CES trip

Christopher needed to go to the CES conference in Las Vegas last week, and so we headed down as a family. To be honest, I was ready to be done traveling already, but I love seeing my three brothers that live there and all of their kids, and my Dad was in town to go to the same conference. So off we drove.

Our first order of business turned out to be a tourist visit.

I don't know if any of you watch Pawn Stars on the History channel, but we love it. It is like Antiques Roadshow a little- people are bringing in stuff they want to sell or pawn, and the experts tell them what it is worth. But the guys who run the place are hilarious- true Vegas characters. So we shopped around for a while, and Christopher bought a T-shirt he is now very proud of.

Most of my days were quiet while Christopher was at the conference. But somehow one of the highlights of my trip was just talking with my sister in law- of all the moms I have ever known, she is one I really look up to, and she is so amazing that she even teaches parenting classes. We talked for hours about my kids and how I am doing, and I felt like I had taken a weight off by the end of the trip. I really needed a re-focus on what really matters!

Anyway, on to the fun stuff. Friday night was a big family dinner. I love catching all of the millions of things that are going on! These two girls are cousins the same age, and they had a very elaborate dance going to demo music on the keyboard.


There was a pool game for the boys- my two older brothers are really good!

Grandpa was so cute playing with Kaitlyn here. She loved telling him about each little object she found in that bin.

Since my family has a January birthday . . . problem (7 of my mom's 13 Grandkids were born in January), we had birthday cupcakes to blow out. Kaitlyn had been crying about wanting one since they were baked the day before. No amount of moving them or covering them with tin foil would let her forget. And of course she couldn't understand that I really was going to give her one eventually. Poor thing.

Finally. Yum.

Gary led these guys in a rousing jumping jack routine, which was hilarious.

Nicholas borrowed my camera to take a self portrait.

And here it is- the Kaitlyn patented death glare. She started this when we first arrived in Ohio. My little brother Dan told her "don't touch" when she got too close to the Villiage, and she gave him this glare for 3-5 minutes before breaking into tears. She now gives any family member she doesn't know this glare, and leaves them all cowering. I swear, it is scarier in person.

But Grandpa isn't scared.

We spent a good portion of the weekend playing the Super Mario Brothers game on Wii. It is awesome! I loved how interactive it is- four people can play at a time, and you are talking to each other nearly the whole time.

The next morning we went to Chuck E Cheese for some cousin birthday parties. Tyler sure does love slides.

This was the funniest game I have seen in a while. It was like a big giant hampster wheel! The faster you ran, the more tickets you got.

Kaitlyn loved this horse, even if she didn't know how to steer when I put a token in to start the game.

Tyler liked watching his cousins play.

And then everybody else had plans that afternoon, and it was a beautiful day. So we went to the nearest park. Because that always makes sense a week after snowmobiling.

They were so excited to run around! It was a real treat to play in a park in the middle of winter.

Peek a boo!

Kaitlyn's hair is so light, she started this poof-ball after one trip down a slide.

And then, because playing in a park in January isn't creepy enough, an ICE CREAM TRUCK showed up. I was laughing all the way home.

That night we went to Gary's house for dinner. Maya was so cute- she sat with my kids at the little table and helped them eat. And Kaitlyn is always happy to have a coloring buddy.

And of course, we had to play more Mario Brothers. Gary is so competitive that even though everyone is on the same team, he would throw people who were slowing him down into the water.

And poor Tyler just crashed. Between Chuck E Cheese and the park that afternoon, he was exhausted. I was impressed Grandpa could still try and play with a sleeping toddler on his shoulders.

We had to leave the next day, but we took one more trip to the park before, and my family came along too. There were kicking a soccer ball around and blowing bubbles, and my kids were having a blast.

And then we headed back up to the land of snow again! It was a great trip.

Christmas card

I have a lot of fun designing my own card every year. So, even though this is beyond the time for such things, but I figured I should post it anyway. Especially considering that I was just working on sending some OUT. (There were a couple of people I didn't have an address for until they sent me one, and I didn't get the card until we got back from all of the trips.)

So, Merry . . . January . . . everyone!

Piles of snow and what to do with it

Our trip to Ohio was flanked by trips to the cabin. Getting up there in the winter is certainly a lot different than during the summer, since the roads aren't fully plowed. The 80 year old guy that lives beyond us a little bit plows the road with an ancient beast that breaks down a lot, but it is a gravel road after all, so a thin layer is the best you can hope for. Basically our cabin is only accesible by four wheeler or snowmobile right now, and I suspect that will change to snowmobile only soon.

Because, wow, there is a lot of snow up there! We might have a few inches kicking around down in the valley between melting periods, but it doesn't melt up there, and rain down here is often snow up there. So far it is up to about three compacted feet or so, but we are told it gets close to 6-8 feet. Assuming you could ever find the bottom.

So getting up there is a chore, shuttling people and supplies, etc. But once you are there, life is great.

Tyler LOVES sledding. That little white sled is just his size, and he has only been upset by one wipeout so far. We cleared a path for him to sled down our driveway, as well as this jump in the backyard. Meanwhile, Daddy has a fancy runner sled to take down the road up to the cabin. One time I took Tyler down there, and he got going so fast he dissapeared around the bend. I ran after him (which is an odd thing to do in snow-shoes), and finally found him lying down in the middle of the road, giggling madly.

My family is behind that powder kick-up somewhere, I swear.

There was a full moon on the last trip, so I made my first attempt at night photography. It was fun- and freakin cold. :)

Daddy lined up that shot. Classic. Kaitlyn does not like sledding as much as Tyler, that's for sure. She would cry that she wanted "outside" all morning while I got breakfast cleaned up and gathered snow gear, but after the first face full of snow she wanted nothing to do with the stuff.

And then there is this beast. We had friends and family coming up for New Year's weekend, so we looked into renting a snowmobile. For that amount of time, it would have been $300. Christopher found this beauty in an online classified for $500, but when he got there to see it, they couldnt' get it to start. Finally it started up once it got some starter fluid in it, and so we got it for $375. We figured if it lasted the weekend, we broke even. If it lasts longer, we win. And sure enough, starter fluid is all it wanted in life. We had a lot of fun with that thing!

Ohio trip

After Christmas Day, we went off in search of fun toddler things to do with Grandma and Grandpa. The first stop was a place we had previously entitled Tyler's Happy Place.

Great Lakes Science Center
The whole place is wonderful, but they have a special toddler section that is our favorite right now. There are tubes for balls to run down . . .

benches and mirrors to inspect . . .


gears to line up . . .

and awesome, fast slides to run down . . .

and even places to climb where you aren't supposed to climb.

Is it wrong that this next picture makes me laugh every time? This is the grunting face while she is trying to climb over something too big.

We had fun in the rest of the museum as well. Kaitlyn especially liked this "coloring" spot where you bumped the platform to make the cool shapes.

The headphones didn't work, but Kaitlyn didn't know that.

Hi Tyler!

Next up- Kirtland.

I've been to Kirtland a few times when I was growing up, but it is always a good stop, and especially at Christmas it turns out. They collected about 500 nativity sets to put on display, and it was wonderful! The international section was my favorite, because they were all so different. I could write all about them, but an article in the Plain Dealer was so much better than what I could write! If you have a minute, follow the link to read it.

Some were wooden, some were metal, and everything inbetween. I was worried that the kids would be trying to grab them all, but they did fairly well for toddlers.

This set was even made from Coke bottles!

I loved these pictures that were made from banana leaves by orphans in Ghana. They were so beautiful.

There were so many beautiful sets, it was hard to choose which pictures to put here.

This year they put up a kids room, with plush and plastic nativities to play with, as well as dress up clothes too. Fun!

We also went on at tour at the Kirtland Temple itself before we went home, and had a knowledgeable and good tour guide. It rained on Christmas Day, but finally snowed for us that Sunday.

The next day, we went to the Lake Erie Nature and Science Center.

It is a little, free, animal spot up in Bay Villiage, and it was great. There were animals to look at outside and inside. Kaitlyn sure does love to talk about ducks, even when they are actually geese.

They even had a bald eagle! I thought that was rather cool.

And deer, which the kids recognised from the cabin. I think.

They loved this little turtle habitat inside. I loved the feet all up off the floor to get a better look.

This hollowed out tree was the perfect toddler size to climb through.

My favorite was this guy in the hallway. He would bring out animals one at a time and tell you about them, letting the kids pet them if they were brave enough. It was neat to see a different one every time you turned around- he would bring out a snake, then come back with an owl, and then reappear with this skunk.

Well, those were our big fun adventures! The kids also had a great time with Grandma and Grandpa, and Kaitlyn especially has been asking for them ever since. I just wish they lived closer!