Birthday and Vacation

Quick update before the other half of December starts and we have even more to post about! Hahaha!

We celebrated Sierra's 4th Birthday. Her birthday requests were: 

A chocolate Hello Kitty cake

Sherbet

A pink elephant

Wow....if only every child and every birthday (or any other gift-giving occasion) was this easy! She woke up on her birthday, got out of bed, and asked me, "Am I four?" She was quite happy when I responded, "Yep, you're four today!!"

After Ashlyn left for school, Sierra helped me mix and bake her chocolate cake. She helped me frost it, eat a ton of frosting, check the frosting, eat some more frosting, check the frosting again, eat some more frosting....wow, she had a TON of frosting!!

She requested Chicken flavored Ramen noodles for breakfast (no surprise there!), popcorn for lunch, and McDonald's for dinner.  After opening her presents, she began to share them with Ashlyn.  When we asked her what she wanted to buy with her birthday money, she replied, "Hats and scarves and gloves. For everyone." We told her that was very kind and thoughtful, but she could buy herself some gifts with her money....she replied, "A hat. For daddy." We will have to take her to a store and have her pick out something for herself.  :) 

Such a giving soul.

The weekend just after Sierra's birthday, we flew to Phoenix for a few days.  It was a lot of visiting and driving packed into 3 days. 

Ashlyn on the flight from DEN to PHX

We took the girls to Peter Piper Pizza right after we got into PHX, and some friends met us there to hangout and eat and catchup. It was a fun 4.5 hours and the kids all got their energy out for the day I think! We stayed the night at Jared's since it was getting late and we had to get up and drive 4.5 hours to Greer, AZ. There, we stayed in a log cabin (Little Colorado #5 thru the Greer Cabin Keepers), ate dinner at the Molly Butler Lodge, visited with Mrs. Claus, and then took a trolley (the Candy Cane Express) to the North Pole to visit with the Elves and Santa! This place was all decked out, with no detail left out. They started out with the Toy Hall of Fame where older toys were displayed that were created by Santa. Then they got a little lesson on the North Pole and elves. We followed the Elves into the workshop, where the kids all got to help "make" and test some toys.  Ashlyn made a cheerleader bear, and Sierra made a cute little bear in a dress. They both got to test out some bomb rocket launchers, following which all the kids and elves starting shooting them all over the workshop! LOL! Then they were led over to a big table for some snowman soup and cookies, and sang a bunch of Christmas carols. After that, they went to a "classroom", with tables and benches and everything....Elf University (E.U.) They played "Elfman" (like hangman), and some other fun games. Then they were led into another room where they were given a paper and pencil, and wrote/drew out what they wanted to tell Santa what they want for Christmas.  Then we stood there. For a LONG time. Probably around 30-40 minutes. 50+ people in one room. Heater cranked up high. Temperature rising. Sierra was getting tired and starting to fall asleep in Matt's arms. 5 minutes till we were with Santa. Then out of nowhere BLECK! No more snowman soup and cookies (and ice cream)....Matt and Sierra headed to the bathroom to cleanup, and Ashlyn and I went to see Santa and get her picture taken. 

Ashlyn with Santa Claus

It was a long, stinky trolley ride back to the Lodge and another long stinky car ride back to the cabin (both were about 15 minutes each but felt a lot longer). Poor little B didn't get to see Santa, whom she'd been talking about all day and dying to see.  The following morning Santa was to be at the Lodge to have breakfast with everyone....but he was only there from 7-830AM. (We didn't even get done with the North Pole Experience until 1030PM.) Needless to say, we didn't see Santa. But it did start to snow that morning on our way out of Greer. And what a sight to see Arizonans trying to drive in 1/2" of snow!

Sierra with Mrs. Claus

After returning to Phoenix, we went to Matt's brother's (Brandon) house they just rented in Florence.  The kids played and we relaxed and ate and crashed late that night. Tuesday we took Matt's mom to lunch for her birthday, which was on Wednesday but we wouldn't be there to celebrate. Then we got Matt and Sierra some new shoes after their mishap. We went back to his parents' house for a few hours and visited (his dad just landed from Ghana on Monday morning for a few weeks). Then we went back to Brandon's and visited, packed everything up, and headed up to Jared's for the night. We went out to dinner with them, then crashed around 11. Wednesday was an EARLY morning, waking up a 5 to catch our flight at 830AM back to Denver. *The car we got from the rental company was supposed to be an Intermediate SUV.....we got a Jeep Compass....and it sounded JUST like a jetski/snowmobile!!! It kept us laughing the entire trip!

Sierra's mode of travel anytime we had the luggage with us!

 We made it back home, picked up the pooches from the kennel, and were lazy the rest of the day. 

Tomorrow, Ashlyn has a school Winter program, so we'll start some more events for the month of December.