Some AK pics

We have been so busy here and it has been so exhausting with 2 little ones up here that I haven't even had a chance to post pictures. I usually fall asleep every night after reading to Hannah when she goes to bed around 10pm (b/c it never gets dark here)!! Well tonight I woke up after sleeping with her, went to take a shower and I feel like I had a good little nap. It is light outside at 11:50pm...well it looks like twilight so I could get up and start my day again...ha-ha. So here is a little picture recap of our last week:

Sisters happy to be reunited with each other. This is the first time they saw each other when Hannah got up after the day we flew in.



Feeding the ducks every evening at Reflection Lake near my brother's house and afterwards helping my dad and my brother work on his house.





Finding my brother's skateboard is a lot of fun:


Playing at "Hannah's Cove" in downtown Anchorage. After this Hannah decorated her rock and the area with the petals from a rose that was planted near by.



At the Musk Ox Farm feeding the Musk Ox. Both girls really LOVED this. Samantha thought they were big dogs probably and Hannah learned a lot about Musk Ox from the tour. But both girls just kept feeding them and I am sure the Musk Ox really appreciated that.









These next series of pictures are from the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center south of Anchorage. This was an awesome place that pretty much has gives the animals acres of land to roam on and you can drive through the entire center and stop where ever you want and get out and check out the animals you see. It was an incredibly windy day the day we went but it was still very much worth it. The girls again LOVED seeing the animals and it was really cool so see them up so close.


















Here we are on Tuesday in Seward, about 120 miles from Anchorage getting ready to go on a dog sled ride. These dogs run in the Ididarod Race and they keep them in shape during the summer months by having them pull tourists around the forest. Adam and I did this 10 years ago when we came here and it was a highlight of our trip and it once again was another highlight. Samantha being the dog lover the she is was in absolute heaven and Hannah loves all animals so she was very excited too. When you sit down on the "sled" the dogs are going to pull you on all the dogs go absolutely nuts b/c they all want to be hooked up and run but only some of them get to go. As soon as the sled took off both girls were laughing and smiling the whole entire ride. It was rainy day and only about 50 degrees but that is still hot for these dogs so we had to make about 4 stops along the 2 plus mile course to let the dogs "cool off". Each time we did this the dogs would still be going nuts b/c they wanted to keep going and so was my lovely daughter Samantha. Everytime we stopped she would cry that she wanted to go and as soon as we went she was a happy camper...crazy kid. A lot of the workers there were amazed at how much a little toddler like her could love dogs so much...I told them that in about 18 years she would probably be working here. :)



















And now one of the best parts...visiting with the puppies. They were so incredibly cute and Samantha and Hannah were so loving with all of the puppies. Both of the girls could have stayed there all day.











After our exciting visit with the dogs we saw our first real "wild" animals, a baby moose and her mommy. Hannah was very excited although thought it was funny the mommy had a beard.



On the drive back to Anchorage EVERYONE was asleep except of course me who was driving. Although I was enjoying the quiet. :)



I hope to post more pictures before I go...but I am not making any promises. Everyone send good thoughts my way and lets hope my flight home with both kids goes well.

Worst Flight Ever!!!

So I have been dreading flying with Samantha for as long as I booked this flight to Alaska. Of course this is not b/c I don't love that girl to death but she is a crazy woman...she likes to move and move and move. She is nothing like my Hannah who will happily sit and remain calm...Samantha does not poses this gift. I imagined the worst but there is now way I could of ever imagined how bad it actually went...so here is my story:

We left from SFO last night at 7:45pm. When we got to SFO and checked my bags it was 14lbs overweight so they were going to charge me $50 extra dollars. They then told me it would only be $50 extra to upgrade to first class b/c of my bag overage and there were a lot of spots open so that it was a good probability that there would be an open spot next to me to put Samantha in. So Adam convinced me that it was a good idea this way I could enjoy my 4 1/2 hour flight up in a comfortable 1st class seat. I have never flown first class so I decided I would try it.

As soon as I got through security Samantha started being a wild woman. Trying to crawl out of her stroller including using a garbage can as leverage to pull herself out of her stroller. Finally the flight was ready to board and I got in my fancy first class line and off we went. I even asked at the gate if the seat next to me was open and they said it was. So I dragged that massive car seat onto the plane and started to take it out of its carrying bag when I heard a man say I believe that is my seat....damn!! So back I put the car seat in its bag and another nice man helped me bring it back to the flight attendant to gate check it. I settle into my seat with the horror of knowing I would be holding onto Samantha for 4 1/2 hours but I figured it is already her bed time she should be asleep soon...I was so wrong.

From the moment we sat down it was like I gave Samantha some mega dose of sugar or perhaps even crack! She was jumping up and down on me, leaning this way and that, rolling all over the place trying to escape into the aisle over my leg that was blocking her. She did momentarily sit down on my lap to read a few books but that lasted all of about 15 minutes. One of her best moments of craziness was when she was hanging upside down on my lap and grabbing the magazines in the seat in front of us while upside down and throwing the magazines into the aisle. I really didn't know what to do but laugh...I was so beyond exhausted at this point b/c she continued on like this for 3 hours!! Don't think I didn't try to get her to sit and not move around and encouraged her to lay down but several times she would scream out in protest or start crying and that was just torturous to have people look at me when she did that...none of this would fly at home, so I don't know why she thought it was o.k. here. Luckily the man next to us was incredibly nice and VERY tolerant of my crazy daughter. He was evening trying to play with her and laughed when she threw her plastic cell phone at him...I was not laughing. Oh and I forgot to mention that she of course pooped about 2 hours into the flight and so I had to change her in those mini bathrooms where luckily they had a mini changing table that folded down on top of the toilet but it positioned Samantha right under the kleenex box so of course she spent that time wisely and pulled MANY kleenexes out. She for some reason had diarreha and some leaked out so I had to do a complete wardrobe change in that small bathroom and Samantha decided it was a good idea to "help" me and take some of those kleenexes she was pulling out to try and help me wipe the poop up...I of course freaked out.

Finally, at 11pm our time she decided she was tired enough to crash, which she did on my chest. Now the other "drama" that was going on in first class was diagonally from me where a lady was having an asthma attack and they had her on oxygen but it was not helping b/c the oxygen could not get in since her lungs were constricting. The flight attendants paged for a doctor, nurse or EMT over the load speaker several times before a nurse finally came up to help from coach. Prior to this her husband had been on some special head set to the medics somewhere on the ground and I was praying we wouldn't be landing some other place in an emergency landing. Well since Samantha was asleep I now devoted my full attention to this interesting medical emergency and my seat mate and I gossiped about it and about how much these 2 had been drinking. All of a sudden my legs started to shake uncontrolably and I started feeling really sick. My right eye started twitching and my world started to fade in and out. I was so scared I had no idea what was going on. I looked at my seat mate and told him I don't feel well at all and with a look of horror on his face the last thing I remember him saying was "WE NEED HELP OVER HERE!!" The next thing I remember I am awake and Samantha is on his lap and crying. He tells me I just passed out and was ghost white and he grabbed Samantha just to be safe. The flight attendants had oxygen on me and were asking me if I had a medical condition. Well of course I don't and now the nurse that was helping the lady with the asthma attack was helping me! I was so embarassed! Since they were trying to work on me and Samantha kept crying a really nice lady a few rows ahead of us with a 10 year old boy came and grabbed Samantha and started to walk up and down the plane while holding her. They finally figured out that I was probably dehydrated and exhausted (they had been watching my fun 3 hour ordeal prior with Samantha) and that is why I passed out. They gave me water and kept me on oxygen. I begged them to go back to helping they lady with the more serious asthma attack and not the dumbass who forgot to drink enough that day. I realized now looking back that I had been busy that day and had not drank much and then I know I didn't drink much before or during the flight for fear of how I was going to go to the bathroom with Samantha sleeping on me (if only that were the case). The nice lady brought Samantha back to me after I recovered and then of course Samantha was awake again b/c why should she go to sleep. So on that whole 4 1/2 hour flight she only slept 20 minutes. When we landed and the paramedics came for asthma lady they flight attendents asked me if I wanted to be checked out too but I declined it b/c I did feel better and I just wanted to get the hell off that flight.

When we got to my brother's house Samantha again was a crazy woman and decided that it was not time to sleep so she did not get to sleep until 1 am Alaska time, 2 am our time. Then she woke up at 5:30 am and wanted to get up....crazy! I managed to get her back to sleep until 8am but not before waking up once more to cry a lot a protest about the fact that I wanted her to sleep.

So you can see why I dreaded this flight so much, but I could have never imagined it would go this bad. All the people in 1st class were enjoying free alcohol, free digi players to watch movies, a nice chicken salad and I got none of that but a crazy child and passing out.

We are having fun now though and I hope to post pictures tomorrow.

Not liking the Toddler Room

Samantha's transition to the Toddler Room is not going so well. Sometimes she has great days, but a lot of days she cries A LOT. Yesterday she cried all morning and kept pointing to the Infant Room. So at about 11am they let her go over there and she was much happier. About 12:50pm she went to take a nap and when I came to pick her up at 3:30pm she was still out cold. This is what I saw:



Poor thing! She slept like this until 4pm...crazy 3 hour nap! Hopefully today goes better.

Here is a new skill of Samantha's that she likes to do:



When Adam was in Palm Springs my mom came up to help me with the girls. One night we took her out to dinner to celebrate her birthday and I thought it would be a perfect opportunity to take a picture of the 3 generations of women...Samantha had other plans and did not want to take a picture at all! Didn't this just turn out lovely..and this is the best one...so sad.


This last weekend we went down to Vacaville and stopped at the new Nut Tree play area. Hannah and Samantha had a lot of fun:





Here is Samantha bench pressing the giant chess pieces (I wish Adam and I could have played):


Samantha and Hannah on a ride together...of course they can NEVER both be looking at the camera and smiling nice at the same time...why would they want to do that?



Here is Samantha and Hannah on the Spiderman ride...Samantha was really curious about Spiderman...

Happy 35th Birthday to Adam!

Wow! I cannot believe Adam is 35 today...what's worse is this means that I will soon be 35 too...craziness! We are almost 40! Anyway, poor guy is not here on his birthday, but rather in Palm Springs on business and not happy to be working. He was really upset about this, but the girls and I packed him a little present to open today and we will celebrate with him when he gets back. Hannah was a lovely little peach this morning and refused to wish him a happy birthday b/c she was "starving" and couldn't take a 5 second break to wish her father a happy birthday...lovely.

While Adam is gone my mom is staying with us to help out and her birthday is Friday...she will be 65!...but shhhh...I didn't tell you that. Hannah again being a lovely little peach whispered to her yesterday to inform her that she will die at some point...again lovely.

What was really nice last night was that my mom, Hannah & I all snuggled in my bed to watch "Dancing with the Stars" together (Hannah only got to watch the first hour...and really wasn't even suppose to stay up watching that late but suckered me into it). That was a really nice moment to be laying in bed with my mom and my daughter commenting on the "Dancing Show" as Hannah calls it. It will definitely be a nice memory for me.

Diseased

Hannah was sent home from school yesterday with a fever. Last night she developed a rash with her fever and by this morning when I was home with her she had quite the rash spreading and a fever that still persisted. So off to the doctor's we went. Diagnosis...strep throat AND chicken pox!!! WTF??!! She has two different rashes, one that is just a bunch of red bumps in lots of places including her booty which is a strep throat rash, plus a culture was done and it confirmed the strep throat. Additionally she has round circle shaped rashes in several areas with little bumps or blisters in the middle which is the chicken pox. We had to be escorted out of the doctor's office through the back door...I was laughing. B/c of the chicken pox she is contagious for a week and cannot go to school until next Wednesday!!

You are probably wondering how did she get both of these things at once and aren't there vaccines for chicken pox? Well I have no idea how she got both of these things at once! She had her chicken pox vaccine at one but was suppose to get her booster at 4 and did not b/c she was getting her urinary reflux surgery at 4 and so the doctor and I decided to hold off on her 4 year old shots so she won't be tortured with them in addition to the trauma of the surgery. Last month I scheduled her for her 4 year old shots in June...obviously a little too late. So her pox won't be as bad b/c of her first shot at one but she will still get them. She CANNOT scratch them b/c if she breaks one open and gets bacteria in there it will go straight into her blood stream and she could get a bacterial blood infection...which she already had when she was one and was hospitalized. So lets hope this does not happen again!

Good times in the Morrill House. Poor Hannah.

Easter is the BEST!!

Hannah has always loved Easter in her 4 years of life. She pretty much talks about it all year round. And Easter this year did not disappoint. We started off our Easter festivities on Saturday by going to the "Breakfast with the Bunny". Hannah was very excited to see the Easter Bunny and was happy to take a picture with him/her (what is the Easter Bunny a boy or a girl?). I was worried that Samantha might be scared of that bunny, but just like her sister was she very happy to see the bunny.



Hannah also took pictures with many other "characters". Here is McGruff the Crime Fighting Dog and below that is some random bear that Hannah AND Samantha LOVED. Again I am so happy Samantha was not afraid of these "characters".





After the breakfast we went off to participate in the parade. Really it is just a walk around the neighborhood behind a fire truck with the Easter Bunny on it and in the back is the Band-Uh. Regardless it was fun. Hannah rode her bike the whole way and I was proud of her.



Finally it was on to the Easter Egg Hunting. Samantha grabbed her Easter basket like it was a purse over her shoulder and went off to get the eggs. She was like an old pro, yet this was her first year hunting for eggs! Once she got out into the field of eggs though she put her basket down and would walk to get the eggs and then walk back to place them in her basket. Each kid could only get 3 eggs but how could we explain that to Samantha. So each time she turned around after dropping her eggs in the basket, Adam would grab 2 or 3 and throw them back out into the field of eggs. Each time Samantha would come back to drop more eggs into her basket, she would kind of pause and look into her basket. I was beginning to wonder if she was thinking "Is there a hole in this basket, where are all these eggs going that I keep putting in here?".







Sadly this is the "best" picture I could get of both of the girls together with their Easter baskets. They refused to both look at the camera or smile.



There were lots of other activities to do that day including:

Face Painting


Cookie Decorating:


And of course cookie eating:


Jumpy House:


And more pictures with the Easter Bunny:




Blowing the Easter Bunny kisses:


I have more pictures from Easter Day, I just haven't downloaded them yet or edited them. But as soon as they are done I will post them.