Every time we passed by SLC on the way to our ranch, my kids begged us to go to Cowabunga Bay. The summer really went by quickly for us this year and before we knew it school has started! We decided last week that we could probably take one last trip up to SLC and do the Cowabunga Bay thing.
Our Last Trip of Summer 2011
For some odd reason my kids love to stop at Love's gas station when we go through Cedar City. It's probably because they sell toys there! Appeasing them and making this stop makes them easier to travel with though. Some may call it bribery but what can I say, we are suckers for quiet trips and this does the trick!
***Sadly I forgot to take any pictures of our first evening in SLC so I will just tell you what we did instead of the preferred method of showing you via pictures.
My pregnancy cravings took over and I HAD to get me some lemon herb roasted chicken and Chad is well aware of the saying "Happy wife is a happy life!" so I got my wish to have The Cheesecake Factory for dinner! All you need to know was that it was DIVINE! We decided the best way to spend our first night was at the good ol' Drive-In movies!!! I used to go there a lot as a kid and I have a lot of fun memories there that I wanted to share with our kids. I mean what's not to love about a GIANT screen playing fun new movies while you enjoy the summer breeze from the comfort of your car? Our kids thought it was the greatest thing ever! The bonus was that kids were only $1(Yet we still noticed that people hide their kids to avoid paying more money! Cheapskates! It's $1, come on!)! I just wish we had a Drive-In closer to us. St. George is a great candidate for outside movies don't you think?!!
The next day we finally made it to Cowabunga Bay, the water park my kids have dreamed of all summer! It was just too exciting with all the slides, dippin' dots, lazy river, and yummy pizza! We went with Chad's brother, Jon and his kids so it was really fun to go as a big group! The kids got there and just took off with their cousins.
Chase's favorite was the shallow pool with Chad because he could run in the water and jump and splash around.
Emma and Taylor went on every ride they were tall enough for. I had to have a mandatory Dippin' dots stop because of those unavoidable pregnancy cravings again!
Chad was such a good sport with Chase despite the fact that it was really hard on his arm to be chasing him all day.
Chad and his brother Jon
After 4 hours at the water park, the kids were still not wanting to leave. Bribery came into play again to persuade them to leave and go up Milcreek canyon for dinner. For our kids it works every time! Although Chase keeps asking us every day when we can go to "bunga bay"! I'm so happy they had so much fun, it makes the whole trip totally worth it!
We love going up the canyons for dinner and it is so much fun when we can get a bunch of family together to go too. We had our family, my Mom, my brother Mikey, my brother Chris and his family, and my Grandma Claire! Good food + good company=Good times! It started to get dark around 9:00 so we packed up and left.
Chad obviously was in no mood for pictures! ha ha I had to snap a few quick pics before we left the canyon though.
SCHOOL BEGINS!!!
I have had a hard time dealing with the fact that my 2 sweet little girls are so big and both going to be in school each day! I keep making excuses for stopping by to visit them, to bring lunch, to drop off extra school supplies, to volunteer with reading, etc.
This was my latest "excuse", a treat for Emma's whole class. I brought it at the end of the day for her to pass out to her class as school was getting out. I thought they were a cute way to say "Yeah, school has started!" I hope I won't miss them so much when they are gone! I guess I am going to pick up some new hobbies to distract myself! Any ideas? LOL
Cabriotti's 1st day of Kindergarten!
Because we have 2 girls, we try to make everything as "fair" as possible. So on Emma's first day she got pink pancakes and of course on Cabriotti's first day of school that's what she wanted as well. Oh ha ha this post may be confusing to some of you that know her only as Taylor, let me explain...The past few years Taylor has been asking me if she could be called by her middle name instead of Taylor because she liked it better. I kept telling her maybe later but she was very persistant. This year we made the decision to let her go by her middle name, Cabriotti. She loves it and says it so cute when she introduces herself to people. I have a hard time remembering to call her that but she quickly corrects me and says "You mean Cabriotti, don't you Mom, I guess you could call me Bri for short!" I just laughed ha ha. This is a big adjustment to make but we are trying our best!
This is my beautiful little girls before we walked in to their classes!
Cabriotti was not scared or sad at all, that really made it easier on me to drop her off!
Cabriotti and her teacher we love so much, Mrs. Anderson (she was Emma's Kindergarten teacher)!
All ready for school!
I thought she looked adorable!!
