Friday, April 05, 2024

January 2022 and our Trip to California and Disneyland

 It's a new year, and a new chance to get out and see the world a bit! A time to set new goals and to accomplish what we can this year!


So excited to go skiing with these cute kids on Saturdays!
Always being busy and climbing on things.

Grandma Heaton took off after an exciting two weeks with out family. We are so grateful for the time we get with our loved ones.
Anytime we can play some street hockey we take advantage of those opportunities with friends.
We feel the same about pictures with dogs. We don't have enough pictures with our dogs.

After being isolated and together and doing very minimal group events during covid, we all are vaccinated and felt like it was an ok time to face some crowds. What better way to face a crowd than a trip to Disneyland?! We still had to wear masks on the airplane and at Disney, BUT we were out! We took our first trip as a family out of the state of Alaska since we had moved here a year and a half ago. The kids were beyond excited, and it didn't even matter that we had to wear masks.
On the shuttle.
We made it to California!
We were SO excited we could see Nana and Papa Pat in California at their house one last time!
It was a really long flight, but we were excited to see Grammy's orange tree in Nana and Papa Pat's back yard and to start exploring. We can sleep later right?
Even better, Uncle Rob met us there and surprised us! We got to see Steve and Silvia, and their cute grandkids. We felt so loved and so blessed! We definitely needed some family after being away for so long. Then, Grammy and Mark met us in California so they could come to Disney with us!

Your cousins kids are still your cousins, so the kids were very excited to see some cousins!
Nana's face is always a joy to see what expression she comes up with.

We took the kids to one of Derek's favorite beach spots growing up. We got to look for sea creatures and play in the sand and water. 
It was fun getting to do some exploring with Grammy and Mark.

Grammy and the kids at the beach.

My hottie and I on a windy beach. Nothing better.



We can't visit California without stopping at Tommy's! Best sloppy chili burgers on the planet and the best of memories to go with it.

We sure love this family of ours!
We of course had to find a few blue bellied lizards while we could.


Our hotel had a pool, so we had to get wet the night before Disney!
All dressed up for day 1 at Disneyland!
They wanted cool Rey Star Wars hair styles.
All ready for our first day at Disneyland!

Traditional Photo in front of the park showing off our awesome Star Wars shirts to celebrate our first time visiting the new Star Wars land!


Excited to be with their Grammy!

We of course ran to Star Wars land! It did not disappoint!
R2D2 and Chewbacca!
Then off to the Millennial Falcon for Smuggler's Run and a flight through space.






They loved going to Star Wars land and they love their new little Porg friends.


Kael and Mark on space mountain. Probably good they had masks on, or their mouths would be hanging wide open. 

We love Buzz Lightyear's Astro Blasters. It never gets old shooting a gun on a ride.
We made several trips back to Star Wars land.
It took a couple tries, but we got on the new Rise of the Resistance ride. It was very interactive with live characters and videos and was really quite fun!







This Dad sure loves being with his kiddos.





It was hard not taking pictures of everything. It was so new and fun!



One thing is for certain, Connor is not afraid of rides, and is a thrill seeker. It is so much fun being able to go with the kids and all of them a little more excited for the rides.


The kids were all super brave and tried the Incredicoaster for the first time!


Even sweet Connor was so braved and he loved it!
So many new cool Marvel things.


One of the days we were able to buy a few photos from the park. It was pretty fun getting some X-wing fighters in our pictures in the sky!

We might have a little competitiveness in us...


We have a new love of riding roller coasters with all 4 kids!
I feel like Kael's face got better and better each time he road the coaster. He really doesn't love fast rides or heights and he got braver and braver until he could strike a cool pose for the photo! The kids were awesome!

Trying to make as many cool photos on the Incredicoaster as we could!
We were nervous getting on, but excited and terrified, and then we always had a BLAST!

The swings are fun for a minute, but they always make me sick. The kids love them.


It always makes me laugh when the kids say, "Mom take a photo of me with this" and seeing what it is they want a photo of. Frozone for the win.

On Spiderman with Grammy and Mark.
There are so many 3D rides now of days. My motion sickness doesn't love it, but they are quite fun.
We got to watch Doctor Strange do a show. It was cute.
Let's be honest the person with the most points was probably, Derek.
Can't go to California Adventure without stopping by Radiator Springs!



These brothers, together forever!




Day 3

It's incredible the kids can ride together and are old enough we don't have to sit right next to them. I remember thinking about this day and sometimes that it wouldn't happen and sure enough it came.


The kids are finally all big enough for Indiana Jones!

The most magical place on earth with two pretty cute sisters!
We got to watch a parade and Connor just loves dancing along with everyone.

Kael and Derek making Kael's official lightsaber! He saved his money so he could have this experience.

Kael saved his money and paid to create his own lightsaber!
Derek got to tag along for the experience.


All completed!


My Aunt Denise's family were at Disney at the same time as us, and we were able to meet for a quick hello amid all of our adventures while Derek and Kael made Kael's lightsaber. It was so fun being able to see some Heaton family as well. There is never enough time to see and do all we want, but we were so grateful for our hello!
Eden met my cousin Matthew's daughter Gia.
Just a couple more rides!
We aren't competitive at all seeing who got the highest score?!

Guardians of the Galaxy. 
Only Eden and Connor wanted to brave the drops on this one!

Eden's obligatory sucker, and the girls balloons.
Eden saw pictures of her with a sucker from Disney when she was around 3 and has to get one every time now just to keep the memory alive.

All of their cool souvenirs! The kids made Spiderman robots, and Star Wars robots, suckers, and lightsabers. They saved all their money for this trip and it certainly didn't disappoint.



We had time to kill before heading to the airport, so we went to a pier to play for a while and found a swing set. The kids are never too old for some good swinging.

Their balloons wouldn't be allowed on the airplane, so they did what needed to be done, and sucked the helium out of the balloons and made videos singing in a high pitched voice. Never gets old.


The trip was needed in a bad way for us. We needed to see family and have these amazing experiences.

But our fun never ends. Our love for exploring Alaska will never grow old. We invested in ice fishing equipment and got to work catching our dinner just a few days once home.
Alaska's beauty never ceases to amaze me.





We caught so many fish! Now to learn how to properly fillet all these fish!



I love homeschooling with the kids. Connor and Elara made a imprints like fossils. Elara used a sea shell from our trip and a small lego guy, and Connor used leaves. The projects we can do at home always are unique and inspire a love to keep learning and growing.
I love to see the temple!
Eden got to go to the temple for the first time this month!
We went with our friends the Schreiner's Angelica and Willie. Homeschooling makes it so they can do baptisms for the dead during the school day, which is a pretty neat experience and makes it more possible to get the kids to the temple more often. We are so blessed!
We do miss some "school" things from homeschooling, but we have ways to still have fun experiences. The kids do so many projects and we have friends that will celebrate holidays with us.
The kids still endeavored to make Valentines Day boxes!
The kids dress up the pug dogs whenever they can.
Some of us have loved skiing more than others. It can be difficult to learn, but learn the kids did. We were missing Elara this day. So grateful we could do this sport affordably with having the military base so close. My kids don't feel a need for speed, or to do anything extreme, so we take it nice and easy on the slopes. They really don't love race days because they don't want to have to go fast. I'm just glad they learned to stop and turn and now have the ability to go slower if they want.



I'm just grateful I can do so many activities with the kids and have this time with them. 
We had so much fun this January and are so glad to be moving out of isolation from covid. I will never take back that time that we had, the memories we created, the people we met, but I was ready to move on.

So many things came from having covid 19 in this world, but the best thing that came from it was the time with my people, my family and the ability to enjoy being with them even more.

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