Christmas in March

Well that's depressing. I was going to blog about how FABULOUS this Spring Break has been and then I realized I haven't blogged on my family blog since November! GAH! I'm always the catch-up queen, so let's get to it!

This Christmas was different because my parents are on a mission in Salt Lake City again and it was kind of everyone's years to be with their in-laws except Tami and I don't do in-laws for Christmas and Heather WAS so far away. (more on that later!)

So we decided since it was a weird year anyway and our kids needed NOTHING for Christmas, we would do a vacation! We looked at places like Hawaii and San Diego but air fare over Christmas is Re-Donk. So we found cheap flights to Portland and then drove to Grand Mound Washington to the GREAT WOLF LODGE... Pretend I just said that like Oprah. May her show rest in peace.

I wish we had a super cute family picture in the super cool lobby but we don't. We were literally having too much fun to stop and take very many pictures.

The airplane ride went well but the rest of Christmas Eve was a little shady.

See HERE.  I was the nut-job lady yelling at the Wal-mart worker and crying at customer service. I was super menstrual.  Even that night in the hotel was kind of shady... kids were kind of whiny and acting slightly entitled and I lost it a little bit.

 But then Christmas morning came and Santa came and we played all week and gloriousness ensued.

 We ate Christmas morning breakfast inside a life-size Gingerbread house. This thing was literally made of Gingerbread and candy.

Great Wolf Lodge has a really fun indoor water park.

























It also has this thing called "Magic Quest" where you buy these wands and play this magical quest throughout the resort where you're finding things like treasure chests and fairies and you get clues as to the next place to go. It was really fun. I wish I'd had a chance to play that part more with the kids.

They also have this animatronic show in the lobby a couple times a day and for the month of December they make it snow indoors. "It's snowing...at great wolf lodge...and all our friends are here..." (A song they play every time.)

There's also a bunch of other stuff to do like mini golf, arcade, build-a-bear type thing that also comes with a quest game...


























































 We went with our friends Ryan and Natalie Taylor. Again, I wish I had pics of all of us together! We've been friends with them since before we had kids or houses! We love them!

So we spent 3 FULL days there and then decided since we were flying out of Portland, to spend the last 1/2 day there in the city. We went to the Portland Children's Museum and VooDoo donuts, which is a must visit in Portland!

Then we flew home, had a day to recover and then drove to Salt Lake City to meet this little ADORABLE BABY!!!! 

And to spend New Years with my family. Deacon got sick the morning we were supposed to go, but there was a big family party that night, and I really didn't want to miss it, so we went anyway! Deacon through up randomly off and on for 3 days.

We also celebrated Brighton's birthday there!  Holy cow, we did a lot!