Palm Springs –March

Annual birthday dinner at Mikados

 

Hailey being entertained by the chief

 

Shane entertaining himself

Papu doing what she does best, catching food in the air

 

Papa showing her up

Pool time

 

A tough volleyball match and

 

the stiff competition

 

Shane was all about shooting hoops.  I (Molly) tried to “verse him” as he would say,  and he killed me.  He’s got some moves

 

For whatever reason, Jesse told the kids to stick their heads out of the sunroof and wave to everyone as we drove back to the room.  They saw some maids driving a golf cart and yelled, “Ranger!” and ducked down. Goodie-toe-shoes

 

There were tons of cottontail rabbits outside our room.  Shane would chase them……

and Hailey trying to love them

Shane's report card

Great job Shane!

PAC-12 Tournament

Shane has become obsessed with watching basketball.  When I come home from work, he immediately asks if we can watch basketball tonight.  I decided to take him to the first round of the PAC-12 tournament at Staples Center.  We got to see two games for the price of one: WSU vs. OSU and UCLA vs. USC (the good guys won).

We bought seats in a 12-person box from ticketcity.com and had the box to ourselves for the first game. Only 2 people joined us for the second game. It was great!  Shane loved scanning the barcode on the tickets to open the door.

In the box

Between games we walked around and found the Verizon booth, which had the actual tournament trophy in it.  I ask if we could take a picture with it and the guy nervously said “yes.”  If he knew that Shane is capable of spilling an unopened can of soda all over the place, I don’t think we would have got this picture.

Ringer

My soccer team beat one of the best teams in the league. After the game a few of the girls on the other team went to the office and accused our team of bringing on a 20 year old ringer. We do play in a 30 and over league, so they checked my birthday to see if i was legit. Feels Good!

Vegas Baby, Vegas!

While 45 of our neighbors went skiing during Ski Week, we went to Vegas. We did family version and we were still busy seeing and doing stuff the whole time. We hung out at the pool and jacuzzi everyday to relax because of all the walking we did. We had great meals, 2 buffets that Shane ate his moneys worth. It was a nice little getaway from reality...pirate ships, volcanoes, pyramids, water shows and all the theme hotels.

Here the kids are in an arcade where Shane hit the jackpot playing Wheel of Fortune!

A little taste of Italy, the sky is fake and we are inside in a mall

Jesse and Shane went on a crazy simulator ride that Shane said was “Awesome” twisting and turning upside down

A very common attraction in Vegas--escalators are on the streets, flat ones on bridges, and everwhere in the casinos. The kids loved playing on them, especially going the wrong way

The ridiculous 4 story M&M store that had a 3D movie, who knew?

Smile kids, the Eiffel Tower! They just wanted to go in the candy store that was behind them.

We went to a one man show and it was hilarious to say the least. I pointed to Jesse when he asked if anyone could juggle. I think Jesse was on stage for 1/2 the show while the guy sat down next to me to watch Jesse.

Hailey couldn’t stop laughing during the show, neither could I. But I was laughing at all the jokes that went WAY over the kids heads!

A cool chair in a bar

The Mirage Hotel (where we stayed)

Getting ready to watch the Bellagio watershow

Thanks Vegas!

Kid Swap

We did a little kid swap last week because we wanted to go to the UCLA basketball game and knew Hailey wouldn’t enjoy it. So we switched kids with the Wada’s and got Kyle for the day. Hailey was so excited to ditch us and hang out with Calvin and the rest of the Rancho Vista kids. They pretended to be brother and sisters and held hands according to his mom. She attended opening day for baseball and got to see the parade and do all the carnival games. Here is Calvin and Hailey on the jumpy

Hailey had so much fun that she wouldn’t even talk to me on the phone when i called. When we came to pick her up she wanted to stay longer at the Wada’s house, even after 6 hours with them. Talk about independent Here she is with Mischa

Here are Shane and Kyle at the UCLA game which was so exciting, down to the last 1.5 seconds of the game. It brought back so many great memories for Jesse and I, we attended all the games back when we were in school. We were yelling and cheering and of course doing the 8-clap. So Fun!

I told the kids to give Josephine Bruin bunny ears, Kyle listened. It was so neat to see how into the game the boys were. Shane even said he likes basketball more than soccer now!

All i want to do is go back to another game. Go Bruins!

Fun Run

Shane had his Fun Run at school where they ran for 30 minutes around a track. He did so well, running the whole time except to get water. Shane ended up running 50 laps and tied for the most laps. He was in a running mode and very determined while out-running most of his buddies by 10 laps. Jesse and I rewarded him and took him out of school at 10am and went to lunch and to the tidepools.

Then there is the other half of the story. .....Jesse and I helped out at the fun run and noticed that there was Kyle's tally card left over, he was on vacation. So we suited Hailey up and told her to run as Kyle. She was game from the start and ready to go. She started with all the 2nd graders and never stopped for 30 minutes. She ended up running more laps than a 1/3 of the 2nd graders! The sad part was that she outran her best buddy, Riley by 5 laps and he cried at the end when he found out. Here is the only picture we took that day, Riley and Hailey stretching before the run.