McRady Invasion!

In June, we got a visit from Brady and McCall.  The best part: Brady's work paid for the trip, since they ran out of free trips to Hawaii!  We did our best to make Chicago a good substitute for Hawaii.  Here's what we covered:

We started off the visit with a bike trip along the lake front.

Blake enjoyed the bike seat, while Sam and James fought over snacks in the trailer.

It was the last day of school for Henry and Ellis, who couldn't have been more pleased with their new-found freedom.

We celebrated with chocolate cake shakes from Portillo's, at Brady's request.

Then initiated James on the tire swing - an integral part of the Iverson park experience.

James' favorite Chicago activity was discovering that we have a vacuum!  James is totally obsessed with vacuums, and getting to use it is the ultimate reward for him.  Our floors have never been cleaner.

We got talking about Chicago donuts and how amazing they are, and then Brady made the mistake of claiming that Dunkin Donuts are just as good as any other donut.  We accepted the challenge and collected donuts from five different donut shops, then had a blind taste test to crown a champion in each category: best old fashioned, best frosted, best specialty, and best overall.  Dunkin Donuts came in dead last in every category, and Stan's Donuts was the clear winner.  Take that, Dunkin.  

The next day we took a trip to the Botanic Garden, and the boys all loved the model railroad exhibit.

While at the Children's Museum on Navy Pier, we couldn't help but notice that Sam and Blake, and Ellis and James, are total look-alikes.  It's a real joy to navigate two double strollers through a crowded museum.

Here are the boys in the pretend car wash, practicing for what is hopefully not their future career.

Sam the fisherman!

Ellis the fireman!  Sam the dog!

A key part of this visit were daily soccer games with Uncle Brady.  The boys couldn't get enough soccer time...and Brady was happy to oblige.

We found time for a date night at the Cellar.

Speaking of look-alikes...yikes

No trip to Chicago is complete without seeing the Bean! Inside the Bean is basically a giant fun-house mirror, which would be hours of fun if it wasn't so crowded.

 What a great group of boys!  We we so glad they came to hang out with us!

Happiest Place

We have been planning this trip for a very long time.  We wanted to go to Disneyland when I wasn't pregnant or nursing, and when all of our kids were old enough to enjoy it.  We figured out a long time ago that the summer of 2013 was our golden opportunity.  We don't look as ecstatic as we should in this picture.  We had an AWESOME time!

We convinced my mom and dad to join us, which made it so much more fun (this was Star Tours - which the boys LOVED - we did it several times)! 

And Brady and McCall and James came too - making it way more fun than it would have been otherwise (notice Sam's crush on Minnie!  He didn't hesitate at all when Brady asked him to kiss her!).

It was a lot more fun to wait in line with buddies -- although I will tell you that we didn't wait in a single line for more than 20 minutes -- thanks to this program called Ride Max that Ben found.  This program asks you what rides you want to do, and the times you want to be there, and it gives you a schedule that minimizes wait times and walking times.  It was AWESOME!  It totally had us doing things in an order we never would have expected, and it had us sending runners to get fast passes at appropriate times, etc.  Let me tell you, on a July weekend at Disneyland, it felt SO good to be walking to the front of nearly every line, looking at everybody else who was waiting in 1-hour plus lines, wondering why they didn't opt to be as cool as us.  Yeah, leave it to my economist husband to find such a program (and check it out if you're going!  They have it for Florida too!).

We kind of took advantage of Brady and McCall's kindness and let them take our kids while we did a bunch of rides.   

Meanwhile, Brady and McCall won major brownie points with three of their nephews! 

   

Henry spotted Jolie's name on the ground among thousands of bricks!  She was an ambassador for Disneyland in 2012 . . .  

 . . . and she is still working for Disney!  She was able to leave her desk (inside Space Mountain) to join us for lunch and to dish out some insider tips.  Our boys idolize Jolie and still ask about which characters she has played at Disneyland.  

Henry planned ahead for the Star Wars Jedi Training, making this sign to ensure that he would get chosen as a volunteer.  He came up with the wording all on his own.

How could they resist such a sign?  He was chosen - of course! 

And . . . he got to fight Darth Vader.  Yep, that's my son. 

 Henry, Yo-da man!

More than one boy's dreams came true in Radiator Springs in Cars Land.  I will say it fulfilled my wildest dreams as well.  That Cars movie makes me teary-eyed at several points.  And thanks to Ride Max, we got on Radiator Springs Racers in 20 minutes.  It ruled.

Several minutes after leaving a gift shop, I discovered that Sam had shoplifted!  He had pulled both of these items off the shelf and successfully swiped them as we walked out of the shop.  He was pretty disappointed when we had to return them . . . 

 Meeting Mickey!

 This was the cute Anaheim house we stayed at.  I love staying in homes like this so we can all be together.  So much more fun than hotels!

There were a lot of stroller naps.  I got this dream stroller right before we left, and it turned out to be a major pain to bring (especially when we had to pay $200 to upgrade the rental car to fit it).  BUT I will say that I thought it was worth it to have a comfy, shaded place for the boys to rest on these intense days. 

Um, we couldn't help but reminisce about the good old days when we were two Layton High choir kids getting into the romance of Disneyland (and maybe, possibly holding hands on the Matterhorn?).  This place holds lovely memories for us, and we had fun introducing the magic of Disneyland to our children!