Vacation: Day 1 - Movies & Play Places

When we arrived late that night Camp Potter was up & ready for us.

I love how Opa & Oma set up tents for each of the kids with welcome mats at the entrance & pillows, sleeping bags, & flashlights inside.  There's always a "present" when we first arrive & the kids loved their new t-shirts & jewelry.  We love 

CAMP POTTER.

We all slept like babies that first night.  The 3 hour time difference always takes a few days to get used to, but we did alright.  The first day of our trip we went out to see a movie as a family & then went to a fun bounce house to play.

We saw Rio 2 & the kids loved it.  We always love going to to the movie theater since we only go a couple times a year.  The kids LOVED watching a movie with their cousins & Opa & Oma.  Bladen played in the video arcade after the movie & was REALLY into the motorcycle game.  He's growing up so fast.  I just want him to stop!!!

After the movie we drove to a really fun bounce house place where both kids & adults get to play.  Bladen's favorite thing was this climbing game.  He is such a climber & made it almost to the very top.  None of his siblings could get as high as him & he even out climbed Trek.

Canyon spent most of his time exploring on his own.  He likes to crawl around & see things on his own these days.  He climbed into a few of the bouncy things, but didn't enjoy them as much as the big kids did.  But he still had a blast.

All of my kids loved the steep slides.  They would go up & down & up & down & up & down.  They convinced me to go a few times with them & holy cow. . . those slides are really up there & they go a lot faster than I thought they did.  I admit my heart may have raced a little bit my first time down.

Trek & I both LOVED challenging the kids to duels in the dueling rings.  Of course we show no mercy & totally win every time.  It was fun going up against each other too.  Trek always beat me, but it was fun making it a challenge for him.

We convinced Oma to take Ella up to the top of the big slide.  Once she got up there she realized she really didn't want to do it anymore. . . ha ha ha.

Trek blocked the way so she couldn't chicken out & go back down so she HAD to slide.

It was beyond HILARIOUS.  Ella liked it. . . Oma did not.

Canyon LOVED the slide.  My boys are just sliders.  They love slides & the bigger the slide is, the better it is.  They get that from their dad.

When we were tired of running, jumping, climbing, & sliding we checked out the quarter horse ride & let the kids have some fun.

And then we headed back home for a fabulous spaghetti dinner with homemade milkshakes.  Oh Opa, how I've missed your world famous chocolate-peanut butter milkshakes.  YUM.

And we're off on an adventure. . .

We've been waiting for Spring Break for months now.  We knew we were going to CA to visit Trek's family & the kids could hardly wait.  Of course we HAD to fly since we live on the complete opposite coast & the kids were SO excited to be on an airplane again.  This was Craiger & Canyon's first time on an airplane too.  It was SO fun.

Of course our first flight reminded me of why I despise flying so much. . . our flight was delayed 2 hours & 15 minutes.   We had a layover in Chicago that was supposed to last 2 hours & 30 minutes meaning that there was a possibility we would miss our connecting flight from Chicago to LAX.  Ugh.  The kids were bored after the first hour of delayed sitting at the airport time.

Our plane did finally arrive & it was tiny.  The boys were SO excited to hop on.

It was such a small plane that there was only 1 seat on the sides, meaning all the kids had to sit by themselves.  Yikes.  Luckily the plane ride was great & nobody had any issues

(other than Craiger & Bladen having to go potty in that tiny bathroom 6 times in 2 hours.)

We landed in Chicago 10 minutes before our next flight took off.  Our 2nd flight was all the way on the opposite side of the airport as well.  We knew for sure we weren't going to make it.  Luck was on our side though.  Even though the flight had already boarded, they knew our previous flight was late, but had arrived so they didn't shut the doors until we got on.  I was counting my blessings at that point.  We were running through that airport like crazy people.  It reminded me of the scene in Home Alone where the family almost misses their flight to Paris & they're sprinting through the airport.  HILARIOUS.

However, because we were so late, we didn't get to eat lunch/dinner during our layover as we had originally planned.  We ended up having to BUY food on the plane which is completely over priced & disgusting.  That's $60 we'll never see again.  ha ha ha.  But at least our bellies were full, we were happy, & we were on our way to Opa & Oma's house.

Princess Fairy Tea Party + A Few Pirates

My friend & I decided that we wanted to do a cute little princess fairy tea party for our girls the weekend spring break started just for the fun of it.  She brought her daughters & a few friends over & we set up an adorable little picnic outside in our backyard.  We had fairy wings & princess hats & little tea cups. . . it was so fun.

And of course we had a couple pirates invade while we ate.  A party just isn't a party without a few cute pirates.

Even Canyon got a mustache to show his pirate side.

We all had a great time. What a fun way to start Spring Break here in Virginia.

Taya's Easter Party

I absolutely LOVE being the room mom for Taya's Kindergarten class.  I get to plan all the class parties & have a blast with the kids.  I love it.

For Easter we had a great party with arts & crafts, egg coloring, games, snacks, & a big Easter egg hunt outside.  The kids were SO excited.

Taya loves egg hunts.  She couldn't wait to get outside & hunt for the candy & toy filled eggs.  She did very good at counting out her 20 eggs as she collected them.  She is such a cutie.

April's Fools

Everyone SMILE!!!

It's APRIL FOOLS!!

Who doesn't love a good April Fool's joke?  I snuck into the kids' rooms at 5am & drew mustaches on them with black markers.  Surprisingly only one of them woke up in the process & still doesn't remember it happening.  ha ha ha.  Sleep talking is hilarious!!!

They all thought it was hilarious. . . all but Bladen.  He was mad & refused to sit, listen, smile, or talk to us until that scary black line was off his face.  We were dying of laughter.  It was SO funny.  We washed his off & all was well in the world again.

Cadence tried to fool me as well with this letter taped to my front door.  I knew it was from her, but it was adorable & I love it.  I love that my kids get into holidays like I do.

Toothless Yet Again + More

Taya's teeth just keep falling out.  Her other front tooth was hanging SIDEWAYS.  I had to beg her to just tug it & make it come out.

One tug is all it took.  Now she's officially the toothless wonder & she looks ADORABLE.

She sounds pretty adorable too with her little lisp.  What a cutie.

Also at the end of March, I had the opportunity to take Cadence & Lorien to the Women's Conference at church for the first time.  They just lowered the age to ages 8 & up meaning both my girls could come with me.  I took them out for some ice cream beforehand & then we enjoyed the broadcast at our church.  It was some great alone time with my girls.

St. Patrick's Day Fun

Hooray for Green Day!!  We love St. Patrick's Day at our house.  I always put together a fun little treasure hunt for the kids to celebrate.

For breakfast there were Lucky Charms on the table with a note I wrote talking about a treasure to be found throughout the day.  The red piece of the rainbow was attached to the box as well.

The first clue told the kids to get dressed & ready for school just like normal & that they'd find the next clue doing something during their normal everyday routine.  Sure enough, when the girls came downstairs to practice piano, a nice little set-up of green accessories were waiting for them.

They all got green necklaces.  The boys got green pins & the girls got headbands/earrings to celebrate.  The orange rainbow piece was hiding on the piano as well so they added that to the red piece & read the clue.  The clue told them to go to school & that they would find their 3rd clue when they got home.

The rainbow piece & clue were on the front door when the girls got off the school bus.  It told them to do their homework & then go to a place where mommy cooks things.  Bladen found the next piece first inside the oven.

Inside the oven was a box of Fruit Loops & string to make rainbow necklaces.  They love these because it's a craft, snack, & activity all in one.  They had a blast.  On the clue it told them to make necklaces & then sit down ready for dinner.

For dinner we ate a giant fruit rainbow, green jello, andes mints, spinach ravioli (shaped like shamrocks) & green alfredo sauce.  OH!  And don't forget the green apple kool-aid.

As the kids were doing their dinner chores, Cadence found the next piece of the rainbow under the fruit platter.  That clue told us to finish up our chores & go to the living room for Family Home Evening.  We played games, had a spiritual lesson, sang songs, & enjoyed ourselves for 30 minutes.  Craiger was hanging out under the coffee table where he found the last piece of the rainbow with it's clue. 

The final clue led them to the boys' bedroom, under their bunk beds.  There the green treasure was hidden.

There were cookies, bubbles, some green duct tape, green gum, & a few other green tidbits for the kids to play with.  They loved it.

So Happy St. Patty's Day from the Potter house.  We hope you enjoyed it as much as we did.