The Crapo Stars: January 2012

Monday, January 30, 2012

San Francisco

After we visited the North Pole, we drove to San Jose, CA to be with Neil's family for Thanksgiving. We got there Saturday night and went to church the next day. Madoc ended up with a fever and laid on my lap the whole three hours of church.

After dinner that night Neil and I left our sick children with Grandma and Grandpa and went to San Francisco by ourselves! We stayed for two nights and had a great time. We stayed at the Drake Hotel in downtown. It was really nice and pretty but it's an old hotel so our upgraded room was just really big and didn't really have anything special in it. We won't stay there again.

For breakfast we went to Boulette's Larder in the Ferry Building. Best. Breakfast. Ever. I don't remember what any of it was called but I had an almond tart and Neil had a fruit cake/bread. His was way better. But I had a European hot chocolate that Neil tried to recreate for the rest of the week. He couldn't quite do it but he got close once.

Then we did the usual. Walked through Chinatown. Walked along the piers. Ate clam chowder and fish and chips.

Then we went to Alcatraz which was by far the coolest thing we did all day. So fascinating. I've been to San Francisco before but never took the Alcatraz tour. I'm so glad we did this time.

The Golden Gate Bridge behind us as seen from Alcatraz.

After we got back to land we headed to Ghiradellis and split a brownie sundae. At this point it was getting cold and dark and I was really tired. The line for the trolley was ridiculous so we started climbing the hills. We made it to Lombardi street and went down and then back up that crazy twisty street. Then we managed to squeeze onto an already packed trolley and headed back to the hotel where we were really boring and watched tv until 10pm. At this point we were finally hungry for dinner so I sent Neil out into the dark and cold to find take out. Isn't he great?
The next day we checked out and went to pick up the car just to find out that the battery was dead. What an adventure. We finally made it out of the city a couple of hours later and home to our kiddos!

Thursday, January 19, 2012

North Pole

The weekend before Thanksgiving we took the kids to the North Pole. It was a lot of fun (except for the long windy drive through the desert and into the mountains). We got on a tram and the elves took us through a magic portal to Santa's Workshop.

Here we are in front of our tram. It had green velvet seats! Talk about fancy. We saw the reindeer in their stalls as we pulled up.

When we first got there we met some elves who led us through the Toy Hall of Fame. There were lots of cool old toys. The Hall of Fame was in Santa's "old" workshop and there were even some funny old toy prototypes.

Once Alabaster Snow (Santa's chief elf) took us into the toy shop the kids got to help the elves make toys for little boys and girls. Here Sadie is stuffing a bear.

They also got to play with Ram Rockets and shoot all the elves. Madoc really liked this part.
Our tour group had a lot of no-shows. There were only three families with a total of seven kids. The elves outnumbered them by a lot so the kids got a ton of attention. I think Sadie and Madoc had six or seven elves surrounding them. While the kids worked on the toys I let Charlotte wander around. Elves kept coming up to her wanting to hold her and find her dolls and toys. Apparently even elves can't resist cute little Charlotte.

After toys everyone got cookies and "snowman soup" or hot chocolate while the elves sang Christmas carols. Then we went to Elf school and learned all about how to be an elf.

After that the families went into Santa's office one at a time to write letters for Santa. Charlotte just tried to get the tree the whole time.

Then we saw Santa! He was a really good Santa. Charlotte didn't even cry.

At this point we went outside around a big fire to wait for the tram. It was really cold and the wind kept blowing the flames at us. Not a fun part of the night.

Our last stop was back at the lodge with Mrs. Claus. She read a Christmas story and then the kids colored pictures.
When we got to our hotel for the night we were all very tired. Then we discovered the hotel didn't have baby beds. Charlotte ended up in our bed and wouldn't go to sleep. Not a fun night, especially when we had to get up the next day to drive to California.

Wednesday, January 18, 2012

Primary Program and Visitors!

Last year we became part of a brand new ward. Because of this our Primary Program didn't happen until the week before Thanksgiving. When Grandpa Crapo heard this, he decided they needed to come visit for the weekend.

That Saturday was the Pecan Festival. I ran the 8.5 mile race that morning with my running buddy. We knew a ton of people running the race that day. My only goal was to finish and I did. I hadn't been running that long since finishing nursing Charlotte. Unfortunately nobody made it in time to see me cross the finish line but I found them all eventually. And there was hot chocolate in the car from Neil! That more than made up for the tardiness.

We then took the horse wagon across the road to the festival. The kids had a good time. First we did face painting. Sadie got a pink butterfly on her cheek and Madoc had a fire breathing dragon on his arm. Grandma and Grandpa treated them to the petting zoo and the pony rides. And there was the obligatory jumping castles.

We had to cut the trip a little short and drag the kids away because Charlotte was cranky. Daddy had forgotten to bring any diapers or bottles or food. She was especially sad about her dirty diaper. Fortunately I was able to find a fruit leather buried in my purse and sucking on that kept her happy long enough for the kids to do everything they wanted.

We spent the afternoon getting cleaned up and having naps. I think the kids went with Grandma and Grandpa to go geocacheing before dinner. Sadie came back with a hand full of tiny needles. It took forever to clean out of her hand but then we were rewarded with a delicious dinner. Neil made chicken bellagio and it was soooooo good. I think he may need to make it again this weekend.

Sunday was the Primary Program and the kids did great. They both knew their parts and said them loudly and clearly. Too bad Madoc never sang any songs though.

Halloween 2011

Charlotte and I got sick the week of Halloween. It was really bad timing. There are parties and school programs like crazy that week. And I had to make Madoc's costume. It was a very miserable week and everything got done last minute and only halfway really.

We hurried and carved our pumpkins before Trick-or-Treating. You can't carve them very early here because it's too warm and they rot. And the Saturday before was the ward Trunk-or-Treat and I was busy all day being sick and sewing Madoc's costume so we didn't get the pumpkins done then.

Sadie decided she and Charlotte would be hula dancers, just like Sadie was for her first Halloween. Madoc wanted to be a cheetah.

Yes, she's eating rocks.

Due to the time crunch our pumpkins were pretty simple this year.

Neil turned 30 in October. Wahoo! I wanted to do a dinner party but there were just too many people to invite. So instead we made all of Neil's favorite desserts and had a backyard party. You can do that in October when you live in the desert.

Neil always makes cool vents on his apple pies. And his apple pies are yummy. Yes, he made his own birthday pie. But I made all the rest.

With the birthday cheesecake. Sadie was very happy about this.

And all the food. We had homemade cookies and cream ice cream, chocolate chip cookies, and hot chocolate too.

Here's the pie baked.

And a whole lot of kids on one swing. They had a good time. And so did Neil.

Hunting for Pumpkins

We have several pumpkin patches in the area but one is quite close. It's only 15 minutes down the highway which is extraordinarily convenient when you have three small children. We didn't go in 2010 since Charlotte was due soon so we decided it was time to go again. We spent a few morning hours at the patch and as we were driving home Neil and I both agreed that it had been a highly successful morning. Everyone had fun, Charlotte was good, there were no tantrums, the kids saw everything they wanted, and everyone was ready to go at the same time with no complaining! We packed a lunch to eat in the car on the way home so everyone was ready for naps when we got back. How awesome is that?!

We rode on a hay wagon out to the pumpkin patch to pick pumpkins. Sadie found a good one right away. Madoc wanted the biggest one of course. We almost walked the whole patch before he finally settled on one. Sadie also found a tiny pumpkin for Charlotte.

This farm has awesome tire swings. The kids had lots of fun taking turns with the other kids.

Neil decided the pumpkins needed some shade.

I sat and watched while the kids were on the swings and in the trees.

The kids also saw some animals, walked the hay maze, and played in the bounce house. Once she was done jumping, Sadie announced that she was tired and ready to go home. Madoc was good enough to oblige her as soon as he was done jumping too.

Thursday, January 5, 2012

Madoc's Baseball Day

Neil and I were talking about 2011 and one of the things that we thought our family did well on was daddy/daughter/son dates. Every weekend Neil takes one of the kids on "date" of their choosing. Sadie almost always goes out to lunch but we try to suggest new things to keep the variety going. This October weekend was Madoc's turn. He and his dad headed into the backyard to play tee ball. After awhile Madoc had us all come out to watch. They had a good time and got very sweaty.