Rainbow Nationals Dance Competition

July 18-24

We had a fun but busy week! It started out with a weekend at Jeb and Amber's house. We had fun staying cool in their doughboy pool and playing Guitar Hero. The kids had a great time playing, and we had a great time relaxing and visiting. We also got to see Brooklynn's room. It is painted lavender and has lavender and pink butterflies, with a beautiful crib set to match. She is already being loved and spoiled by her parents, and we are excited for her arrival. I got to go to a Dr. appointment with Amber, and see the baby on the ultrasound. I saw an arm, a side view, saw that she is definitely a girl, and heard the heartbeat. I am lucky and thankful that I have such a great sister. It was so cool to get to go!
On Monday, we got Becca's hair and make-up ready and went to Rainbow Nationals in Anaheim. She got there, slipped on her costume, warmed up, and did her dance...

"I want fabulous, that is my simple request, all things fabulous, bigger and better and best"...

She ended up getting a First Place in Petite Jazz and 4th overall in Petite 8 and Under.
Her aunt cried, and I screamed! Becca proudly held the bigger trophy over her head during the awards ceremony


Here she is with her teacher, Miss Kim, her friend Crista, and their awards...
After the awards, it was time to eat, so we went to the Rainforest Cafe. The girls and Grant had a fun time making weird faces and sounds, and waiting for the storms every few minutes.


Then we walked around Downtown Disney for a while, and took these pictures at the Lego Store with Darth Vader and R2-D2...


a cute pic of Grant with his daddy. We were glad they could come with us Monday and watch Becca. Love you guys!!!
We ended up (after a move) with a poolside view at the Disneyland Hotel. Along with getting in to the concierge with our friends and getting to eat all the food up there and watch the fireworks, this was their favorite thing at the hotel...
yeah, I was pretty lucky to get this picture of Becca at the very moment of pool impact. On Mallory's, I forgot to zoom in...
On Tuesday, we had fun at Disneyland all day, but I wasn't very good at remembering to take pictures. I will have to go back and do a blog of our trip there with my sister when we came down for her graduation in June. Well, here is Tarzan's Treehouse, anyway...

Becca being a Tarzan...

On Wednesday, Becca did her team routine, and they got 1st place and 5th overall! We were proud of them! Then they went to a jazz master class with one of the judges. As you can see, they didn't group them by age or anything. The dance was difficult, but by the end, Becca was getting it...

They said they were the Cheetah Girls, and were posing and yelling "CHEETAHS!"- so silly, and so much attitude!
Becca and Crista on one of our several walks Downtown...

with the parrot in front of Rainforest Cafe...

I am so proud of Rebecca. She is one talented little dancin' diva!More pictures of my divas doing their things (Bec's dance and Mal's gymnastics) to come...

4th of July Weekend in Utah!

July 4th

We had a great Fourth of July weekend in Utah! We caravaned up with Cammi and Lance in their car, and the rest of us in Dennis' car. The kids had a fun time together, with Becca and Mallory switching off riding with Carter and Reilly, and talking on to each other on walkie talkies.

They also had really fun travel bags which were put together by Grandma and Aunt Cammi, with workbooks, sketch pads, songs, card games, and road trip bingo. When we got there, we celebrated Kelly's Birthday and the Fourth at Angie's parent's house. We enjoyed "Cafe Rio" pork sandwiches, potato salad, chips and birthday cake!

Uncle Kelly was the official lighter of the fireworks!

He did a great job helping the kids! We were sorry to hear later that he singed the hair on his legs and burned his shirt! Afterwards, we headed to our nice hotel at Thanksgiving Point, and watched the town fireworks display from a grassy area there. Instead of the regular "oooh" and "ahh", I got the kids (Carter, Reilly, Becca and Mallory) to yell "pancake" every time they saw a round oval shaped one explode. They were funny, because they kept asking me if this was "finale time". Finally it was, and they all said "Awww! It's over???"

July 5th

The next day was a very special day! We got ready in our color-coordinated outfits and went to the park to take updated family pictures, since the Stohls now have two wonderful additions, Kevin's wife Stephanie, and Kelly and Angie's new baby, Laynie Lynne. Getting to the park proved to be a bit tricky, but we took a nice scenic drive through town with Uncle Sid, Kevin and Lance driving behind us (haha, Dennis!). We are thankful Cammi made it through the rush to get everyone situated at the park! From the park, we reassembled at Angie's parents house again to bless baby Laynie, and have a wonderful brunch prepared by Angie and her Mom...

Isn't she beautiful? She looks like a Stohl!

She had both of her Grandpas, Uncle Sid, Uncles Kris and Kevin, Uncle Lance, both of her Uncle Jasons and a couple of neighbors in her circle...

She had the three girl cousins (Becca, Reilly and Mallory) totally adoring and doting on her! Mallory was a natural at holding the baby, and the baby was good while she got passed around for all the kids to hold...

But of course, the boys love her too! Here are all 7 of the Stohl grandkids!
Laynie with her mommy...We also got to know Kevin's wife Stephanie. She is pretty and is very sweet! We are excited that she and Kevin are so happy, and excited to get to know her even better. We all loved her instantly. Here is Becca with Stephanie...

The rest of July 5th was spent near our hotel at Thanksgiving Point. It was a fun place, with a big dinosaur museum, movie theater, farm/petting zoo, gardens, food and shops. In between swimming in the hotel pool, we took the kids to the farm, where they fed goats, llamas, chickens, cattle, pigs and horses. They even got to milk a cow!


Kris fed a very big horse and got slobbered on...Becca liked milking the cow a bit more than Mal did!

They ran around so much we finally decided to put them in jail!

It was in a pretty setting...

After that, there was more swimming, and a trip for the adults to the movies, while grandma hosted a pajama party in her room for the grandkids (actually, they tried to do this every night, and by the last night, they actually decided they were too tired from all 3 late nights!)

July 6th

We got ready early and went to the Conference Center and Temple Square. We watched a live broadcast of "Music and the Spoken Word" with the Tabernacle Choir, so awesome!

Before leaving the Conference Center, we got another personal tour from Uncle Sid, who works there. We got to see the teleprompter booth, as well as the translating booths, then we walked around and looked at all the paintings and statues on all the levels, and went all the way up to the top, to take this picture...

We had to take a picture in front of the Christus... and by the reflection pool in front of the temple...

After that, we took a train ride to Applebee's to eat lunch...

This day of course was rounded out with fun times again at the hotel...

July 7th

We ate breakfast one last time at the hotel- eggs, sausage, muffins, a whole spread (the girls' favorite was making their own waffles). We said our goodbyes and headed home. On the way home, we stopped at the Bonneville Salt Flats to let the girls stand on the salt and see it up close. They took a few small rock souveniers, and Becca decided that she wanted to research salt when she got home. Mallory chose to research the state of Utah. Here they are at the Salt Flats...

It was a quick but very memorable and fun trip! We are greatly indebted to Judy and Cammi for being the main organizers of it, helping us all be together and have a great time!