Good Family St George Trip 2015

We made our annual Goold family trip to St. George this year. We rented the same house we did 2 years ago (which 2 years ago was a nightmare with the girls crying the entire weekend!) 

This year we had so much fun.  It was between 105 and 110 degrees each day so we basically lived in the pool.  Luckily the girls love swimming now and Jaron, mr. water bug of course loved it as well.  As I've said before, Jaron has NO fear of the water.  He just jumps in and sinks to the bottom with total faith that someone is going to grab him at some point.  He swallowed so much pool water that he woke up every morning soaked through his diaper. But he had a smile the entire time.  We also turned Jaron's car seat facing forward for the trip and got him his own headset and he was so happy to finally be able to see the TV and watch some movies. He really didn't know what he was missing out on.

Aria, my most timid in the water did great. As long as she had her little inner tube around her she would jump and kick around all day.  She did pretty good jumping without it when I would make her but it was a fun vacation so I didn't force the issue of swimming without it (that's what swim teachers are for, which is happening in a couple weeks.)  I just realized we took lots of videos and very few pictures by

Siena was the most improved for sure this week.  She pretty much taught herself to swim.  She started with jumping into me, then I would slowly push her to the step and tell her to kick and I started moving back and back until she was swimming the width of the pool (well with a big push from me.)  Then she started swimming from one step to the other and I was so impressed that she not only could do it but was excited and wanted to keep doing it.  Then I got her to go down the slide by herself and once she did that there was no turning back.  She would do down the slide and then swim to me.  She did great.

We went to the temple on Sunday while we were there.  We showed up for church to find out we were an hour late for Stake Conference, so we walked around the temple instead.  It was also Father's Day so we celebrated all the Father's that were there with us.  Including Shane who does so much for his kids and is the best dad to these 3.  It was fun to spend the day with my dad as well who loves all his grandkids and children so much.  He would do anything for his kids.  And both these men mean the world to me so it was fun to spend Father's day together.

We also went to the Children's museum there which my kids loved, we stopped off at the carousel.  And one afternoon went to the splash park. 

We had such a fun week.  The kids were well behaved, the cousins even would entertain them with little movie times and play times which my kids love hanging out with their older cousins.  And they were very worn out each night and sometimes during the day.

Frozen Ballet Dance Recital

The girls had their first dance recital in June.  I was a little nervous how it would all go.  A few months ago Siena started having separation anxiety and even during dance class where she can see me through the window, she would cry and make her excuse of having to go potty just so she could leave.  Luckily we worked through it but neither of them were that excited when I would talk about the recital.

We got their costumes, still, no excitement.  We took pictures and put on makeup...still nothing.  In fact they hated the make up.  Siena started crying huge tears when I put her mascara on, which we all know what a disaster that turned into.  And as soon as we were done putting it on they were asking when we could take it off.  So unlike how I thought my 3 year olds would be.

But then the dress rehearsal rolled around and we drove up to Kingsbury hall.  Yes their recital was at Kingsbury Hall at the Univ. of Utah.  This is no ordinary, regular cute little girls dance recital. This is a full on production of a ballet.  It runs for 3 nights so they can fit all their classes into a dance.  So dress rehearsal came, they went up on the 'big stage' and practiced their dance once and came back down.  But that was all it took to convince them that this might be something fun they wanted to do.

The ballet this year was 'The Ice Princess' or otherwise known to the rest of us...'Frozen.'  The whole production was amazing.  They do such a good job and all the dances were cute and went off without a hitch.  The girls danced as Reindeer with Sven and Cristoff.  The day of the recital they kept telling me that only people from Arendelle are allowed on the big stage, so I can't come up on the big stage, but because they are reindeer they get to be from Arendelle.

As their time approached to come out on stage, I was feeling so nervous for them.  I wanted them to have fun and I didn't really care how they danced but I was just nervous.  They came prancing out and the dance was so cute.  I even got a little emotional, I have no idea why but I was.  They looked sooo little on that big stage but they did great.  They did about 1/2 the dance and then when the dance was over they were supposed to line up in a single file line in a train behind Sven and walk off.  I think they either forgot or were having so much fun they just wanted to look around some more cuz they all just stood there and looked around.

After watching them dance all year, it was such a rewarding night to see them up on stage.  We had dropped them off before the performance and they keep them downstairs doing dances, parades, singing, etc.  So after they came out for the finale we went and picked them up and they were so excited and you could tell they had so much fun and loved performing.  Now they keep asking when they can go back to dance class and do their dance performance again.  I have to break the news to them that their next performance is not for another year.

After we took pictures with family (My mom, Jennifer and Margene came as well which was super nice of them!) we were about to leave when we saw Elsa standing by us and her friends had just walked away and she was standing there by herself.  So we ran up and took a picture with her.  She was so cute and nice to talk to the girls for a minute and compliment them on their dancing.

 

The night was truly magical for me and for the girls.