Swimming Party!

Aleah and Cade had their last private swimming lesson.  They both choose to have lessons from Mom for the rest of the summer.  They both met their goals.  Aleah's goal was to dive in by herself.  She did that.  Plus, many pancakes, which she loves!  Pancakes are her favorite.  She starts in her back float and then John flips her (spins her to her stomach and she has to spin to her back) like a pancake.  She has been improving her back stroke, front crawl, and breathing to the side.  Her other favorite thing is swimming down to the bottom to get the diving rings!

Cade has made a lot of improvements!  Notice that his ears are in the water!  His goal was to do his back float all by himself, and he did it.  He learned to grab the side of the pool and flip over so that he could climb out.  And now he can put his head under the water to get the diving rings!

Since they both met their goals, they earned a swimming party at Grandma and Grandpa Stone's house on Memorial Day. 

As you can see, they were so excited and loved the swimming party!

It was kind of a cool day, but not too bad.  The water was very nice.  After Cade was done swimming he needed his jacket on and then he had fun playing by the pool.

Aleah stayed in as long as she could!  She didn't get out until dinner was on the table.  She practiced her front crawl and swimming down to the bottom to get the diving toys.

 By the end she was doing so good.  She would swim down to the bottom, get the toy,

and then swim over to the steps!  It was fun to watch her.

Our Memorial Day weekend was packed with fun and barbecues!  Saturday we had a fun barbecue at my Grandma Bushman's house.

Sunday we had a barbecue with Brad's family at his sister's house.  Monday we had a barbecue at my parents' house after our swimming party.  Fun family filled weekend!  We did find some time to visit some graves.

First stop was my Grandpa Bushman.

Second stop was my Grandpa Madsen, my Mom's Dad.

Third stop was my Grandpa Stone, my Dad's Dad.

With the nice weather that we have been having, we have been riding our bikes a lot and going for  family bike rides!  Aleah and Cade have been trying out Aleah's big bike.  They can ride it, but I have to help them get started and then I have to catch them when they stop because their feet don't reach the ground.

We love going for bike rides on the trail that is right by our house!  It is fun to exercise as a family.

Gymnastics Exhibition Meets

Aleah and Cade had their exhibition meets for their gymnastics classes last week.  It was so much fun to see them perform and to see how much they have improved in the last year!

Aleah had a lot of fun.  She had a big smile on her face the whole time!  She loved it!

It was so nice to have family come to support her!

 Cade did his meet with the Little Ninjas class.  He was so excited!

He loved being with all the boys and I could tell that he felt special and grown-up!

Throughout the meet he would look over at Brad, Aleah, Grant, and Braedan and do this super fast wave with a huge smile on his face.

I loved getting to watch Aleah and Cade.  They are super cute gymnasts!

For our family date night last week, we had to try out our new Pass of All Passes at Trafalga.  We had fun playing some mini golf and then the kids had to do the frog hopper ride.  They loved it and have been talking about it all week.

For my Dad's birthday present and my Mom's Mother's Day present we gave them a date night to see Mummies of the World.  It was fun to go to dinner and then walk around and look at mummies.  It was pretty interesting and such a nice relaxing evening with my family.  The time went by way to fast!  I was a little worried that I might have some bad dreams because some of the mummies were a little creepy, but I'm happy to say that I didn't!

I love my family and I'm very thankful for the time that I get to spend with them!

Disneyland!

Brad was able to take a couple of days off from work so that we could have a little family vacation while we were out in California.  We spent a day at Disneyland, a day at the beach, and a day touring around San Diego.

I can no longer say that I have never been to Disneyland!  We had such a great time together at Disneyland.  We had to start things off on our favorite roller-coaster!

I don't really understand why people love, It's a Small World, so much.  Even Aleah and Cade remembered it from Disney World and were excited to go on it.

Tea Cups are always a repeat favorite.

The train ride was fun.

We all loved driving the cars!

We got fast passes for Splash Mountain, Aleah was tall enough!  We watched it a few times and asked her if she really wanted to go on it and she jumped up and down and said, "Yes, I really do!"  So Aleah and I went first and Brad stayed with Cade.  Right as we made our way to the line they closed the ride.  I asked Aleah if she wanted to wait and see if they would reopen it and she said, "Yes, let's wait 10 minutes!"  After a few minutes I started to wonder if she knew that we would come back later so I asked her if she wanted to go on a different ride while we wait for them to fix it and then come back.  She said, "Yes, that's a good idea. But, they will let us get on again?"  She was so excited to go on Splash Mountain.

We went on a few more rides and then headed back to Splash Mountain.  Brad took Cade on the Winnie the Pooh ride again while Aleah and I went on Splash Mountain.

It was a little crazy for me since she had to sit in her own chair and there was not a bar or a belt or anything!  So I wrapped my arms around her.  I didn't have my phone with me so I didn't get a picture of the picture of Aleah and I after we got done.  It was such a funny one!  We loved the ride.  As soon as it got over Aleah said, "I have to go and get Daddy, he is going to love it!"

Aleah took Brad on Splash Mountain and Cade and I went to see if we could watch them.  I was able to get a video of them because I told Cade to tell me when he saw Daddy.  I was ready with my phone and pushed record as soon as he started yelling, "I see Daddy!  I see Daddy!"  That was Aleah's favorite ride.

Riding the Carousel with my handsome husband is always a good time.

Aleah and Cade couldn't wait to ride the Dumbo ride.  Every time we walked passed it there was a 30 - 40 minute wait, which I just couldn't make myself do.  So when it dropped to 20 and we couldn't get Aleah and Cade to put it off any longer, we jumped in line.  They love the Dumbo ride!

We went to get some dinner and since it took them forever to get it ready for us, they gave us dessert for free!

After dinner we had time for a few more rides.  We had to do Buzz Lightyear and the Tea Cups again!

Our day at the beach was a beautiful day.  Lots of sun, but the water was still too cold for me.  Brad is such a great Dad!  They are off to do some buggy boarding.

They had fun buggy boarding for their first time.  I loved seeing their big smiles as they rode the wave in!

I always enjoy watching Brad play.  I'm going to say it again, such a great Dad!

For our last day we decided to go see a cave in San Diego.  We had to park far away since it was a Saturday and there were tons of people.  But we had a good walk and saw some really pretty flowers.

The cave was pretty cool.  We walked down, I think it was 140 stairs to get to it.

We looked around.

We found some sea stars.

Then we climbed up all the stairs.

We had some amazingly yummy sandwiches with a beautiful ocean view.

Then we got to go to the naval hospital to visit my cousin and her husband and their sweet little baby who was born early that morning.  It was so much fun to see them and hold their sweet little guy and see where my cousin's husband works.  I'm glad that they had him that morning so that we could see him before heading home!

We flew home on Mother's Day which was also our 12 year anniversary!  That makes two years in a row that we have been on an airplane for our anniversary.  Brad and Aleah got upgraded to first class.  So Brad let us have a Mommy Daughter Mother's Day Date in first class.  It was fun!