thankful thursday: a great daddy

I'm dedicating this Thankful Thursday to Chris since we were not with him for Father's Day. I'm so thankful that Elle and #2 has a Daddy that loves them so much. He works so hard for them and wants to make this world a better place for them. He is the best person ever! His heart belongs to God and is such a wonderful example of a Christian man, father, and husband. He loves to cuddle and play with Elle. He constantly tells me and her how much he loves her. And he's so loving even when she's tired and grumpy.

He's willing to carry her in the really long Little Mermaid line and then the ride while she sleeps

He'll take her to swim in the freezing pool

He'll ride the carousel again and again because she loves it

He'll finally go on the Dumbo ride just for her

He loves her momma


And he spent a whole day in an airport to get us a free trip. Not to mention the fact that he didn't eat anything, but plane food to save money.

For Father's Day we got Chris some new running shoes, and I had seen this idea in a magazine, so the card and the gift went together perfectly! (I turned my back for 2 seconds and she went crazy with the marker! He still loved it though.)

disneyland: part 2

Do you know this book?

It's what I kept thinking about the last day as we were trying to get home. We'd learned some lessons on this trip, but weren't too happy about the ones we learned Saturday. First of all, never underestimate LA traffic. We tried to go to Hollywood since we had several hours before we had to be at the airport. But we ended up being stuck in traffic most of the time and ended up with only time to eat lunch in Mahattan Beatch at Cozymel's, which serves "coastal mex". There's not very many around so I guess we got an out-of-the-ordinary experience. It was good and had a different flavor than tex-mex. Then we drove by the ocean on our way to airport.

Just before our flight they announced that it was too full and they were looking for volunteers to take $ and a voucher to take a later flight. After discussing it for a bit we decided it wouldn't be a bad idea if Chris wanted to do it. We had options about how to get back to OKC once we got to Dallas. So he volunteered. It wasn't until we were getting ready to take off that they then told him it was just a voucher. (At this point I refer back to the book.) It was pretty big, but still we felt misled. Then we found out Chris wouldn't fly in until the next morning. Thankfully my cousin took Elle and I in again for the night. The next morning Chris got his early flight to Kansas City, but when he got there his plane to Dallas had been used for another flight. Apparently there was a hail storm Saturday night and two planes were damaged. A lot of people were stranded and Chris wasn't going to get to Dallas until that evening. So he convinced them to send him to Oklahoma City, which they actually agreed to do because I guess it helped Southwest out. Elle and I drove back to OKC by ourselves, but as the day went on his arrival time kept getting pushed back. He finally arrived at 9 pm. So much for Father's Day!

other lessons learned:
*Disneyland is much more manageable than Disney World for little ones. You only have two parks instead of 6. It's also right in the middle of the city so we didn't have to stay at the resorts and was within walking distance (money saver!), found a grocery store to get food so we didn't have to eat all meals in the park (money saver!), and there were several restaurants or fast food places right there if we did want something else.
*The only bad thing about it being right in the middle of the city is there were more locals than at Disney World so there were a lot of unsupervised kids and teens around and it didn't seem as exotic.
*We packed breakfast foods, snacks, and to-go peanut butter and jelly packets in one of the suitcases so we didn't have to spend so much on food in the park.
*California Adventure was almost deserted in the morning when it first opens. Chris and Casey got on most of the big rides right away. However, it did get busy in the afternoon and there's not as many ways to travel around the park so you have to walk more.
*Elle can fit her head through the bars at the Dumbo ride, she just can't get it back through. Very scary moment!
*I'm the worst stalker ever! You know the guy who was on American Idol a few seasons ago who was blind? I recognized Scott MacIntyre as he got on the Dumbo ride ahead of us. Look at the shots I got and you'll see why I will never be a part of the paparrazi! It was him! I promise!

disneyland: part 1

I guess this was our first official family vacation since Elle was born. We left Tuesday evening for Dallas because we decided to fly from there to save a chunk of money. Yes, even with gas prices so high it's still cheaper to drive, park, and fly from there. My gracious cousin and cousin-in-law let us stay at their place for the night. We left their house at 5:45 (I guess Elle was so really excited because she was up at 4:30!) to drive to the airport. We picked up my mom and sister at their hotel and caravanned over to Dallas Love. Traveling with a toddler through an airport actually has it's perks. We always got special treatment in line through security and boarding!

Elle did wonderful on the flight and she had a blast. We got to LAX, boarded the shuttle to the rental car, got the rental car and some lunch, and drove over to our hotel. We dropped our stuff off and we had a 10 minute walk to the gate. Elle, my mom, and Casey, and I spent 2.5 days all over Magic Kingdom and California Adventure. Chris was presenting at Pepperdine on Thursday so he was in Malibu Thursday. The weather was wonderful! I think it got up to 80 one day the whole time we were there. We even wore jackets in the evenings. All and all it was a wonderful time! (Except the trip back, but more about that tomorrow.) Here's some pics from our trip:

I found these magnet paper dolls for Elle to play with in the car. It was well worth the money. She spent a ton of time taking the magnets apart and then played with them for quite a while.

Elle loved the planes,

looking out of the plane,

the free snacks,

and the in-flight movie.

She did not love the seat belt!

She was pretty nervous about getting too close to the characters, which actually worked out since the lines were so long this and one other pic was all we got. However, Elle LOVED seeing them from a few, or 50, feet away. (By the way, biggest disappointment...no Donald or Daisy, but plenty of Gipetto. Honestly, who wants their pic with him?)

Elle's favorite rides...Dumbo,

"Kissing Booty" Carousel (so named after trying to explain the pictures of the story),

and of course Pooh. (That's Elle's head up front!)

She got her first experience with fireworks. A little scary the first night, but awesome the second night. I'll try and get all the pics up on our shutterfly account soon.

mlm: disney

I'm trying to get back in the swing of things so I'm starting with a new Media Literacy Monday post. In keeping up the spirit of our vacation that we just returned from (Disneyland--more about this later) I thought I'd do two book reviews.

1) The Mouse That Roared: Disney and the End of Innocence by Henry Giroux
I actually read this book over a year ago for my media literacy class. I was drawn to it because I'm a Disney fan and I was curious. Henry Giroux is a professor and major figure of the media literacy movement and he's definitely in the critical media literacy camp. Basically people who are in this group focus more on the negative aspects of media. In this book Giroux calls out Disney as a corporation whose motives are to sell Disney products, rather than innocent entertainment. If you haven't figured out that Disney is trying to sell a product than you must not live on earth. I do think he points out some interesting contradictions in their message of innocence, but you have to consider the time period of the examples he gives. And it is a business! To me Giroux spent a good portion of the book talking as if Disney were the same thing as the public schools. He also left me with many unanswered questions. I'd also like to know how he feels about the recent Disney movies and movements (e.g., The Princess and the Frog, the Disney Princesses). If you're interested in Disney at all you might want to read this book. It does have some thought provoking information and facts.

2)Polite as a Princess by Melissa Arps
While looking for a new book for Elle to take on our trip I found this one. Chris and I are trying to be careful about Elle and the princess stuff, but I thought this was a good example of my previous thoughts on what the princesses should teach girls. It has all the regular princess characters and uses them to teach behaviors that are good manners. It's cute and if you know a little girl who's interested in the Disney Princesses she'd probably like this book.