Weekend Updates with Haley McDonald!

Some might wonder what exactly I've ben up to lately; and the truth is not too much besides work and regular everyday life!  There have been a few fun weekend activities I've participated in over the past month that I figure I'd share with you!

First off; a few weeks ago Isaac came over and we made Beignets (French Donuts.)  Isaac had a box mix from his trip to New Orleans last year; Cafe Du Monde is the bomb!  I promised Isaac that I wouldn't put up any pictures of him in his apron without his pre-approval, so sorry no pictures tonight (use your imagination; my old cold stone aprons!).  The Beignets turned out really well though we have a few ideas to improve our Beignet making skills for next time!  We both have a fondness for powdered sugar so we didn't hold anything back in that department (ok, the powered sugar was my job; Isaac was the fry cook!)

A mini Beignet; our tester!

Our final product; don't worry we didn't eat them all!

Two weekends ago I made a trip to Healdsburg to visit with my mom who was out for her Tri Girl Tri (see her post here) and my aunts and uncles.  It was a quick trip but it was a blast; not only did I get to see my mom and aunt T in their race but I had some serious bonding time with my uncle T who is a total crack up; I guess that's what happens when your in a car with someone for an hour + at 6 a.m.!!  Congratulations to my mom and aunt T for their awesome accomplishments!

And last weekend I was presented with the opportunity to help out at a Special Olympics bowling practice for a few hours.  I was in charge on two lanes; basically my job was to make sure that everything in my lanes was running smoothly (resetting when things messed up and such) reminding the players when it was their turn and keeping track of their scores.  It was a crack up!  I had 3 people in one lane and 2 in the other; they were all older then me, I think 4 of them were probably in their 40's!  One lady was too much for me; she was very protective of her bowling ball (had her name engraved on it) and kept telling the other two guys in her lane not to touch her ball (over and over and over again!) and telling me to tell them not to touch her ball.  At one point she threatened to kick Tod's (one of the guys) a** if he touched her ball; poor guy never even went close to her ball (he had his own personal ball) and had no clue what she was talking about half the time.  I had to bite my lip a few times so I wouldn't bust out laughing.  They were all super sweet and it was a very humbling experience to help out.  The guys in the lane next to us (also part of the Special Olympics) were amazing bowlers; getting strike after strike; they could out bowl me any day!  

So in a nutshell that's what I've been up to over the past several weekends!

3rd Annual Chicken Festival

The moment we've all been waiting for; what exactly happens at a Chicken Festival in Fair Oaks!!  Last Saturday I made my way over to the Chicken Festival in town; it's only like 5 minutes walk at the most from my apartment!  It was quite large; shockingly so considering the size of this little town.  It was much like any typical festival celebrating a random thing!

There were 3 bands playing on different stages; one at the back park, one right smack dab in the middle of Old Fair Oaks on the street and one at the end of the street in the beer garden.  All along the street were vendors selling their goods; some chicken related, some not.  The park in front had all different kids of food vendors and the bounce things/activities for the kids, and the park in the back had a band and the chicken cook-off events.

Now for those of you who don't know; Fair Oaks has a whole bunch of wild chickens and roosters that randomly live around town; I'm not really sure of their history, perhaps something for another day!  They are such a huge part of the culture that the "Welcome to Fair Oaks" sign has a rooster on it!  So this was the 3rd Annual Chicken Festival in celebration of our beloved chickens.  I will say I did feel kind of bad for the chickens because any of them that dared show their face during their celebrations was pretty much continually chased around by children and even some adults.

Funniest thing I heard all day was a conversation between two ladies trying to photograph a rooster; it went something like this . . . Lady 1: "I can't get a good picture."  Lady 2: "I know; we'll he isn't being very corporative."  The were both dead serious and I wanted to scream at them; "Seriously, it's a rooster for goodness sake!"

Without further ado . . . 

Chickens Decor 

Chicken Ladies 

Chicken Fans

Chicken Man

Chicken Dog

Chickens

*Any chickens consumed at the event were store bought, and in no way an attempt to "thin the herd"

Race Around the Track

Saturday morning was pretty relaxing.  There were a few schedule mix-ups so about about 12:30 we headed out of the house to a birthday party that had started an hour and half before!  Oh well, we didn't miss the pinata, cupcakes or presents; so we didn't miss much!

Frosting Lipstick

Gone before I could even snap a picture

After that we headed up to the El Dorado County Relay for Life.  It was weird but very nice not to be caught up in the mix of things, and be able to just relax and enjoy the day and the company without the stress.  The kids had a blast running around and playing and helping me make our luminaria bags; they did an awesome job.

Helped with decorating and filling

I'm not sure there is a more touching sight then seeing these two little ones partaking in such an important event; even if they don't understand it all.  We made 13 bags in total and I'm sure we could have easily made another 5+.

We were up there for most of the afternoon, and ran home at about 7:30 for a quick warmer wardrobe change, some food and the stroller and headed back for the luminaria ceremony.  Aden was in heaven because he had his light-up shoes on and was able to run laps around the track all by himself because I could see his light-up shoes the whole time.  He was like the energizer bunny, he kept going and going and going.  And of course once again both kids passed out a few minutes into the car ride home!

There really isn't much to report from Sunday, we made our way to church and then spent the rest of the day at home relaxing and recovering for our fun filled party weekend!

"The Greatest Show on Earth"

So after the Big Cookie Friday portion of the day was over, Lauren went down for a nap and Aden had some quite play time before we headed to the circus.  Lauren was so excited to be going to the "Fair"; I could not convince her that it was actually called the Circus!  We got there early because I didn't know what Friday traffic or the parking/crowd situation would have in store for us, so we grabbed a snack and headed to our awesome seats to watch the open floor pre-show.  Neither of the kids wanted to venture down onto the floor for an up close and personal experience so we watched happily from our seats!

Having some chicken strips and lemonade while watching the pre-show

I'm not really going to go into the politics of a Circus; animals and such, but I will say this; the fair is weird!  It was a really great show, very impressive to say the least, but it's just so weird.  I mean you've got women hanging by their hair, men bending in ways that a body shouldn't be able to bend holding other men up, and a random collection of animals doing stunts (the porcupine was most surprising to me!)  I will say this; there is pure joy for a child to experience the circus, and the should all get to do it at least once!

Barnum and Bailey claims to have "The Greatest Show on Earth" and it was beyond adorable when Aden heard someone say that and then promptly said to me in all his excitement "This is the greatest show on earth!"

Aden's favorite part was the motorcycles in the cage of death (at least that's what I call it!)  I think they got up to 9 in there.  Lauren loved the elephants; and they were my favorite part too.  

The Cage of Death

The Elephants

Two Passed out Kids with their light up toys!

Stay tuned for Saturday adventures . . .

Weekend with the Polley Kids

Last weekend I had the pleasure of watching Aden and Lauren from Thursday afternoon through Sunday night.  There were all sorts of fun activities for us to do; and by Sunday afternoon we were all pooped out!

Thursday night we kept it pretty low key because Aden still had school on Friday, but by the time end of school rolled around of Friday the fun began, and it didn't slow down!  

Friday is often referred to as Cookie Friday or Big Cookie Friday (as the cookies consumed on Friday are required to be substantially larger then any cookie consumed on any other day of the week!) around the Polley house; a tradition that started a few years ago when Aden started going to preschool.  So last Thursday while we were in Target, I asked the kids if they wanted to go to the Cookie place for cookies the next day or make them at home.  The results were unanimous; make them at home.  So Friday while the spider-man mac and cheese was cooking we made the cookies.

Hard at work making the perfect cookies

The Masterpieces ready to bake

No one could have guessed they'd grow that much

Apparently they were exhausting to eat; but tasty none the less

The funny thing about Big Cookie Friday is that neither of the kids eat their whole cookie!!  Sometimes Aden has come close, but Lauren just picks out whatever chocolate might be embedded into the cookie!!  I'd say that the Big Cookie Friday part of our Friday was a hit.  

Up Next. . . The Circus . . .

My My My Mexico Part 2

Everyone watching Justin fly in the sky

The Kids playing in the sand

Thursday Kim, mom and I took a yoga class which consisted of the three of us and the teacher.  It was an awesome class and though I was apprehensive at first of the small class size, I was glad in the end because I feel like I probably got a better workout because of it.  After class we met the boys and the kids for a late breakfast, and then the Rush's headed home.  We decided to trek over to the Marina that afternoon for some shopping and dinner and were enjoying the wandering and dinner when a huge storm hit.  It was awesome at dinner because the restaurant was open so we saw and heard amazing lightening and thunder, but the walk home was a whole different story.  We were walking in flooded streets with the water well up to our shins.  Because mom had a white shirt on and I had kaki pants on (see through when wet) we opted for the trash-bags we'd seen a few others wearing.  Not really sure what Bill's excuse was!  And the night was closed out with some Olympics; did you expect anything else!?!

Bill doing his best Nacho Libra

My Turn

Mom Always trying to one up!

Nice Family Dinner

Trash-bag Trio

The damage

Friday was another day of nothingness which was just the way I liked it!  We had more pool time and after mom and Bill headed off for their afternoon at the spa, Justin and I headed to dinner and then back to our room for the exciting 100 Fly with Phelps taking his 7th Gold!!!  Kim Rush actually called us soon after the race to find out what had happened because through the husle of the night they missed the race.  So of course we were more then happy to fill them in!  Oh, and there was another storm on Friday evening; Justin say lightening strike the building right next to ours, and the thunder was so loud I jumped/fell out of my chair!

Enjoying my lime smoothie 

Justin enjoying his banana smoothie 

Pool Girls

Saturday was a late morning, breakfast at the buffet that we'd been having breakfast at pretty much every morning (oh, how awesome is a vacation in Mexico when you can eat things like tamales, beans and quesadillas for breakfast among other things like the worlds best waffles!)  

Roses on the Roll

The water running through the hotel

After packing up we played a few rounds of card before heading to the airport and back on to SLC.  Mom and Bill had to rush through to their connecting flight but Justin and I met up once again with Timbra and Al.  Timbra took us on a little downtown SLC adventure and to dinner before we headed home.  

It was an awesome trip, and while usually we do more on vacation then lounge by the pool everyday, I think this was exactly what everyone need that week! Thanks Bill and Mom for an awesome vacation!

My My My Mexico

So there's not much I can say about my trip to Mexico except that it pretty much rocked my world!!  A lot of relaxing, lounging by the pool/ocean, and soaking up the sun with an occasional evening sea turtle adventure!

Saturday we headed out for our adventure far too early in the morning; I believe that I set my alarm for somewhere around 3:45 am, but I've tried to block that out of my memory!  Justin and I headed to the airport and flew to Salt Lake City where we had about an hour to go out and visit with Mike, Timbra and Alani in the airport.  It was sad that they didn't go on the trip with us so it was a nice treat to get a little visit in.  

Me at like 4:15 am

Justin getting us gas at 4:40am

Al stealing auntie Haley's shoes

We flew on from there to Mexico and after waiting a bit for the parents we headed on to the hotel.  Can't complain about the view from the room that's for sure!!

We happened across the turtle nursery after talking with just one person about where we could release baby sea turtles and that pretty much set the rock'n pace for the rest of the week!  I mean, come on, how lucky were we that there was a whole baby sea turtle farm right at our hotel!!  I'll give the sea turtles the respect they deserve by posting a whole different blog about them, for now an overview of the week!

So Saturday night after dinner we watched some Olympics and then mom and I headed out to do some sea turtle sighting and were excited to see a few different turtles in different stages on coming up to the beach to lay eggs and going back to the water!

Sunday (like most of the days to come) was a lazy/relaxing day by the pool.  We found some lounge chairs between the pool and beach and camped out for the day.  We enjoyed chips/salsa and blended drinks while lazing around!  We pretty much spent most of the day going back and forth from the pool to our lounge chairs, and the most exerting thing we did all day was play a little 2 on 2 water volley ball (quite a sight to behold!).  That evening we ordered room service and watched the Olympics (you'll notice this to be a recurring theme!)

Monday Mom and I made our way to the spa where she enjoyed a facial and I enjoyed the best hot stone massage I've ever had - a fire opal massage!  After that we did more lounging by the pool, under the umbrellas trying to recover from our Sunday sunburns!  After having dinner at one of the hotel restaurants and watching the olympics ( it was a sports bar type place) we check to see if any babies might be ready to release and were pleased to discover that there would be a nest ready in about an hour!  So you can bet that we were there an hour later ready to let them go!  We also saw a few more turtles coming up to lay their eggs while we waited for Oscar (the turtle master!)!

Aww, brother and sister 

Tuesday morning we did the room service thing again and watched the olympics over breakfast!!  Around noon our friends the Rush's arrived for a overnight visit, so we said our hellos and took the kids into the pool while everyone worked on catching up in the water!  It was someone's grand idea to do room service in our (Justin and I's) room and watch the Olympics so I ordered up some pizzas and the 9 of us crammed into our room to enjoy good company, good entertainment (the Olympics as well as Tim and the Kids!) and good food!

Wednesday we pretty much hung out by the pool yet again, taking the kids swimming here and there.  There was a storm coming in so we got out of the pool fairly early that day, plus the Rush's were all suffering their Tuesday sunburns.  Justin did have the opportunity to go parasaling in the afternoon so that was really fun to watch.  And in the evening we all had dinner at a nice Japanese restaurant (the type where they cook in front of you) and after that went for a walk on the beach to see more turtles coming up to lay eggs.  And of course the evening was concluded with some Olympic coverage!

Justin checking the medal count

Mom and Bill relaxing by the pool

Justin Parasailing