January

We have had a very busy month so far!


Braelyn is getting so big and my kids love her sooooo much!  Seeing them with her almost makes me want a third...but I will happily (and very officially) settle for a baby we can send back to my sister's house. :)

We had a great breakfast at my sister's house with the whole family. The kids enjoyed some play time on the hammock with my dad.

Chuck, Mary, and Brian arrived on the 10th.  Their visit went by too quickly, but we squeezed a lot in in a short amount of time.  Unfortunately, I wasn't great with photos, but we stayed very busy.  We had a great dinner on Las Olas Saturday night. Sunday morning, we headed to Miami for a boat tour of Miami, including the celebrity homes on Millionaire Row.  The homes were beautiful.

After the boat tour, we headed up to our favorite beach spot to show them the boardwalk we enjoy visiting.  We grabbed a bite to eat at our favorite taco place, and Charlie was a crazy boy enjoying his black beans. His faces were cracking us up!

We came back to our house after that and enjoyed a belated Christmas dinner and gift exchange. It was a wonderful night!

I had to work on Monday, but the rest of the group enjoyed a great day.  They spent some time at the park, as well as the mall, complete with a trip to Barnes and Noble. 

Charlie was a little tired after the busy day. :)

We have been doing a lot of home improvement projects lately, which means a lot of time at Home Depot.  The kids enjoy being crazy in the race car cart they always insist on getting. 

Unfortunately, one of our projects led to a major mishap the other night.  It's a long story to explain, but the short story is that I tripped and fell flat on my face in our bedroom...while carrying an open 2 gallon bucket of white paint. It was pretty much terrible, yet better than expected.  It cleaned up pretty well, although a co-worker just found more white paint in my hair today, which is 2 weeks later. Once the mess was almost cleaned up, we were ready to laugh about it and grabbed the camera.  I wish I had a picture of the original disaster.  Believe me, it was AWFUL.

Charlie had a great time borrowing Reese's princess dress while she was at school the other day. :)

We met my parents for breakfast last Saturday. Charlie insisted on wearing his rain boots (despite the sunshine).  Who was I to argue? 

The poor little guy is way too big for his little tricycle, but he refuses to try to pedal, so I'm not sure what to do next!

We headed up to Disney to use the final two days on our pass last weekend.  The kids were great in the car on the way up. 

Look at the size of that hand!

Reese was super sleepy and sweet on the way up.  And then about an hour from Disney, she said the 4 little words no parent wants to hear..."I just threw up."  Yeah.  We were hoping it was just motion sickness, so we decided to hang out at the hotel to see how she did.  

This was all she wanted to do. 

Eventually though, she got a little energy and wanted to check out the resort.  Charlie was happy to be out of the room. :)

Each section of the resort represents a different decade. It was fun to see! 

Reese seemed to spunk up at the park, but then she laid down on the ground to rest, so that cancelled out our optimism. 

The pool area was pretty cool, and Charlie was infatuated.  Unfortunately, I had figured we would only be at the resort to sleep, so I hadn't packed any swim gear at all.  Charlie kept insisting that he could swim as long as he had a life jacket (he took one from the resort and put it on himself), but didn't understand that we didn't have swim wear and that no one could get in with him.  The poor kid was very disappointed.  

At some point in this argument, Reese decided to dip her toes in too, and then suddenly declared she was ready to go the park.  We headed back to the room to have her eat something to be sure she could keep food down.  She really seemed fine, so we chalked it up to being carsick and headed to Magic Kingdom.

She was so excited to ride a bus.

I took this picture of Reese in front of the castle.  I showed it to her tonight, and it blew her mind.  She couldn't figure out how Tinkerbell could have been there without any of us seeing her.  She said she never even felt her land on her hands.  She thought it was so cool.  It was pretty great to see her reaction. :)

The first thing we did was catch the Move It Shake It parade.  Basically, the characters come through on floats and then head to the streets where the kids can go up and dance with them.  It was awesome. :)  Charlie was very excited to see the Toy Story float again. He even got to dance with Woody.

We caught Mickey taking selfies. :)

After the parade, we headed to meet Jasmine and Aladin.

After that, we headed to Winnie and Tigger.  We wanted to try to meet everyone we didn't get to meet last time--Reese has had a running list she keeps reminding us about. ;)

Reese and I went on the speedway race car ride.  Neither one of us could control the car.  It was kind of awful. haha

Charlie took his first ride on the teacups.  He LOVED them!

Reese fell asleep in line waiting to meet Woody and Jessie. 

Meeting Woody and Jessie was epic.  At first, Woody didn't see Charlie.  He only saw Reese.  Jessie had to take a break from the action to point him out to him.  Once he saw him, he bent down, and Charlie gave him the never ending embrace. Woody kept opening his arms to end the hug, and Charlie kept holding strong.  It was hilarious.  He had no intention of letting go.  It was the sweetest thing ever.  

The kids love the magic carpet ride.

Reese insisted on waiting in line to meet Merida from Brave. She was on her list of people she hadn't met yet..even though she hasn't seen the movie and doesn't know anything about her.  She certainly enjoyed it though!

We went to story time with Belle at the end of the evening.  Austin was selected to play the Beast, which was pretty awesome. 

Braelyn met her first princess. :)

After the fireworks, we headed back to the hotel.  Charlie fell fast asleep on me on the shuttle ride back, and hardly woke up to change into pajamas.  It was his first time sleeping outside of a crib with Reese, and it was so sweet to lay there and watch them.  

Unfortunately, Reese woke up throwing up again in the middle of the night.  I was up with her most of the night with trips to the bathroom.  We thought for sure we were headed home and skipping the parks in the morning, and then as suddenly as she had the day before, she turned a corner and insisted she was fine.  We debated and debated and finally decided to head to the park.  Overall, she was great all day, but she definitely was more tired than usual and not totally herself.  And since Charlie and I have both caught the bug now, we can definitely determine that it was contagious.  So if you hear of a stomach flu outbreak from Disney....whoops.  At least we didn't start the measles. :)

We decided to switch it up on Saturday and we headed to Animal Kingdom.

We went on the safari tour. It was really cool.  Our vehicle drove through the wild, and we had animals walking right along next to us. 

Charlie insisted that he wouldn't go near Pocahontas without me.  And apparently this weird face was his new thing this weekend. 

We ended the day and our trip by visiting Mickey and Minnie. It was the perfect farewell. 

Reese has still been reading a ton, which is really awesome.  She wanted to read bedtime stories to Charlie the other night.