need a laptop... our upcoming trip to China.
In case you haven't seen my other blog... we have FANTASTIC NEWS! We are matched up with an adorable girl from China. We'll be flying out this summer to pick up "Gracelynn"! For more detailed adoption news, check out www.ourjourneytofour.blogspot.com .
Sunday, January 13, 2008
Around the World in Two Hours
Well, we've been a little busy since Christmas... sorry about the delay in posting. Two days after Christmas, my grandmother passed away after suffering for quite some time following a surgery in November. So our plans were changed. Then we returned from that trip with just a few days to remove all Christmas decorations and to prepare for a birthday party on January 5!
Yes, my daughter is now 7. Time really flies!! We gave Reagan her choice of venues... a skating party, a Michaels party, a pottery-painting party (my favorite choice), another Libby Lu party, etc. She said, "I want it at home." Ugh. So after some Internet-searching for a cool party idea, we came up with an Around the World party.
My goal was to keep the guest list to about 6 or 7 girls. Ha! I can never take my own advice with parties. Once we made the list, we realized we had to invite a few more to include the remainder of the Brownie troop (can leave anyone out). Then we had to invite a few more to include the rest of the girls in the class. Couldn't forget that handful of friends outside of Brownies and class that Reagan adores. Anyway, after all was said and done, we had a total of 15 girls! YIKES!
The invitations were boarding passes inside a mini folder explaining the party and showing a map of the continents. Unfortunately dummy me stated that we were hitting all 7 continents... including Mexico which I ridiculously counted for South America. Duh. I had to email all the moms and apologize for that... I was embarassed. We had one regret, and two girls were no-shows. So at 11am, we had 13 girls in our house. I felt so bad... I actually set the girls down in a circle and discussed the rules of the party! What a party-pooper I was... RULES!? But I tried to mention them in a nice way. They were the rules of the "travel agency". No touching the "locals" belongings. No yelling seeing as though we were a full plane and it would be too loud. No roughhousing since I didn't want to send anyone home due to injury without completing the trip. Etc., etc. The rules were listed on an itinerary sheet that also showed the map of the world on the back. I had empty stars at each of our stops which they filled in as we went along. They learned the rules after decorating their Souvenir Bag.
We took off from Reagan InterNational Airport (ha ha ha) on Hollar Airways. Our first stop was downstairs in China. We learned a little about Chinese New Year and then the fun began. The girls had 143 balloons (we popped one out of the gross) in red and black to pop! As you can see below, Tommy thought that was a little loud! They were some tough balloons, but inside 12 of them were puzzle pieces. Once we found the pieces, we were able to assemble a picture of a Dragon Costume in a parade. Then they collected their souvenirs for their souvenir bag: Chinese folding fans.
From China we went to Mexico, where we broke a pinata and filled up pinata loot bags. Then we collected our souvenirs: maracas.
Pizza had arrived, so we went to Italy! We ate pizza and listened to Dean Martin and various others sing Italian songs (Volare, That's Amore, Finniculi Finnicula, etc.) I loved just prancing around singing the songs! The girls then collected their souvenirs, soccer notepads. Okay... that was a stretch, but Italy loves soccer, right?
Then we went out to the cold garage for... what else... Antarctica! The girls did a little matching game trying to find two matching numbered plastic penguins. It got a little confusing and my own daughter broke down in tears since Mommy screwed up the directions. But, after the confusion, all girls left with their penguin souvenirs. :-)
We headed downstairs to safari in Kenya. We played animal charades where the girls got a chance to act like an animal and have the others guess, then we played a game where teams had to link together two parts of cards to make either a picture or a word... then they had to match the picture to the word (i.e. aardvark, chimpanzee, etc.) The winning team won 2 lollipops each. Then I gave the rest a lollipop, too. They collected their safari souvenir: binoculars.
After Kenya, we scooted across the room to Australia, where we made our very own boomerangs. (The girls colored cardboard boomerangs.) I was a little worried someone would attempt to throw them... but no one did. Whew! I don't know that the cheap cardboard ones would return... but they did do funny turns in the air (yes, I tested one and nearly knocked a ceiling light down.) The boomerangs were their souvenirs.
Then we headed upstairs for our last stop in North America: New Orleans for MARDI GRAS! The girls donned their metallic masks, tinseled crowns, listened to cajun music (and a jazzy favorite... When the Saints Go Marching In), and ate King Cupcakes. I explained the tradition of a king cake. Although I had actually found and purchased little plastic babies to bake into the cupcakes, I decided not to risk a choking hazard. So, I used gummy bears. For the record, even after the cupcakes are out of the oven and have cooled for a few minutes... they are still too warm for little gummy bears. I thought I'd attempt to squish the bears into the cake while it was still warm and moist. So I did. Five minutes later I returned... no more bears. They ALL melted. So I had to replace them all. Fortunately the holes had already been made. I gave everyone a red gummy bear, except one. The girl with the green gummy bear won. I gave her a silly Mardi Gras jingly pen. I think the king cupcakes were a hit. Messy since they needed to find the bear with their fingers rather than eat it... but it was fun.
After Mardi Gras, we watched Reagan desperately open 12 presents in 15 minutes. And she made it just before the first mom arrived to pick up her daughter!
Lots of High School Musical and Hannah Montana gifts and Bratz and Barbies and crafts... Reagan was a pleased little girl! She even got her first Rescue Pets epets.com dog. So now the kids are officially on Webkinz (with what? 30 Webkinz??) and Shining Stars (with about 6) and now ePets.com. They now have a ton of pets to keep up with!
All in all, it was a quick-paced, activity-packed party, and the girls were great! I was very happy with it (although I felt bad about the silly penguin game mix-up). And now, I begin to think about Tommy's party (May). I'm thinking of an indoor park party. $100 all said and done sounds good to me... and with no mess in the house!
Yes, my daughter is now 7. Time really flies!! We gave Reagan her choice of venues... a skating party, a Michaels party, a pottery-painting party (my favorite choice), another Libby Lu party, etc. She said, "I want it at home." Ugh. So after some Internet-searching for a cool party idea, we came up with an Around the World party.
My goal was to keep the guest list to about 6 or 7 girls. Ha! I can never take my own advice with parties. Once we made the list, we realized we had to invite a few more to include the remainder of the Brownie troop (can leave anyone out). Then we had to invite a few more to include the rest of the girls in the class. Couldn't forget that handful of friends outside of Brownies and class that Reagan adores. Anyway, after all was said and done, we had a total of 15 girls! YIKES!
The invitations were boarding passes inside a mini folder explaining the party and showing a map of the continents. Unfortunately dummy me stated that we were hitting all 7 continents... including Mexico which I ridiculously counted for South America. Duh. I had to email all the moms and apologize for that... I was embarassed. We had one regret, and two girls were no-shows. So at 11am, we had 13 girls in our house. I felt so bad... I actually set the girls down in a circle and discussed the rules of the party! What a party-pooper I was... RULES!? But I tried to mention them in a nice way. They were the rules of the "travel agency". No touching the "locals" belongings. No yelling seeing as though we were a full plane and it would be too loud. No roughhousing since I didn't want to send anyone home due to injury without completing the trip. Etc., etc. The rules were listed on an itinerary sheet that also showed the map of the world on the back. I had empty stars at each of our stops which they filled in as we went along. They learned the rules after decorating their Souvenir Bag.
We took off from Reagan InterNational Airport (ha ha ha) on Hollar Airways. Our first stop was downstairs in China. We learned a little about Chinese New Year and then the fun began. The girls had 143 balloons (we popped one out of the gross) in red and black to pop! As you can see below, Tommy thought that was a little loud! They were some tough balloons, but inside 12 of them were puzzle pieces. Once we found the pieces, we were able to assemble a picture of a Dragon Costume in a parade. Then they collected their souvenirs for their souvenir bag: Chinese folding fans.
From China we went to Mexico, where we broke a pinata and filled up pinata loot bags. Then we collected our souvenirs: maracas.Pizza had arrived, so we went to Italy! We ate pizza and listened to Dean Martin and various others sing Italian songs (Volare, That's Amore, Finniculi Finnicula, etc.) I loved just prancing around singing the songs! The girls then collected their souvenirs, soccer notepads. Okay... that was a stretch, but Italy loves soccer, right?
Then we went out to the cold garage for... what else... Antarctica! The girls did a little matching game trying to find two matching numbered plastic penguins. It got a little confusing and my own daughter broke down in tears since Mommy screwed up the directions. But, after the confusion, all girls left with their penguin souvenirs. :-)
We headed downstairs to safari in Kenya. We played animal charades where the girls got a chance to act like an animal and have the others guess, then we played a game where teams had to link together two parts of cards to make either a picture or a word... then they had to match the picture to the word (i.e. aardvark, chimpanzee, etc.) The winning team won 2 lollipops each. Then I gave the rest a lollipop, too. They collected their safari souvenir: binoculars.
After Kenya, we scooted across the room to Australia, where we made our very own boomerangs. (The girls colored cardboard boomerangs.) I was a little worried someone would attempt to throw them... but no one did. Whew! I don't know that the cheap cardboard ones would return... but they did do funny turns in the air (yes, I tested one and nearly knocked a ceiling light down.) The boomerangs were their souvenirs.Then we headed upstairs for our last stop in North America: New Orleans for MARDI GRAS! The girls donned their metallic masks, tinseled crowns, listened to cajun music (and a jazzy favorite... When the Saints Go Marching In), and ate King Cupcakes. I explained the tradition of a king cake. Although I had actually found and purchased little plastic babies to bake into the cupcakes, I decided not to risk a choking hazard. So, I used gummy bears. For the record, even after the cupcakes are out of the oven and have cooled for a few minutes... they are still too warm for little gummy bears. I thought I'd attempt to squish the bears into the cake while it was still warm and moist. So I did. Five minutes later I returned... no more bears. They ALL melted. So I had to replace them all. Fortunately the holes had already been made. I gave everyone a red gummy bear, except one. The girl with the green gummy bear won. I gave her a silly Mardi Gras jingly pen. I think the king cupcakes were a hit. Messy since they needed to find the bear with their fingers rather than eat it... but it was fun.
After Mardi Gras, we watched Reagan desperately open 12 presents in 15 minutes. And she made it just before the first mom arrived to pick up her daughter!Lots of High School Musical and Hannah Montana gifts and Bratz and Barbies and crafts... Reagan was a pleased little girl! She even got her first Rescue Pets epets.com dog. So now the kids are officially on Webkinz (with what? 30 Webkinz??) and Shining Stars (with about 6) and now ePets.com. They now have a ton of pets to keep up with!
All in all, it was a quick-paced, activity-packed party, and the girls were great! I was very happy with it (although I felt bad about the silly penguin game mix-up). And now, I begin to think about Tommy's party (May). I'm thinking of an indoor park party. $100 all said and done sounds good to me... and with no mess in the house!
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