Easter Fun!

We had a fun Easter weekend at home and in Utah! Friday we were able to go to an Easter Egg Hunt at the Blackfoot pool and dye eggs as a family. We got a "monster" egg kit at Kessler's and had a lot of fun playing with our eggs. I think my favorite part was the bright colors and watching the kids figure out how they wanted to decorate their eggs.

Saturday morning after my 11.33 mile run (exact mileage haha!) we had an early Easter breakfast, the kids showed us what the Easter Bunny brought and we got ready to go to Salt Lake to spend some time with my family. My parents celebrated their 40th wedding anniversary and we were able to go out to lunch with everyone and have an Easter Egg hunt at Grandma and Grandpa's house afterward. All of my sisters, their husbands, and kids were there! It doesn't happen very often so it was a treat for us to all be together! We spent the night, got up Sunday morning and headed home so we could spend some time with Brett's family too. Scott, Kara Lee and Dane were able to come up from Logan, so we had a good, fun crowd. We had dinner at our house (Chicken Cordon Bleu with Swiss Bechamel, Spiral Glazed Ham, mashed potatoes, cooked carrots, homemade honey butterhorn rolls, fresh fruit and veggies, and Grandma Gaskill's Carrot Cake). It was worth every calorie.

I also want to express my love for our Savior, Jesus Christ. I'm so grateful for the atonement and the true reason we celebrate Easter. I'm glad that I got to spend time with the people I love most!

The Yancey Monster Easter Eggs!



Decorating Eggs...one of our favorite Easter activities!




Luke getting in on the action with Daddy




My creative Colby




All of the Colby cousins!




TEN naughty kids! Just kidding, they were just really excited for the Easter Hunt waiting for them outside!



Jolie showing off the first few prizes in her bucket

Brett, Huge and Joe

Our cute family!

Jolie with silly string and an excited smile because....wait for it.....

She was about to attack Aunt Christy!

My parents, Henry and Diane, celebrating 40 years of marriage!

Las Vegas

Luke in his Steak n' Shake diner hat, so cute

Colby folding his convertible!

Jolie concentrating on her picture and Brett...observing

We started our vacation by stopping off at Grandma and Grandpa Colby's to drop off Meatloaf. We spent the night and then headed to Vegas. I'll have you know that I hate Las Vegas. It's too slimey for this protective mama, but it's a good stopping point so we made the best of it! We stayed at South Point which is south of the strip and we were able to eat there, swim in the hot tub, order "Tangled" on PPV in our room and then leave! It was great! We read about the Steak n' Shake before we left, and luckily we got there during happy hour. We all got shakes and burgers and had a good time.The kids loved the hot tub even though it was a little on the cold side, and our room was nice with comfy beds and pillows. It was a great start to our trip!

San Diego

Our next stop on the schedule was San Diego, CA! We were so excited to head toward the beach that we were on the freeway by 7 a.m.! We made two stops on the way, the first was for breakfast and the second was to play with the Huge. We reached our destination by about one in the afternoon and it was glorious to see all of the ships/boats, the water and the boardwalk! Brett and I separated and he went with Colby on the U.S.S. Midway tour and I took the little kids and explored the boardwalk.  Jolie, Luke and I saw street performers and vendors, lots of shops and restaurants and most importantly--sunshine! We all had a great afternoon and then we found our dinner destination, Sammy's Woodfired Pizza. It was great. We had several appetizers including Duck Tacos, Pork Dumplings with an amazing dipping sauce, and Steak Skewers followed by a barbecued chicken pizza. YUM.

We then packed up and went to check into our hotel which was about 15 miles away. We saw the amazing San Diego Temple on the way and enjoyed the view on our drive! After we got settled and checked in we went over to BevMo and got some of our favorite Root Beer, some Orange Cream Soda and some ice cream and we headed back to the hotel to relax! 



Brett and Colby were able to tour the U.S.S. Midway in the San Diego Harbor. It's a Navy Air Craft Carrier and it's quite amazing. I loved how neither one of them could stop talking about it. They were both fascinated and amazed and even still if you get them talking about it...they'll go on and on. I think they both learned a lot and had a great time. They made sure to take pictures in the kitchens, so I could see how big the steam kettles and mixers were! Cute boys.

 The next day we went to Sea World yay! We saw all of the shows in the two days we were there and rode the rides as many times as we could. Our favorite was "The Journey to Atlantis"! It's a roller coaster that you get wet on and it even had an elevator. It was crazy fun. I think Colby got to go on it at least 7 times. Our favorite show was the Sea Lion show with Clyde and Seymore and we loved seeing all of the animals.

Here are some pictures from Sea World! Yes we saw Shamu. No...no one was maimed or eaten.

La Jolla

On our second day at Sea World, we spent about half a day there and then we left to explore a little bit of San Diego. We went over and found the museum district and the San Diego Zoo. There is some amazing architecture in that area and we thoroughly enjoyed our drive. It made us sad that we didn't have more time there. I know next time I'll plan for it! We ate at two more really fun places in San Diego too. The first was the Lucha Libre Taco Shop and the second was the Corvette Diner. We had fun at both places, but the food at the Luchadore place was awesome. We saw it on Man vs. Food and it was a great place to visit! The Corvette diner was fun too. It had a 50's theme and they had old movies and tv shows playing and they had an arcade where the kids got to play games afterward. It was a hit, especially because we got back in the van with a bunch of prizes.

Anyway...La Jolla! We stopped in La Jolla on the way back to our hotel because my sister Hilerie suggested it. We loved it! We need to go back! We found a parking space right by the beach and we walked down to the sand where the Sea Lions were. It was amazing! Jolie could have played in the sand all day. Unfortunately we got there just about an hour before sunset (which was beautiful by the way). We soaked it all in and watched the sun sink into the ocean! We also ran into some friends from Blackfoot! After it started to get dark we headed back to the hotel, had floats, and then we went to sleep and all dreamt of Mickey Mouse!

Jolie seeing the sea lions up close! This mama and her baby were just a couple of feet away from us. The baby was so chubby, fuzzy, and cute!

Colby in front of the cute baby! The one thing he really remembers about the sea lions on the beach is that there was a lot of farting going on.

Our little family!

Brett and little Huge checking out the waves

Here's Colby gazing off into the distance, thinking about Hemingway.

Me and little Jo!

The Happiest Place On Earth!!!!

Disneyland oh Disneyland! We love you so!
When we got home and I looked at these pictures, I realized I didn't take enough! I think the princess with the princesses dominated the camera time. We truly had fun even though we did have to battle the cranky 3 year old and Thursday and Friday the 90+ degree weather!

When we got to Disneyland and picked up our park hopper passes and made it in, we immediately went to the Tiki Room, got our pineapple juice with pineapple ice cream float and watched the show woo hoo! That was followed by a whole lot more fun. Indiana Jones, Tarzan's Tree House, Pirates of the Caribean, The Haunted Mansion, Winnie the Pooh...Thunder Mountain Railroad and so on. We partied Disney style for four days. This partying included Space Mountain, Raging Rapids, and churros. It also included the Rain Forest Cafe, Roller Coasters, face painting, and princesses. Small World and Toy Story were hits with the kidlets and the World of Color show was spectacular. I think we went on everything we wanted to at least once and our favorites at least twice! We used the switch pass system the whole time we were there and Colby got to go on everything with Brett and then with me and if we had fast passes, he got to go again! We really tried to make it fun for everyone and I know we succeeded!



Awe the Tea Cups! Colby was the noble big brother and took his little sis on her first tea cup spin!



Jolie loved "It's a Small World" SO much that we went 3 times. We're nice like that! She was so cute! She started singing along and Colby named the countries of each scene every time we went through lol!



Here is Jolie totally smitten with Snow White. This was the first princess that she saw and she was in AWE! Snow White was talking to her and she just didn't know what to say or do! She is her favorite!



Snow White gave her a hug and made her feel like a princess too!

See...lot's of pictures of Jolie! She loved it so much!

Sleeping Beauty was telling Jolie that she liked her shirt because there was a picture of her on it.

Jolie still amazed that she is talking to Real Princesses!

Look in the front of the stroller. There are some crepe paper ribbons that Jolie got from the princess dance that made her very angry. She yelled at the ribbons and we were so baffled why they were bringing out her angry lions! We had to throw them away when she wasn't paying attention so she could settle down!

Listening to Cinderella tell her fairytale!

Huge cooling off with a little water!

Colby cracking up cause he loves the princesses so much ;o)

Jolie dancing with the May Pole with Cinderella

More dancing! More Jolie!

Jolie getting her face painted!

She requested a RAINBOW DOLPHIN! It was glorious.

Goofy's Kitchen...Ten Thumbs Up!

We decided to go to Goofy's Kitchen on our vacation because my sister and brother-in-law suggested it and so did my friend Tina. So, I saved for it beforehand and just included it in our vacation package so we wouldn't have to worry about it on our trip. I have to say it was one of the highlights of our Disney experience. It was well worth the money and the food was fantastic. Everyone found multiple things that they loved. Colby loved the peanut butter and jelly pizza, Jolie loved all of the fresh fruit and Brett and I loved the salads and the prime rib. We will go again. We went just before 5pm before the dinner rush showed up and I would highly recommend doing that if you choose to go for dinner. We had the characters to ourselves and the food was fresh. I can't say enough about it--it was very fun.



Here we are right before we went in to Goofy's Kitchen. We had just woken up Jolie and she was mad! I was sweating bullets because I wanted her to have fun and it wasn't looking good!



Minnie followed us to our table and Jolie willingly gave her a hug. Minnie was amazing. She just held Jolie and rubbed her back forever! It had to have been at least 3 minutes straight! After that Jolie started to feel a little better and Brett and I started to have hope that the rest of dinner was going to be fun for us! Jolie still wasn't sure but when Pluto held her hand all the way to the buffet table, she was hooked. She perked up and had a great time.

Here's Rafiki talking to Luke. He tried to get him to share that breadstick I was holding. Luke thought he was pretty funny.

Cinderella visited our table and made Jolie feel like a princess. She visited with her and talked to her about princess things--so fun for Jolie!

Here's Cinderella signing Jolie's autograph book! Jolie was so excited!

Jolie's buddy Pluto. Apparently while I was gone getting some food Pluto came for a visit to our table. Brett kept calling him "Goofy".  When I got back Colby told me of Brett's error and he couldn't stop laughing. He was like..."Dad's so embarassing!" LOL! 

This is Terk from Tarzan. She stole the show for Huge. He wanted to take Terk home with us. He was laughing and grabbing for her and Terk loved it so him so much that she stayed at our table for awhile, it was absolutely adorable.

What a sweet happy baby that loves gorillas! GO-RIL-LUHS!

One happy boy!

All of our little cuties after dinner. We had such a great time and ate so much good food that we wished that we could have just driven this Autotopia car back to our shuttle stop!