LifeNado

I'll be honest, I haven't checked out this supposed Sharknado hilarity that is hitting pop culture right now. Mostly it's lack of interest but also an extreme lack of time to do so. However, love the name and am stealing it for this blog post. We've been experiencing a serious Lifenado right now. Life seems to be coming at us in all directions and the hits keep on coming. Right now everyday is a new emergency in regards to the condo\car issues\broken ice makers\appointments\shopping for fixtures\etc. and we are in a constant scramble to keep up with it all. We all have our health and each other so life is mostly great but I will certainly be a little happier when the pace slows down just a wee bit. I kind of liken it to finals week in school: you know the light at the end of the tunnel is soon but you're completely zapped of energy from the exertion of the last several months and somehow have to find a way to keep pressing on.

At the beginning of the month, my parents were here for Dylan's big 4th birthday bash which also happened to be the day of my cousin's wedding. While they were here, it was also a whirlwind of traveling and events- NH for condo progress, western MA for the wedding, and Dylan's party. We kept my parents on the move. I'll post about the bigger events another time. But, for that week, here's the stuff that happened in between.

Bubbles! Always a big hit with the boys.

 

Dance Parties

Extreme Cuteness

Ahhhh!

Time with Pipaw and Mimaw

 

On the new NH deck

 

Always pretty in the White Mountains

Babysitting and letting us sneak away for a quiet dinner.

Mimaw and Dylan played a lot of IPad together
(Mimaw is now addicted to the Plants vs Zombies game)

Our Last Disney Day

As I post this, my parents are en route here for a very busy week of fun and celebrations. In order to make some room for those future posts, let's wrap up this Disney trip which is now a month past and we finally feel recovered from.

Our last full day in CA we went to Disneyland California Adventures. This day was magical....no really. Other than Cade flipping over a rail and face planting into the cement (he recovered quickly and was fine other than some funny shaped boo boos on his poor little face), the day went really, really well....especially in comparison to the last few.

First thing we did when we got in the park was to get a fast pass for the new Cars ride. Good thing we did because our time slot wasn't until 3pm and shortly after we got them, they were out of passes for the day. I was a little worried about this park because there seemed to be a lot of rides that Dylan either couldn't ride or ones we weren't sure he'd like. Definitely a good amount of stuff Cade couldn't ride but passing the baby back and forth between us and my parents taking turn to ride stuff worked out pretty well. And we finally managed to get a few semi-decent family pictures:

There were lots of cool places in the park. I really liked Bugs Land (that's where Cade face planted so we didn't get to spend lots of time there). Dylan's favorite place was the Hollywood Hotel. It's the deserted hotel with a Twilight Zone theme where they take you up the "elevator" and randomly drop you. I don't know how much he actually loved the ride part (he was squeezing my hand pretty hard on those drops) but in his usual love of spooky, the deserted hotel we saw while waiting in line and the spooky theme really amused him. He still talks about the spooky hotel and wants to know where all the people went.

Jellyfish Ride with Dylan

But, the coolest part of the park is also the newest - Cars Land. Despite the heavy crowds in that area, we were able to enjoy it a lot. It really looked like they picked Radiator Springs out of the the Cars movie and plopped it down in California.

We had lunch at Flo's while Cade napped.

Just missed getting to have our picture taken with Lightening McQueen.

But we did get to have our picture taken with Mater.

And Red!

And for the finale, we cashed in our fast pass for the Cars ride. Cade couldn't do this one so he hung with my parents while we went. It was really an awesome ride where you drove around Radiator Springs and the surrounding area. And of course, you couldn't have a full tour of Cars without a little racing:

I'm not sure I would have loved it so much if we had waited in line for it for 2 hours, but it was definitely really cute and lots of fun.

Pretty soon thereafter, we decided to call it a day. My parents stayed on to go do some more stuff at the other park and we headed back to the house. It was really a great day to end a vacation on. Having fun with my kids that day almost overwrote all the tough days we'd had with them previously....almost.

So that was our trip to Disney. We made it back fairly uneventfully other than another Cade tantrum (seriously, they were EVERY day on that trip...ugh!) and were happy to be home. Have I mentioned we won't be flying anywhere for a while? Quite frankly, I was looking to get back to work the next day for a the real vacation. Sad, huh? Like I said, it took some recovery time and we were hit with illnesses in both boys in the week back but once they were well and well rested again, my happy babies were back. It's been nice....really nice to have those sweet boys to hang out with again.

The Only Cool Thing In La La Land

At the start of our California trip (or rather 6 hours into it which felt like 3 days), we landed in Los Angeles. Mike and I immediately were reminded of something....we really hate L.A. I mean absolutely no offense to the people that have fond feelings for the place (resident or visitors) but we honestly just don't get it. There's not 1 single solitary thing about the city of angels that appeals to us. The culture, the lifestyle, the traffic, the architecture...I suppose the scenery\views could be nice but you wouldn't know it with all the smog. Yep, not really place high up there on our liking it list. But saying there's absolutely nothing we like about it is not really the truth. There is one cool thing there and that's the La Brea Tar Pits. After 2 tiring days of Disney and a long day of wedding celebrations, we took a lower key pace to the day and set our sights on going to the Page Museum.

I really thought Dylan would love it. He has a thing for skeletons and, well, that's pretty much all there is at the museum. It's a collection of all the skeletal animal remains they've found when exhuming some of the tar pits. I remember going there with my family when I was 5 years old. It left an impression. On my last trip to L.A. about 13 years ago, I went there again. This time I wanted to take my boys....all of them. Mike hadn't been there either!

In the spirit of non happy kids on the trip, it continued here. It was pulling teeth to try and help Dylan be happy about anything. Cade was happy as long as you let him wander freely which we couldn't always let him do.  Joy, it was going to be yet another one of those days!

Cade was instantly fascinated by the bubbling tar.

Dylan was content to hang in the stroller.

I think Cade was only still for about 3 seconds for this photo.

Once in the museum, I got Dylan interested in this saber tooth tiger display. It showed the bones then would change to show a holographic image of the animal in tact. We'd recently been watching the Ice Age movies a lot so Dylan was fairly fascinated with the "scary Diego" (Diego being the saber in that movie). Unfortunately, he was so fascinated he wouldn't leave it. Only after lots of coaxing and promising we would come back before we left was I able to pry him away from it without him being too upset.

The Promised Picture

Once we picked up a few souvenirs, we went back outside and attempted to get a family picture in front of the museum. You won't see one here because no one was happy and we were tired of trying. Thankfully, the boys found some pigeons to chase. And they finally seemed to be having a bit of fun.

Still couldn't get them to cooperate for a family picture.
This was the best we could get.

After running in the grass and chasing birds for a while, we said good bye to the elephants and explored more of the grounds.

I don't even know what this animal is, but climbing on top of it made the boys happy.
We're no dummies...we take our shots when we can and this ended up being one of
my favorite family pictures from the trip. 

We timed the trip home perfectly....right in L.A. afternoon traffic. Ugh. It was a long, long trek home. Luckily the boys napped a bit and stayed happy watching a movie when they were awake. As for Mike and I, we didn't fare so well. We were worn out from the day and ready to get home. The highlight of the trip was seeing the Hollywood sign very, very far away. Exciting, I know.

Though Dylan didn't seem really into the museum, it did leave an impression. He asks about and talks about the elephants in the pit quite often and about the "scary Diego." So hopefully down the line, it will be remembered positively by him. I also hope, down the line, I'll look at the smiling pictures and only remember the happy moments too. Sigh.

Disneyland Take 2

After having had a few nights of adjusting to California time and recovering from travel, we had high hopes for our 2nd day of Disneyland. Our original plan was to skip the park on the weekend (and hopefully avoid longer lines) but after talking with family at the wedding on Saturday, we changed our plan. Most of them were going to the park on Sunday so we went to try and meet up and spend some more time with them.

The day had a fabulous start. After meeting Goofy a couple days prior, Cade decided this character thing was pretty awesome. As we arrived on Main Street, Mickey had just come out and didn't have a very long line. We jumped in it and waited our turn.

And then this happened:

Extreme Sweetness

This might have been the longest hug Mickey has ever gotten. We really didn't think Cade would ever leave him. I kind of felt bad for the folks waiting behind us, but Mickey seemed pretty content to stay there as long as Cade wanted to love on him.

And it was a while!

Now that is just cute!

Dylan wasn't all that into posing with the characters, but we did convince him to come with us for one family shot with the mouse.

Just across the road was Chip and Dale. Now Dylan absolutely adored them on our cruise and were the only guys he wanted to see and get a picture with on that trip in December. On this trip, Dylan was more interested in chilling in the stroller. Cade, however, was extremely happy to find his own personal life size stuffed animals.

Cade Hugging Dale

And Hugging Dale
Chip was a little jealous so he moved into group hug position.

We thought he'd never stop.

Chip and Dale just ate him up!
They were shooing the rest of the line away
clearing the way for Cade to stay there all day long.

We popped in to get our picture while Cade hugged away.

Seriously, I almost cried. It was one of the sweetest things I've ever seen.

After sitting in his stroller for 5 minutes watching Cade hug them, Dylan finally decided he wanted a picture after his opportunity had passed. So, here he is.....

Getting his picture taken from the stroller of Chip and Dale hugging a complete stranger.
Sigh.

Next up was Pluto. Cade went quickly in to give him a big hug:

After the last 2 characters getting extreme hugs, Cade was done. He was in for a hug and then took off before the rest of us could join.

And then REALLY didn't want to be there.

Squirmy Cade and Unhappy Dylan
Poor Mimaw, Pipaw and Pluto

Then it was off to make the boys happy again and ride some rides.

Finding Nemo Submarine Ride
The boys loved this. It got Dylan out of his morning funk.

Then Dylan, Mike, my Dad and I hit the Matterhorn. Dylan talked about the Yeti on that ride the rest of the day. Cade had a little nap with Mimaw. On to the ride Dylan was looking forward to - The Haunted Mansion! He loved it and we went on it twice in a row. Then we hit Splash Mountain:

If you ask Dylan if he liked this ride, he'll tell you he didn't like the waterfall part.

Then we got to do what we set out to do for a bit of the day...spend a little time with family. We met up with my cousin Neil and his family and rode Pirates of the Caribbean. It was really great to get to chat with them a little bit since I think we barely had time to say hello at the wedding the previous day. After that ride, things went downhill fast. Cade had the mother of all tantrums for the week and after trying to calm him for a quite a while, finally had to strap him in the stroller until he screamed himself to sleep. Yes, we were those parents. The ones that seem oblivious to the child they're pushing around in the stroller. What can I say, sometimes it just has to happen. We were at the point that we wouldn't have even noticed if we had judging glances thrown our way. Then, there was peace:

Of course, just after getting Cade down was when the rest of the family that was at the park that day wanted to try and get together for a ride as a group. Well, we just couldn't take the chance of anyone waking up so we had to pass and instead hit just about every store at Disneyland and got our souvenir shopping out of the way. When Cade woke up, he was a little happier but still a little punchy. Of course, always happy to see Mickey though.

                                         

When Dylan woke up not on the energetic side, we knew it was time to call it a day. We left my parents at the park and headed back to our house for dinner, jammies and a movie. Surprisingly, after some craziness that day, that night was very chill, happy and relaxed for everyone. Perhaps all the boys needed to refuel was a little downtime.