February is almost gone…

Not quite sure what has happened to it – a lot of snow, ice, and wind, I think! 

Flip back the calendar a page and let’s wrap up the last weekend in January.  Madison went to Youth Winter Retreat at Camp Luz with a lot of jr. high kids from our church (and other churches).  It is only a weekend, so it is a different vibe from summer camp.  You also stay specifically with your church group, so that is different.  She was a little hesitant to go, but she ended up really enjoying it.  The first night their cabin door blew up and the frigid air infiltrated their night.  It was down to 49-50F in there!  Their sponsor had them layer clothes on and bundle up with the heater tried desperately to start warming it up again.  They had lots of snow to play in, too.  I am hoping this was a good start to JHY for her – getting to know the older girls in the youth group and making better friends with them. 

Madison had wanted to join ski club at school this year.  This is a club that takes the kids on a bus to Snow Trails every Tuesday during ski season.  While I thought I sounded fun, it made me nervous to send her “alone” to navigate getting her skis, the slopes, etc.  We had only skied once before.  Plus, they got back pretty late on Tuesday night.  Our compromise was we would try to take her a few times this season to give her more exposure and see how she felt by next year.  We planned to go on February 4 after school with the Paulis; their daughter Ellie had also considered ski club, but they decided to take the same approach as us.  Well, as snow storm blew in on Wednesday, and even Friday the roads were questionable. They ended up clearing enough for us to travel to Snow Trails.  It was amazing, fresh snow to ski on.  We had fun skiing from about 4-8pm. 

              

Somewhere in those snow days, the girls had the neighbors over for a sleepover.  They played outside for almost the entire day and then took a supper break at their own homes before reuniting for the night.  We had just bought a couch that pulled out to make a full bed, so we tested that out as well.  The next morning, they made a feast – pancakes, eggs, and blueberry muffins. 

       

Madison and Jeremy also went skiing this past Saturday from about 12-6pm at Snow Trails.  While it had been warm, rainy, and then cold and icy the days leading up to it, the resort had time to groom and make more snow for pretty good conditions on Saturday.  Madison ventured on blue slopes our last time out, but stuck to them almost exclusively with Jeremy.  She even used the ski ramps that were built along the edge to just go up and over; she really enjoyed that.  It is neat to see her confidence grow. 

While Madison and Jeremy were skiing, Ellie and I headed to the animal shelter to pet some cats and dogs.  She had a lot of fun, especially because there was a pen with three puppies in it.  This is Papi, a Chihuahua mix on the left, and Bosco, a English Sheepdog on the right. We took a few dogs out for a bit, but it was cold  We will have to go another time when it is warmer to let them out longer.

    

Madison recently rearranged her room and Ellie rearranged her this weekend.  I am not good with the before and after pics, but it is fun to watch how they continue to find new configurations for their stuff.  They have gotten faster at rearranging, and also better at putting their own things away afterwards. 

Jeremy and I went out on a date to see the movie, Marry Me, and eat out at The Nook.  It was a good chick-flick, which I feel like I haven’t seen in forever.  The food was good at the restaurant, too.  Our next date is to the Eagles concert in mid-March.  We should get in the habit of one date night a month.  It is good to be out and learn how to talk to each other about the things that aren’t just the details of the daily grind. 

Enjoy the last bits of February – sunshine and 50s out there today.  It is also Ellie’s one year anniversary from her Type 1 Diabetes diagnosis.  We will be celebrating today with a trip to the roller rink. 

California Adventure: Day 4 and 5

We settled in quickly to our hotel on day 3 and woke up by about 7ish.  That gave us time to get breakfast, change Ellie’s Dexcom, and pack things up for Disneyland.  Jeremy had found a hotel that was only about a 15 minute walk to Disney.  When we left the rain started to come down hard enough we had to shelter under an overhang for a bit.  The rest of the day was pretty clear.  You have to walk through Downtown Disney District to get there, full of shops and restaurants.  There was the Lego shop, which always has cool Lego creations outside of it.

    

We had spent one day in DisneyWorld at Magic Kingdom back when the kids were 4 and 6.  They were interested in a few small rides and seeing lots of characters.  It was crowded, crazy, and hard to figure out the FastPass system you had to work months ahead to get to work for you in the best possible way. 

This day in Disneyland felt entirely different once we got going.  They have a new system in place.  Instead of a FastPass, you pay $20 extra per person to have the Genie Plus, which allows you to book Lightning Lanes for rides and skip the line.  I did some quick research prior to purchasing our tickets and decided it would be worth the extra money.  It was a beautiful system.  You can use a Lightning Lane one time on each of the rides.  While you can’t double up and go multiple times on a ride, you don’t necessarily have the time to do that.  It saves so much time in lines.  I think the most we waited if we used the Lightning Lane was 10 minutes.

We started the day in Tomorrowland.  We used our Lightning Lane pass for Star Tours, then Space Mountain, then Buzz Lightyear Astro Blasters.  We jumped on a few more rides while we ordered our food for pick up at a specific time. 

    

While we were in Magic Kingdom, we did Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride, Pinocchio's Daring Adventures, and walked through Sleeping Beauty Castle.

After lunch, we ventured to It’s a Small World and Matterhorn Bobsled.  We used our Lightning Lane on both of these.  Ellie and Jeremy also went on King Arthur’s Carousel, while Madison and I looked in a few shops. 

    

We headed to Mickey’s Toon Town.  We rode no rides, although we thought about it.  The rides and attractions were perfect for younger kids, but our kids were pretty much too big for much of the exploring and climbing around.

I don’t remember the order of what happened next, but we headed to Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge – a pretty cool land made to look like you were on set of the movie.  We rode Smuggler’s Run (lightning lane).  It is an interactive experience.  You board the Millennium Falcon with 6 people.  Two people are flying the Falcon, two are shooting the weapons, and two are engineers.  We actually rode this ride twice by the end of the night.  Madison and Jeremy piloted first; Ellie and I manned the weapons.  The second time, Ellie and Madison flew, while Jeremy and I took out the enemy ships.  Apparently, how you fly does actually matter, so the better the pilots, the better the ride.  We saw Chewbacca from a distance, as well as some Storm Troopers and Kylo Ren.  Jeremy even drank Blue Milk!

         

At some point, we were in Frontierland and rode Big Thunder Mountain – my favorite ride. 

New Orleans Square has the Pirates of the Caribbean ride.  Not Ellie’s favorite due to a talking skull, but she recovered and (I think) enjoyed the ride otherwise.

We also spent time in Adventureland where we did the Jungle Cruise.  Critter Country had Winnie the Pooh, which was a pretty laid back ride. 

We ended the night with Indianan Jones.  We had put in for our Lightning Lane pass, but when we got there the ride was shut down for some reason.  That was the one ride Madison really wanted to do.  We (after much drama) ended up being able to get on it at the last minute before the park closed. 

By the end of the night, we were very tired and we still had to get home.  Jeremy offered to go get the car, but the way the park is set up, you have to walk through so much that by the time we got to where he could pick us up, it was only another 5 minutes walking or so.  My legs, back and feet all hurt to an extent I haven’t felt in a long time.  We walked almost 12 miles, stood in lines (even short ones) all day, and pretty much were on on the move from 9am – 9pm. 

We packed our suitcases when we got back to the hotel.  Our plane left at 7:45am, which meant a 4:30 wake up to get things loaded up, rental car dropped off, and through security with time.  We ended up having more than enough time before boarding the plane, but you just never know.  Better safe than sorry.

We flew back to Ohio 2 days after a snow storm had passed through that part of the country.  In fact on Sunday, 95% of flights in Charlotte were cancelled – that was our connection!  Luckily, the mess was cleared up by the time we were flying on Tuesday.  Things went smoothly. The girls and I shared a row to Charlotte; Madison and Ellie sat together on the way to Canton.  We saw the sunsetting through the windows as we started our descent. 

    

Jeremy unearthed the van from the snow, and we were home by about 8pm – where, thankfully!, my dad had snowblowed our driveway so we could get in.

  

We had a blast.  We moved pretty much every day that were there.  This was both good and bad.  The girls didn’t seem to mind, but they also like trips where we get to unpack a suitcase and settle in a bit.  It was a good time of year to go because it was cool at Joshua Tree.  It wasn’t warm enough to give us good lay on the beach weather, but we hadn’t planned on a lot of that either.  Jeremy and I have been to California together a couple times.  Every time I go, it is something different.  The state is huge and diverse and there is so much to see.  I would still love to go back and drive on Highway 1 – Big Sur  - with Jeremy sometime.  I was really looking forward to Joshua Tree for some reason – maybe my obsession with going to national parks.  I was not disappointed and am so thankful the girls put this on their list of places to go.  I didn’t really want to go to Disney at all, but I was pleasantly surprised at how much I enjoyed it.  Not sure where we are headed next, but it is always so much fun.

California Adventure: Day 3

We woke up to the sun coming up outside our window.  Such a different view from the morning before when we saw the beach.  This morning, there were palm trees, desert scrub brush, and mountains on the horizon. 

    

We ate a tasty breakfast in town, and then headed out to explore on our way to Joshua Tree National Park.  Just outside of Barriga Springs is Sky Metal Art Sculptures.  They are really cool.  You can see them around, drive up to them, bike to them, and explore.  There is the dragon/serpent that stretches across the road, appearing to dip above and below the ground.  You can see Jeremy and I at the tail with the head in the distance.  Then, there were tons of other sculptures – over 130 total! – we did not see them all.  Here is a good website if you want to explore it more.

                          

    

On our way to Joshua Tree we passes acres and acres of date palm trees.  There is the Salton Sea (see it in the distance in the pic on the left) which was formed in the early 1900s when the Colorado River burst through poorly constructed irrigation canals.  The run-off from all the agriculture in this area continues to feed this body of water.  It is not a healthy system right now.  In fact, they say to try to fix it would be one of the most expensive and largest water project in North America since the Hoover Dam.  You can read more about it here.  We also drove through some unique canyon areas. 

    

We made it to Joshua Tree by about 1pm.  Because Ellie is a fourth grader, we can get a year pass to the National Parks for free.  It is a super cool program (and very easy to do).  The first stop was the Cholla Cactus Garden.  These are a unique cactus (one of many species in the park) that are congregated in this area, but can be seen other places in the park as well.  There is a path to walk through the area.

         

Then, we stopped to see Skull Rock – aptly named.  This is in an area of rocks that you can just climb around on forever.  We had fun just running from rock to rock.  It would be easy to get lost if you weren’t careful though because while there is technically a trail, it is very hard to see where it goes. 

         

We stopped at one spot to get some pictures with the park’s namesake – the Joshua Tree.  It is an interesting tree.  The “leaves” are pretty spiky and kinda hurt if you bump up against them.  They have weird limbs and just an odd shape.  You can learn more here if you want. 

    

Jeremy wore his U2 Joshua Tree shirt to the park to be most authentic!

The view from the rocks near this grove of trees was expansive.

Our last hike of the day, we took the Barker Dam trail.  It was about a 1.5 mile loop with some cave paintings at one point.  The interesting and disappointing story about these paintings is that back in the day Walt Disney was filming a movie here, found the paintings, decided they weren’t vibrant enough… so HE PAINTED OVER THEM.  Not all of them, but you can certainly tell the originals from the updated ones.  I guess, either way it is pretty cool to see them either way.

    

As we rounded the corner at the end of the trail, we were tired.  We had decided to just give up watching the sunset – something that is supposed to be pretty spectacular – because we were just too beat.  However, as I waited with the girls for Jeremy to get the car (maybe a 1/4 mil away), we were given an amazing show!

  

This is a view when I turned around of the moon rising over the Joshua Tree and the sky being tinged by the setting sun.  It was breathtaking.

It continued to get more fire-y as the minutes passed.

         

We drove away from that remote beauty and headed to Anaheim – a 15 minute walk to our next destination, Disneyland.