Our 10th Anniversary Trip to Whistler Day 1

We had an early morning, waking up at 6:45 to get ready for our flight to Vancouver, Canada. We were a bit surprised when we found our gate at the airport was actually downstairs in this little tiny room. We realized we were going to board our flight by walking out on the tarmac. We had never done that from PDX before. This would be the reason for walking out to the plane.

It was an itty bitty plane and it wasn't full at all, but it was quick and a very nice flight.  

Here was a view of Mt. St. Helens from the plane. Poy was proud of this pic

Once we got into the airport, through customs and got our rental car we were on our way.  They are doing a ton of prep for the upcoming Olympic games.

Here are the rings on the side of the highway. 

We decided we wanted to visit Chinatown since we had heard it was a good one to visit. Unfortunately we didn't have a great map and drove way past where we needed to be so we had quite a road trip. We did finally find Chinatown though and found a chinese restaurant for some lunch. We had some great BBQ pork, but I wasn't so impressed by the chow mein. We then did some shopping and found some stuff for Sophie. I finally bought her a pair of chinese PJ's that I've always wanted. We also bought her a good luck kitty and my dad a back scratcher :)

The outfit (I think of them as jammies) are actually bright pink, I think they look red in the photo.

We stopped on the way to Whistler at Shannon Falls. We did a little bit of hiking and took some fun pictures.

Being goofy

Gimme a kiss!

When we finally arrived in Whistler at almost 8pm, we were very happy with our hotel room. We are not normally splurgers when it comes to hotels, but we decided since it was our anniversary trip we were gonna stay somewhere nice.  So, here is our room.

The bathroom has a tub which is VERY important to me and it has heated floors :)

The living area is good sized and has a mountain view.

The bedroom with a pretty bed.

This little note and box of chocolates was on the kitchen island. 

Here is our kitchen

This is the view out our window. This is what the mountain looks like right now. Bikers were taking the chairlift up and biking down. 

After checking out the room we had pizza in the hotel pub and then walked around the Village. Although many shops were closed, it is a very cool area and we are looking forward to some great times.

"We were just excited about water wings..."

And now the kids don't even need water wings!  We went to parents day today for the kids second and final session of swim class for the summer and we were blown away! I knew the kids were making progress, they tell us what they are doing daily, but until we saw it we just had no idea! Sophie is swimming completely underwater and even jumping off the diving board into the deep end with no help at all!  Nolan is doing fantastic as well, but when he's in the shallow end he definitely relies on the bottom more than he needs to. Today I was in search of water wings because I do want to have them for our upcoming trip, and Nolan kept telling me, "but I don't need water wings mom". I just asked him to trust me... the kids don't know that we are taking them to Disney World at the end of September and we'll be swimming a lot.  Anyway, here is a video of Parents Day today. We started to video after Nolan did his deep end stuff so unfortunately we don't have his diving board and deep end swimming.  In case you can't tell, the little one on the diving board is Sophie.  I had originally posted it here, but the quality is not good (you could hardly tell who was who), so click here for the link to the video.

Summer Fun Photos

We have been having a great fun filled Summer. Here are a bunch of pictures of what we've been up to.  

Both kids were in swim class everyday for 2 weeks. They both did great and we signed them up for one more session starting in another week. The class is in a private pool and parents do not watch, so we don't really know how it's going until parents day on the last Friday.  It was very impressive seeing how they were doing.

Nolan is holding the pole and swimming in the deep end. Sophie is waiting her turn.

Sophie swimming in the deep end. She is super comfortable with her water wings on.

Parents join in and swim with the kids on parents day. Nolan loves dropping the rings in and going after them.

Sophie playing with a ring.

The kids playing

Nolan

Sophie swimming for a ring.

One sunny day we decided to find some free fun. We visited a park in Portland and fed the ducks. The kids loved it! I've never seen  a loaf of bread disappear so quickly :)

Sophie and the ducks

The kids running around.

Happy girl!

They even posed a for a couple brother/sister shots

Teeter totter!

Climbing trees

Poy had to work on 4th of July this year, so the kids and I went to my parents house.  My dad put on a great fireworks display for us. We had a lot of fun. Here are just a couple kid shots.

Nolan hanging out watching Papa and the fireworks.

Sophie watching fireworks and smiling pretty.

Anne-Elissa's husband Chris celebrated his 30th birthday mid July and we were invited up to his parents house in Bremerton. His parents live on the Puget Sound and it is just beautiful. We went up to Bremerton on Saturday and when we got there at noon, it was already blazing hot. Nolan was really excited to get out on the wave runner. We had many different trips out onto the water and we had SO MUCH FUN! We camped out in the yard for the night and went home Sunday morning. Chris and Anne-Elissa, thanks for having us come up. We can't wait to celebrate your 31st :)

This is the view from the house. It was beautiful!

Trish and I on our first wave runner outing.

Poy and Nolan on the wave runner. 

Aren't they cute :)

Nolan and I on one of our last trips out. I think we got caught in a little rain storm. We were out and having so much fun it didn't matter that it was raining... then I saw lightning and thought we should probably come in.  Nolan was a little speed demon with me! He and I would go max speed and he didn't even care when the water was spraying in his eyes. 

My Garden

I have never gardened in my life and I'm pretty proud of how well it is doing.  My bok choy (asian veggie-top right corner) is doing particularly well.  I am really excited about the corn although we've had some squirrel trouble and lost some corn. I replanted though and I am back up to my original corn count and it looks good. Today the broccoli looks larger as well. I can't believe how much I enjoy seeing my veggies grow.  Other than those I've mentioned, I also have green beans, edamame (soy beans), lettuce, tomatoes, cherry tomatoes and a watermelon. Outside my box I have strawberries, raspberries and blackberries as well.

 

This first photo is of the garden the day I got everything planted.

May 27th

This is how it looks today.

June 20th

 

Check out that Bok Choy!

 

Watermelon, Beans, Tomatoes and Broccoli

White Belt Represents Innocence

Nolan started Taekwondo about 2 months ago with his friend Benjamin. When his instructor told us the boys would be testing for their white belt on June 20th, both his mom and I were a little leery that the boys would be ready by then. The instructor was encouraging though and let us know that he is lenient on the White belt test because it is their first time.  We have been practicing at home and today was the day.  The test lasted over 2 hours because many different kids and adults test at different levels at the same time.  Part of the test is sitting still and watching others. Also, not getting frustrated or upset if you struggle. 

Nolan did very well today. During one part of testing he was asked what are the five tenets of Taekwondo. Nolan answered Courtesy, Integrity, Perseverance, Self Control and Indomitable Spirit. He was then asked which one is your favorite and why. His answer was "self control, cause you always need to be calm and quiet and the usual stuff" It was pretty cute and had the spectators giggling. 

Nolan did great with the board breaking. It is amazing how great the energy is in the room when the board breaking happens.  Nolan had never even tried to break a real board before. They use practice boards in class.  After they successfully break a board in testing they get to keep it!  After the test one of the more experienced kids told Nolan & Benjamin to ask the instructor to sign his board.  He wrote "Nice work Nolan, You are off to a dynamic start!"  It was really cool.

When they gave out the belts it was very thrilling. Of coarse I teared up a bit. I am so very proud of my son.

To watch some of the highlights of the testing Click Here

To watch a longer version of the test Click Here

In case you are wondering, the students get their dobok (uniform) once they  

have received a belt.

Great Wolf Lodge Trip

We made a trip up to the Great Wolf Lodge for spring break Sunday-Tuesday.  We had a great time playing at the waterpark and exploring the interactive scavenger hunt throughout the lodge. Here are some of our photos and videos.  We didn't get a ton cause we were playing in the water a lot, but here are the better ones. For those of you that are wondering... it is quite expensive, but considering it was within driving distance it was much less money than we would have spent going somewhere like Disneyland.  Food was the biggest issue for us... I don't do buffets cause it costs way more than I'd ever eat, so food was limited and expensive. Other than that the room and MagiQuest wand/game were our only other expenses.

Poy helping Nolan wave the wand to get the clue in MagiQuest.

MagiQuest was truly one of the highlights of our trip. It was just a very fun way to interact with the kids and explore the Lodge. We had such a great time.

Sophie waving the wand.

This was during a little show that happens in the lobby 3 times a day.

This was the screen we would see when we started a new quest. As you can see our team name was Wonginators!

We did well enough to be 14th in Top Gold for the Week and got our team name on the big screens throughout the lodge :)

This was the GIANT bucket of water than spills every few minutes. It is seriously a lot of water. One time I was in the wrong place when it dumped and it about took my swimsuit bottoms off :)

Nolan and Poy after coming off of the innertube waterslide.

 Sophie on the red slide. The first time we did these I assumed she could go on my lap, but they don't allow that. I was surprised at how easily she did these slides and wasn't afraid at all.

Nolan going across the lilypads. This kind of stuff is so good for him because it doesn't come naturally to him. 

Sophie on the little slide.  This was very fun for her and there was no line :)