Silverwood vacation

We had a great time in Idaho at the Silverwood theme park. My mom and dad, Amy, Nate, and their kids, and Sam and I and our kids all went together. Unfortunately, my brother and his family were unable to attend.


We left on Sunday and took our time getting to our hotel, making many potty stops. *Remember, we were traveling with 5 kids, as well as my sister who has to stop frequently, and she isn't even pregnant! :-) Love you Amy! We got there, settled in and had a sit down dinner which was...good, but terrible. We will get to that later. Amy, Nate, Sam, and I have shared hotel rooms in the past so we did it again this time. We had a suite-like room where there was a "living-room" area with chairs and tables. We used this area in our room to set up 2 playpens for both of my girls. My mom and dad were in a room across the hall from us and took all 3 of Amy's kids, until after the first night when Mikayla decided to stay with us. No wait, Mikayla didn't decide, my mom did, since she was the one up with her all night while Mikayla was begging for mommy and daddy.

Anyways, long story short on dinner, the service was TERRIBLE. As my family started to leave after we paid, I stuck around to chat with the manager. That's right, leave it to me to stand up to them! Actually, I wasn't that upset, I just wanted a manager to know that we were unhappy. The manager was not there (of course) but I talked with the bar manager who was extremely apologetic. She took my name and told me that she would talk with the manager and that they would make it up to us. Tuesday morning we were headed back to Silverwood when the manager calls me. I explained everything again and he was very apologetic and offered my whole family dinner on him that night! Man, I really wasn't expecting that! When we got to dinner that night, they treated us VERY WELL! We heard that the waitress that had "helped" us the first time we went was actually drunk or hung over when she was taking care of us. It makes sense now, but I wouldn't have even thought of that then! The manager came over to apologize again and said that he hopes she finds a job! I feel pretty bad, I got someone fired! But dinner was excellent and free! And we left a hefty tip to show our appreciation! So, if you are ever in Liberty Lake by the freeway, the "All-Star Sports Bar and Grill" has excellent food and good service (now.) :-)


So, we went to the waterpark all day Monday. The weather was perfect...warm, not too hot, breezy, but not cold. My mom was gracious enough to stay with my girls most of the day since she isn't huge on waterslides. She had them in the double stroller and followed us around a lot. They did well considering that Jenna didn't want to get into the water at all. She was content looking at it. Apparently swimming lessons early on in life doesn't pay off! Jocelyn walked around a bit in the "kiddie pool" area, but same thing went for her...don't splash her. They are definitely not my kids! :-)


Our absolute favorite ride was a 6 man raft ride. We (my dad, Nate, Amy, Sam, Juliana, and I) were pretty much complaining about how long the wait was for a pathetic looking ride. You all sit in a huge intertube and go down a slide. Sounds easy huh? It was crazy! It turns about 10 different times at 90 degree turns. That is why it looks so short. But at each turn, it throws you up the side of the wall. At one turn, well, basically every turn, whoever is lucky enough to be on the side that goes up the wall, is literally looking down at the rest of us. The raft basically folds in half. No wonder why they tell you to hold on to 2 handles at all times! After the second turn, I was looking at Juliana's face and you could tell she was doing all she could to hold back tears. And let me tell you, Juliana, the 9 year old, was the most fearless of us all! I kept trying to say, "Juliana, we are almost done" but every time I tried to talk, I was either thrown up the wall or someone was looking down on me as if they were about to fall on me. At the end, Juliana was dripping blood from her face. Apparently, her dads knee hit her in the nose after the first turn. We got the bleeding under control and she laid down with my mom in the shade. When we told her that we were going to go do it again, she jumped up and insisted that she go again! What a sport! Unfortunately, when we tried to go again, they wouldn't let us all go in one raft. They have a 4 adult limit. We told them we had already done it, but they said with more weight on the raft you can really fly up the walls and people can get hurt. We chuckled, because we couldn't argue with them...we knew first hand what they were talking about. Anyways, they split us up and it was enjoyable, but very easy going, not fast-paced like the first time and definitely not worth standing in line for!

The next day we spent at the theme park....well the first part of the day. The 2nd part of the day we spent running to the car to get home since we got rained out...I mean, poured out! They had a new ride called "Aftershock" that opened the day that we got there. Noone was brave enough to ride it except for Amy and Sam. And they did it while the rain was pelting them in the face and while the rest of us sat in the comfort of our car.

Before it started raining though Jenna got to ride on her very first amusement park ride. It was airplanes that go in circles and up and down. She was a little nervous sitting in her own seat, but Isaiah was right in front of her and he turned around ever so often to hold her hand. I think I was more nervous than Jenna was. :-)

It is always nice to be home, but we are looking forward to going back when the girls are a little bit older so that they (and we) can enjoy it more.

I am not attaching any pictures because our camera got dropped at the park and it is officially broken. So, until we get a new one, don't be expecting any pictures, any time soon. Sorry!

Jocelyn eating her birthday cake

For Jocelyn's birthday, we decided to just have family and the girls's God-parents over. We made this decision after Jenna's 2nd birthday when we had both sides of our family here as well as a hand full of friends and their children. Now don't get me wrong, we love our friends, and we even love their kids, but there were a few melt downs at Jenna's party, and it was all a bit overwhelming. I decided that Jocelyn is 1, not 10, and she won't remember who was here, so we tried to make it simple. Also, we had a wedding at 4pm to attend (we had Jocelyn's party at 11am) and then we still had to get ready for our trip the next morning. So, we just did Subway sandwiches (which was so extremely convient for me) and cake for the party.

Jocelyn was still taking her morning nap when all of the guests arrived, but we didn't wait for her to wake up to start partying. We decided to enjoy our lunch while she was sleeping. Man, I didn't think that was bad until now that I am writing this. That was cruel huh? Bad mommy! Then she convienently woke up after we finished our lunch and drinks.

Jocelyn got LOTS of cool new toys that Jenna has already claimed as her own. She got so many new things that I actually re-organized the playroom and have packed a few toys away so that I can bring them out later when these current ones get boring. My hope is that they have forgotten about the old ones and see them as new. We hear this works, but haven't tried it yet.

The cake experience was very memorable and SO different than Jenna's 1st birthday. If you remember in an earlier post, Jenna freaked out when she touched her cake and got frosting on her hands. She didn't even care that it was sweet and yummy, and that she could have as much as she wanted. She wanted it off of her hands because it was too messy. No, Jocelyn went right into and didn't stop for anything! It was classic! And messy! Very messy! So messy that she went right from her highchair into the bathtub...even while her family was still here.

Jocelyn ended the party by sneaking out the back screen door (she figured how to open it up), crawled out onto the back patio, and fell down the 3 cement steps into the grass. Juliana was on the playstructure and saw her at the last second tumble down and hit her head. She ran and got her and brought her to us. She had a scratch on her cheek but didn't even cry! I felt terrible that I didn't see her get out, but now I know that she is smarter than I thought! I also know that if she is able to do it again, she will probably be okay! :-)

Jocelyn was a trooper and graciously shared her toys with all her cousins and her sister!
Happy 1st Birthday Jocelyn! Mommy and Daddy love you!

My mom with Chelsy in the background

My mom, Amy, my dad, Matt, Nate, and Jocelyn and I

Jocelyn playing with tissue paper

Mikayla and Genevieve "helping" open gifts while Isaiah watches

Jocelyn's very own cake

Grandpa McCoy pulling Caitlin around

Mikayla tall and proud

Sam and Juliana

Grandma McCoy, Rachel and Bridget, Chelsy and Caitlin and Ron and Sarah Hartley (God-parents) in the background

Yummy cake

Princess Jocelyn

Princess with a bruise on her head proving to you that she is now walking

Mommy helping her get cake rather than just frosting

The cake the rest of us got to enjoy!

Back up

Here it is Wednesday night and we just returned from our Silverwood vacation, but some other things have happened before then, and it would absolutely drive me crazy to talk about things out of order, so go back about 5 days! :-)

Our friends John and Aurelia and their daughters Karli and Melanie came to Yakima for a visit and got to spend some time with us too! We had pizza and beer with them as well as my sister and her family and Sam's brother and his family. 8 kids total, 7 of them being little girls! Is it just me, or are there way more girls than boys on this earth? And all our friends that are pregnant are expecting girls too! Crazy!

Anyways, we had a short, but sweet time with them. We are hoping to make a trip to their place in Bremerton so that we can do some wakeboarding with them. They live on a lake and own a boat so we are looking forward to visiting them real soon!

Jocelyn's 1st Birthday

OK, so today was Jocelyn's first birthday and I have lots of good pics, but no time to display all of them. We leave tomorrow morning on our family vacation to Silverwood and I haven't started packing so I gotta run. I will add one picture (okay 4) just to hold you all over. I will add tons more when we get back.

Jenna in Jail Part 2

Oh, it's messy!

Our livingroom window looks out at the cul-de-sac that we live on. Across the cul-de-sac is a husband and wife named Bob and Rachel. We have met them and talked with them a few times, but I don't think Genevieve would know who they were if she saw them at a grocery store. Well, Bob and Rachel just did a huge remodel and are currently working on the landscaping. A large pile of bark was dropped on the street next to their lawn to be dispersed around.

*side note*
If any of you know Jenna, you know that she unfortunately took after her mom in the slightly OCD department. As a child (and even now as an adult) I don't like sticky hands. I think I wash my hands 40,000 times just while making dinner. At Jenna's first birthday, she put her hands in her very own cake and started crying because it was to messy.
*end of side note*

Ok, back to the story.

So, Genevieve saw the bark pile. "Oh, daddy, it's messy!" Sam explained to her that it was okay, it was just a pile of bark. She accepted that and left to go play. A little later, she went back to the window, "Oh, daddy, it's messy!" Sam told her again that it was okay. She said, "It's okay, daddy clean it up!" Sam laughed and said, "No, Bob will clean it up!"

Fast forward one day. I am driving home from errands with the girls. Jenna is eating cheerios in a bag in the back seat. She drops a few. "Oh mommy, it's messy...it's okay, Bob will clean it up!"

Fast forward another day. Genevieve watches Zoe out the window. "Oh gross, Zoe go poo-poo....it's okay, Bob will clean it up!"

So, now everything that needs cleaning, Jenna assumes Bob will clean it up.

By the way, on a totally different topic, Jocelyn is walking like a mad woman and I haven't got a good clip of it yet, so when I do, I will post it. :-)