I demand a recount

Reina came home last week with a "1, 2, 3 Pink Elephant" award from school.  In her words, Pink Elephant is a game where "the teacher says 1, 2, 3 Pink Elephant and then everybody has to be quiet and whoever stays quiet the longest wins a prize." So let me reiterate.  Reina won a round of Pink Elephant.  I find this news to be shocking.  I'm thinking that particular round of Pink Elephant lasted about 5.5 seconds because that's about how long she can go at home without speaking.  Heck, she spent about 15 minutes telling me about winning the award for not talking.  Ironic that on this very blog, I devoted at least a couple of posts to my worries about her NOT talking at fifteen months.  Now most of our conversations start with something along the lines of, "Mom, I need to talk to you about something.  I know that unicorns aren't real." A half hour later, we've covered unicorns, other things that aren't real like dragons and bad guys, a story about a kitten I had when I was a little 'ghel,' and a list of people who wronged her at preschool.  It's never dull. 

Will had a birthday. A while ago.

While looking through the camera this weekend, I realized that I never finished posting about Will's birthday.  At this point, I'm proud that I remembered during the actual calendar year.  So here you go.  

Opening presents, birthday morning.  "It's the LEGO's set I always wanted!"  He said that about every Lego that he received for his birthday. 

Wearing the Jedi Robe that he opened shortly after the Star Wars Lego set.  He kept asking for a robe for his birthday.  Glenn thought he wanted a bathrobe.  Luckily I erred on the side of Star Wars.  I think he looks a little monk-ish. 

Building something Star Wars Lego-y on the birthday morning. 

Much to the delight of everyone in the family, I opted to buy an Angry Birds cake from the grocery store instead of attempting to bake one myself.  It was a big hit.  See below.

 

She's going to love this picture in about a decade, huh?  CAKE! 

So Will officially turned six.  And now it's been documented for another year. 

We interrupt this blog to bring you 2.5 snow days

The view from the front porch.  I finally pulled down the "let it snow!" decorations I had on the door from Christmas.  Enough.  Let it rain, rain, and rain. 

I still have vacation pictures to post but this hasn't been the week for it.  From Monday through Wednesday, we received about 17.5 inches of snow and it was 10 degrees when we got up this morning.  It's a little difficult to look at Florida under those conditions.  Don't get me wrong, I'm super thankful for all of the great moisture (we had another storm last week that resulted in about 10 inches of snow, I think) it's just the stinking cold and wind that's bringing me down.   School closed on Tuesday at lunchtime and has been closed since then.  Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on your perspective) state government didn't close so we've been doing some acrobatics to get childcare taken care of.  Thanks to a flexible Grandma Hansen who was also having snow days, we've managed to make it through.  School better be back in session tomorrow because I'm running out of entertainment.  We've made cookies, watched movies, played Memory, read stories, made the house really, really messy and napped.  I'm not sure what's left besides boring chores like cleaning our rooms.  Gasp - the horror!  

Glenn and I shoveled the walk and part of the driveway yesterday afternoon.  After we finished, it started snowing again.  I'm now waiting until it all just blows away. 

Glenn was supposed to go turkey hunting this weekend but with all of the snow and cold, the turkeys will probably be very uncooperative so he's staying put for another week.  In the meantime, he can look at Will's drawing and dream of taking out man-sized turkeys with some sort of automatic weapon.   Glenn's green - he must be wearing camo?  Ah the mind of a 6-yr old. 

P.S.  I asked Will about the thing on the turkey's back - he informs me that it's a knife.  Naturally.  Let's just focus on the pretty feathers..... 

We interrupt the vacation pictures to bring you a story about Reina

Reina informed me on the way home from preschool last week and that she had a boyfriend and that they were going on a date. I guessed correctly that the boyfriend in question was named David.  Reina and David were going on a picnic and Reina had it all planned out.  She was in charge of the lunch.  She was making sandwiches, but not peanut butter and jelly because David doesn't like peanut butter.  She was also packing chips, cake, grapes, apples, watermelon, soup, blueberries, strawberries and yogurt.  Apparently David is vitamin C deficient.  The picnic is going to be at the park, naturally and Glenn gets the privilege of driving them.  I wonder if she'll want her dad to take her on her dates in another decade (and a half). 

Tonight, while driving home, Reina broke the news that after she and David get married, they are going to live at Disney World.  I tried to talk to her about the humidity and hot summers but she said she won't mind.  Reina informs me that she's going to dress up as Minnie and David will dress up as Mickey, obviously.  I hope they'll be very happy.  In case you would like to buy a wedding present for the happy couple, they are registered at the Disney Store and Toys R Us.

L

A few of my favorite pictures from our trip - part 1

We've been home for more than a week but I still haven't had a chance to go through all of the photos and chronicle our trip.  I have to write it all down before the memories (and the lovely tan on my feet) fade.  Here are some of my favorite pictures from the trip.  Stay tuned for the second half.

Reina and I at Playa Linda on our last day.  It was the warmest day of the trip, but not quite warm enough for me to ditch the long sleeves at the beach.  Reina and Will loved the water and splashed around until their teeth were chattering and their lips blue.  Just like last time. 



Wild Wyoming kids staring down the surf.  I take this same picture each time we go to the beach.  The waves and the sand don't change, but the two humans just get bigger and bigger.  Sob.

Cooooold water on your feet! 

Reina and Minnie.  This picture was taken at about 9:30 at night.  Reina was such a trooper - she was starting to fade a little bit at this point, but she perked up when she saw Minnie and Daisy. 

We also meet Ariel.  There are better pictures of Reina and the mermaid but this is my favorite because Reina is talking Ariel's ear off.  She told her about our trip to Florida, going swimming at Grandma and Grandpa Pauley's house, her dogs, etc.  Ariel was very patient. 

She looks so grown-up!  We were trying to get back to the castle before the fireworks but I had to set her down and give my back a break for a minute.  A great time to take a picture of my big girl. 

Earlier in the day, when everyone was more awake, we visited Mr and Mrs Easter Bunny.  It was the only 'ride' that didn't have a 2-hour wait. 

If four-yr old Will Pauley had been to Disneyworld on this day, I think his little head would've exploded.  Capt JACK SPARROW!  Modern-day Will was pretty excited and even got to run up on stage for a few minutes.  This picture was taken specifically for Grandma Hansen.  Hubba hubba.

These pictures are out of order but before the beach, and before Disneyworld, we visited several state parks and canoed and swam and ate pancakes.  The water at this spring is always 72 degrees so obviously that was warm enough for some members of our party.  Are you seeing a theme here?  The water is never too cold for W & R, sometimes too cold for G, and usually too cold for the Bronco Baby Mom.  That's why I'm the Official Photographer.

I've had to ask Glenn to remind me what these birds are called every time I see this picture.  They are limpkins and we saw them while canoeing.  You don't see a ton of them in Florida but this pair had 3 chicks with them.  One is in this picture and they are two are fuzzy blobs on about ten other pictures that I took.  Little limpkin chicks!  According to Wikipedia, the sounds made by limpkins were used as the sound effect for the hippogriff in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban movie.  Who knew?! 

Up next, pictures of the other two people who were with us at Disneyworld, more pictures of people swimming in cold water, manatees and the rest of our vacation.  As I type this tonight, it's 6 degrees and we are in the middle of Winter Storm Walda.  72 degree water doesn't sound too bad right now. 

Florida - camera phone edition

We were in Florida for Spring Break last week and I have a lot of blogging to catch up on.  We had a nice trip and the kids really enjoyed the sun and sand and doting grandparents.  Unlike our last trip to Florida in 2012, we didn't have any midnight trips to the ER with Will or Ear Infection Reina.  Everyone was healthy and we all came back tired, which is a sure sign of a fun trip. Here's a quick rundown of the cell phone pictures.  The camera pics will show up this weekend after I've sorted through the piles of Reina and Ariel,  Reina and Belle and Will on roller coasters.

 

The day before we flew home was spent on the beach.  It was the warmest day of the week.  Still not warm enough for many of us to get in the water, but these two had no problem splashing around.  And digging for treasure. 

The photos are in a random order but I'm too tired to change them.  The Will of 2012 would've had his little mind blown by a real live sighting of Capt Jack Sparrow.  2013 Will was pretty excited.

Reina posing next to a cannon at the Castillo de San Marcos in St. Augustine.  The jaunty hand on hip was her idea.  Notice the winter coats?  It was cold!

Our first sighting of the Cinderella castle.  It took us an hour to get from the parking lot to the actual inside of Disneyworld.  That was a preview of coming attractions when you go to Disney during the week between Palm Sunday and Easter.  More whining on that later.

Swim, swim, swim!  The grandparents' neighborhood has a giant heated pool.  We visited it several times during our week there.  It was even warm enough for the Broncos Baby Mom. 

My photogenic girl on a boat tour.  She was very interested in finding alligators. 

Too cool for Florida.

Hollywood.