Life with Dylan

Category: Summer

  • Dylan’s Cupcake Wars

    It is no secret that Dylan loves watching the Food Network with me. Cupcake Wars is one of his favorite shows and he is always getting new ideas for us to make cupcakes with from this show. As you may know, one of the judges on Cupcake Wars is Candace Nelson, the founder of Sprinkles Cupcakes. When I told Dylan that there was a Sprinkles cupcake bakery just 5 minutes from us he got very excited!

    After much discussion about local and not so local cupcake bakeries, Dylan decided that he wanted to taste all of these “famous” cupcakes and judge them for himself. So today our first stop was Sprinkles Cupcakes in Newport Beach. We purchased two cupcakes. Chocolate Marshmallow and Vanilla were his choices.

    Personally, I do not care much for Sprinkles Cupcakes. The Chocolate Marshmallow basically tasted like a Ding Dong and the Vanilla cupcake was very dry, but my opinion doesn’t really matter … watch the video and see what the cupcake expert had to say.


    Our next stop will be Wonderland Bakery …

  • Cub Scout Day Camp

    Dylan just finished his first Cub Scout Day Camp. Five days of all things Cub Scouts! Archery, flag football, ultimate frisbee, creating with clay, building a bird house with wood and nails, making his very own earthworm farm (which now resides in our house), making his own fishing pole from bamboo and fishing in the pond, and I’m sure much more than he told me considering the long list of achievements that was sent home.

    The days were long (8:30 am – 3:30 pm) and the weather was hot, but he had a blast and I’m sure he will want to do it again next year!

  • Surprise, We’re Going to Disneyland!

    What better way to kick off summer vacation than with an impromptu visit to the Magical Kingdom … The Happiest Place on Earth … well, minus the long lines and the 87 degree heat. Although Dylan finished school last week, I still work until the end of the month. He was so excited to be on summer vacation that I decided to surprise him with a late afternoon visit to Disneyland. Dylan has been watching all the commercials about the new Star Tours ride and just about jumped out of his shoes when I told him we were going.

    Surprisingly, the lines were only 15-30 minute waits. However, this is beacuse everyone was standing in line for Star Tours! The wait went from 115 minutes down to 90 … no more fast passes … ugh … the things we do for our children.

    As much as he wanted to go on this ride, the heat and the idea of standing in line did not make Dylan happy. He did everything he could to sit in the shade alongside the building while I stood in line.

    As we got closer to entering the building his frown began to fade and the excitement was hard to contain.

    After 80 long minutes of standing we finally make it inside. The happiness on Dylan’s face made all the numbness in my feet disappear and I quickly remembered what it was like to be a child at Disneyland.

    Our destination was Hoth, which was the first choice of Dylan’s … coming in close second place was Endor. The flight was smoother than before they renovated the ride, but the best part was Dylan’s reaction when the ride was over.

    “Seriously, that was it? Seriously? So not worth the wait”

    Classic.

    Now that we had accomplished the mission of riding the new Star Tours it was off to all the other fun rides. Pirates of the Caribbean, Matterhorn, Tarzan’s Treehouse, Haunted Mansion, Indiana Jones, Jungle Cruise, and a few spins on the Gadget Coaster (all by himself)

    All in all, it was a great way to spend a Sunday afternoon and evening. Next visit we hit California Adventure and Mom gets to ride the new Little Mermaid …

  • It’s Summer!

    Dylan is done with school and I have only four more days of work … Summer Vacation is in clear site and we couldn’t be happier. Sure, working for the school district I always have summer’s off … but this summer is different. This will be the first time in over two years that I will not have homework or papers to write over the summer. I can actually relax and enjoy the summer with Dylan! We have so many exciting things planned and I can’t wait until July 1st so that the fun can begin.

    Closets have been cleaned out (yes, even the ones that I was afraid to open) and the deep cleaning that has been put off for so long is complete. Come this time next week we will have nothing to do but relax and have fun in the Southern California sun!

    I can hardly contain myself …

  • Shooby-Dooby …

    Nothing beats the afternoon blahs like a trip down to the island. Amazing how much fun you can have just going to lunch …
    A simple drive down to Balboa Island, a ride across the ferry, and a short walk down to the Newport Pier. All so we could Shooby-Dooby, Down to Ruby’s for some good food and laughs. Dylan was happy to use his certificate he won for being the Top Otter Log Reader in his class, and I was happy I didn’t have to pay for his cheeseburger!

  • My Deepest Apologies …

    Considering it has been almost 3 months since my last post, I must admit I have no excuse except that I have been extremely busy with work, school, and life in general! I will try to get caught up here with some of the highlights and promise to do better over the summer.

    The Cub Scout year ending with an overnight camp out and I sent my little guy off with Grandpa …

    Then it was time to earn his official Tiger Cub Rank!
    As May came to an end the Southern California weather began to warm up and we both needed to escape the hectic day to day life that can becomes so crazy. Being true to our Beach Baby roots, we headed down to Little Corona for some impromptu fun in the sun after school!
    No idea why this picture came out purple, but I absolutely love it!!
    June came and Mommy turned 40 … WOW!!

  • Summer is Coming …

    It might only be the end of May, but we are having a heat wave and it’s in the high 80’s. So we went to Grandma and Grandpa’s house to kick back by the pool and have some fun! Dylan played with the new pool toy Grandma bought and I got to relax in the sun.
    http://picasaweb.google.com/s/c/bin/slideshow.swf