Hannah was very excited to be going to Emily's church for Trunk or Treat again this year. This church's Trunk or Treat is loads of fun with lots of cars for Treats, game booths, and even bounce houses!
This particular church is becoming more and more well known amongst quite a few of our friends, It was fun for Hannah when she ran across her friend Emma, and was able to hang out with her for a while. 
Hannah's school had a parade around the blacktop first thing this morning. This year we saw lots of pirates and lots of Star Wars, including a girl dressed as Princess Leia, complete with the honey bun hair!!
Following the parade, the students had to be out of costume and into regular clothes for their school day. But at the end of the school day, I brought cupcakes and treat bags!
Every year Steven always talks about wanting to go to a really good airshow. Months and months ago he discovered why it is that we usually don't go to one of the biggest airshows in our area, it always falls on the weekend of my birthday. But this year, we put it on the calendar and planned to go, and that is what is what we did today. We went to the Open House and Air Show at Edwards Air Force Base.
Hannah really didn't want to go today. It's a 2 hour car ride from our house and she complained off and on. But at the end of the day as we were heading back to our car, she was complaining she didn't want to leave! LOL. 
Having never been to an airshow before, Hannah really didn't know what to expect. She had loads of fun touring some of the airplanes on display. Her and Steven even waited for close to an hour for her to get to sit in the cockpit of a C-17 Military Aircraft. A cargo plane so massive that it transports and drops tanks and humvees from the air to ground troops. 
The The United States Air Force Thunderbirds were the best part of the enitre day! Their demonstration was phenomenal. It was especially cool that one of the pilots was a woman, which made Hannah express that she perhaps might like to become a fighter pilot someday.
I had packed a picnic lunch and ice chest to leave in the car, thinking we would come back to the car to eat lunch, but you had to park and then be shuttled by school buses over to the part of the base where the airshow was, so we ended up just buying lunch. We really didn't know what to bring, the website sounded so strict on what could and what couldn't be brought to the flight line that even our chairs were left in the car, something we were later wishing we'd had. Needless to say we spent plenty of money on water, trying to stay hydrated in the bright and shinning sun and heat. We ended up having our picnic lunch for dinner as we hit the road home!
Hannah's vacation has come to an end. It's back to school tomorrow morning!
She's excited about seeing her friends, but a little nervous about going back to a totally different classroom (one of the ways a school can totally utilize all thier classrooms on a year round schedule).
One of the nice things that I really love about the track she is on is that, she'll have a 5 day Thanksgiving Weekend, and then will have the traditional 2 weeks off for Christmas, and then will go back the first part of January and will be off track for a month come February! It's a nice layout of time off in my opinion.
We took a drive up to Oak Glen this afternoon. It's a place I love going to in the Fall. It's really about the only place near us that proves there's such a thing as the colors changing, something we rarely see in our neck of Southern California. Most times, the trees in our neighborhood don't even change colors until December, sometimes January. It was a pretty drive and nice surroundings!
Whenever Hannah is off track, it's not uncommon for us to go to Disneyland about once a week. Some trips it's just me and the girls, sometimes it's with Gramma, sometimes with other friends who have passes. Today's trip was with friends who haven't been to Disneyland in a few years (imagine that!) and we had a BLAST!!!
Since we're annual passholders, very rarely do we open the park (arrive before it opens) and stay all day to close the park (leaving as they are closing the rides, attractions, etc). There are always those few exceptions for such a long day - and today was one of those days!
We went with our good friends whom not only does Hannah go to school with, but our families also go to the same church. So Hannah sees Zach and Alex six out of seven days a week. The kids enjoy spending time together and I really enjoy their mother's friendship and company. Rachel loves them all, including their older sister. All of that combined made for a great and memorable day at The Happiest Place on Earth.
The park is currently operating on "off season" hours. So the park was only open from 10-8. So we did our best to show them a good time and get the most out of our day. Taking advantage of getting Fastpasses and the Child Swith pass, we were able to get on all the major rides and lots of other rides as well. Some of the major rides saw more of our party waiting at the exit than than the amount of our party actually on the ride!
The kids all had so much together. Debi's been working on getting all the grandparents to go in on getting the kids' annual passes for Christmas. So the kids and us mom's are already talking and planning all the potential future trips we can have together.
Next month, after a four and a half year closure, and a $93 million renovation and expansion, the The Griffith Observatory reopens to the public.
For over 25 years, my mother-in-law has been a member of the Friends of the Griffith Observatory. Because of this special membership, she had the opportunity to preview the Observatory before it's open to the general public. That special preview day was today, however, my mother-in-law is in Oregon, visiting my sister-in-law and her family. But because the membership is under the name of 'The Fraser Family', Steven was able to book tickets for us to go.
By the time we got the details as to how to get to go, most of the day time slots had already been taken. However, we were able to get a ticket for the 5:50pm shuttle up to the Observatory. After stopping for something to eat, we arrived at the shuttle departure area an hour early and they allowed us to go earlier than our scheduled time. Once on the shuttle bus and on our way, Hannah was informing us that should the bus tip over, we could exit through the safety hatch in the roof of the bus, which totally gave the little old lady sitting across from us something to think about. It's apparent Hannah was listening last year when they did school bus orientation!
Hannah seemed pretty interested. And Steven was able to simply explain a lot of things about all the different exhibits and things we were seeing. She learned that despite weighing 50lbs on Earth, she would only weigh 10lbs on the moon.
Today was just a preview. More or less a way for the kinks to be worked out in the shuttles and handling all the visitors, etc. The Planetarium wasn't up and running, nor were any of the other special programs. And alot of the exhibits still need a lot of work before it opens to the public in less than 3 weeks. We'll be able to see the shows when we go back on November 4th with my mother-in-law.
Ever since Hannah started school last year, she gets invited to more birthday parties than ever before! This school year it seems like every kids in her class is having a party and today was yet another party. Today's party was held at Jumping Jacks. It's a "HUGE indoor playground...with all the biggest, wildest, and newest inflatables". 
This place was AWESOME! One of the nice things about this place that all parties are private, we had our own room. It made it really easy to keep an eye on your kid. Hannah had a blast, as did Rachel, who got to play because the birthday girls parents didn't have to pay for anyone under age 3. The girls had so much fun, this place would be a great place to come back to on a rainy day. 
We didn't have a birthday party this year for Hannah, and she's already told me that she would like a party next year. She's been invited to some killer birthday parties the last couple of months - todays and then the Girl Mania party in August. These kids aren't going to know what to do when they are invited to a simple party in the backyard with cake and ice cream and maybe a few games. LOL
Yes, we went to Disneyland today. And No, I don't ever get tired of going so much. We always find new things to do and everytime is always different.
We had a great time today. Because of the Columbus Day holiday, Hannah's friend Emma, and her brother had no school today. What better way to spend a day off from school than at Disneyland! The girls and I went down early this morning, meeting up with Lori and the kids once they arrived later in the morning.
I recently figured out how to take video using my digital camera and then uploading it to You Tube without having to do a bunch of editing, etc. Here is a short video I took while on the Teacups.
Hannah's been tall enough to go on the majority of the 'good rides' at Disneyland for at least a year now, but has always been scared for the unknowns of what the ride held. However, today, she conquered one of her fears and rode Big Thunder Mountain Railroad. While she wasn't exactly having the time of her life while on the ride, once she got off and had a few hours to think about it, she says she might give it a try again. 
We had a great day and look forward to our Disneyland trip next week, when we'll act as park tour guides for some friends from church and school.
The girls came home from Gramie's house this afternoon. They had a great time...went to the movies, played at several parks, went out to lunch, went to the local pumpkin patch, had a tea party, and lots of playing.
Usually after spending a few days away from home, it takes a couple of days for Hannah to 'detox". So far, Hannah has had a great attitude and is in a great mood. We were wondering if it was because the time away wasn't completely one-on-one time, Hannah had to share Gramie with her sister Rachel.
Of course, Hannah is already asking when they can go to Gramie's house!
One of the things Hannah had hoped to do while off track was to spend a few days at Gramie's house. While she wasn't crazy about having her sister get to go this time around, she was still pretty excited to go! We took the girls this evening and they'll return home on Sunday.
Gramie was all ready for the girls...the guest bedroom was set up with all the babydoll stuff, there were dishes of M&M's on her end table (Rachel's favorite candy), a couple of miniature balloons for the girls, and lots of things planned for weekend. I'm sure a great time will be had by all three of them! 
I'm in the process of upgrading my blogs to a new beta version, and I'm having to "refine" things here and there. I've started with Hannah's blog, so if things look a little off, I'm still tweaking.
We went to Disneyland today. This year the park is doing a little bit of decorating for Fall and for Halloween, which made for some great backdrops for pictures. 
