Disneyland!!!

We finally made the big trip to Disneyland this past weekend, and had a great time. We went on lots of rides, saw some 3-D shows and even a live performance of Aladdin, which was great!

The plane ride out was an adventure, and I forgot how literal the mind of a 6-year old works. As we were sitting in the plane getting ready to pull away from the gate, the engines revved a little. Lanna asked “Why is the plane making that noise?” I said, “We’re getting ready to take off.” Lanna replied “How can we take off, we’re right next to the building?”

To pass the time during the flight, Maggie, Lanna and I played hangman, which again is an adventure with younger minds. Lanna and I were taking turns guessing letters, and on one of Lanna’s turns she guessed the letter “th”. (I’m sorry, the phonetic version of hangman is on the next flight.) With only two letters left to go, Maggie was trying to help her sister and said, “Lanna, what comes after q?” to which Lanna replied “Cumber”. I laughed for about 10 minutes after that one.

We eagerly set off for Disneyland the next day and Saturday before heading over to California Adventures for two more days. We all agreed California Screamin’ was our favorite ride (awesome rollercoaster!) followed by Tower of Terror and Space Mountain. Splash Mountain was fun too, but the River Raft ride left us all a little too wet.

We were at the parks quite a bit each day and did a lot of walking, which really wore the girls out. But, they were troopers all the same and it was well worth it to get everything in! We even had breakfast with Chip & Dale and other Disney characters, which the girls loved.

We got back early evening Tuesday night and we all hit the ground running the next day. We miss the fun and sun already and are looking forward to our next family vacation. For now, it’s back to the grind stone until Spring break and Memorial Weekend. Sigh…

Happy New Year!

It has been a while since we posted and a lot has happened since then: Christmas, the New Year, snow days and sledding.

Christmas was fun and relaxing for us this year and we had several treats on that day. We started the day with opening presents, and Lanna received an authentic chef’s coat and toque. She helped quite a bit with the dinner and was so proud to wear her outfit. When ever she helps in the kitchen she puts on her coat and toque and gets busy. Of course, she posed in front of the dinner table before Christmas dinner, just like in the magazines.

As we ate dinner, we had snow falling (but not sticking) and also had 4 (yes 4) bucks in our backyard at one time. We were in such awe we forgot to take a picture, so you’ll just have to use your imagination.

After the start of the year we headed up SR 504 towards Mt. St. Helens and went sledding and took family friends with us. We had the whole run away truck ramp to ourselves and enjoyed fresh falling snow and a long sled ride. We had so much fun our friend’s whole family went the next weekend. We found a fun spot with a few runs and one with a small jump at the end. Everyone shied away from the jump at first, but by the end of the day we were all going down that run and off the jump. We will definitely be going back for more sledding fun.

Maggie and Lanna have started basketball thru the YMCA. Maggie has had one game and is enjoying it much more this year with an all girls team. Lanna’s first game was canceled due to weather, so her first game will be this weekend, hopefully. She is enjoying playing as well and is practicing (sometimes) with Maggie’s team.

Santa brought our family a Wii this Christmas and we are having great fun as a family playing the different games. We recently got Guitar Hero, and Maggie and Lanna think they are ready to go on tour. We have all been a Wii bit sore, but more than a Wii bit happy. We even took part in a Wii party! Lots of fun for the whole family. More exciting things are sure to happen in the next month as we get into the basketball season.

Happy Holidays (and other stuff)

Since our last post, fall has gone and the Christmas season is now in full swing. As usual this fall, we had many leaves in our back yard to rake up and "give back" to our neighbors behind us. And being a kid, Lanna could not resist playing in the leaf piles. This reminded me of my own time as a kid playing in the leaves!

In early November, we lost a wonderful neighbor. Bill and Lanna shared the same birthday, and every year at his birthday party, he made sure that everyone sang Happy Birthday to Lanna too. That same day, Lanna learned to ride her bike without training wheels! How excited we were for Lanna as she conquered this feat in just a few hours!

Dan and Carol ran the Turkey Trot on Thanksgiving day, while Maggie and Lanna helped Nanny prepare the Thanksgiving dinner. The night before, they helped make the pumpkin pies, and how delicious they were. Lanna says she wants to be a chef, and Maggie loves to help in the kitchen and also says she wants to learn to sew. Good thing they have a grandmother who knows how to do both well!

The Saturday after Thanksgiving, we took our annual trek to the Fern Crest Tree Farm to pick out the "perfect" tree and to visit with Santa. As a bonus, we had snow that day and it was great fun (but cold) walking thru the snow and watching snow flakes land on our eye lashes.

The house is now decorated, the lights hung up outside, the school holiday program complete and the kids (including Dan) are now out for Christmas break. The girls are eagerly anticipating Santa's arrival, and even got a phone call last night from the big man himself. How fun it was to watch their faces as Santa talked to them about what he was planning to bring, but that they needed to be nice to each other and make sure to clean their rooms.

We wish you many blessings as you gather with family and friends, and hope everyone has a wonderful Christmas and Happy New Year.

It's the Great Pumpkin...

Pumpkin Patch Visit - 2007

Today was our annual pumpkin patch trip to select the “perfect” pumpkin and get into the spirit of Halloween. We visited a different patch this year, and had a great time. There were lots of pumpkins, some tractors to climb on, a corn maze to walk thru, a hay pit to jump in, a tractor ride and, for the kids, a fun spin on the tractor train. We always have such fun picking out our pumpkin and just enjoying the day together as a family.

The girls really enjoyed the kids train and didn’t at all mind the mud splashes, as you can see.

We saw some friends at the patch and had a good time visiting and watching the girls run around together. Alas, it was time to wrap the trip up and make a stop at Starbuck’s before heading home. The only thing that could have made the day better was sunshine instead of sprinkles, but the memories we made were warm none the less.

The Ruiz Family, "farming" for pumpkins

The Great Columbia Crossing

After a long Saturday of soccer, our running group took Sunday morning to ourselves and ran the Great Columbia Crossing in Astoria, OR. This race starts in Washington at the Dismal Nitch Rest Area, crosses the Astoria-Megler Bridge over the Columbia River and ends in Astoria, OR. It was a beautiful day and everyone did great. The bridge is 4.1 miles long with a ¾ mile long climb up 205 feet before descending back down toward Astoria. The 10k (6.2 mile) race finished at Tapiola Park in Astoria. If you live in Longview and do your running training anywhere other than Lake Sacajawea, you have to run hills. Fortunately for us, we were well prepared from our many training runs, and everyone passed more runners than they were passed. This is how runners measure how well we run, and of course we looked totally better than everyone else! (LOL) We all finished between 53 and 57 minutes and then enjoyed a bowl of great chowder and a leisurely walk back to our ride.

Dan doesn’t run with us in the mornings, but we consider him one of our “Raccoon Racers” and he has joined us for a few races. We missed one of our training partners, Cindy, this race, but she'll be with us at the next one. Next up...the annual Thanksgiving Day Turkey Trot.

The Raccoon Racers - Shannon, Trish, Carol and Dan

(Absent - Cindy)

Astoria-Megler-Bridge

Labor Day and Soccer Weekends

We decided to enjoy the last “weekend” of summer this year by spending our Labor Day Holiday camping. The girls had a blast fishing, hiking and hanging out by the fire. They enjoyed being able to “poke” the fire with their own stick and throwing more wood on. We were all a little dirty and tired, but it looks like we will be going camping again next spring and summer. Time to invest in some good camping gear.

Last weekend was the start of fall soccer and the kick off jamboree. Both girl’s teams did very well, and Lanna has announced that she now likes outdoor soccer. (Previously she only liked indoor soccer). Maggie continues to enjoy all the positions from goalie to defender to goal scoring striker.

Both the girls had quite the fan club today as cousins Cole, Jo and Darian (Tina’s neice) came up this weekend for a visit. Cole was quite into Lanna’s game, cheering her on and using body English to will her a goal. It may even have worked, and Lanna connected on a few today. They have all gotten along well, and even given the parents some relaxation time. How nice it is when they can entertain themselves.

Carol and Jill played in the Mark Morris Alumni game this afternoon against the Mark Morris Varsity Girl’s Soccer team. We are proud to say the alumni won 3-2! We like to think we had valuable contribution to the win, but what can you say when you have Lisa Sari on your team. What an honor it is to have played with such a great player.

Time to chill out on the couch and watch some college football.