Jayhawkers

pg 4 GWL

2007-10-31T09:53:00.001-06:00

The next day, after we swam all morning the kids played a game called "Magi Quest." They had been looking forwards all night and morning to play it and were VERY excited about it...

The boys team and the girls team each had a wand. Basically it is a game in which you use your wand to find things around the lodge and the computer tells you what things you have to find to finish the quest that you are on...there are several quests to complete and then you can go on "adventures." At the end of the game you have to "fight" and defeat a dragon with your wand.... We were running up and down stairs, going down hallways...etc. Needless to say, the kids thought it was the most AWESOME game ever! ha

Here are the boys starting one of their "quests."

The girls are using their wand to open the trunk...

Grandma B. getting in on the action.

Before we left we got a cold treat...YUM

Good-bye GWL!!!!

pg 3 GWL

2007-10-31T09:37:00.001-06:00

That is Kaycie under water...she had become quite the swimmer over the summer and was proud to show off her new skills to Grandma B!

The blue slide was the girls FAVORITE thing....they would race each other sliding down it and run back up the stairs to do it again and again...I never did catch them actually ON the slide though, all my pictures ended up just showing an empty slide. ha With the delayed picture I could never get it timed right to actually catch them going down it. Oh well....

Grandpa B and the girls getting ready to have a huge bucket of water pour on their heads.....

There it goes!!!

The girls got right into bed after changing into their jammies...they were obviously very tired from all the excitement and all the swimming! ha

The boys on the other hand....... ;0)

pg 2 GWL

2007-10-31T09:21:00.001-06:00

All the grandkids...

Grandma and Grandpa B

The kids were getting ready to go swiming and boy were they exctied!

Having a splashing good time! Unfortunately none of the pictures of the

big boys turned out good enough to post.

Fun at the Great Wolf Lodge

2007-10-31T08:45:00.000-06:00

We were recently invited to go to the Great Wolf Lodge with Grandma and Grandpa B. and Tristan for a fun weekend with all their grandkids together. The kids were ecstatic of course and had an absolute BLAST while they were there....Thank you Grandma and Grandpa B!

Howling at the GWL!

My little brother, Tristan.

It's been a LONG time!

2007-08-29T14:26:00.000-05:00

Hey guys,
I know that it has been FOREVER since I've posted anything...I'm sorry about that. I still have hundreds of pics from our WDW vacation to post plus the kids first day of school...etc. YIKES!
I shall do my best to get up to date now that the kids are gone in the mornings (except for Kaycie). She demands a lot of my time but I manage to get some time for myself to get stuff done so slowly but surely I will get those pics posted. I did start a myspace page due to peer pressure! ha So if you want to check it out the address is myspace.com/melbacheez . I seem to be able to keep more up to date on it since it seems to upload pics so much faster. Maybe I'll post all my Disney World pics on it instead of in the blog since it is faster.... I'll let you know if I end up doing it that way.....meanwhile thanks for being patient with me! I promise I'll get with it! ha

Animal Kingdom page 4

2007-07-18T15:49:00.001-05:00

Kaycie and her buddy Wesley on the Safari.

Kids checking out the alligators from underwater.

Kids in front of the Tree of Life.

Kids posing with Grandma.

Smith family in front of tree.

Animal Kingdom page 3

2007-07-18T15:31:00.000-05:00

Ronnie and kids in front on Ape carving on the tree of life. The entire tree is covered with animal carvings like this...it is pretty remarkable!

Kylie and Kaycie with their 3-D glasses on for the "It's a Bugs Life" show.

Kylie and Aunt Wendy on the Safari ride. We saw all kinds of wild animals roaming around....it was really cool.

Ronnie is evidently enjoying the Safari. ha

Animal Kingdom page 2

2007-07-17T15:01:00.000-05:00

After experiencing Dino Rama we headed off to the big new ride at Animal Kingdom, Expedition Everest! Here is a couple of the views walking up to it. Much to my surprise, Kylie rode this ride....her very first roller coaster ever!

She kept saying she wasn't going to ride it but then when we got there her cousin Wesley, who she adores, convinced her to ride it with him. I was shocked! I waited with Kaycie since she was too short to ride it and got to ride it later. It is an AWESOME ride. When Kylie came back after riding it, she was just beaming and grinning from ear to ear, it was so cute! I don't think that she rode it again though. ha

We got to meet the gang from the 100 Acre Woods.

Animal Kingdom

2007-07-13T13:55:00.001-05:00

We started out in Dino Land at Animal Kingdom. The boys headed off to ride the thrill ride "Dinosaur" while the girls headed to the ride "Triceratops Twirl."

On the Triceratops Twirl ride.

The boys thought this ride was pretty cool! I didn't get a picture of the actual ride. Oops.

The boys in front of the Dinosaur ride.
This was one of the coolest rides in Animal Kingdom!

Bradon and Dylan each bought a dinosaur to remember this ride by.

Our Family Vacation

2007-07-13T13:03:00.000-05:00

We left for our family vacation on Friday night, May 25, and drove to Tenn. before we stopped for the night. The next day we got up early and continued on our road trip until we got to Kissimee, FL around 10 p.m. My mom, my sister and my two nephews went too so we followed each other there. It was a L O N G drive but the kids really handled it well and I was very proud of them! Of course knowing that we were headed to WDW helped! ha Once we got there we had a little bit of a challenge finding a hotel room that wasn't full but we found one that was only 5 min. away from Animal Kingdom which worked out great since that is where we were headed in the morning.

Ronnie drove the whole way.....what a guy! ;0)

Taking a break and enjoying a cold treat! Yum!

Kaycie stayed busy coloring and playing with her toys that she brought along for the trip.

Kylie was busy coloring and playing too. She and Kaycie played great together!

Wesley, reading a book and listening to his MP3 Player.
He had the most comfortable ride of all of us! ha

Kylie and Kaycie conked out after a very long day of driving! Bradon and Dylan road in my sister's car so I didn't get any pics. of them on the road.

I'm Baaaaack

2007-07-13T11:35:00.000-05:00

I'm sure all my fellow bloggers are wondering what in the world has happened to me since it has been so long since I have posted a blog. What a crazy summer it has been and it is just FLYING by. First I was on vacation with my family to the wonderful Walt Disney World and then we were working on Vacation Bible School, which my husband and I were in charge, of and then we had some major computer problems....now life is finally slowing back down again and getting back into a routine. Whew! It's hard to believe that we only have 5 more weeks until the kids go back to school. So anyways, I have a LOT of catching up to do and over 1,000 pictures of our vacation so I'm going to try to get that all posted today. (I know, probably not very realistic goal! ha) Here goes.....

Girls day out with Grandma B continued....

2007-05-19T09:26:00.000-05:00

After we left the Rainforest Cafe Grandma B took the girls to Build-A-Bear.
This was our first time to go there too so they were just ecstatic!
She told them each to pick out an animal and I couldn't believe all the choices.

It is a pretty neat place. Well anyways, they looked at all the

options and Kaycie picked out a pink princess kitty (of course) but Kylie shocked us and said that she didn't see anything that she wanted. She said that they were too big, she wanted a little stuffed animal that she had seen at the Rainforest Cafe. I couldn't believe it! We went ahead and had Kaycie start "stuffing" hers with Kylie watching the whole time....of course she changed her mind and decided that she wanted one after all. Then with all the choices that they had available she picked the same exact kitty that Kaycie had picked! Go figure! I was just glad that she did go ahead and pick one because I know that Grandma B had been planning on taking the girls since forever so it would have been a disappointment to not see her make one.

Kaycie "stuffing" her Kitty. She is stepping on a pedal and that is what is what blows the stuffing into the Kitty.

Here, Kaycie is rubbing the heart for her Kitty on her elbow. I'm not sure why....it has tickled Kaycie's funny bone anyways!!

Kylie is warming her Kitty's heart before she puts it in her. They have them do all kinds of cute things before putting the heart into the animal. She had to jump up and down three times, she rubbed it on her tummy and on her head. She kissed it. I don't remember what all she had her do but while Kylie was doing, it the worker was explaining to her why she was doing it. I was too busy snapping pictures to get what the significance of each action was. The girls sure enjoyed doing it all though and giggled the whole time! ;0)

Kylie is now "stuffing" her Kitty.

The girls have found the purrrfect outfits for their kittens and Grandma B is helping them dress them. Kylie picked out a fancy purple dress that was covered in sparkling pink sequins. She also picked out sparkling purple shoes to match. Kaycie picked out a sparkling pink tutu and ballet slippers. So cute!

Here are the girls with their new "best friends." Kylie named hers Kylie Princess Smith and Kaycie named hers Sarafina. Thanks Grandma B!

Day with Grandma B

2007-05-17T06:25:00.000-05:00

We had a girls day out yesterday with Grandma B. It was a lot of fun. The girls were so cute and funny to watch because they were so giddy and excited. We went to the Rainforest Cafe which we had never been to before. It was pretty cool. Right when we got there though the "thunder storm" started and it scared Kaycie to death. They sat us down right in front of the elephants which was a huge hit of course. ha They were just being so silly and funny! What a joy they are! I know that Grandma B got a big kick out of just watching them. After we ate, we walked around and looked at everything and took lots of pictures. You can tell in the pictures how excited they were. Kaycie was being a total HAM while posing for pictures and everyone was watching them and laughing. They loved every minute of it (other then when Kaycie was scared of the thunderstorms)!

We got one of the best seats in the house sitting by the elephants! The girls said that the big elephant was the daddy elephant and he was taking care of his baby elephant. The were tickled pink to be sitting by the elephants and went crazy every time they saw them move.

Here is some evidence of Kaycie being a HAM. She kept posing like this. I call it her "movie star" pose. ha ha

Saturday Fun continued...

2007-05-14T09:21:00.000-05:00

One of our family's favorite past times is to play disc golf. It's free, it's something that the whole family can do, it's a great way to get some exercise and enjoy the beautiful weather. We like to go around and check out the different courses when we get the chance to, so on Sat. afternoon, after Ronnie got off work, we headed out to try out a disc golf course that we hadn't been to before. We really liked this course because it was like a hiking trail/disc course.

This is where the course started. Let the adventures begin!

Kylie, holding her "favorite" disc. She is getting pretty good at this game and is quite proud of herself for that.

Bradon kept running off and exploring little side trails. Here he is climbing up a rocky hill. He really enjoyed himself and worked up quite a sweat running all over the place.

There were lots of interesting things to check out along the way!

Look, I DID it!

Daddy gave Kylie the disc bag, Help Mommy!

Bradon throwing his disc off of the cliff.

What a fun day!

Saturday Fun

2007-05-14T07:28:00.000-05:00

Our day of fun started out w/ Bradon's soccer tournament. His game started at 7 a.m. That was interesting getting everyone up and out the door by 6:45 but we made it! This was the last games of the season and so I thought that I'd better get some pictures of Bradon playing soccer in the blog! ha His team was called the Bulldogs and they were great. It was a lot of fun watching him and he was quite the player! His team ended up 2nd in the league and the Semi-final game actually ended w/ a shoot-out so it was pretty exciting!Here Bradon is playing the "defender" position.

He sure looks like a fearsome opponent

at the moment doesn't he! ha ha

Here is Bradon's team at half time. The dog he is holding was a school project. He had to take "Bingo" with him everywhere and document what they did for the weekend together so we snapped a picture of them together in the huddle.

Go BULLDOGS!!!!

My Celebrity Look-alike (just for fun!)

2007-05-12T11:43:00.000-05:00

Fun in the Great Outdoors

2007-05-11T09:42:00.000-05:00

Kylie is playing "mommy" and is going to the store. Kaycie loves to fill Kylie's car up w/ gas every time they play with the car. Kaycie pretty much does whatever Kylie wants her to do and when she does decide to do things her way instead, fireworks FLY. They love playing outside on their many bikes and big wheels and want to be out there any chance they get!

Bradon loves to be outside too. Yesterday he discovered many ant trails and was totally thrilled and excited by that. I was totally disgusted! ha I have to say I've never seen that many ants in our yard before and I hope that they don't find a way into my house or we are in trouble. He is convinced that our whole yard is part of the ants trail and after yesterday, I'm inclined to agree. YUCK!

Our Tree

2007-05-11T08:47:00.000-05:00

We have a special tree in our yard that the kids LOVE to climb in so I took pictures of them yesterday in it. It was a gorgeous day and the kids had a blast playing outside!

Bowling Fun

2007-05-10T08:03:00.000-05:00

Here are the pictures of the kids bowling at their cousins Birthday party. They each had their own "style" of bowling and it was pretty cute to watch. Kaycie kind-of ran and threw the ball and actually got the ball going pretty good for such a little squirt. After she threw it she would "scoot" from side to side trying to get the ball to move in the direction that she was scooting. It was pretty funny! She actually got all the pins down once and she was
SO excited! ha

Kylie tried throwing it a few times and made Daddy very nervous. After throwing it in the gutter a couple of times (how do you get a gutter ball with the bumpers up?! She did it! ha) he got her to bowl it from in-between her legs instead.
It went super s l o w .....and then when it finally got to the pins even though it was barely moving, it would knock down several pins. It was so funny to see!

Bradon was quite the bowler and bowled "regular style" He did very well and got a few spares too. He was very excited about that. It was a lot of fun for all and we will definitely
have to do this again!

Sick Day

2007-05-09T09:32:00.000-05:00

Well, we were all sick yesterday except for Bradon. Hopefully he can avoid getting sick altogether. I'm hoping to post some pictures from this last weekend of the kids first attempt at bowling. They really got a kick out of it and actually did pretty well for first-timers. I'll try to get them on later today.

Hello friends and family

2007-05-07T15:37:00.000-05:00

Hello all, let's see if I can get this to work for me this time! ha I enjoy reading all ya'lls blogs and want to give it a shot too. A big thanks to Jen and Elisa who have tried to answer all my "technical" questions. ;0) So far all seems to be working so I'm keeping my fingers crossed! ha

~ Melissa