Fall 2014 ~ Camping, and Camping, and Disney! Oh my!

It seems doing a bunch of posts at once is how I get things done--if at all--on this blog! But aside from what's going on with the kids, which I will do posts of following this one, there usually isn't too much to report.  But here are a few highlights of family fun this Fall.

August 16th we took off on one of Paul's little day adventures.  I think I've mentioned before how Paul loves to just hop in the car and head off to explore some place around AZ.  A lot of times it's up north towards the Rim country past Payson.  This trip Paul & the kids found some water to play in, I took pictures.  Then we had a some hot dogs and s'mores and headed home.

Two weeks later we went camping over Labor Day weekend with Paul's sister and nephew.  His parents also came up for a day.

Then in less than a month at the end of September we went camping AGAIN on our Ward Family Campout for church.  I didn't get any pictures from that, but I should have because it STORMED all night long and our tent had the pockets of water inside to show for it!  Can I just point out that this was the 3rd time I went camping in less than 2 months?  And we already went camping earlier in the spring.  That's 4 times this year, that's a lot for me.  But if Paul has his way, we'll be doing it lots more times.

October 6-10 the kids have a week off from school for October Break.  We usually hang around here as Paul is working, but this year we actually took a trip...to Disneyland!  The kids have been beyond excited for months as we've talked about how we've saved and they earned spending money doing garage sales for the trip.  There is no way I could post ALL the pictures we took and not sure anyone would want to see them all anyway, except us.  But you can view them all here: https://neerings.shutterfly.com/8060.

Day 1: We drove all day and despite departing an hour and a half later than planned, a stop at Discount Tire to fix a tire with a nail (on my mom's car, her and my brother Hunter came with us), and a motion sick toddler, we made it and attended Mickey's Halloween Party for the first part of our Disney Trip.

Day 2: We spent ALL day/night at Disneyland.  Everyone did great!  We had yummy treats, rode the rides, saw some characters and shows!  We enjoyed dinner at Goofy's Kitchen.

 Day 3: California Adventure!  The kids loved Cars Land!  We rode the Radiator Springs Racers 3 times, well 3 1/2 because it broke down the first time the kids & I went.  So we had to walk off and get back on again.  We only did one day at CA adventure so we did miss a lot of rides they had.  But we still enjoyed ourselves of course.

This girl rode that roller coaster in the background with Paul! 

Day 4: We hit Disneyland up again and were there from 7AM-12AM!  And everyone survived!  We had quite the adventure getting back to the hotel from Disneyland because we didn't know the trams stopped BEFORE Disneyland officially closed.  But we can kind of laugh about it now.

Before we headed home we had to stop at the beach.  Next time it will be a longer spot, the kids loved it.  Audrey has only been to a beach once, at 10 months in the Outer Banks, NC.  Owen & Alison have never been.

It was an amazing trip!  Having my mom there really helped so we could all take turns staying with Alison on any rides she couldn't go on.  Next Disney trip...you know when we save up for it again...we think Alison will at least be 5 or 6, seems to be the perfect age! 

Of course we ended October with Halloween.  Alison didn't want to dress up, she screamed when I put on the two costumes I tried.  And they were just basically dresses.  But Anna (from Frozen) and our firefighter had a great time. 

November 23rd, Paul I celebrated our 13th wedding anniversary!  And we enjoyed a yummy Thanksgiving with our family.  

Paul also sold an unopened Star Wars Lego set he's had for years and bought himself and me bikes!  The kids are so excited we have bikes now too.  Last weekend, we also got a trailer for Alison so we could finally have family bike rides.  Our first one was a success!  They kids also complained they were tired!  LOL!  It's a lot harder to keep up with adults riding bikes instead of when they're walking behind and pushing a stroller!