Florida Trip DAY 2

We started the day off bright and early with a trip to Gatorland. There was rain in the forecast and it was quite wet outside, but it's Florida (where it often rains) so we didn't let that stop us. The humidity was HORRIBLE! Seriously I shouldn't have even bothered showering because once I stepped outside I was all wet again. We had to stop at Target to get jackets for the girls. They were cold. Haha....even though it was close to 90 degrees out. They weren't use to humidity. 

We were meeting up with my forever long time friend, Jamie, who I just adore, and I couldn't wait to see her. The park was fun. Nothing terribly exciting (except I did really enjoy feeding the birds). And honestly if you live in FL, you never have need to come here because no person in their right mind would PAY to see an alligator when all you have to do is drive past a river or lake to see one. But Ashlyn had a report to do for school on Florida wildlife, so my family members were all good sports and agreed to come with us.

The albino alligators were pretty fun to look at. They can't really survive in the wild, so most are in zoo's of some sort. Gatorland had four of them.

This a Chester. A 1,000 pound 13 1/2 foot long alligator that was caught eating backyard dogs in Tampa. Trappers wanted to turn him into accessories, but Gatorland saved him. My sister said she thought he would have looked better as a purse. Haha...naughty girl.

Pop and Leah

Dez, Pop and Leah

Me and Jamie. I just love this girl. SO glad I got to see her. The time was WAY too short.

Feeding the birds.

I love this picture. It just captures Jamie's happy spirit. These are her two boys Jack and Taylor, who are both very close in age to my boys.

Jamie's youngest little boy, Taylor who is just a 1 1/2 months younger than Carter. I had to hold him for a while just to pretend I had my little boy with me. He was also the only diaper I changed ALL week long. That was crazy. It's been almost 9 years since I've gone a week without changing a diaper. 

Me and my cute Leah on the train.

We went twice.

Uncle Chad, Ashlyn and Aunt Dez

Leah just adores her Uncle Chad. I had to repeatedly tell her to give him a rest from playing. Poor Chad was probably exhausted by the end of the week.

 The fam minus my Dad.

Now one minus my Mom.

Leah was a riot the entire week. Just cracking us up left and right. Here she is being eaten by an alligator. But my favorite line of hers all week has to be when we first walked into our hotel room. She looked around and said, "Where are the monkey bars?" HAHAHA....as if she was fully expecting to find some in there.

After Gatorland, Jamie had to head back home to Tampa, so we headed back to our hotel to get cleaned up and then right back out again to Downtown Disney. We ate dinner at this fun little Irish restaurant where they clog danced all around us. It was very entertaining.

Me, mom and Leah

After dinner, we walked around for a bit, waited for Brent's friend to get there, and then headed to Ghiradelli Ice cream shop to get some dessert. 

This is my nephew Brent (the reason for the trip to FL in the first place) and my sister Desiree.

Talk about HUGE dessert. I should have had the girls share a milk shake. They were SO yummy though. I had a mint brownie fudge sundae or something like that. I don't even remember what it was called. I just know I couldn't finish it.

Ashlyn didn't appreciate the flash in her eyes.

  

This is just a random picture taken on a random bench in Downtown Disney with some bronzed statue. Random huh?!

Leah was pretty slap stick by this time. It was at least 10 pm or later. She said her belly hurt after her ice cream (surprise, surprise), so she said, "Daddy told me if my belly hurts, I should lay on my tummy". She so lunged herself over the side of the chair. Then on the way home, she crashed. I guess the sugar rush wore off by then.

All I know is that by the time we got to bed, we were ALL exhausted and ready to not have to wake up at the crack of dawn the next day.

Florida trip DAY 1

Sunday after church was spent doing laundry, packing and getting ready for the big day. I was exhausted by the end of the day and went to bed at 10:30pm setting my alarm for 4:40am. Our flight left at 8:50 am and I wasn't sure what traffic was going to be like, so we planned to leave at 6 am. Low and behold I wake up to the sunlight. Hm....that was not good. I look at my phone. It's 5:50am. AHHHHH!!!!! I jumped out of bed yelling to Paul that I missed my alarm (still not sure how that happened). We kicked it into some MAJOR high gear and still got out of the house and on the road by 6:20am. It was definitely not how I had planned to start my week long trip to Florida. Traffic was fabulous though (thanks to Memorial Day) and we got to the airport in about an hour. Maybe just a little under that. We got to our gate no problem and had a FABULOUS flight to FL. Seriously the best flight I have been on since having kids (with kids that is). It was so easy to have the girls. They were really good and mostly listened to music or watched movies. 

We landed in FL mid afternoon (FL time), got our luggage and rental car and headed out to find something to eat. The plane literally offered us NOTHING. Not even a bag of peanuts. Just a drink. We ate at Subway. It was the girls request, and they both ate a full 6 inch sub. They've never eaten that much at one time. After that we headed back to the airport to pick up my mom who was flying in from UT. We ended up having to wait in the cell phone lot for about 30 minutes until she got in and while sitting there, saw this sandhill crane walking across the lot. It was definitely a fun welcome to Florida. 

After we got my mom, we drove to our hotel, got a little settled and headed to my sisters house to hang out for a bit. Before I knew it, it was after 10pm, so we got back to the hotel and got ready for our early morning the next day. 

Hair cut

I chopped about 6 inches off my hair two days before I went to Florida. It was time for a change. It had been growing for 2 years and it was stringy and dry. I was sick of it. I, of course, do not fix it as well as the stylist did, but I still like it. Leah, on the other hand, told me she liked it better long. Haha.....

Leah's treat for sitting so nicely while I got my hair done. She was insistent on coming even though I told her it would probably be boring. I think she was hoping for a treat like this at the end. 

Leah's year end performance

 Leah's year end performance was scheduled to be during the week that we were going to be out of town for my nephew's graduation. But having the awesome teacher that she does, she offered to let me come to the rehearsal of it the week before. She even had Leah wear her costume. I just love her teacher. Anyway, the performance was super cute. We got VERY front row seats, since we were the only one's there (well us and one other mom that happened to be volunteering in the classroom that day). It was super cute. The story of the "wide mouth frog". Totally adorable. Leah was a lion and she did a very good job.

Leah's teacher even had Ashlyn pulled out of class so she could watch it. Seriously, that was so thoughtful!

Brandon got bored and started taking pictures of everything. He took over 200 I think. 

Including quite a few shots of his feet. Haha.....

Spotlight on Carter

I'm almost a month behind, but Carter had his 18 month check up the end of April. He was a champ. No shots cuz he was a little under the weather, so we have to go back for that. I can't remember all of his exact stats, but he is 25th% for weight, 50th% for head and about 75th% for height. Approximately. He's dropped down in the weight a bit, probably due to the fact that he only eats baby food and drinks milk. (well at least at that time). 

So just as I was starting to look into occupational therapy to get him eating solids, he ate an alphabet cookie. I must say I was shocked. He had been carrying them around for a while, with occasionally bringing it to his mouth, but had never actually eaten it. Well, he totally did! It was a VERY exciting day. Since then he has eaten them every day and has branched out to liking Vanilla Wafers and graham crackers as well. I'm so excited to be making some progress. I'm still looking into occupational therapy, but in the mean time, I have a friend who is one and specializes in feeding issues (Talk about a huge blessing. Wish I had known her when Ashlyn was a baby.). She gave me some other tips to help him start eating more lumpy textured foods. It's a very slow process, but it'll come. I'm sure of it. 

Other than that, Carter is doing really well. He's sleeping great, napping great, saying more and more words all the time, communicating some with sign language, playing with friends and just running around being a happy little 18 month old. Not to say he's not into everything. HE TOTALLY IS! And he pretty much exhausts me on a daily basis, but that's pretty par for the course. Oh and he doesn't like to stay in nursery by himself (but honestly I can't blame him. It's craziness in there).

I was at the store yesterday and some lady looked at him and said, "wow. well isn't he just perfect"! To which I said, "why yes, yes he is!" I can't be humble when it comes to him. He's got a smile to die for and an adorable little personality to match. (Just don't ask me how fun he is to have around when he's sick though. I might have something totally different to say). 

Here are some random pictures of my little cute guy! 

Update: Ok, so he pooped in the bathtub tonight. I guess no one's perfect! We still love you little guy!