part 2

While I have time I am going to finish writing about the rest of our vacation. And really I use this as a way of journaling of sorts, since I do have a goal of printing this blog someday, I should do it sooner than later, but at least for now I am getting it down.

We are still in Talkeetna and Jonathan is having a great time with grandma and his uncles, I'm sure grandpa is disappointed he's out of town this weekend and missing out. Although this weekend turned out to not be what I planned, late Thursday night I realized that I left a bag of material and all my notions at home, so no cutting tools, thread, etc. with me. Very sad moment for me, but I'm making the most of the time I have here and enjoying the relaxed nature of this trip.

Helping Grandma with laundry

~~~ On to the trip ~~~

Excited to be going to Sea World

~ Sunday morning drove from Riverside back down to Sand Diego and spent the day at Sea World, Kelly came with us so was fun to still get to hang out with him.
~ Jonathan loved the dolphin show! There was a lot of activity so I think that captured his attention. It was really fun to watch him watch and enjoy the animals.
~ Kelly offered to watch J while Jeremy and I went on a river rapids ride - one where you are in a big round tube, with like 8 seats. Well, along the ride route spectators can pay .25 and spray water cannons at the riders. So, Kelly spent the best .75 of his life and let Jonathan shoot the water cannons, which I guess he LOVED pushing the button. And of course he got Mom and Dad SOAKED!! When we came off the ride he was all smiles and laughing, it was very cute actually!
~ the shark tank was another hit, he liked an area where we stood outside two panels of windows but he could see the sharks up close and got pretty excited about that.
~ We had to say good bye to Kelly at the end of the day, as he had to be back for PT in the morning, but not before dinner at Olive Garden.
~ Jeremy's conference started on Monday, so it was Jonathan and Mommy time. We actually had a great time together. I found a fun children's museum downtown and we spent some time there. I will post pictures of those from my camera later.


Jonathan playing at the children's museum

~ There was an area called Seaport Village right near the hotel so we spent some time walking through there Monday evening and again on Tuesday.

Where we ate along the bay for dinner one night.


Baby Belly - about 17 weeks

~ On Wednesday we got packed up in the morning and Jeremy's conference was over by 11:30, so we picked him up and went back to Sea World for a few hours - when we bought our tickets they were running a promotion that for the same price of one day you could come back all year. We probably won't be back this year, but was fun to spend one more afternoon there.

Waiting for the dolphin show to start

~ This time we were able to see the penquins, some beluga whales up close, a couple of polar bears, and the dolphin show again.
~ In the Arctic exhibit they had some sort of ice/snow caves to walk through, the coldness didn't seem to bother our Alaskan boy and he climbed all over the cold ice in his shorts!
~ It was time to head to the airplane after this. We had great flights home and Jonathan slept well on the late night flight this time!



Learning about moving walkways at the Portland airport - he thought this was great!

California May 2011

Well we got home not even 24 hours ago and Jeremy and I are off on another trip. This time Jonathan is with grandma and we are just about 2 hours north of Anchorage in Talkeetna. Jeremy had a conference to go to, so I came along and Jonathan is getting a weekend with Grandma and his uncles. This is our first time away from him for an overnight, it's a little weird leaving him, especially after such a full week together but at the same time I am already enjoying my time. Currently I am enjoying the free wifi and cable television :). And I brought along my sewing machine and a couple of quilting projects that I hope to make some progress on. But for now, I am going to talk a bit about our trip last week. I will try to keep it brief - but any reader of this blog knows I'm not too good at that :).

Hotel Yesterday in San Diego


Hotel today in Talkeetna - I think McKinley is behind the clouds somewhere.

We were able to make this very fun California vacation happen due to a conference that Jeremy attended in San Diego. This really was "how to go on a great vacation on a small budget" type of trip, this is how: Fly wife and lap child on companion ticket that comes with credit card, spend four nights at brother and sister in laws place, the rest of the nights in hotel provided from credit union, we then paid for rental car, tickets to Disney and Sea World, having a child makes eating at a super nice restaurant very unappealing, stayed at an Embassy Suites with AWESOME breakfast. So really it turned out to be an ideal situation for us. It was wonderful to go away for a real vacation as a family of three, the only time it will happen and will be memories that Jeremy and I will treasure for a while, and Jonathan can enjoy the pictures, as I'm sure he won't remember much of it, but it was fun for us to watch him enjoy new things and new scenery.

A few highlights...

~ we got an extra seat in our row for EVERY flight!! So took car seat on plane with us, so was nice to not have to hold him the whole time. oh and best part was if he was unbuckled he could stand up tall and flirt with ANYONE and EVERYONE who looked his way, however for first overnight flight did not sleep until literally the last 20 min of the 3 hr 20 min flight!
~ We got in to San Diego on Wed am, then drove to Riverside (a suburb of LA, where Kelly and Ashley go to school and live) and stayed at their place - unfortunately Ashley was gone on her choir tour, and Kelly didn't get there until Fri (he was in AK for a few days) - anyways we decided to tough it out and despite little sleep the night before go to an LA Angels baseball game. This was our only opportunity for a baseball game in the trip and decided to just make the most of it.
~ Got to Angels stadium and while standing in line for tickets a gentleman came up and offered us two tickets! yay! and giveaway at gate was free Angels hat - this vacation was starting out well! :) We didn't spend tons of time sitting with Jonathan in the seats, but Jeremy and he really enjoyed their time walking around and enjoying the ballpark. And Jeremy enjoyed getting to take his son to his first baseball game. Jonathan loved clapping along with the crowd and overall enjoyed his time.



~~~ agh I was trying to make this bullet points! haha!! ~~~

~~ Thursday went to Huntington Beach - Jonathan LOVED playing in the sand, and mostly loved that there was so much room to run around in! Enjoyed a walk along pier and I got myself sunburned - I sun screened everyone but myself :(

~ Did not take Jonathan long at all to adjust to the warmth, at K and A's, he loved to go out on their patio and play in the sun!
~ Fri we picked up Kelly from the airport and headed to Disney Land. This was a very long and fun day. Of course it seemed like Jonathan fell asleep at all the wrong times, like when we could go on a ride that he could go on, but oh well.

He seemed to enjoy all the people and a couple of the rides. He particularly liked the Buzz Lightyear ride where you get to shoot a laser gun and can spin the car you are in.

~ Walking through the New Orleans district in Disney Land we saw Stevie Wonder - not sure what he was doing there, but he was there.
~ Another favorite at Disney Land was Goofy's Play House - there he could play around on a slide and run around, which was great as he was tired of being restrained all day. There was also a piano just his size, which was a big hit!! He even got possessive and tried to push some other kids off - not a proud parenting moment, but humorous at the same time :)
Playing the piano


This hat was left behind in Disney somewhere - was cute while it lasted though.


Checking out a Mickey Mouse pretzel - no, he didn't want to eat it either, he tore off a chunk and threw it on the ground.


Waiting in line for the Nemo submarine ride

~ We didn't leave DL until 11:40 pm!! yikes! We went back in after dinner at espn zone to watch the fireworks show and then were able to get on a couple of rides quickly, so it was worth it! It was a long day and we got to sleep in the next day.


Trying on Mickey Mouse ears - they stayed on for about 2 seconds, so decided this wasn't the time to buy them :)


I even was going to let him eat some cotton candy but he didn't want it!


Even got our picture with Mickey!

~ Saturday we went to a farmer's market in Riverside (on my list of things I wanted to do, not anyone else's :) ) - but i got some awesome cherries and oranges!
~ We also got to explore Riverside and Kelly showed us around their school (California Baptist) which was great to get to see his life in CA - we also went swimming in outdoor pool at the school! I cannot remember the last time I was in an outdoor pool! So great!


Captured a yawn - this is right after swimming outside, yes he fell asleep shortly after in the car.

~ WOOHOO Oklahoma City Thunder just won!! series tied now!

Ok, I think I'm going to end there for now. And these are only pictures from my phone! It's going to be hard going through all the ones on my camera! I feel a photo book being made soon! :)

A few things....

I've been reminded this week of a few things, not things I didn't already know but that I guess I needed the reminder of...

...I am appreciative of the fact that we have two cars, sharing is hard...
...I am so so so grateful that I don't work outside our home, Jonathan has been sick this week so he has spent a few mornings with my mom so I could go to the commitments and appointments, and it is hard leaving him...
...I love that I have brothers interested in helping their sister get her car fixed, they replaced my radiator this week!...
...I am a homebody, I need my time at home to be energized, my schedule has been way too full this week and I am so excited about not leaving by 8:30 tomorrow morning...
...I am giddy to be in the sun and warmth next week...
...I love maternity clothes, I was mortified the first time I went shopping for pants when I was pregnant with Jonathan with the huge waist bands and all, but this time I am so excited to get to wear them again, to not have a band cutting into my waist is great! ... If TMI - too bad :)
...I don't know why I'm doing the "..." thing, it just seemed right...
...I will backup my iphone regularly now, since it had been about a month apparently and when my phone freaked out on me and went in recovery mode, I lost all my pictures and videos :( ...
...I was smart enough to have my family that I send photos to to text them back to me, so I at least got a few back...
...Hearing the heartbeat of my growing baby is so amazing and just doesn't get old...
...The only reason I had crazy energy on Monday was because I had a latte/mocha freeze thing from Costco that evidently had way more caffeine than my body could handle, I was awake until past midnight, but did get a lot done during the day...

I know there were other things to be added to this list, but for now this is all that's coming to mind. So I will allow you to enjoy a few cute pics of my little boy :)


Our little climber, although I don't think he actually wanted into the play pen, it's more fun to climb on the chair.

Uncle Rob came over for lunch and they sat on the couch drinking their juice together, it was very sweet.

I thought we tried to stop eating in front of the tv before Jonathan was too impressionable, but he brought his bowl to me, asked "Please" - which his sign is he rubs his chin, which is super cute - for it to be filled and then I gave him a snack in it, and he took the bowl and sat in his chair next to the tv to eat his snack. When he was done he came to get more. :)

And this series of pictures was taken Monday night, Jonathan was super tired and was ready to go to bed, but he knew it was bath time first, while I was starting the water, he behind my back got into the tub with his clothes fully on and went straight to the faucet and sat under it. He loves to sit under the running water. He was so tired I couldn't even get him to stand up to pull his shorts off!

Exactly 17 months and 16 weeks...

The age of our two children .... just a small tidbit for any readers :)

Well I am now 16 weeks into this pregnancy and I think that I am getting to the more manageable part of it. I am trying to wean myself off the nausea medicine, mostly to just see if I can make it without it, or if I still need it. It seems to be day to day. I go in tomorrow for my check up and am looking forward to hearing this little one's heartbeat. I have even gained a couple of pounds since the last visit, so the medicine must have been working :).

I am getting very excited about this next month. Next Tuesday night Jeremy, Jonathan and I are leaving for a vacation down to San Diego and will also spend some time in Riverside (Kelly and Ashley live there) and Anaheim (Mickey lives there!)!!! Jeremy had to go down to SD for a conference for work, so we just used our Alaska Airlines ticket and Jonathan and I get to travel with him. We are very excited for a fun week of relaxation and not too much planned. I am looking forward to spending some time walking the boardwalk areas near our hotel and being outside with Jonathan during the day and just for a different trip than what we are used to that is full of visiting family and going from place to place - which we do love too, but I am looking forward to a small change. :) And it is a well timed trip as it is the week after our 6 year anniversary and Jeremy will complete the last of his classes for his Master's before we leave!! woohoo!!

AND did I mention it is in the 80s and 90s right now!?! I will probably die! I'm thinking about what to pack and seriously can't remember the last time I considered what clothes to wear in that type of heat, it was probably when we lived in Texas and that was 8 years ago? This poor white Alaska skin hopefully will hold up in the heat!

And to top it off when we get back Jeremy has another conference in Talkeetna (about 2 - 2 1/2 hrs north of here I think) so I will actually go with him there and Jonathan gets his first weekend with his grandparents! And most exciting for me is that I'm looking forward to taking my quilting and working on some projects that have been stashed away for a little too long now.

WE have been fighting colds this last week and Jonathan still is, so that's never fun to be dealing with, but he's a trooper. Best way I could tell that he was getting sick is he is quieter when he "talks" and was actually standing still the other day - he is usually constantly moving, even if standing in place is swaying or bouncing. And his run turned into more of a walk. However, he continues to be busy, I'm just able to keep up a bit more :).

Oh and speaking of 16 weeks pregnant I think that I am finally getting some of my energy back and am not counting down the minutes until my next nap time :). I still need rest but not quite as bad. AND I have actually gotten some things done around the house, even mulitple tasks in one day! Like yesterday I did laundry AND folded it. And swept AND mopped! woohoo! it's the little victories in life! Well, off to get Jonathan up, he's awake and thinks that there are things to be doing other than being stuck in his crib! haha Oh and sorry, you made it to the end and no new pictures - My only updated pictures were on my phone and it went into recovery mode or something today so I had to restore it all and it doesn't appear to have recovered my most recent pictures :( I guess I should download my pictures more often. But if I find them I will post some.