Legoland

After 2 years of living in Los Angeles we finally made it to one of the many amusement parks that the area has to offer. Jim is kind of anti-amusement park so this is a big accomplishment for us. The kids had so much fun at Legoland - Jim even had fun! There was really no whining or misbehaving and even the kids did good;) I loved it when Ben would get off the rides he would ask all of the workers if they were magic. It was so cute. Just another reminder that I never want my kids to grow up. I love how they are so innocent and easy to please! This airplane ride was one of Luke's favorite. He couldn't stop smiling and laughing while he was on this ride.

Jimmy was even brave enough to go on a big roller coaster with Jim. It's kind of hard to see the look of terror in his face when he was going down that hill. I felt so bad watching him go down that hill. He's not exactly a thrill seeker. Jim was being such a good dad and holding his hand to give him a little bit of security. At least when he came off the ride he was smiling. But he was clear that he didn't want to go again.


We spent tons of time in the build and test room where they were able to build their own lego cars and then race them down ramps. They loved this! Jimmy and Luke spent most of their time at the ramps racing their cars while Ben only raced his car a couple of times. He spent most of his time at the table perfecting his design. They are following after their dad's footsteps - little engineers in training! Here are some pics of their cars. They went through a lot of revisions. I didn't get a great shot of the racing because it was pretty crowded, but they all did a good job and learned a little about aerodynamics in the process.






After this ride, I have resolved that it will be a LONG time before I let this kid get behind the wheel of any vehicle! Yikes!

Disclaimer: Whatever you do don't wear white to an amusement park! I learned this the hard way.

This picture made me laugh. I'm just glad that this wasn't a real woman that Ben was grabbing onto to help him get out of the car!




Miniland was really cool! It was my favorite part of the whole park. They have replicas of different world landmarks all made out of hundreds of thousands of legos! Amazing!


It took Luke about 30 seconds to assume this position in the car. He was wiped out after a very exciting and very long day!

Jimmy and Ben on the other hand were wide awake and ready for more. But after a few minutes they followed Luke's footsteps and fell fast asleep.

Birthday Boys

Jimmy and Ben have birthdays two weeks apart so we decided this year to do a double birthday party. Luckily the boys agreed somewhat when it came to picking out a theme for the party. Ben wanted a Star Wars party and Jimmy wanted an outer space party. It was pretty easy bring them together and please both of them. Except when it came to the cake. I was up until 1am Friday night doing their cakes and when Jimmy woke up on Saturday morning and saw his cake completed, the first thing that he said to me was that he really didn't like it. He said that he wanted to create his own cake and decorate it himself. I was about to cry but I decided to just laugh instead! Then I called my mom to tell her thanks for everything that she did for me as a kid and now. Because the whole incident just reminded me that moms don't often get the thanks and appreciation that they deserve. So if it's been awhile, call you mom and tell her thanks - she needs to hear it! Okay, I'll get off the soapbox now. Anyway, back to the party. The kids had a lot of fun. It gets pretty wild with 18 kids running around on a sugar high. So we crashed after that. But overall, it was a fun day.

Just in case you can't tell from this picture, Ben's cake is supposed to be Lego blocks. I was kind of irritated that one of them turned out pink. I was going for red, but I couldn't figure out how to make it a deep red. I used the gel food coloring but I really didn't want to dump the whole jar in so I just called it good. Does anyone know the trick to making frosting look red? I really should take a class or something and learn these things.

Happy Birthday Jimmy and Ben!

Whale Watching at Morro Bay

After our trip to Utah, Jim's sister Amber came back with us for about a week and a half. It is always a blast to have her around! She was so kind and watched the kids overnight for Jim and me. Thanks again Amber for letting us have a little break! We don't get that chance very often. We went up the central coast to Morro Bay. It is such a quaint, fun little coastal town. Ever since I've moved to southern California I have been saying that I want to go whale watching and I finally got my chance. We were fortunate enough to observe a blue whale from a fairly close distance. It was amazing to see those massive creatures up close. We got a few pictures but they're not that great because it was really hard for me to take good pictures on a boat that is continually rocking back and forth.

This picture shows the whale's spout as it comes up for air. We were about 7 miles out from the coast so the water was still fairly shallow. The whales kind of follow an interesting pattern. They would come up to the surface about every 5-10 minutes and they would blow out of their spout about 6 times or so. After they did that they would dive under to find food. They would come up often because they were in such shallow water and didn't have to dive very far for food. We stayed close to one whale and he came to the surface repeatedly. We managed to stay with him and not lose him. We also saw about 6 more whales from farther away. We could just see their spouts on the horizon. An interesting fact is that whales eat crill, which are really tiny fish. It is kind of ironic that the largest animal in the sea eats the smallest.

After they have exhaled a few times they dive under the water to go deep in search of food and when they dive is when you can get a good view of the tail. It's amazing! The pictures don't even begin to capture how cool it really is!

We also saw some sea lions just chillin' and hanging out on this buoy.

It's fun to go to the zoo, the aquarium or Sea World to see these animals but there is something that is so unforgettable and awe inspiring to actually observe these creatures in their natural habitat. It was $30 spent that was well worth it! If you ever have a chance to do this, don't pass it up! You will not regret it - I promise!

4th of July in Utah

If there is a limit to how many pictures that you can put on one post I think I've exceeded it in this post! Oh well, I don't want to leave anything out! We went to Utah for a couple weeks for the forth of July. We had a great time with Grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and friends!

We lit fireworks with Grandma and Grandpa. . .

. . .then Luke burned his finger from a sparkler and decided he was done.

We visited the Hill Air Force Base Aerospace Museum!

This is Grandpa and the boys in front of one of the planes that Grandpa used to work on when he was serving in the Air Force in Thailand.

We went canoeing. Jim and I and Jimmy and Ben got caught out in the middle of the lake in the raft during a crazy rain storm. Unfortunately we didn't get a picture of that. It's not something I'm going to forget anytime soon!

We went camping. . .

. . . and got REALLY dirty!

It's Batman with a dirt mask!

We caught some fish. . .

. . . then we decided to kiss it! Well some of us did. I can't believe that I let my kid kiss a fish!! What was I thinking?!

We visited the Timpanogas Cave.

(I am so glad that my kids got those great Ostler blue eyes!! Amber's got them too.)

Ben's Pre-K Culmination

Ben graduated from Pre-K this year. I was so proud of myself for being prepared with my camera and extra batteries. When Jimmy graduated from preschool, I ran out of battery right before he walked out on the stage. I was devastated. Anyway, back to Ben. He has enjoyed school so much! He loves to do homework and he is so smart! I'm not biased or anything. I can't get over how much he has matured and grown in the last year. This is his class. I really tried to get him to wear a shirt and tie but he would have none of it. He's the one in the middle with the blue polo shirt on.

This is Ben with Ms. Fabian, the principle.

These are Ben's amazing teachers, Teacher Renee and Teacher Kim.

Congratulations Ben!!

Jimmy's Class Play

Jimmy's first grade class put on a play a couple weeks before school got out. They performed some of Aesop's Fables. Jimmy's little group did "The Selfish Bees." They did a fabulous job! Jimmy made a great little bee. Jimmy has been blessed with such a great teacher this year. Ms. Monteilh has been so good for him and she is so organized and on top of things.

Of course I did what I always do and forgot my camera, but luckily I was able to get some pictures from my friend, Rosalyn. She is always there to rescue me when I forget my camera. The play was very entertaining and the best part was that each story had a lesson at the end.

Jimmy did soccer for the first time this spring. His team is the Mar Vista Sharks. I didn't know how it would turn out because Jimmy is not really into sports at all. He has had fun but I think most of that fun has come from spinning around (during the game) to see how dizzy he can get and picking up all of the little black pieces from the artificial turf, and seeing how fast he can do the crab walk across the field. There's not many action shots here because quite frankly there was not much action. But at least he had fun!