This is a bowl full of strawberries from our garden... just in one picking! Our (Mike's) strawberries did really well this spring/early summer.
Isabella lost her first tooth in May 2nd... just 3 months shy of 6 years old. She wasn't scared at all! I had been wiggling it every night when I brushed her teeth and tonight it seemed even more lose. She made the noise for me to stop wiggling so I did and told her I thought it could come out pretty easily if she pulled. So she pulled and out it popped onto the floor! Then it was a scramble/panic on her part to locate it, which we did quickly. She was so excited to have pulled it out and then super excited to share with everyone. She wanted to send out cards to everyone, to announce her lost tooth. :)
Co-op classes ended and we had to say goodbye to our friends for the summer. Here is a picture of Jackson's class that I taught and assisted in all day... he is a bit grumpy. ;o)
For mother's day, the kids and Mike took me out to a newer restaurant in Norman called Local. They use nearly all local ingredients so of course I had been wanting to try it out! I was super excited to go for brunch. Isabella is into taking silly pictures these days. :)
Another milestone that has occurred this month is related to Jackson's sleeping arrangements. He has gone from this...
To this (as I scramble to put his new bed together with Mike working because we sold his crib faster than expected).
And then to this (a bed he can sleep in). He did end up spending the night with Bella since I didn't get it done in time and we needed a twin mattress (oops).
And then I made some curtains out of a shower curtain I found at the store. And now he has a little playing area underneath.
Unfortunately it wasn't all lovely this month... Jackson mysteriously came down with hand foot mouth disease. His throat was super sore, his feet were a bit sore, and we I had to take him into the ER on a Saturday morning (and miss the Ostrich egg breakfast at the zoo) to get a diagnosis. Unfortunately there isn't anything they can really do to treat this but the doctor did give a Rx for a solution of numbing meds for him to gargle to help his throat so he could eat. Not too long after, Mike came down with a minor case. Thankfully Isabella and I were spared. This pic was taken after he was feeling better.. but this is what his feet looked like!!
Aren't these hydrangeas lovely? I've had the bush in my front garden for a couple years now but this is the first year I've brought some inside to enjoy. I'm sure glad I did!! The are so nice to have around to look at. And it actually helps the bush outside look better because it gets so saggy with the heavy flowers. Win win.
We did the classic volcano experiment in our homeschool activities one day. It erupted fast!
The kids gymnastics year came to an end and they had their end of the year olympics show. Here is Jackson hanging off the bars.
And Isabella turing to look. Gymnastics has been super fun and next year Jackson will be in a class by himself (instead of one with a parent). Isabella is saying that she wants to go back to dance again.
Due to a busy travel month in April, I had to do a lot of Jackson's planning in advance. I'm a pretty good last minute prepper (although that is a bit stressful) but this had to be different. I only had Monday-Friday the week of his party after getting back from Vegas (and Costa Rica right before that). So I did a majority of the things before Costa Rica. We even made our favors (cookies) a few weeks in advance and froze them.
Jackson has been a big Star Wars fan, ever since we bought my nephew Cameron a little Star Wars figurine and it sat on my counter for a week or so before the party. This was back in July so that would make Jackson just 2 years and 2.5 months! He wanted to look at that figurine every time he came into the kitchen. He would ask about it, the name, what was it from. So then after that, he had a radar for all things Star Wars and would zoom into SW things at the store, on the TV, etc.
A Star Wars party was a natural choice and it was Jackson's choice. There are tons of ideas online but I wasn't crazy about most of them... it just was too theme-y. Yeah, I know, it is a theme party. But I just don't like all the matchy matchy cups, napkins, paper decorations, etc. But thanks to pinterest and some helpful suggestions by friends/family, I came up with enough ideas to make it fun for me to plan and fun for Jackson to party. :)
Invites (made with the silhouette cameo):
I had gotten a Silhouette Cameo cutting machine shortly before I began working on his party stuff (thanks to my sweet hubby) and it was really great to use it for a lot of the party prep. I used it for the invite, the door sign (above), the labels on his pictures, the favor labels.... I think that might be it. Oh and the Happy Birthday sign above the fireplace & other misc. circle cut outs that I hung up or made a banner with. Really fun machine, in spite of it's few downfalls. :)
My picture wall in the entry that is usually my holiday decorating area became Jackson's yearly photo wall. I added in some pictures of each of the 6 Star Wars episodes (which you can't see very well in this picture) that are silhouette depictions of a scene from each movie.
As far as party activities go, we had galactic playdough set up at a table where they worked glitter into playdough and then cut out stars, star wars figures, etc. Another table was coloring and Star Wars tattoos.
Decorations were the paper lanterns in red and black (meant to be like planets), the circles on the photo wall (also somewhat like planets), and circle banners (again, planets).
We played pin the lightsaber on the jedi... Isabella actually pinned it in the exact location it should have gone (not sure if her vision was truly impaired by the bandana or not... but everyone got a prize for effort!). Then we played with the pool noodle lightsabers I made (just cut in 1/2 the dollar store pool noodles and then used duct tape, black and silver, on the ends to make them look like light sabers) either hitting each other or attempting to keep a balloon from landing on the ground. Then the last "game" was the pull string piñata with lots of fun gadgets and (healthier) candy.
We had lots of snack foods which had fun names like Vader Veggies, Sarlaac pit dip, Padme Popcorn, and Yoda Ears. My mom made a super yummy and really great Chewbacca cake. Favors were green (colored with green matcha tea powder, a recipe I found online!) yoda cookies with a yoda label.
Jackson arranging his bugs from the Piñata.
Jackson got heaps of great Star Wars gifts and truly enjoyed his day. He was super busy the whole time, running around crazily from activity to activity. He loved having so many friends to light saber with and also loved getting lots of play bugs/lizards from the piñata.
I've been involved with our local MOMS Club chapter for nearly 5 years. It is a wonderful way for stay at home moms to meet other stay at home moms (and the kids to meet/play w/ other kids) and support each other in this not so easy job of raising kids full time. :) Our chapter is small but we all know each other really well and see each other often. I've been the president for the past 3 years (totally not done on purpose) and it has been a good experience. Every year, there is an annual luncheon held to motivate, train, inspire, etc moms club members around the region. This year they decided to have it in Las Vegas. I have never been before but this year, one of our newest members was totally pumped about going and after talking to Mike about it, I told her I would go with her if she decided to go. (I do have to say I was hesitant to commit to going because I would have to fly out to Vegas just one day after returning from Costa Rica. But Mike said it wasn't a big deal to him that I go right after we got back and I didn't need too much more to motivate me after that!). I had been to Vegas once before... back in maybe 2002 Mike took me for a few days. There is so much to see in Vegas, I was excited to go back to check it out again.
So we returned from Costa Rica on a Thursday. I spent Friday during the day unpacking & doing some of the more necessary laundry. Then I packed for Vegas and Rebecca and I were off that evening at 7pm on a flight to Vegas.
Once in Vegas we checked into our hotel (Circus Circus... going for economy this trip! :) and then set off to check out the sites. We went up to see the circus area in our hotel with the rides and such and then we walked down the strip looking at the hotels all the way down to The Bellagio. It was quite late Oklahoma time by the time we reached that point so we headed back down to our hotel.
Here I am outside of the Bellagio but you see the Paris hotel in the background.
And here is the Bellagio in the background with their fountain show (which is pretty cool to watch).
And the video...
They do play all sorts of songs, not just Elvis. ;o) The one before this was a classical piece. I think it is every 15 minutes for the water show during the operating hours.
When you are walking the strip in Vegas you get to see all sorts of things. Pretty much anything goes. I didn't take any pictures of the crazier things... and I would probably spare you even if I had. But there are lots of people who come out, dressed in costume, and make money by people paying them to take pictures with them. There were a few that caught my eye- a couple of them I had to take the picture for Jackson... but one in particular really caught my eye. :)
The hotels are all very unique and many are fun to explore inside and out. Here are some of the highlights... I think Paris, the Venetian, Bellagio, and Circus Circus are in this picture below.
One of my favorite things to see inside the hotels on this trip was inside the Bellagio in their garden/conservatory. I don't remember if I'd seen this area on my last trip but apparently they change it out every so often. This time is was made to look like bits and pieces of Holland... from all the flowers (gorgeous lovely smelling flowers including beautiful tulips!), the wooden shoes, the umbrellas, the bicycle, windmill, etc. I was completely blown away to see this portrait that was made completely with real flowers!! Amazing. I think it would almost be worth it to go to Vegas every time this garden is redone... if money was no object. ;o)
Another thing that I hadn't seen before was the chocolate fountain inside the Bellagio. It runs through a sweet shop just behind the gardens and you can buy lots of yummy treats inside. There is white and regular chocolate running through the fountain and it is all enclosed in glass. We also saw this mannequin dressed in chocolate and this amazing dragon made from chocolate. Such talent!
Saturday morning we had to wake up with our alarms (and I really didn't want to get out of the bed!) and get ready for the luncheon. We got breakfast and coffee to go in the hotel and walked down the strip just a short way to the hotel where the luncheon was being held. We had a really great time with the other Moms from our region... and there were quite a few. We got to chat about club things, listen to inspirational stories, and we also ate lunch. :) Rebecca and I got some really great ideas to bring back to our group as well.
Saturday night we ate dinner at Wolfgang Puck's restaurant at the MGM hotel (the fish I had was delicious) and then afterward we went and saw Cirque Du Soleil's Ka. (There is a little preview on their site.) It was pretty neat and the acrobatics were amazing. The set was very unique and the special effects were extraordinary.
It was on Saturday, maybe when we were heading back to the hotel to change for dinner, that we decided to go ahead and get a bus pass. The walking was getting old (especially that we were just walking up the same areas repeatedly only to get as far as we'd gotten the last time!) as well as the heat and I remembered when my feet were killing me on the last Vegas trip that we hopped on the bus very inexpensively. We were so thankful to sit in those bus seats. ;o) We should have done it sooner. So from then on, when we weren't walking in front of the hotels that we wanted to see, we were going to them on the bus.
Sunday we decided to try out the buffet scene and after reading a good review of the Aria brunch buffet, we headed that way. I am not normally fond of buffets but this was really nice... lots of international dishes (including sushi!), tons of vegetarian options, and crab legs! I wish my stomach could have held more. ;o) I also got the unlimited bloody mary... only to drink maybe 1.5. Ah well... we had places to go!
Namely....
My all time favorite place to shop for inexpensive, cute clothes. :) When I was looking up the Vegas locations (I had spied an H&M bag on the strip so I knew they were out there!) I read an article that said this store was the largest in the world. In the WORLD?!?! It was pretty huge.
After some other last minute shopping and then a scramble to get our bags at the hotel and get to the airport in time, our trip had come to an end. :( It was a super fast trip but very full and definitely fun! There is still so much that we didn't do so I guess that means I might have to go back one day... but other travels will come first. :)
On the last day in the Manuel Antonio area (and essentially the last day of our vacation since we would be flying out the very next day), Mike and Isabella went on their canopy tour and Jackson & I hung out around the hotel.
Here are some pictures of Jackson and my day.
At breakfast with Jackson.
The view from our breakfast table.
Our first lizard spotting for the day.
After a pretty long walk Jackson was getting fussy and wanting me to carry him. Thankfully we happened upon this super docile lizard and he provided a good little break from our hot walk. Jackson was actually able to touch this lizard where all the other ones dart as soon as anyone gets near.
I think this is Jackson trying to give it a leaf. I was telling Jackson he wouldn't bite only later to hear from Mike that they can. Who knew??
This is a plane that is actually converted into a hotel room at the same hotel we stayed at.
After getting hot on our walk we took one last swim in the pool. We then gathered up our stuff, checked out of the hotel, and then waited for Mike & Bella to return from their trip.
Isabella and Mike's Canopy Tour (this section is narrated by Mike):
We had been talking about a canopy tour for literally weeks, if not months, before we went down to Costa Rica. Isabella was super excited about it, and I was super excited to get to share it with her, because I hoped it would be a great experience for her. We nearly booked one at our second hotel, but I decided to hold off and find one that was independent of a hotel. So at our last stop I had seen a number of signs around town and some material in the room about canopy tours. I talked with the desk staff at the hotel about what was available, they were encouraging and recommended one tour above all of the others for which they had literature. I wanted to make sure that I could stay really close to my girl on the tour, and I was assured that we would be close together. I actually thought he said that Isabella would be going with a guide tethered to her, but I must have misunderstood that...
Anyway, for those of you who are thoroughly acquainted with Isabella, you know that she is a pretty "girly" girl. She also inherited much of her father's lack of grace. So going into the day, I sort of expected it to be a little rough. She had been running an average of 1.7329 skinned knees per day on the trip and a crying fit about every 1.326 hours. There are a lot of ways to get injured and skinned up in Costa Rica, especially if your parents like to see animals and waterfalls and stuff like that.
Come the morning of our canopy tour i got up at six-fifteen, jumped in the shower, dressed, and then woke Isabella at twenty until seven. She awakened with a smile on her face and was raring to go. She got dressed semi-quietly and we slipped out of the room so that Mommy and Jackson could continue sleeping, which I'm sure they did. Mommy loves her sleep, and she will, as a rule, sleep as long as she is allowed to or until at least 10 :) Isabella and I were down at the front desk of the hotel at ten until seven waiting for the van to pick us up for our adventure. The van arrived just a few minutes late, but we hopped on board and off we went...down to the area near Manuel Antonio park to see if there were any last minute stand around participants, which there were not. Then off to the canopy tour office to sign a release and meet up with a few other folks from other hotels. I was reassured to see several ACCT signs posted around the office. Oddly enough, I had not even considered course certification up until the time I saw those signs. I guess I was very much in tourist mode. We visited for a few minutes with the other guests (all of them were from the U.S. if I remember correctly) then loaded on to a big van for the drive up into the jungle. The lead guide, Jorge, kept everyone interested and sometimes entertained with tidbits about the area's history, flora and fauna, and funny stories. He told us that driving over the very rough roads in the country is called a "Costa Rican massage" and showed us the best plant to use for jungle toilet paper, which information thankfully we did not need. We finally arrived at our destination (nearly an hour drive up into the jungle) and unloaded. We sat down to eat breakfast. Eggs, gallo pinto (no avoiding that at breakfast), fruit, bread, and juice. Then we geared up.
Up until now Isabella had maintained her remarkably cheerful demeanor.
She seemed really excited and a little impatient with any delay, like
the drive and the breakfast. Once she got a seat harness and helmet on,
she was really raring to go. We immediately made our first zip line
traverse, which was a really short one just across a small creek to get
us to the trailhead, then we had a pretty long uphill hike to get to the
rest of the canopy tour. I'm talking close to half a mile, all uphill,
in very warm and humid jungle. You can see by the photos that my girl
was cheerful the entire time. Not one complaint, no whining or fussing,
and most amazingly, no injuries. She was as sure footed as a little
mule, even though she was wearing the same shoes that she had complained
about the day before. I think it helped that she had socks on for
this...
We finally got to the top of the trail and made ready for a series of
zips, rappels, and one Tarzan swing. It turned out that Isabella did not
go tethered to a guide, but rather just was clipped in like all the
other participants. She was right ahead of me and we stayed very close
together the entire tour, always within arms reach when on a platform.
Isabella took to it like she was born to it (which I suppose she may
have been:)). She never showed the tiniest hint of being nervous or
afraid - even when bigger kids (or sometimes full grown adults) were
crying, literally. So...I guess I'll let the photos speak for
themselves. I guess the only other thing I want to say is that I was (am)
very proud of my BIG, BIG girl.
Leslie's part: After they returned from their trip we headed off to eat lunch at El Wagon which was also owned by our hotel but up the road a short bit. It had some sort of converted train car that you could dine in or the outside patio with a lovely mosaic tile floor. We ate outside (of course) & had a really nice meal. I had a fish wrap which was probably my 2nd favorite meal in Costa Rica. It was delish. While there, our waiter told us that we could look over the patio railing & see an agouti which is basically a large tropical rodent. :) There were several of them & I thought they were pretty cute. You don't really get the size in this picture but I'd say they are maybe twice as big as a squirrel??
After lunch we made the drive back to the capital and to our hotel where we would be staying our final night in Costa Rica. :( We got in after dark and only had time to eat and then get the kids to bed. We were pleasantly surprised to find out that this hotel had a rental car agency in it and actually the same one that we rented from so we were able to return our car that night at the hotel rather than waking up even earlier in the morning to try & find the other rental agency to go through the whole return deal there. So this was a major time saver for us and allowed us some extra sleep and peace of mind.
This is a picture coming into San Jose. We were very surprised to see a different side of San Jose than what we saw when we came in. The area we drove through after getting our rental car was a poor section with lots of small shops and cramped driving conditions. Coming into San Jose from Manuel Antonio we saw a more metropolitan side with lots of tall buildings and a large highway.
And here are the kiddos on the return flight. Doing pretty well for having to get up around 5am in the morning to get on our 8:35am flight. This was an easier travel day as it was a straight flight from San Jose to Dallas.
After arriving in Dallas we took a shuttle to our hotel (the one we stayed at before leaving on our trip) & picked up our car. Then after a quick lunch we headed back to OKC. We were sad to be done with our vacation but so happy about the fun times we had! We can't wait to go on another trip. :)
We said goodbye to the beach at Nicoya Peninsula (much to the kid's dismay... they wanted more pool time and more beach time) and headed out to what we hoped would be a shorter trip to our next destination. We opted to take the ferry over to shorten our drive time. Well, we did end up driving for a shorter period of time and on better roads. We drove about an hour from our hotel to the ferry. Then after getting off the ferry we drove for about 1.5 - 2 hrs. Sounds good compared to 5-5.5 hrs driving, right? Well it didn't shorten our overall trip by much, unfortunately. We arrived to the ferry about an hour in advance (maybe a little more, I can't remember) to make sure we would get on (as recommended). Then we wait and wait on a ferry in the heat. At times it wasn't that bad, if the wind was blowing just right... but other times it was pretty miserable for everyone. Then we finally get going and we have an hour long trip ahead of us. And it was still pretty warm. They have air conditioned areas inside the ferry but I think it might have been a couple degrees cooler than outside and without the benefit of the wind. So if you add the 2 hours on the ferry to the 3 hours we spent driving, it all about equaled out. Except being in the car is more comfortable and you don't have to watch out for shady people on the ferry... nor do you have to figure out when you're suppose to go down to get into your car to get it off the ferry (we didn't hear the announcement and Mike had to rush down at the last minute after cars were already getting off the ferry!). So it was definitely an experience and there were some nice views but I don't know that we would recommend doing it to get out of the drive.
We ate another lunch in the car after a quick run into a grocery store.
So here are some pictures of our ferry trip.
We arrived at our hotel, Hotel Costa Verde, after dark. Of course. We are shown to our room by the hotel staff member who was on a motorcycle (he drove and we followed). We couldn't see much of the property but our room was spacious and even came with a small kitchen (too bad we hadn't stocked up on food to cook at our last grocery store trip!). We quickly unloaded our things and headed out to eat at one of the hotel's restaurants. We opted for the one across the street, La Cantina. Mike was grumpy ... long travel day and he was not enjoying the heat (we were eating outside as that is the only option we've ever seen in Costa Rica and the temps were probably in the upper 70s to lower 80s, after dark) but I was still happy to be on vacation. :) The kids were a bit tired but that wasn't out of the ordinary. We ate and it was okay food. Nothing memorable but nothing horrible.
After dinner we headed back to the hotel to change into our swim suits for a quick swim that was just down the path from our hotel. We couldn't see much but the hotel had nice signs that helped us figure out which way to go. The hotels are kind of stuck in the middle of lots of trees with paths to connect them but it is done in a way that you really feel like there isn't many people staying at the hotel. We felt quite secluded where we were at.
We swam for a short bit before I noticed something in the tree nearby. It was tough to see, but after staring at it for awhile I determined that it was a sloth hanging from the tree. Mike looked for a bit and agreed. Too bad we didn't have our camera... not that a picture would come out in the dark. :( Pretty amazing though - to see a sloth while you're swimming in the pool. And of course it was there the whole time... they don't move very much or very fast!
The next morning we ate breakfast at different restaurant on the property, Anaconda. I had the traditional breakfast w/ the pinto gallo, egg, fruit, and bread. I think the kids had pancakes. Not sure what Mike had. He was still grumpy... this morning he was grumpy about missing out on the hanging bridges in La Fortuna (which was back where the volcano was) because we didn't realize that the hanging bridges were there. Ah well. He eventually got over it. After a bit. That seemed like forever. ;o)
Anyway. After breakfast we went to check out the town, Quepos, and also scope out the Manuel Antonio National Park. It ended up raining which sent us back to our hotel to wait it out.
Here is our hotel balcony and our room.
And here is the amazing view we had from our balcony. A bit hazy because of the rain, but still pretty!
After the rain stopped, we headed back out to the park. We had a guide that approached us up once we were heading to the park (in the wrong direction, but he did help us to find the entrance) but we ditched him when his story ended up changing about who was going to be our guide, when we'd pay, etc. Ah well, we saved some money there.
We didn't walk very far into the park before Isabella started whining about rocks and dirt getting into her shoes. So I knew right then the visit to the park wouldn't be very long. We ended up spotting a sloth that a guide was showing some other tourists. It was quite a ways up in the trees so it was hard to see & I don't think the kids ever did figure out where it was. I got a few pictures, but even in the pictures it is hard to make out. Here is one picture cropped with the sloth directly in the middle. You can see his long arm reaching up to the tree limb & his head is hanging upside down below that arm. The tour guide said she had a baby hanging on to her. We couldn't really see that.
We walked for a bit more with more whining and came upon this beach. We were hesitant to go down to it because Mike didn't want to swim but we knew the kids would. So we quickly changed in the bathroom area and headed down. This water was slightly calmer than the water at Nicoya Peninsula, but still rough enough that I had to keep the kids very close. I ended up taking them out one by one, holding them in a deeper part of the water so that they could get in deeper. A couple of times the undertow scared me so we didn't swim for too long. Mike got a picture of a raccoon on the beach that you will see in the bottom right corner.
After the beach we changed and headed out of the park. We didn't spend very long in this park but the kids were whiny and not wanting to walk much. We were just thankful for the rainy weather that kept things cooled off during our hike.
We went back to our room just in time for it to start raining again. We had some time before dinner so we all sat out on the balcony relaxing. And then we got to something pretty exciting, directly in front of (above?) our balcony! MONKEYS!! We were so excited to see them ... a huge pack (or whatever a large group of monkeys is called!) of them swinging from the trees, eating, scratching, and making noise. We think that these are Capuchin monkeys. Here is a little video of them.
The pictures we got of them aren't very easy to see them in. The video is much better.
We watched them for quite awhile... they hung out in our tree for at least a half hour before they moved on to another area. We also think we heard howler monkeys at one point... and Jackson and I heard them again the next day. But we never did see any.
For dinner we headed over to El Avion which is a restaurant that has a plane in it's center. It is actually a plane from the Iran Contra affair. So an interesting little history lesson was spurred by this visit... mainly Mike filling me in on what I must not have retained from high school! Isabella thought it was pretty cool to go inside the plane (where they had the bar) and see her shirt in the black light. Jackson was totally wiped by the time the sun set and came to sit with me while we waited for our food. Before very long he was passed out asleep. Mike took him after a little while and he continued sleeping for the majority of our dinner.
After dinner we headed back to the hotel to get to bed. I think Jackson ended up eating some of his quesadilla in the hotel room because he missed out on eating his dinner at the restaurant. Isabella and Mike needed to get to sleep fairly quickly because they had an exciting canopy tour ahead of them and would need to be at the front desk to be picked up at 650am. Jackson and I planned to have a relaxing day at the hotel swimming, hiking, and just hanging out.
