SeaWorld - San Antonio, TX

Emma has been wanting to go to SeaWorld for over a year, so I decided it would be a good time to visit my father and sister down in Texas. We spent two days at SeaWorld, San Antonio. We had lots of fun. Emma finally got to touch a dolphin, which she said felt like glass.

We spent the first day seeing all the animals and shows with Tonya (my stepmother). We got drenched by a 10 minute rain downpour in the morning, and spent the rest of the day in the blazing sun. The high temperature that day got to 96 degrees. Both girls favorite show was "The Cannery Row Caper" sea lion and walrus show. It was super funny!

Leora fell in love with the Sea Lions after watching the show. We fed the sea lions afterwards and she freaked out when it was time to leave their exhibit.

We spent the second day at the "Lost Lagoon" waterpark with Steffinie (my sister) and her children. The girls had lots of fun being with their cousins and playing in the water.

Overall it was a fun trip for us. The only downer was when we got stuck in the Phoenix Airport on standby on our way home to Seattle. We ended up spending 10 hours in the airport being bumped from 2 flights. Instead of getting home at 6pm as originally planned we got home at 2am the next morning. The girls were real troopers.

You can view all of our pictures of the trip in the photo album that's on our family website. The link is on the right!!!!

What a Wonderful Day!

Sunday, August 17th was a fun day for us. We went berry picking, dug for clams, and went out boating. We did it all without even leaving Raft Island. We live in such a great place! My sister Lindsay came down from Bellevue to spend the day with us. Our berries turned into a yummy blackberry cobbler, and Eddie ended up with a bucket full of clams which he was very excited about.

Of course the water was rather cold as usual on the boat, the skies were overcast, and of course with my luck we got a little rained on. While Emma was in the water she said, "I'm roasting it's so cold in here!". It was a good laugh.

Breaking Dawn

Okay, so I have to admit that I am a big Twilight series fan. I loved the first 3 books. So since I get off work at midnight most of the time I decided that on my way home at 12:30am the morning of August 2nd I would stop by the super Walmart and pick up the book. That way Eddie didn't have to go with me to Costco or Target just to get the book, and so I could avoid him rolling his eyes at me. I finished the book in 4 days. Slower than other people I know, but according to Eddie, way too fast. His words were, "That must be a really good book!" Well, the truth is that I did like the book, however, was disappointed by Stephenie Meyer. I know that the series is categorized under teen books and is therefore advertised to the world of teenagers. The first 3 books of the series I felt were age appropriate for teens, but the 4th book is not.

I just kept thinking while I was reading "Breaking Dawn" that there were so many young teenagers, meaning age 12 to 15, that were reading this book at the same time I was that I felt shouldn't be reading it. There were moments in the book that I felt were too steamy for a young teenager to be reading. We try to shield our children from certain things until they are mature enough to really understand them. I feel that she wrote the book very tastefully, but just kept thinking about a 13 year old reading the book bothered me.

I admit that I liked the steamy moments and other violence that has escalated from the previous books. It made the book better for me, and is what kept me reading. Unfortunately it also kept younger readers reading on as well. If Stephenie's book "The Host" was categorized as an adult book then "Breaking Dawn" definitely should have been the same!

I won't put any spoilers in here, since most people haven't finished the book yet. The book made me love Jacob more, and get really irritated at Bella a lot of the time.

A New Haircut?

Well, I've been thinking about cutting my hair for sometime now, wanting something more in style and edgy. So I took the leap yesterday and here are my results. I have to admit I don't know how I feel about it. After it was done, I thought "Oh, it's real short but pretty much what I asked for". Then last night I thought "I really don't like it, what have I done!" I did wear it yesterday the way the cutter styled it, which was entirely rolled under. It made me feel old I think. So after playing with it for hours today trying to make something out of it that I can live with, and adding highlights, this is what I came up with. Keep in mind I am cursed with having very thin, and a very little amount of hair. The hair cut I wanted obviously requires more hair than what I have on my head to make it manageable. So what do you think? I want honest opinions on what you think and any recommendations on what I might do to make it look better! To achieve my look I blow dryed my hair upside down and used a flat iron on it.

Happy 30th to Me!

So for my 30th birthday present to myself I took Eddie to Boston, MA to go see Bon Jovi in concert! I have for some reason always wanted to see Bon Jovi in concert and it was the one thing I regretted not doing while I worked for Jetblue in Utah. So since I've started working for Jetblue again I knew that going to see Bon Jovi in concert was definitely at the top of my list of things to do. Thanks to my sister Lindsay, who gave me the heads up that they were performing back east, I was one of the crazy people that sat online waiting for tickets to go on sale one morning to get seats to see Bon Jovi in Boston.

We left late Tuesday night, July 8th, flew through the night and arrived super tired in Boston Wednesday morning. Luckily we were able to check into our hotel, the Hyatt Regency in Cambridge, early so we were able to get some sleep in before the concert that night. Temperatures in Boston were around 90 degrees and high humidity, so needless to say we were missing our Washington weather, and only survived in shorts and t-shirts. We packed very light, only what would fit in our backpacks. We rode the subway around most the time, which I highly recommend! We would have gotten so angry if we had rented a car trying to get around.

We had dinner at a small little Italian restaurant named "Antico Forno" which was recommended to us by someone at the airport. We had to go out for Italian while we were in Boston! I've never had Olive Oil that tasted so good.

The concert was so much fun!!!!! Bon Jovi really knows how to put on a show, and you can tell they love doing it. I want to go see them again. The All American Rejects opened for them and they did a good job, but I have to say I wasn't impressed and thought they were actually really weird during their performance. Atleast they sang the songs of theirs that I like! The concert was at the TD Banknorth Garden.

The next day, after sleeping in until almost noon, we walked around the city of Boston. We had fried dough for breakfast from one of the street vendors at Boston Common, and proceeded to walk along the Freedom Trail. We walked through the cemetery where Paul Revere, Samuel Adams, John Hancock and victims of the Boston Massacre are buried. We saw Paul Revere's house, and walked around on Old Ironsides in the harbor. Boston was so beautiful! I loved being able to walk through so much history and the city was so accessible using the subway. Eddie and I both agree that we want to go back and visit again.

Indian Reservation Fireworks

We got to experience illegal fireworks at the Muckleshoot Indian reservation this week. It was really loud and there were so many people. We went with my sister Lindsay and her husband Jeff and his parents who were in town visiting. They go every year. I was pretty nervous at first at how unsafe it seemed, but was told I was being silly. It was fun to see some fireworks with the girls!

Chuck E Cheese Party

Emma wanted to have her birthday party at Chuck E Cheese's this year! After having to reschedule it, I feared that no one could come, but luckily I learned that Emma didn't care who eventually came. She had a lot of fun playing the games, riding all the rides, and dancing infront of the movie camera that put her up on the wall of TV's.

We all had a good time! Leora used atleast 20 tokens riding the school bus, which is 1 token per ride. Leora was really good at a game that you punch ducks over to earn tickets, which when I tried it I did horribly. Eddie went around helping Emma win lots of tickets. They ended up with over 1000 tickets to use toward prizes.

It was a really fun day for all of us. Eddie even had a good time, although he might not admit it. Emma already wants to go back again. It will have to wait until I can get the tune of "Where a kid can be a kid!" out of my head though. I heard it sung atleast 100 times while we were there.