Happy New Year! or Disney Christmas in July

Happy New year everyone! What? Like you've never been seven months late for something? Whatever.  The beginning of this year was super awesome! My big brother and his wife planned on taking their family to Disneyland and at the last minute there was an open space in the van. I had told them before I couldn't go because I had a coworker who had asked for the time off already so we couldnt both take it. Well, she moved to another department so I was able to go. I called and asked if I could take that spot.

They came to pick me up on Saturday, Dec 30 at the crack o dawn and we headed out! 

It's just the nature of the Baker clan to have a few mishaps. This was the first one. The dumping of our super awesome holiday snack. Dangit!

One of our pit stops was Mesquite. Shayla is now old enough to gamble- so we stopped for a bit and played some slots. The first (and last) time I hit Vegas I left $1.75 richer than I started. In Mesquite- I lost it all. I had $9 in my wallet and I lost all of it. I tried my hand at roulette just to say I've done it.  I've done it. I lost it. Don't ever need to do it again. But Shayla won! So I guess there really is something to beginner's luck!

Alex was pretty into it too.

As we were heading south, the traffic was pretty gross- but going north it was even worse. It was like everyone in California was headed to Vegas for New Years! We were quite happy not to be going the other direction.

We stopped in one other spot for a potty break- and to our suprise they had a display of awesome movie cars! We were probably more excited about that than anything.

Lisa was most excited to see the car from Grease!

Traffic really slowed us down. We were going to wait till Anaheim to eat- but we were starving. Shayla googled pizza and found this place in Victorville. Oh my gosh it was so freaking ghetto. We were pretty sure we were going to get shot. Any time a place has bars on the windows... I felt a little like I was back in Jersey for a bit.

The highlight of that little detour was that we were on a stretch of Route 66. I didn't take a picture because we really just wanted to get the heck out of there. Five minutes after we ate and got back on the road, we found a totally blissful, food-filled oasis about five minutes down the road. We didn't let Shayla navigate after that. Haha!

We didn't have anything planned for that evening. We were just going to get to the hotel and hang out and rest up for the next day. But a friend of mine had told me about this band that he was obsessing over- He'd played me a few of their songs and when he found out that they would be playing in Downtown Disney- he totally geeked out all over me and said I had to go! Well.. we wern't really doing anything else. So I asked Randy if he would drop me off at Downtown Disney and I would go check out this weird band.

I am totally fine doing things alone- but Macy said she'd come with me. And then Kim caved and said she'd come. We got there shortly before their last set.

The band is called Steam Powered Giraffe. They are a steam punk band. They are robots! Well... they're actualy not bad. Some of their songs are super catchy and I had listened to them enough beforehand that I was able to sing along with them.

My sister was like, "what the heck are we watching?" But I thought it was awesome. haha!

I'm not even going to try to explain the music to you. Decide for yourself.  But you have to admit their harmonies are fantastic!

It was a ridiculously fun way to start our trip! Randy and Lisa came back and picked us up and we went home and got settled into our huge room that all 8 of us were sharing. Good thing we love eac other!

The next day started out with another mishap. If you know me at all, you know I never go anywhere without my water bottle. As we were sitting around at the hotel, waiting for bus time... I dropped my water bottle and broke it. The very first day. Ugggh!

When our bus came I got to sit next to Jenna. I'm not sure who was more excited to go to Downtown Disney, Jenna or me. We'll call it a tie.

Our first day there we just went to Downtown Disney. None of us had ever been there during the holidays so it was really fun to see it all decked out for Christmas.  We just wandered the stores and had fun.

We had Jenna in a wheelchair just so she would't get worn out. We did a TON of walking that week and she would have tired out so much faster if she'd walked the whole time.

Kim and Macy are basically Buzz and Woody- they're buddies! So They made matching shirts to wear together.

And Macy collects nutcrackers so she was pretty much in love with this guy.

 And then there's me.

When we went to DIsneyland as a family in 2009, I took pics of Shayla and Macy by these big stars- so to the best of our memory we had to recreate those photos! A few things have changed.

 Our only real plan for that day was dinner at Goofy's Kitchen. It's a Baker tradition.

We were there a little early and they weren't quite ready for us so we wandered around the Disneyland Hotel a little bit.

Seriously though, the CHristmas decor was just so fun! Here's an idea for this year's gingerbread house! Yeah?

yeah. no.

I saw this had and thought of JoAnna. She'd passed away just a few months before and we're all still missing her. JoAnna is my little brother's baby sister-in-law. Too young. So sad. But it was nice to see this fun little reminder of her.

We went back to see if our reservation was ready yet.

I loved the Goofy treee that they had. There is just no deteail left out.

A goldfish bowl in a christmas tree? Haha! How goofy! :D

And then we got to mean the man... er... dog himself! Chef Goofy!

I look absolutly horrendous in these pictures... but I posted this one becuase what the heck was I doing with my feet? I'm not a flippin ballerina?!

 If you've never been to Goofy's Kitchen I highly recommend it. And it was super fun seeing it all decked out for Christmas.

We had a few visitors at our table. The most notable was Pluto. We may have gotten into a bit of a fight. and he MAY have sent me to stand in the corner to think about what I did...

But we made up. At least long enough to take a picture. He vowed to keep an eye on me... not one more whisker out of line...

The dessert section was out of control! There were so many yummy things to choose from. I ened up sharing most of this. But the little mint whoopie pie was yumm-o!

Chip and Dale stopped by for a minute too! It's always fun to mingle with characters.

I'm not entirely sure if these videos will work- but we'll try anyway. Jenna loved dancing with Minnie. All the characters were so good with her. 

 

Because it was New Years I bought everyone New Years garb and then my mom and Kim helped me Disney-fy them a little bit! We got asked all over the place where we got our hats.

Here is the whole group- Minus Alex. He was taking the picture.

So he took a separate one of himself. He'd lost his hat. (and by "lost" I mean it fell and he ran over it with Jenna's wheelchair.)

Of all the times I've been to Disneyland, I've never taken time to walk through all the different buildings of the Disneyland Hotel. Each one had a tree representing a land in the Magic Kingdom.

These ones were Adventureland.

Fantasyland. 

And I'm pretty sure this one was Frontierland but it was too long ago and the picture is too little on my computer. haha!

It was also fun that every spare patch of soil had poinsettias planted in it. Unlike the frigid climates of Idaho and Utah, California can sustain the life of Poinsettias outside. So they were everywhere. It was awesome!

I found this guy as we were wandering the grounds. I'm not entirly sure what is going on with the mohawk looking business, but it's Mickey, so it's automatically awesome. 

We still had a lot of time to kill before midnight so they boys went to see Star Wars and the girls all went to see The Greatest Showman.  So good!

Our movie got out a lot sooner than the boys' so we wandered the shops some more and just took in all the decorations.

If you are ever finding yourself needing to buy be a gift, (birthday, Christmas, Tuesday...) then any merchandise you see here will give you an idea of what to get me. 

If you'll stop and take a look at the purse that Kim is wearing... It was Melanie's. It was just a funnny little black purse that she decorated with duct tape to make it Disney. Kim brought it with her so we'd have a little bit of Nonee with us.

And then of course Buzz and Woody found Buzz and Woody. 

We found this adorable cart that was selling macrons (not to be confused with Macaroons). They were almost too adorable to eat!

Almost.

We got a whole bunch of differnet ones and each took a bite so we could sample all of them. Oh my gosh they were amazing. 

What a fun way to kill time! When the boys' movie was over Randy and Lisa took Jenna back to the hotel to get some sleep. The hotel had left us a little bottle of Martinellis sparkling cider and some glasses so Randy and Lisa toasted the new year in together at the hotel. The rest of us went to sit in the space between park entrances. We sat around and talked about all our favorite memories of 2017 and what we were hoping 2018 would bring. Then we counted down the new year and got to see the fireworks over the castle.

Bonus surprise! There were three sets of fireworks going off! We didn't even know which direction to look! It was fantastic!

It was the best way ever to ring in the new year. Happy New Year everyone!

 

The Party's Over

When I was 39, back when I was young and idealistic, I had a goal that I would get a second little part time job that would allow me to save up for my birthday trip to Greece.  I wanted something that was fun. Something that was not stressful and somewhere I wouldn't have to work on Sundays.

In Utah the options for places that are closed on Sunday are kinda hard to come by because EVERYONE  wants a job with Sundays off.

On a whim I wandered into the party store. I turned in an application and a couple of days later I got a call from the manager. I interviewed shortly thereafter... and by interview I mean, I sat down to chat with the manager and before she even asked me anything retail related she said, "you know what? You're awesome. I'm not even going to interview you. You have the job."

It was that easy. And just like that I started working at the party store! It was just as the Halloween season was kicking off. I was happy to work until Halloween got closer and the store started to look like this.

It was totally out of control. People can be such jerks when they shop. Go ahead and throw it on the floor. Sure. Sure. Go ahead, open the package and then just leave the random costume parts strewn about. That's not at all a jerk face-y thing to do. Ugh...

But I survived Halloween and asked if I could stay on as I was hired as seasonal. I never doubted that they'd keep me- I'm awesome.

Seasons came and went and I got into a good routine. I always worked with mostly teenagers but for the most part they were pretty good kids. Lazy? sure, but when they did work- they worked super hard.

We always had fun though. Which was the hole point of the job.

From my years at Freddies I have a little merchandising experience so they let me do a few things in the store. 

Corporate would have someone slap together a table and they'd send us a picture of it... the manager always gave it over to me and let me improve on it. It was a fun way to use some of the weird things they sell.

Last year for our gradation table I filled this 36 inch balloon. This is the Balloon like, seven months later. After nine months it was still floating but it was looking pretty pathetic so someone popped it. Crazy, right?

As Halloween rolled around again, the manager knew to keep me away from costumes or I'd have a nervous break down! Ha! I still hadn't recovered from the previous Halloween. But by now I had other responsibilities throughout the store so they had the newbies do the seasonal and I was in charge of candy. I filled all the bulk bins and made sure things were fresh and clean.

I actually worked on Halloween night and we had waaaay too much fun! I talked my friend Ana into working there with me and it was always fun when we got to work together. It was rare- but when we were both there- watch out!

If I never blow up another balloon, it will be too soon. There were days where I went home with raw, sore fingers from having blown up so many balloons.

Like I said, this all started when I was 39, young, bright-eyed and full of hope of going to Greece for the big ugly birthday. Well, I'm 40 now, Greece didn't happen and I'm still broke.

A few months ago- I'm not sure what happened but it stopped being quite so fun. The people that I liked to work with started quitting. And the teeny boppers that were replacing them weren't fun. They were lazy with no side of hard work- just lazy through and through. and SO fowl mouthed. Ugh. I tried to make my own fun. And I mostly kept to myself doing the candy gig.

A couple of months ago they got a new manager... things didn't change. In fact, they kinda got worse. The teenagers got lazier, the store got more chaotic and it was officially no longer fun. I never even met the new manager. She's been there two months and never cared about her employees enough to even meet them face to face? The only time I've ever even spoken with her was when I called in after my vacation to tell me I was scheduled on a wrong day. She said I had to call someone to get coverage. Umm... not my mistake there honey. So instead, I worked the shift and turned in my two weeks notice. It was supposed to be a fun evening job, something to do to get me off the couch and out of the house.

Well lately it seems that I just don't have time to do anything. I was only at the party store two nights a week but it just seemed like it took up so much time. And it was work. I already have a full time job that is work. I already supervise a department of like, 20 people. I didn't need to go to a second job, work my tail off and make the same amount of money as the kids who stood around playing on their phones. Nope.  When it's supposed to be lighthearted and carefree- but you end up spending nine hours a week fuming with anger- it's just not worth it. So I quit.

I told them my last day was going to be tomorrow- but I worked yesterday and it was such a lovely day. Everyone I worked with was working so hard there was no time for anything else. I worked with Ana and so all of it I was able to leave on a really positive note.  Tomorrow it's all the teenagers scheduled so yeah... I'm not going in. I don't think they know that yet... but I have officially given away my last damn. I have no more left to give.

 I've been trying to be good and stay off foods my doctor told me to avoid- but I figured my last day on the job warranted a celebratory shake. It was good. It better be good because I waited FORTY FIVE FREAKING MINUTES in line for the dumb thing!

Anyway, that's the story of that one time I worked at a party store. I tried to leave in a positive enough way that if I decide to in the future I can go back... I don't know how kindly they'll take to my not showing up on the last day... but... oh wait.. there it went. The last damn. NOW I'm out of them.

Auf Wiedersehen, Zurchers!

Sometimes It's Embarrassing to be Me

Ok, Ok, that last post was a little serious.

It's been a while since I've had a good old fashioned whine-out about dating.

Go read this article and then come back.

And people ask why I don't date. Because it hurts too much! They said it's the same sensation as breaking a bone. I've never broken a bone... but I've had my heart broken more times than I can count. And after a while- you start to avoid the thing that hurts you, right? It's just human nature.

Plus- whenever I do allow myself to remove a few bricks from my protective wall, I end up feeling like such a fool. I'm 40. FORTY. That's not young! But I still behave as though I'm 12 when I'm around someone I'm attracted to.

I wont go into detail because it's just too embarrassing... but yesterday at work my favorite flirting buddy came in. I hardly ever see him now that my schedule is so early- but I've been lucky the last few weeks. Anyway, we were chatting... and he said something... within context of the conversation but my stupid head took it a different way and I started blushing and giggling- which made him blush so blushed even more... because.... oh my gosh I just don't even want to talk about it. I excused myself and hid in my office until he left.

If there was ever a poster child for awkwardness... t'would be I.

Jordan River Temple Dedication

I just wrote this long ol post with a zillion pictures and it disappeared. uuuuuuuugh! so here is the short version. I'll post the other pictures another day.

I may have mentioned in the past that my earliest living memory is of me walking hand in hand with my parents through the Jordan River Temple during the original open house in 1981. I was four years old. It clearly had an impact on me if I remember it from that early on. I have always had a special place in my heart for this temple.  A couple of years ago they closed it down for renovation and in March it opened back to the public for an open house before being being rededicated in May. 

for those of you who may not be familiar with the difference between LDS meeting houses and temples, click here.

Lately when a temple is dedicated, because they want as many who can to be involved, they stream the dedication sessions into local churches. I don't know how I got so lucky- but was invited to attend the session inside the temple. 

I went to the 3:00 session and sat in one of the ordinance rooms. Before it started, President Eyring,  Elder Cook and the Temple Presidency kind of paraded through the room. It was really fun to see them. Such sweet individuals.  I made sure to have my white hankie ready for the occasion.

This was my ticket to get in. I'll probably keep this one forever. 

The grounds were just lovely. Does anyone know what those purple puffball looking flowers are? I felt like I was walking through Whoville for a minute there.

It was a long line to get in, but they have a pretty impressive system down and got us all in and seated fairly quickly.

It was a beautiful session. I'm so grateful for the opportunity I had to go. I've said it before, I'll say it again. I'm so happy that I know Heavenly Father's Plan. I may not understand every detail about it- especially where I fit in the whole scheme of things. But it's so reassuring to know that there is so much more than this life. It's especially close to my heart after losing my dad.
(by the way... still weird)

And of course no outing would be complete without the obligatory selfies. It was such a lovely day. I'm so happy I got to be a part of it.

I love to see the temple.
I'll go inside one day.
I'll cov'nant with my Father
I'll promise to obey
For the Temple is a holy place
Where we are sealed together
As a Child of God I've learned this truth:
A Fam'ly is Forever.