Happy 4th of July!

I thought that I should post at least SOMETHING before the insane craziness of the wedding! Here's a brief update:
Uly graduated with his Bachelor's in June; we are so, so proud of him! He's just finishing up his application for Grad school and will most likely be starting in the Fall! Go Daddy!
Ashlee finished the semester by what feels like the skin of her teeth.  She's been wedding planning like mad and has most definitely earned that Hawaiian honeymoon! ;)
Oliver finished his first half-year of preschool and still loved it.  He was a little sad on his last day but sure has enjoyed being home ALL the time to bug everyone! He's learned a ton of numbers and pretty much the whole alphabet - what a smart boy!
We are finally tying the knot a week from tomorrow.  I was so ambitious in declaring that I would be done with everything by now, but boy howdy was I wrong! I've finally managed to catch up and will hopefully have a stress-free week next week! Cue the frantically knocking on wood! 
The next time I post I'll be Mrs. Ashlee Lopez, CRAZY!

Birthday Boy

Oliver turned 4 last Monday and was lucky enough to have a week long celebration! 

We started the week off with a birthday celebration at Chuck E Cheese.  He had been there a total of two times in his little life, yet knew exactly what it was and would yell "I WANT TO GO TO CHUCK E CHEESE!!"  every time we would pass one, so we relented and took him, and he had an absolute blast!

The next day Uly and I took introduced Oliver to the wonderful concept of hooky and took him out of school to go to Disneyland! We rode all of his favorite rides and let him dictate what and where he wanted to do and he loved every second of it. 

I was insane enough to plan his actual birthday party for Friday at 4 PM - 2 hours and 45 minutes after I got out of class! Even with leaving and hour and a half early I was running around like a crazy person, absolutely sure it would be the lamest party ever, but it turned out super cute and Oliver had a blast! 

One of my favorite kid related things I've seen on Pinterest is where a mom asked her kid 20 questions on their birthday starting at age 3, then put them into a book. I saw this about 4 months ago so it was too late to start at 3, but I decided to start the tradition this year! Here they are:

1. What is your favorite color? Red & Green

2. What is your favorite toy? Chamleon Catcher

3. What is your favorite fruit? Apples

4. What is your favorite tv show? Unizoomi. And Mordecai and Rigby (Regular Show)

5. What is your favorite movie? Wreck it Ralph

6. What is your favorite thing to wear? Pirate shirt (costume)

7. What is your favorite animal? Giraffes

8. What is your favorite song? Blow Away (Blown Away by Carrie Underwood)

9. What is your favorite book? The Giving Tree

10. Who is your best friend? Little D

11. What is your favorite snack? Fruit Snack

12. What is your favorite drink? Hawaiian Punch

13. What is your favorite breakfast? Pancakes

14. What is your favorite lunch? Sandwiches with ham and cheese and mustard

15. What is your favorite dinner? Waffles (He wanted to put this for lunch as well)

16. What is your favorite game? Pooh Bear and the moving thing

17. What is your favorite thing to play outside? The stomp rocket

18. What is your favorite holiday? Halloween

19. What do you sleep with at night? Pillows, lovies, pink dinosaur, teddy bear

20. What do you want to be when you grow up? A doctor

To make this post even longer, here are some things about Oliver at this age:

He is super smart and super tall - he often gets mistaken for a 5 year old!

He can't get the letter L down right, so he frequently talks about "awiens," "Wightening McQueen," and "Wook, Mama/Daddy!"

Every morning when he wakes up he turns to me, and says "Good morning!" followed by a hug and a kiss.  

He loves, loves, loves school!

He is 100% potty trained!

He is super sassy and bossy 

He'll agree with us when we tell him he's crazy

If we tell him that he's a duck or something silly like that he'll reply with "No! I'm a Bubbas and a big kid, and Oliver!!"

The more tired he is, the more hyper and sillier he gets - which I will take ANY day over a grumpy tired kid!

He just has been so much fun this past year and we love every minute with him...Well pretty much every minute. He is so sweet, polite, and loving and we are both so grateful that we get to be his parents!

Happy Birthday to our amazing Oliver, we love you!

First Family Hike!

One of our big New Year's resolutions was to be more active as a family. Last weekend we took the first step towards that by going on our first family hike!

I found out about Etiwanda Falls hike from the internet somewhere and everywhere I looked people said that it was a great family friendly hike with pretty falls at the top.  When we got there we saw that it was almost 3.5 miles, but figured it wouldn't be that tough to handle.

We, Were. Wrong.

It was mostly uphill and VERY gravel-y, rocky, and uneven.  We muscled through, though, and were so happy we did! Of course going down is always easier than going up, but we still had a ton of fun! 

We've deemed Saturday to be family day and want to either do a hike or bicycle ride every week.

Uly's sweat is a hidden Mickey!

(You're welcome!)

We got to this point where it looks like it's the end of the hike and we just looked at this thing and went "...Etiwanda Falls??" Thankfully this wasn't it! ;)

We thought the water felt GREAT but Oliver just thought it was cold! 

Catching up Part 2

So far 2013 has been fun! 

When Uly's parent's got back from Mexico we got together and surprised them with passes to Disneyland! We all went that night (sans Uly's brother who was sick at home, sad!!) and had so much fun!

Valentine's Day we went to my friend Rachel's house to have a heart shaped dinner!  It was super fun to have a kid-friendly Valentine's Day with friends!