Sea World Magic

After spending a few days at Disney, we decided to truly go "under the sea" at Sea World. Our kids loved being up-close to these amazing sea creatures. We had originally booked several days at Sea World, but ultimately decided against it when we learned that the killer whale show had been shut down a few weeks prior to our trip.  After voicing our displeasure with this and other customer service issues, we were invited to enjoy a free day at the park!   

One of the highlights of the day was having the chance to feed the dolphins. Ellie and Teyah took a little longer to be brave enough to do it, but they all loved the opportunity.

Aubrie was the bravest of the three!

Even though the killer whale show was "under construction," we did have the chance to see the orcas training and playing.

Dave isn't the biggest fan of the cheesy animal shows, but I have always really loved Sea World.

Disney Magic

After enduring several weeks of one of the coldest Minnesota winters on record, the troops were more than ready for a getaway to the "happiest place on earth."  

Although the week was filled with temps ranging 45-80 and some rainy, total wash-out days, there weren't too many complaints from our crew as our weather back home reached wind chills of -40, with two days of school being canceled.

This vacation was full of several special moments. Our girls loved the brand new attraction at Disney World where they were able to interact with Belle in her home. Even though it's blurry, we love the expression on Ellie's face in this shot.

Kyler loved interacting with all the new Cars' attractions, but his favorite may have been jumping aboard a Star Wars hoverbike. 

At one point the line to visit Anna and Elsa reached five hours!! No joke. But, we decided to get in line in a total downpour at the very end of the day and only ended up waiting an hour. This put a new meaning to 'Frozen', yet even being drenched we knew we still were in a warmer place than Minnesota. My mom joined us on our trip, and devoted Grandma did most of the waiting in the rain.

Ninja stance!!

I'm not exactly sure what's going on with this picture!

We were fortunate to not only have my mom join us, but my sister Lauren joined us for part of our trip. Lauren wasn't too excited about the weather, but we were sure excited to have her with us!

This little pirate loved watching the Jack Sparrow show, even though Mr. Extrovert was too shy to go up on stage!

Argh!!!

Hit it! Even though he had her do it right handed! Haha!

Such a cute crew!

I love my mama! She's so beautiful inside and out!

This is the first time we've been to Disney that we've actually stayed after dark!

It's fun having our kids be a little older where we all can enjoy things -- like Big Thunder Mountain!

Aubrie's 11th B-Day

For Aubrie's 11th birthday, she chose to throw a glamorous, star-studded event to celebrate the big day.

She had an evening full of Oscars, popcorn, and movie treats to create an evening of movie-making magic.

Everyone was dressed as a famous "star" and walked the red carpet as they entered the event.  Aubrie was dressed as Ashley Tisdale.

We had a famous train in attendance....

The very well-known "Jeremy" from Studio C.

We even had an honorary member of One-Direction "Harry Styles" join the fun.

Aubrie's theme fit in perfectly with all of her friends' bubbly, theatrical personalities. They pulled together some hilarious short films that we later watched on the big screen. 

About Aubrie...

1. Aubrie is a sweetheart who is empathetic and kind.

2. She is an all-around all-star -- there's not much she's not good at doing.

3. Aubrie is an amazing speller and spells better than her teacher.

4. She is a talented writer. Her teacher keeps telling her she is certain writing is in her future.

5. Aubrie is a talented ballet dancer. She works hard and is quite attentive -- not to mention flexible, strong, coordinated...

6. She loves to talk and talk and talk and talk. She never misses a single detail about her day.

7. She is nervous to graduate from elementary school and start middle school next year. At this point, she's not excited but just worried.

8. Speaking of worried, she definitely is a worrier.

9. She's becoming quite the pianist! She's been playing prelude music at church for Primary.

Winter fun

We enjoyed a few firsts to help enjoy this year's extra cold winter. Kyler went ice skating for the first time! They loved it even though the wind made it pretty miserable out. This adventure occurred during one of our six days of cancelled school! School is almost never cancelled here, so the fact that we missed so many days speaks to how cold AND snowy our winter was. It was a rough one to say the least.

When it got too cold, we went indoors to enjoy some roller skating instead. This was a first for Kyler too.

Playing in the backyard snow is definitely not a first, but this is a cute winter picture anyway!