Free Pizza!

Little Caesars has a promotion during March Madness that if a number 16 seed beats a number 1 seed team, they will give everyone a free lunch pizza.  Well, it happened. The University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC) beat the University of Virginia.  So on Monday, April 2nd, we got free pizza for lunch.

It was Spring Recess for Courtney (but not for Ethan) so she went with me to get in line.  I was worried because we were only 20 minutes early to get in line and I thought it was going to be a long line.  But it wasn't at all.  We were given a voucher and then we waited.  They had it planned really well so it didn't take long at all.  We got a personal pizza and a drink.  I gave mine to Ethan and he was in heaven!  It was so large that he couldn't even eat the entire thing.

Thanks UMBCand Little Caesars!

General Conference Time

We have candy at Conference time.  It started with Conference Bingo but we have ditched the game and now I just give them the candy. ;)  They have 1 bag each per session that they can eat at their own speed.  This year I used the scale so no one could complain that "she has more than I do" or "his bag has more candy than mine does."  Each bag weighed the same amount!


Then they all sat quietly and watched conference!

PDT Team Pictures

Courtney had team pictures for dance.  It was at a park in St George that I haven't ever been to before.  It was kind of windy and during a really sunny part of the day so the girls weren't too excited to be having pictures.  And Courtney was supposed to be between two really uncomfortable rocks so she had to balance on one bum cheek.  She wasn't very happy about it all but they were cute. 

She wasn't thrilled and started making faces at me. ;)

     

Courtney kept falling off the rock she was supposed to be balanced on.

But she pulled it off beautifully!

Dance Competition

Courtney had her first dance competition of this year and they did amazing!  She is only in the 6-12th-grade class, so she had 2 dances this year to prepare.  They received top marks on both dances which was amazing.  I hadn't seen the lyrical dance before and I was blown away.  Courtney gets to walk on girl's backs and she is the center in the dramatic portion.  It was neat to see and she did really well. (videos are below)

Courtney is the 5th from the right (on her knees reaching her right arm out):

Courtney is in the center:

Courtney is the blurry one in the middle:


Lyrical routine (hopefully it works):

Poor CRX

I don't like pictures like this...and it happened twice in 2 weeks.





I will admit that the second time, I cried when they were driving her away on the back of the truck.

She is all fixed now so Ethan can start practicing driving a manual.

Disneyland - Day 2

The second day was our California Adventure day!  I, once again, got us a MaxPass for the day so we wouldn't have to wait in long lines and I was very grateful.  Cars Land is crazy in California Adventure so we knew that when the park opened we had to book it for the Radiator Racers because that line never gets shorter.  So we got a MaxPass for the Racers but we also go in line.  But the Racers weren't working so we left the line and went to Soarin' because we knew that would have a long line later.

We ended up riding Racers later and doing Soarin' a couple times, thank to the MaxPass.  We didn't realize that the Toy Story ride didn't open until 10 a.m. but we were able to get in line for that although it was a long wait.

California Adventure doesn't have too many rides we wanted to ride on so the day was kind of long because the lines were super long and a lot of rides were closed or being refurbished.  Courtney and Bryan did the Grizzly Run.  We watched sourdough bread being made. And I forced everyone to go on the Ariel ride before it broke down. ;)

The kids were pretty tired when we finished.

Courtney liked Cars Land.  She wouldn't stand in line for Lightning McQueen pics though.



He was tired after we dragged him all over the place.

Courtney was tired too!

Courtney's best friend has a Monsters University hat so Courtney wanted to get one too.  She has some rosy cheeks!

It rained for a bit so we decided to watch them make sourdough bread and get a free sample.



We had to buy some in the shape of Mickey!


Radiator Racers! This pic was the second time we rode it when we figured out where the camera was. Ethan had fun with this one!




This is a video of the sourdough bread being made.  It smelled so good!

We drove home on Wednesday.  We were going to drive to the beach and hang out for a bit but the van was acting up (misfiring in the engine) so we decided to just hobble home.  It was a bit nerve-wracking to drive on California freeways with a van that was lurching but once we got past Mesquite, the van started working perfectly again.  For some reason, it just doesn't like California.  Must be all the crazy drivers! haha!

It was a great vacation though and we had a lot of fun!

Disneyland - Day 1

We decided to take the kids to Disneyland for Spring Break in March.  Actually, Bryan told Courtney had would finish her room downstairs before her 12th birthday or he would take her to Disneyland.  Then we decided we didn't want them to move their rooms downstairs so we just planned a trip to Disneyland. ;) 

We drove down on Sunday afternoon which was a HUGE mistake!  We didn't remember that traffic would be horrible outside of Vegas until we hit it and it took hours to go a few miles.  Ugh!  We finally got to our hotel near the park after 8 p.m. 

I went to the office to check in, was given a key, and we grabbed the bags to go to our room.  I put the keycard in the door, opened the door, and realized that the room was already occupied!  I hurried and backed out then went to the office for a new room.  Courtney wasn't very happy about it and kept saying the hotel was "sketchy."  I told her that she didn't know the meaning of a sketchy hotel but that we could find her one if she wanted to see how sketchy they could get. ;) 

When we finally got settled in our hotel room, Bryan and I walked to Disneyland to get our tickets.  I had bought our tickets months before (right before the price hike and on sale, so we scored!) but we needed to trade our vouchers for actual tickets.  We waited in line and got our tickets.  The nice lady showed me how to get our tickets lined to the app on my phone and then explained a bit more about MaxPass (which is AMAZING).

We all slept well that night but got up early so we could get to the park early.  We were only going to be there 2 days so we went to Disneyland on Monday and California Adventure on Tuesday.  We waited in line, got into the park, and then I bought the MaxPasses for our tickets while we waited in Tomorrowland for the park to officially open.  Then we were off!

It was an amazing day!  Between the MaxPass and the RideMax program I had used (which planned our day for us to minimize wait times) we rode everything we wanted multiple times by 11 a.m.!  We went on Star Tours a few times (with Ethan finally being the rebel spy), Space Mountain a couple times, Astroblaster a few times, Autopia, Matterhorn (which was finally open when we were there, that's the first time the kids have ridden it), Pirates of the Carribean, and the Haunted Mansion (where they really don't give out death certificates, we asked).  The weather was perfect and it was beautiful in California!

Ethan got stopped at security each time we went in and out because of his belt. We went on rides in the morning, went back to the hotel for a swim, a nap, and lunch.  Then we went back to the park in the afternoon and again in the evening.  It was a relaxing time and the park wasn't too crowded. 


This was the second time for Space Mountain and the kids went alone.

This was the first time on Space Mountain and we went with them. This isn't my favorite ride in the park but I had to go once with the kids.

Courtney got through Autopia quicker than we did so she waited for us on the bridge.

Waiting for Star Tours to begin.  This is our favorite ride but Bryan gets a bit motion sick on it so he waits outside for us when we ride it multiple times.

I don't know what was happening in this photo but I'm sure it was funny.

Courtney and her mouse ears.

Our hotel was only 3 blocks from the main entrance so it was really nice to go back and forth.

Ethan helping his sister out by giving her a piggyback ride!

Bryan got a TON of comments on his shirt and a lot of high 5s from dads all over the park.


The pool was really cold!  Bryan told Courtney he would pay her if she would jump in.  She actually did it!  I think it was $10 but I can't remember for certain.  Here is the video he took of her jump.  I felt the water with my feet and it was way too cold for me!