Disneyland

YAY DISNEYLAND!!!

So, Disneyland was fun. It was fun to get away, and also to get to see and spend time with family for a few days. It was fairly eventful in a way, but that's how it goes.

Our drive there was okay, except hitting traffic in Riverside (unavoidable really). That made it take about an hour longer than we had hoped to get there, which wouldn't have been so bad except that we had planned on feeding Ezra right when we got there and so he wasn't too happy with having to wait. But we got there and fed him and he calmed down a bit.

We went out to dinner with the family, which was nice. It was good to see everyone. Jess gave us a onesie that has the letter "e" on it (see above), which was really cute. Afterwards, we went back to the hotel and slept. It wasn't the hotel that we originally thought we were making reservations for, but it was okay.

The next day was fun. We went on Space mountain (Ezra didn't of course, but Susan and I did). We took Ezra on a few other rides, like Peter Pan, and in the Enchanted Tiki Room. He really liked the birds and singing flowers. We were going to record him as we went on Peter Pan, but it was too dark. All you could see was his onesie glowing in the black light.

SINGING FLOWERS???

As we stopped for a snack, there was a guy playing some Ragtime music on a piano, and Ezra started dancing in his stroller as we ate, but stopped the minute that we pulled the video camera out to tape him, figures. We even took Ezra on haunted mansion (which is Nightmare Before Christmas themed around Halloween). He fell asleep in line and slept the entire time.

Susan took him on the Winnie the Pooh ride, while I went on splash mountain with Ryan and dad. Apparently he cried almost the whole time they were in line, but as soon as the ride started he stopped crying and just kept looking around at everything and smiling.

Ryan got him giggling in the store at Rainforest cafe. It was really cute, see:

As the evening went on we put him in his pajamas (which have skeleton bones on them, they're his Halloween costume too). We got a lot of comments from people passing by on how cute he was. He slept most of the evening as we walked around.

We decided it was finally time to go back to bed. We went to our hotel, and went to sleep. Every couple of hours we kept hearing people talking fairly loudly, but just figured that it was people coming back from the park and whatnot, so we just went back to sleep. It got progressively louder as the night went on. At about 4 am it was ridiculously loud. Susan got up and warned the 10 or so teenagers to be quiet, that we had a small child. They said sorry, but kept up the noise, not to mention the smell of paint and cigarettes. We called the office, and it was really apparent when the cops showed up at a little before 4:30 because of the yells of "get the stuff... go go go...." and the sound of a bunch of people running with luggage. Needless to say we were tired all of the next day.

SILLINESS!

On Saturday we went on the carousel, which was fun. We went on Peter Pan again, and Ezra fell asleep in line and just slept through the whole thing. We went on a couple of other rides, and decided that we all needed a nap, so we went back to the hotel for a few hours.

We took Ezra on Pirates, and he really liked the animals, though I think the ride was a bit long for him, as he got a bit fussy after there were no more animals to look at.

We woke up and packed up. Ezra was nice and happy.

He was generally good on the car ride back home. He slept almost the whole way. It was nice to finally get home, as this weekend wore us all out a bit. But it was fun, and we were happy for the opportunity to see everyone.

WORN OUT

My Little Gamer!

So, I've been showing Ezra pictures on my computer this week. That way he won't freak out with all of the new people wanting to hold him next week. His fave's are of Sadie. He gets this big grin and starts chatting away at her picture. Usually he pays close attention to my computer screen but for some reason he has fallen in love with my mouse.

He even took my hand off of it.

Looks like he's going to take after his daddy.

Another thing he's started doing more of this week is shown in the video. Sorry it's sideways I didn't think about it when I took the video. Enjoy!

Squeak....

Ezra keeps growing. His shorts almost fit him (they went down to his ankles before).

He's been playing more and more with his toys. He's starting to giggle a bit and grab at things that you hold in front of him. He gets really animated when he first wakes up and also a bit when he starts getting tired.

We're looking forward to seeing everyone. Only a few more days!!!

Picture Tag!

I've been tagged. Thanks Jess. So, here goes...
This is from the summer after we got married. Mandy, Mark and the kids were visiting. Shawn and Ethan decided to build a sand castle and this is the fruit of their labor.

So, here are the rules: Post the 4th picture in your 4th file and then tag 4 more people.

I Tag:
Liz
Melissa
Kirsten
Emily

Let Them Eat Cake!

Yesterday I had a bunch of energy. So, I decided to make a cake but I didn't want to use a regular frosting. Well after looking for a recipe that doesn't use heavy cream(we didn't have any) I finally found a recipe for a glaze. I was really excited because it was super easy and we had all the ingredients. I though it turned out pretty good for my first time making it. Not only was it a yummy cake it made for a great celebration. We are going to Disneyland to spend time with family. We're really excited to see everyone and for Ezra who is finally going to meet the rest of his aunts and uncles. (and of course Sadie)

Doesn't that look good.

Chocolate Glaze

6 oz. bittersweet or semisweet chocolate (I used 4 oz. semisweet choc chips and 2 oz dark choc)
6 Tbs. water or milk
pinch of salt(optional)

Melt together over double boiler or in microwave. Take off heat.

6 Tbs. Butter cut in small pieces(the smaller the better)

Stir into hot chocolate mixture. Stir in

1-2 Tbs. flavoring of choice

Let cool to desired thickness. Pour over cake.

This recipe would also work great chilled for truffles.

Outside!!!

So, Ezra has been pretty happy recently (as usual). He's really growing like crazy. It's amazing to see how fast his progression has been since he was born. He's been going down easier, which has given Susan a bit of a relief during the day. He used to "need" her to be right next to him the whole time that he napped.

The weather finally cooled down (to mid 80's) this weekend. We were able to take him outside finally. We went to the park, and he really liked it. It was a bit new, and the whole walk to the park he just kind of looked around, taking it all in.

It was such a gorgeous day. We can't wait until all of the days are like this again, to remind us of why Arizona is so nice.


Ezra has also started interacting more with picture books. We got him some this week, and he thinks that they're the greatest thing ever. He gets so excited. He has also starting playing with his Pooh blanket. See:

He also rolled over from his stomach to his back for the first time. He was quite shocked, and it took a second for him to figure out what had just happened. He has rolled over the other way, from back to stomach, but this was new. The look of amazement on his face was priceless.

New Carseat

We finally ended up getting a new carseat, but he should be able to use it for quite a while. He almost completely filled the other one. I think he likes it though, what do you think?


In other news, we finally cleaned the fish tank and replaced the gravel (it was pretty bad, it mostly came out in large chunks). It looks about 1000 times bettter.