Disney Concert Hall!!

So, on Tuesday, the orchestra I'm in had a concert at Disney Concert Hall. I was so excited to be playing there! What an opportunity it was. We combined with a high school choir and the college band at the school our director teaches at. It was an amazing experience. I carried my camera everywhere (including inside the hall). It is beautiful inside and the sound carries so well. We had the opportunity to listen to the first half of the concert from inside the hall since we weren't on the program until the second half. It was so neat. Although they told us no pictures, I snuck my camera in anyways and took some while hiding the camera behind the program and avoiding the unsuspecting ushers that were prowling the aisles. Here are a few of the highlights.
This is what the hall looked like from my perspective (of course it was when we were rehearsing, not during the actual performance that I took these pictures).



Here is what it looked like if you are in the audience. Keep in mind, I was taking these pictures without looking through the camera, so some are crooked.
This is the ceiling

This is what the orchestra area looked like from above. I took this before anyone was on.

Here is the entrance.

Here are a few other fun pictures I took.
This is Jesse-he is 13 and just an incredible violinist. We played Mendehlson's Violin Concerto and he was the soloist. This kid is just incredible. (He gave me permission to post his picture on the blog). This was him in his very own room they gave to him to warm up/think)


Here is Eileen and Emily. Eileen plays the violin and Emily plays the viola. We were exploring.



I found this interesting. These are the salaries of the LA Symphony and the Chicago Symphony. The musicians in the Chicago Symphony get payed so much more!
Pink is Chicago, yellow is LA.



Last but not least, here I am ready to go out and play!

Memorial Weekend

Here are some pictures of our Memorial Weekend. We went to stay in a cabin near Marysvale, Utah and had a blast. Kailey had her first four wheeling adventure. She rode between Chad and I, and the whole time shouted at Chad to go "faster daddy!" She certainly is a little daredevil! When we got there it was way cold-not something we'd bargained for when packing for our trip. We had only brought one sweater for Kailey, and they only have one small mini-store (inside the gas station) in Marysvale. Jamie kindly stopped by and picked out a vintage red sweater for her to wear. It was obviously used before considering it sported a few stains on the sleeve. It turned out to be quite darling on her, despite it. Although the weather was cold, we all had a blast. Kailey played with Luke, ate dirt and explored while some of us went on the ATV's, read or played cards. It was a fun weekend.

Cousin Fun

While we were in Utah we got to go stay with Annie and Cody. Kailey had so much fun with her cousins! The first day, it was so hot so we had them play in the pool together. They were so cute splashing around and going down the slide and running through the water as Aunt Annie watered her flowers.



After a grueling day of swimming and playing, they were ready for bed so in the bath they all went. We got them all tucked into bed and...of course Kailey and Kaden wanted to play instead of sleeping. They finally went to bed around 10:30 and we found them all snuggled up together. It was so sweet.

Kailey's Nana has a big jacuzzi tub that Kailey likes to take a bath in every time we go to Utah. This time we bought some bubble to put in and filled it way up. She had a blast. She was lifting the bubbles up and putting them on my hair (I was sitting next to the tub), and putting them on her face and pretending to be Santa Clause. I think that I ended up almost as wet as her, we played for so long. After awhile, we turned the jets on and really made some bubbles. We almost filled it to the very top!

Fun in the Sun

Today was the official start of our "summer" vacation. After a grueling drive to Utah yesterday, Kailey woke up ready to play today. Her Uncle Chris decided that she would have a blast playing in a swimming pool (and he was right!) so he went to Walmart and bought her one. She loved it! She played out on the deck in that pool screeching and giggling while mom and I snapped photos like she was the star model in a photo shoot. Things got really wild when Chris started pouring water over her head. She was dancing and shrieking and having a blast despite it being a bit too chilly outside to be soaking wet. What fun!

Fun Times and Friendly Faces

We have been doing quite a few different activities lately with friends. Last week, Brooke and I decided to check out a new toddler park we had heard about so we got the kids ready and away we went. After an accidental drive by and a superb parking job by Brooke, we were ready to play. The park was fenced in so it was a bit tricky finding the gate but we managed. The park was full of cute little toys and play structures, but boy was it busy! There was a train play area that had a tiny little crawlspace for the kids to crawl inside. It was quite icky-full of mud and who knows what else, so we kept the kids out. Other than that, it was a pretty fun park. Kailey and Hannah had a blast playing together and when it came time to leave, the usual mayhem occured when Kailey was not quite ready to go yet. Here are a few pictures of them at the park.






Recently Kailey also had her first experience with a giant piece of watermelon. She has had watermelon in the past of course, but never her own piece to hold and munch off of. I couldn't resist and gave her a huge piece she never would be able to eat, but it sure made for some cute pictures!


On Saturday, the fire department had a huge open house. There were booths, tours of the firehouse and the jail, and many other attractions. I took Natalie and Kailey to see the show and they loved it. We ended up staying for two hours. They were able to climb in a firetruck, were given plastic fire hats and badges, and even played in the bounce gym. Unfortunately I could not get either of them to hold still long enough for many pictures, but we came out with a couple. The highlight for them of course was the bounce pit. With the music loudly blaring and the chaos inside, it was like a mosh pit. Instead of crazy teenagers or adults though, it was made up of little kids, probably not even older than five. I'm surprised that there were no broken arms or legs, it was that crazy. Natalie was a trouper, climbing up the wall and jumping down the other side, then returning back to jump with Kailey. Kailey, our little jumping bean just loved it of course. She jumped and jumped and had a ball until she crashed into another little girl and ended up in tears. Deciding to move on to something else, I dragged the girls out of the bounce pit and restored their shoes to go wait in line for a balloon animal. The guy doing the animals was amazing. Kailey wanted a monkey so he made a huge palm tree (almost as tall as Kailey), put some bananas hanging from the tree, then made a monkey with his arms wrapped around the tree. Natalie got a cute little kitty cat. These were the best balloon animals I'd ever seen! After a tour of the jail, and an introduction to a police officer for the girls, (I wanted to make sure they knew who to go to in case of trouble) we walked back to the car. As we walked up to it, I noticed a car stop to wait for my parking spot. Realizing I couldn't find my keys, I began to frantically search through my pockets and purse. Not just one, but five searches later, I finally found them in an obscure pocket I had never seen before and of course never used. The girls were patiently waiting by the car at the time and so was the driver who wanted my spot. After gathering up the piles of goodies that we had gotten, I went to open my car. At this moment, chaos ensued. Kailey dropped her monkey balloon on the asphault and it exploded causing her to cry immediately. I picked her up to comfort her and put her in the car when Natalie's regular helium-filled balloon came loose from her wrist and floated up into the air. This is when Natalie started crying as well. While trying to comfort both the girls and buckle them into their carseat, I noticed that the other car was STILL waiting for me to leave. At this point it had been at least 15 minutes since we arrived at the car. They probably could have parked down the street a little ways and been to whatever their destination was. Anyways, finally the girls cheered up when I pointed out that they still each had a balloon. After that small moment of craziness, they were back to their happy selves and so was I! Kailey has been attached to her shiny red firehat ever since. She has even showered with it a few times! Its cute how kids get attached to certain things, no matter how strange.
Checking out the fire truck-you don't realize how huge these things are until you are standing next to one!


In the bounce pit. The second picture is brave little Natalie climbing the wall despite other kids flying down it from the other side.

Our darling little girl

Even though we have had a rough time the last couple of days, Kailey has still been able to contribute a few moments of sweetness in between bouts of crying and whining (she has been refusing to sleep which has steam rolled into a little miss temper tantrum). Thankfully she went to sleep tonight early and hopefully will catch up!
I decided I had to tell everyone our "awww" moments from recently. Yesterday, Kailey was playing at her "park" on our deck and I was outside watching her. When I went in the house, I stubbed my toe on the door frame and proceeded to sit down and whine about it. (hey, it hurt!). Kailey came over and kept asking "mommy, are you okay?" over and over. When I told her I hurt my toe, she leaned down and kissed my toe and said all better and gave me a sweet hug. She is always so caring of people around her!
Last night during her night time prayers, she started to take off on her own. After blessing the elephants, dinosaurs, zebras (every animal she could name) she proceeded to ask blessings for her family members. Last of all she asked Heavenly Father to bless Kaden so she could see him when we go to Utah. So sweet!