We made it.
My kid is a giant now. Okay, not really, but I’m used to him being a baby and he is far from it. Love him. Proud of him. He was awesome today. Spilled everything he could on his uniform. Almost choked on his lucky penny. You know, the one that Nana put in his shoe for good luck. (A Bickel tradition) How did it get out of his shoe? How did it get into his mouth? Who knows. But he made his first day memorable, in a a very Luke way.
(Isn’t he cute?!?)
To be perfectly honest, this summer has been super busy and not in the most fun way. I’m posting about our Disneyland trip from June, but I have been working like a maniac since then. Boo.
So I’m just tossing all my favorite photos in here, with little to no rhyme or reason. Sorry. But I have to keep my fan (hi, mom!) happy. It’s this, or nothin’.
Lily patting Nana’s leg. She makes me laugh. She was so mellow all day. Lily is Luke’s polar opposite. When it was her normal nap time, we reclined the stroller, gave her her little giraffe and she went to sleep. Really.
At the entrance to Cars Land. I made him hold my hand and run when we got to the park entrance when it opened. He made me proud. He will learn the ways of the Hardcore Disneyland folk.
I did not plan well. I forgot to bring Luke’s hat. Whoops. We tried on a few and briefly considered buying one and then figured it wasn’t necessary. More sunscreen, team!
Out Disneyland tickets were a sweet, thoughtful, greatly appreciated gift from my darling mother-in-law to celebrate: Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, my birthday and our anniversary. To thank her, we went to the Princess Lunch at Ariel’s Grotto.
Me and my little Cinderella:
My handsome princes:
With my buddy, Ariel:
Oh Lily. She was the prettiest princess of all, and all the princesses just fawned all over her. She mostly focused on the food.
Hooray Cheerio!
On the way to have lunch with the princesses, Luke started in with whining about how princesses were for girls, blah blah blah. So I pointed out that “My Little Ponies” were for girls and he had just been watching them the day before. He told me that they were “different.” When I asked how, he informed me that My Little Ponies have unicorn horns. He rested his case, and we moved along.
Who was the most excited about the princesses? Yeah. Luke.
Cinderella looked a little worse for wear (yikes!) but look how stoked Luke is!
I liked seeing all three Cinderellas . . .
We all know Lily is the prettiest Cinderella.
Aurora was my favorite. She actually stopped and spoke with both kids for quite a while. Luke (again) was so excited he was jumping out of his shoes and Lily just stared at her. She was so patient with both kids!
What does Lily like? (other than food) Shiny things. So she reached out and grabbed at poor Aurora. Stuck her hand right down Aurora’s dress. Way to go, Lils. But again, Aurora took it all in stride, and kept smiling.
Lily was so glad to be free of the restraint/cruel and unusual punishment. (aka: high chair)
Todd and Nana hung out with Lily while Luke and I went on Goofy’s Sky School. He did NOT like that ride. “I did NOT like that ride, Mom.”
After the ride, we hung out while the parade passed. Luke and Lily both love music and dancing, so we let them dance for a bit and stretch out their legs.
We ventured back into Cars Land later that day and found they were having a street performance with DJ from Cars. All the kids were dancing. Mine walked around the whole thing, trying to figure out how it worked. He was so impressed!
note: this may not be a huge deal to anyone but us, but there was no way even 6 months ago, we would have felt safe having Luke walk next to us with no type of containment (stroller, etc.) so this is a “wow” for us. He walked the whole day, with stops for lunch, snacks, and all, but didn’t once complain of being tired. Good job, Luke!
My Lils was tired though.
Pictures with Mater.
Historic, rare photo of Lily with a hat on. It was ripped off approx. 3.5 seconds later.
Really what Luke could have done all day was run through the water area in Bugs Land. Notice how he is already looking at where he wants to run to next.
He could have stayed here all day. Next time we’ll go to a local water park. I was so glad we brought a swimsuit and a change of clothes. There were many envious people. But I had seen other parents do that, and I thought it was pretty smart.
By the end of the day, the kids were done and my mother in law was kind enough to take the kids and drive home to San Diego. She let us use her Anaheim time share so we were able to spend the entire next day at both parks. It was a great pre-anniversary gift.
As always, we had a few drinks at the bar in California Adventure. I think it is called the Cove Bar. It used to just be Ariel’s Grotto, but whatever. Right after we were engaged, we came to CaAdventure to celebrate and came to the bar. So it is a special place and we try to visit once a year.
And . . . . I don’t hate this picture. So that’s different.
We were so glad to finally have to school year end so we could run away from home and head down to San Diego. We were all in desperate need of a vacation. Of course, due to the frantic departure, we forgot a few things. So Todd and I headed out to pick them up and left the kids with Nana. Hooray!
So she put on Mama Mia. Wouldn’t you?
Lily is “puppy mode.”
Poor kid is teething like a maniac. She’ll chew on anything.
Please notice that my daughter is wearing a flower in her hair. Of course.
I’m owning it. I will perpetually be behind on the blog. So here’s Easter.
The kids baskets – Luke on the left, Lily on the right.
The Easter Bunny came to visit that night. Silly rabbit – an egg in a cup!
That wascally wabbit hid an egg in Luke’s shoe!
The Easter Bunny left some fun things in Luke’s basket. Candyland bandaids and a top, even some gardening tools for the (at this point, future) garden.
Yeah, we’re going WAY back. Not that we really did much on Valentine’s Day, but the kids received a few cards in the mail. Lily adored/adores her doorway bouncer, so she happily chewed on her card while bouncing.
Luke kind of gets it. I was able to bribe him to smile.
Mostly I can’t believe what a baldy Lily is in these pictures. Crazy! Three months later, she’s filled in quite a bit. :)
