Kreg & I planted this aspen tree outside our house when we bought it in 2008 and Kreg has carved all the names & birth dates of our babies in it since then. We are SO thrilled to announce to all our friends that we are planning to add one more name & birth date to it in mid-September!
And for those who (like me) think that ultrasound babies are SO CUTE, here is our little cutie today at 12 weeks 2 days! So loved already by all 5 of us.
Oh, Tucker! Where do I even start? Tucker Kreg turned four this summer! My blond hair, green-eyed boy has broken the Kell Boy mold in many ways.
Tucker & I do preschool together a few days a week and it is such a treasure to me to have this time with him "one-on-one..." I put that in quotation marks because Brooks is very much here with us but I do my best to keep him occupied long enough to give Tucker as much of my undivided attention as possible. And let me tell you, if you ever get a chance to get this boy one-on-one, you are in for a real treat. Getting a little insight into how his mind works is jut fascinating! He thinks outside the box and I can't wait to see how that develops as he gets older. Right now its just plain fun :)
Like the rest of the Kell boys, Tucker loves being outside and being active. He's been able to play soccer, basketball, and take swimming
lessons this year, and he excels in every sport. He struggles when
he's too young to do something Westin is already doing and I think this
just gives him that little extra motivation, not to mention an upper
hand at understanding said sport, to be the very best when he does get
his chance to play! He blew our minds with his rock climbing skills
when we found a gym that allowed him to give it a try-- he just climbed
all the way up like he was Spiderman! He was THRILLED that he was
allowed to climb :)
His favorite color is green and he frequently points out that he & I are the only ones in the family with "matching green eyes."
His favorite food is pizza & pineapples... at least that's what he said when I asked him! He's a great eater and will try just about anything. No food fear for this 4-year-old.
His favorite game is "Lego Star Wars"
on the ipad-- he and Westin put their hard earned money together to
each come up with $3.50 to pay for the full game so they could stop
playing the one free level :) Thank goodness for the family icloud
sharing!
His favorite movie is Star Wars-- the Force Awakens
He would like to have a baby pig for
a pet and discusses this possibility with us frequently. He told us
recently he would like a farm for his birthday so he can finally get his
baby pig. This child.
He is fascinated by tornadoes so we had to start watching tornado documentaries because he asked questions I had NO idea how to answer. He's the expert if you ever want to know any random twister facts!
Tucker has the biggest heart and is always so conscientious of other people and their feelings. He also has a classic ornery streak and its always so fascinating to me to see how these traits go hand in hand so well :) He's the perfect
middle brother-- he holds his ground with Westin & his friends and
his gentle side comes out with Brooks-- and really ALL babies. He's the
first one to give up something that belongs to him to make someone else
happy. He's protective and playful and we just love him to pieces.
Thank you, God, for our Tucker Kreg! Please bless him as he continues to grow and learn and love You and Your people and Your creation so deeply.
Our biggest boy turned six this year! He continues to be a delight to our family and such a large part of what makes us "us!"
He started Kindergarten this fall and is doing FABULOUS. I couldn't have asked for better! He's a bright, capable student, a willing helper, and a friend to all. He enjoys reading and creating, and understanding how things work. His latest obsession is dinosaurs. He knows far more about them than I do and we have made our way through many a messy dinosaur-dig-kits.
He continues to enjoy being active and played basketball, soccer, and baseball this year as well as took several months of swimming lessons.
I recently asked him which sport was his favorite-- which one he would choose if he could only play one. His eyes teared up and he said, "only one?" HAHA-- guess we're not there, yet! This was a huge year for him in soccer-- he played two ourdoor seasons, did 2 soccer camps, and one indoor season, just in 2015. It was amazing to me to watch him go from really just being out there to socialize, to using real skills and moves and becoming an active participant in the game. This most recent season he had a 3-week scoring streak and was THRILLED with this accomplishment! Baseball was a fun adventure this summer-- this was our first venture outside of t-ball and he did great! I can't get over the fun of watching the pride and joy on his face when he accomplishes something new.
He's a little fish in the water-- we spent hours and hours at the pool this summer and it was a delight to watch him! He loved the ocean this summer as well and frequently talks about going back.
Wes also started taking piano lessons from a sweet friend of ours this year and has loved it so far! He's always seemed to be drawn to music and its fun to watch him practice because he can't help but sing along while he plays. Coming from a *former* pianist, this amazes me because I always found it impossible to do both at once!
His favorite color still is, and will probably always be blue. He gravitates towards blue everything and we all associate it with Wes in the Kell house.
His favorite food is bison hot dogs. He's also a wonderful veggie eater and prefers to snack on celery, carrots, and broccoli throughout the day.
His favorite game is "Wits & Wagers" which we keep up at the cabin in Estes. He's quite good at it and we all enjoy playing with him.
His favorite movies are the Star Wars & Jurassic Park collections, all of which his Daddy has enjoyed introducing him to this year!
His favorite TV show is, get this, The Magic Schoolbus. It's on Netflix these days! Like I said, he loves learning how things work.
Westin is the most extroverted, social person I have ever met. I'm a giant introvert so this has stretched me pretty much his entire life-- one of the parts of being a mom that I'm really so grateful for. He gets along with people of all ages and is constantly asking for play dates. He says all the time how great it is he has brothers because "it's like having built-in friends." This introverted mama is thankful for those built-in friends!
It's been an absolute joy to me to watch his faith grow this year. His precious prayers have extended beyond the "thank you God for [insert literally everything here, which is also a great phase]" to being full of depth about the needs of
others that he sees and asking for character traits for himself like
being a good leader and a good friend and a hard worker. He's quick to
share his faith with others and ask them about their own. I know God's word is being hidden in his little heart as he has been able to apply verses and stories to his day-to-day this year and nothing in the world could make me more proud! Thank you, God, for our Westin Wayne! He is a joy and our lives are forever better because you sent him to us to love.
Sweet Brooks! How fun you are! You are in full-on little boy mode! You bring such joy to our family & a good amount of challenge to our day-to-day. You are energetic and playful, sweet and snuggly, smart and funny, and your smile-- your smile is SO contagious!
You are talking up a storm! Every day is a new word and you have an uncanny knack for stringing them together to make lengthy sentences to tell us exactly how you feel or exactly what happened or exactly what you want.
Your favorite things are:
Mickey Mouse Clubhouse!Your favorite characters are Mickey (Kick-ey) and Donald (Nonald)-- you sing along with the songs and interact with the characters. Any time we see something with Mickey on it while we're out, we have to stop to investigate!
Football! As soon as Daddy walks through the door and you've given him your "daddy HOOOME" squeeze, you ask him "watch foo-ball?" You enjoy watching it and playing it with your Daddy. You have quite the little arm!
Your Brothers!"Bubba" & "Kucko" are your best friends and your biggest role models. You just KNOW you're one of them and there's nothing you feel you can't do with them. They love you too! They think you're the cutest thing on planet earth and they would do anything to protect you.
Sweet potato fries! You eat all of yours and mommy's too!
Backpacks!You always want to wear your brother's and load it up with your stuff-- so we got you one for yourself and you think its just awesome.
Brooks William, you are SO loved! We love having you as part of our family & we delight in all of your "firsts" and in each new discovery. We are so glad God entrusted you to our care and we pray that your heart will always seek Him and strive to love & serve His people.
Well, it may have taken me six months but I wasn't about to let this amazing trip go un-documented! I'm kicking myself that 90% of the photos I took were iphone photos... and I don't even have the excuse of not having my real dslr with me. Oh, well!
As cliche as it sounds, taking a six-year-old, four-year-old, and one-year-old to Disney World truly was magical! It helped that we went with an entourage of built-in nannies :) That may be my #1 suggestion for anyone trying to plan their trip with little ones! Going with my entire family meant everyone got to experience each age-appropriate part of the resort and everyone took turns with those not quite big enough to do everything. It was wonderful.
We stayed on the resort at the Yacht Club-- which we simply adore. This was our second stay at this hotel and it just doesn't disappoint. My very favorite part is the pool-- its attached to the Beach Club, the neighboring hotel, and the pool has SAND in it. This was a massive hit with my crew.
This was a reward trip from my Dad
& Kreg's company which really is my favorite way to travel! Our
first day they hosted a welcome banquet for us at the resort and had all
the characters there for a meet and greet-- we knocked out all our
autographs & character photos this way without the giant lines-- it
was a perfect way to start out the trip for my boys! I love the photo
of our whole group with Mickey & Minnie!
After the welcome banquet we spent the rest of the afternoon enjoying the pools! It was a good way to gear up for the week and recover from our early morning travels. We had a light dinner on the patio and enjoyed the fireworks off the pier behind our hotel.
We had the park hopper passes which were perfect for us for the week. Kreg, our master planner, got all our fast passes loaded onto our magic bands (oh my goodness, I love those things) and we planned our days out based on those times. We used the My Disney Experience app to monitor wait times at the rides we didn't have fast passes for so we really didn't spend much time waiting in lines at all. More on that later.
Our first park day we spent at Animal Kingdom. This was our hottest day of all so the Kali River Rapids was exceptionally welcome-- everyone but Brooks was able to ride so we went in two groups and everyone loved it! Westin was not a huge fan of "It's Tough to be a Bug" but the rest of us thought it was great-- especially since it was air conditioned! Brooks comforted Wes as we were leaving the theater which I thought was precious (middle right photo below!). The Jungle Trek is just awesome, friends. Don't miss it. I cried through the Lion King show because I have 3 sweet little boys who love the Lion King and it's just plain emotional to watch them take it all in and make memories that will stick with me forever. How does Disney do that?? Everyone got naps in, thanks to those awesome nannies I was telling you about and my trusty double Britax B-Ready stroller! We didn't even feel the need to head back to the room for naps this day, which helped us fit in everything we wanted to at Animal Kingdom.
Another highlight of the Animal Kingdom was the Dinosaur ride! It took
some coaxing to convince Westin to ride with us and he became well
versed in the concept of "animatronics" and was quick to confirm that
each ride was ONLY animatronics, right? :) Sweet boy. Tucker, at 39
3/4" was coached by Kreg on how to stand up tall and take a deep breath
each time he was measured so he could ride with us :) I really think his
Keen sandals with the thick sole helped us out too! I'm so glad he
made the cut because that little adrenaline junkie LOVED the rides!
That evening we had another company-hosted party and it was AWESOME. They reserved the Dinoland section of the Animal Kingdom park so we had all the Dinoland attractions to ourselves. They served a yummy cajun-style dinner and we had a private showing of Nemo: The Musical, which was super cute.
I'm bummed I didn't take more pictures of that evening, but I did get an awesome video of the boys & Aunt Tay- Tay doing the Cupid Shuffle at dinner! She's such a cool aunt.
The next day we started off with a hearty breakfast at the hotel before heading out for our first Magic Kingdom day. Everyone knew one day at the Magic Kingdom wouldn't be enough for this crew so we divided it into two days-- the first day we did Adventureland, Tomorrowland, and Frontierland. Brooks and I spent some quality time together in Frontierland while the rest of the crew did Big Thunder Mountain Railroad & Splash Mountain. To this day, Splash Mountain is the ride the boys keep talking about wanting to do again :). Brooks' infatuation with Mickey began about this time so there was plenty of Mickey paraphernalia to keep him occupied! He thought his Mickey Robeez were the greatest thing ever. Seriously, its the little things! Another side note for those planning to do this trip in the summertime with a baby-- STROLLER FAN!! We bought this one and it was a life saver. Yes, people poked fun, but you know deep down they just wished they had one too. And I used the excuse "we're from Colorado" at least ten times a day ;).
One of my favorite memories of this trip was when Kreg, Westin, and I got to ride Space Mountain together. Westin was so excited to be able to do this one with us and we had built it up all day, saving it for one of our very last rides. He looks so serious on the ride photo itself but when we finished he was SO PROUD and said it was AWESOME. The bottom photo pretty much sums it up. If there is one regret I have from the whole trip, its that we didn't end up eating at the Be Our Guest restaurant-- we called 2 months in advance to get reservations and found out you really need to call 6 months in advance when they start taking the reservations... especially if you are traveling with 11 people! So, that's at the top of the list for the next trip!
Our next day we decided to split between Epcot & Hollywood Studios since they are smaller and there was less that we felt like we just HAD to do at those parks. We started off with another company-hosted banquet buffet where Westin had his (ahem) fair share, of bacon. And then proceeded to stuff some more in his mouth and arms as we walked out. Not that I can blame him-- doing Disney works up an appetite! I got roughly 20,000 steps a day on my FitBit so you know his little legs probably got twice that many. And he very rarely jumped in the stroller.
At Epcot, the "big people" did the Test Track while Tucker, Brooks, and I checked out Nemo & the aquarium. Then we met up for lunch-- and let's be honest, eating is one of my favorite things to do at Epcot. Some day I may just have to stop for something in each country. We agreed on England and had some yummy fish & chips before jumping on the ferry to head to Hollywood Studios.
The boys both did Tower of Terror with Kreg... seriously, I'm in big trouble with all these adrenaline junkies. They weren't in a huge hurry to do it again, though! The bigs did Rock 'n' Roller Coaster while the littles & I Chief watched the Little Mermaid show-- which actually kept all of their attention really well, especially Tucker who I had convinced to watch it with me not long before this trip. I know that doing Disney with 3 girls would have been a COMPLETELY different experience, but at least they didn't run full speed away from anything that had to do with princesses. They're very thoughtful to accommodate their mommy's childhood loves! We got caught in a giant electrical storm at Hollywood Studios that afternoon so we hung out at the Backlot Express and snacked and watched the storm while we waited for it to pass. That evening we ate at Mama Melrose's for dinner & finished just in time to catch the Fireworks and head to the late showing of Fantastmic. Where I once again bawled like a baby because that's what Disney does to me. I have such vivid memories of that show over the past 20 years of my life and I love that its been special to me in so many phases of life. Seeing it with my babies drove home how quickly childhood passes! I'm thankful for these reminders even if it is painful to think about-- it reminds me to live in the moment and soak in the memories because I'm really not very good at doing that. I'm very task-oriented and goal-driven and my day to day typically consists of checklists and focusing on results rather than enjoying all the little things. I'm working on it though!
Speaking of time flying, Tucker Kreg turned four during our trip! I really can't think of a better way for a four year old to spend his birthday than at Disney World. He got to wear this "Happy Birthday" button all week & all the Cast Members wished him Happy Birthday everywhere we went. He also got plenty of special treats & a special Buzz Lightyear souvenir courtesy of Chief & Mimi. We adore this sweet boy & the special place he has in our hearts. Life would simply not be the same without him! Thank you, God, for our Tucker!
In other milestones, Brooks took his first steps on our trip! My brother sat him down in the lobby of the Convention center and he shocked us all by taking 4 steps towards Kreg! Seriously, guys-- this place is magic and I love love love it. Thanks to my sister Kortney for getting this video a few minutes later and to Taylor for bribing him with her phone. It takes a village.
Our last day the parks we went back to Magic Kingdom & almost the whole day in Fantasyland. Kreg was a trooper and indulged my desire to dress us all in Mickey t-shirts. Thanks, babe! We had a fast pass for the new 7 Dwarves ride and looking back I'm almost bummed that we did because the line queue is awesome! They seriously have outdone themselves on the line queues-- and many of them are air conditioned... we may have to take this into consideration when planning out fast passes next time! Brooks was a big fan of It's a Small World just like Tucker was when we took him as a baby. You just have to do it every time :)
We stopped and took in some parade magic this time and enjoyed some cold treats. Brooks was so excited to see the Mickey floats-- my heart, guys. My heart. I'm really not joking about the line queues. My very favorite one of all was the Peter Pan's flight line. They've recently redone it and the line queue takes you through the Darling's house and it's just precious. Tinkerbell is all over the place and interacts with the kids thanks to some kind of amazing technology. It was just as fun if not more fun than the ride itself.
Dinner that night was at about 10:30 pm... but when we finally stopped we headed to Downtown Disney and did The Rainforest Cafe. I forget how much there is to do at Downtown Disney, it's easy to overlook it when you're go-go-going at the parks.
It's the Good family's tradition to squeeze a day at Cocoa Beach in when
we are in Orlando. We strategically placed our beach day at the very
end of the week this time and it was brilliant. Everyone was exhausted
from our week of parks and some beach time was just what the doctor
ordered. Taylor took a few family photos for us which I'm so thankful
for! After that we did lunch on the pier and spent the rest of the
afternoon lounging and exploring and watching our 3 little fishies act
like they were made for the ocean.
After a lovely day at the beach, we cleaned up at our hotel and had dinner and souvenir shopped at the Boardwalk behind our hotel-- we ate at Big River Grille & Brewing Works and it was awesome. Definitely going to remember that one for the next trip. It was one of the prettiest nights EVER. It had rained just before we headed out to dinner so it cooled down the air to a very comfortable temperature and the sky was just unreal. It was the absolute perfect way to reflect on the week and enjoy our last evening. We watched the fireworks across the bay from our patio seat at the Grille and headed to bed at a decent time in order to get up early and head home.
I'm so very, very grateful for the precious memories made this week and for the chance to get away with all my people!
One of my favorite memories of this trip was when Kreg, Westin, and I got to ride Space Mountain together. Westin was so excited to be able to do this one with us and we had built it up all day, saving it for one of our very last rides. He looks so serious on the ride photo itself but when we finished he was SO PROUD and said it was AWESOME. The bottom photo pretty much sums it up. If there is one regret I have from the whole trip, its that we didn't end up eating at the Be Our Guest restaurant-- we called 2 months in advance to get reservations and found out you really need to call 6 months in advance when they start taking the reservations... especially if you are traveling with 11 people! So, that's at the top of the list for the next trip!
Speaking of time flying, Tucker Kreg turned four during our trip! I really can't think of a better way for a four year old to spend his birthday than at Disney World. He got to wear this "Happy Birthday" button all week & all the Cast Members wished him Happy Birthday everywhere we went. He also got plenty of special treats & a special Buzz Lightyear souvenir courtesy of Chief & Mimi. We adore this sweet boy & the special place he has in our hearts. Life would simply not be the same without him! Thank you, God, for our Tucker!
We stopped and took in some parade magic this time and enjoyed some cold treats. Brooks was so excited to see the Mickey floats-- my heart, guys. My heart.
I'm really not joking about the line queues. My very favorite one of all was the Peter Pan's flight line. They've recently redone it and the line queue takes you through the Darling's house and it's just precious. Tinkerbell is all over the place and interacts with the kids thanks to some kind of amazing technology. It was just as fun if not more fun than the ride itself.
