We survived, although our camera did not.....

Josh went to Hawaii for depositions, and I snuck along. Unfortunately, I lost my camera so I bought a super crappy disposable camera. Apparently, the store I dropped it off at has lost the film. Sadly, that includes the picture of Josh on a horse, which I never could have imagined would happen, and I know nobody will believe me without photographic proof. :o) However, luckily, I do have these pictures of Josh when we flew on these "death waiting to happen" planes in Oahu. The entire hour we were in the air, I kept thinking, "I don't want to die, I don't want to die." Josh, on the other hand, fearlessly took control in the air and flew the entire time.

The one with two planes in the picture is of Josh in the foreground, and me in the background. On the actual ground is our hotel, Turtle Bay. It really was beautiful, but I am likely to not do such scary, death defying activities in the future.

Happy Valentine's Day

Maddie wanted to say "Happy Valentine's Day" to everyone. She looks adorable in her outfit that she picked out all by herself for her Valentine's Day party at school.

One more special little treat

Dead men tell no tales......

With all the traveling that we do, you would think we would have used our annual passes to Disneyland more than twice. We had to get in a second trip before they expired next month.


Last year, Maddie was absolutely terrified of the Pirates of the Caribbean ride. This year, she was all about being a Pirate girl.



Princess....uh, I mean Pirate Girl Maddie:



The ride that I can't understand how anyone goes on without being sick for the rest of the day:



Maddie has definitely gotten older. She said she wanted to go on all the scary rides, which included Pirates, Splash Mountain, Thunder Mountain Railroad, then across to Space Mountain (the only one she didn't like), and then the "Maddiehorn" (renamed by me).



Alice, the Mad Hatter, and the Madster:

I wasn't really that jealous...

Instead, I went to Newport with my mom and adorable nephew, Cole.

How freaking Cute is this picture?



Picnic with Grandma:



Painting:



Maddie climbed all the rocks at the Wedge - I named her a Swiss Mountain Goat:



Cole was not quite as interested in being a mountain goat:



Maddie was only interested in being a gymnast all day long. ALL day long:







Cole was trying too:



Maddie is still trying to practice on her new "big girl" bike.



I'm the king of the world! (Princess, actually)

I don't always get to go....

Josh "had" to go to St. Maarten for a lawyer convention with his firm, and since he was gone so long and the flight was a little on the expensive side, I decided to opt out of this trip. So he went with some of the other associates in the firm. (Here are Hicks and Boherer.)



Seriously, this could be from the Corona commercial.



They also made a stop in St. Louis for the AC/DC concert. Check out their 2nd row view. Why do I find Angus, in his traditional school boy outfit, so sexy?





On the plus side, we did get to go to Geisha's, where Maddie was enthralled with "the real cooker."

Mother Daughter Moment

Maddie just came up to me, with all seriousness, and said, "Mommy, I think you should tell me all the words that are bad to say."

Uh, yeah right....

Two pictures that are so adorable I just had to share

Our first visitors to Newport

Stephanie, Jessica & Kelsey came to play with Maddie and Me for a few days:



We went to the beach:





Kelsey was the only one brave (stupid?) enough to get in the hottub with Maddie. (It was freezing this last weekend.)



And we got our nails done:



We also did yoga, rode miles and miles on our bikes, watched chick flicks, played Rock Band, ate delicious food, and read good books. It was a great girls weekend. Thanks girls!

This is a standing offer for visitors!

Bring in the New Year Like a Rock Star!

We went to Josh's cousins' house for New Years Eve, and you were supposed to come dressed as a rockstar. Josh's costume is a perfect costume of Kurt Cobain, and I was going for Courtney Love. Of course, my wig and outfit weren't quite right, so I don't know if everybody knew exactly who I was. Which made me nervous because they probably thought I just didn't realize my lipstick and eye makeup were smeared all over.



We played rock band.



And celebrated 2009!!!



Thanks Ryan & Leanne! (I didn't get a picture of Leanne, but I will try to steal one from her blog soon.)

Newpeezy

Maddie got her first library card and was so excited to sign her name on it:



Every Tuesday at 10:30, they have a kid's story time:



and craft time. (How cute is that?)



Tell me these two are not related:





This is the adorable house we rented for a year, just to see how it goes. Come and visit!



Maddie's favorite thing to do in Newport is paint:



And there is a little door down the street that she is convinced Darby lives in. (That is the little girl on the Winnie the Pooh show on Disney). She gets disappointed everyday when Darby doesn't answer the door.



We found the birdman again, and Maddie was so excited to hold the bird again:



There is a new area at Newport Pier that is so cute, and guess what!?



We helped contribute to it and so they engraved our name in the granite. $5 to anyone who can find it!



We taught Maddie how to skate on her new rollerblades:



She only fell once. I was so proud!