Magic Kingdom

On the Tuesday of our trip all 10 of us went to Magic Kingdom. As you'll soon see, it was so good to have that many adults there - we got way more done that way.

It takes a little longer to get to MK because after you park in the parking lot you have to take the monorail or a ferry to get there.

The biggest piece of advice I have about the Magic Kingdom - for those of you with little ones, do NOT bother with the Dumbo ride unless you expect an absolute meltdown for avoiding it. We went straight there (like you have to - the lines are crazy for this ride), but by the time you walk down Main Street to get there, it was already 9:10 - we already had to wait 40 mins - to go on a glorified mid-way ride that goes around in circles in a Dumbo instead of an airplane (or whatever). Especially since we later saw a Dumbo "statue" that you could climb into to get your picture taken in.

Some of the adults stood in the Dumbo line for the girls while they rode Cinderella's Carrousel. Uncle Shaun went to get fastpasses for The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh. I should've stood in line at Ariel's Grotto (meet and greet with Little Mermaid), but at the time there was no line so I didn't. Mistake.... by the time Dumbo was done the lineup was long. So, knowing we were coming back another day, we skipped it.

In the meanwhile Uncle Shaun & Auntie Linsay were waiting in the Princess Meet and Greet line for the girls. It ended up being a 45 min wait so we rode Goofy's Barnstormer (kid rollercoaster) while they were waiting. Next the girls got their prized princess autographs (Cinderella, Belle & Sleeping Beauty) and toured Mickey's House. Minnie's House was closed for repairs.

While we were out in Toontown doing all this, Uncle Shaun ran back to get fastpasses for the Peter Pan ride. So, next we went to ride Winnie the Pooh (using our FastPasses). We rode It's a Small World and then saw Mickey's 3D Philharmagic - it was awesome! Even the girls liked it, though they were a little scared in some parts. After that was Peter Pan's Flight - one of the girls' favourite rides.

After all this we got fastpasses for Splash Mountain, took the train back to the exit and then went back to the house for lunch, swimming and a rest.

Then it was back to the MK. I had to feed Jacob so Nathan spent some time with the girls, walking around and eating popcorn while the other adults went on the Haunted Mansion (too scary for the girls).

Then Mom watched Jacob, Nathan took the girls on the Liberty Belle Riverboat ride and I went with the others on Splash Mountain - most of us wore our rain ponchos so we wouldn't get wet! :)

Then we all toured the Swiss Family Treehouse and went on the Jungle Cruise - the tour guide for this ride was hilarious, so this was another favorite.

We were all famished by this point, so we decided to leave. Well, it was 8:30 and the parade starts at 9:30 so it took us awhile to get out of there! But we finally did.

Even though we got so much done, we likely saw only about 1/2 of the park, if that. It was fabulous and the girls loved it! And we were pretty tired!

Check out the pictures.....

Mickey & Minnie's Houses

The Carrousel, Dumbo, It's a Small World

Our girls!

Relaxing back at the house

Happy Mother's Day

For all those moms who sometimes need a little humour to get through the day, please check out this ecard - it is too cute/funny! I wish I could figure out how to get it to play directly on my blog - if anyone knows how, please let me know! Oh, and for the slightly computer challenged out there (cough, cough, mom, cough, cough) - you need to click on the same colored flowers on the left and on the right of the card to hear the difference in what we hear.

Animal Kingdom

OK, I'm finally getting around to posting some Disney stuff!!

We left Friday right after I fed Jacob and we made it to The City (3hrs away) before he needed to eat again - just like I planned :) I fed him while everyone went inside Paradiso and ordered already - worked great! We almost made it to Minneapolis before he woke up again wanting to eat, so we made a stop at the closest town with a McDonalds so the kids could have ice cream and run around.

At Minneapolis we stayed at the Staybridge Suites - an excellent hotel!!! We had a two room suite with a full kitchen, we could park there all week, got a shuttle to the airport - for $110. Plus the continental breakfast was really a breakfast buffet - scrambled eggs, bacon, waffles, watermelon, canteloupe, cottage cheese, porridge, boiled eggs, name brand cereal, toast, muffins, yogurt - the best continental breakfast I've ever seen!

So, Saturday morning we flew to Orlando. The flight went well. I fed Jacob during take off and he was just fine. When we landed he was sleeping so I figured I'd just let him sleep. Probably a mistake - he was pretty cranky the rest of the day so I think his ears were hurting. On the way home I fed him during take off and landing and he was just fine. Emma was slightly dizzy during take off and landing - but nobody actually got sick, thankfully!

After renting our vehicles at the airport it was off to our house. It was awesome!!! The owners met us there was fresh chocolate chip cookies, muffins, juice and roses. They gave us some tips about Disney (including a short cut) and left us their cell number to call whenever we needed anything. They were great! I highly recommend staying with Romancing the Mouse. If you stay based on our recommendation you get a 30% discount (thats what we did), plus if you mention us, we get an extra discount off our next visit, 5% for every time someone stays there based on our referral.

Sunday we went to Animal Kingdom. It was a perfect day and it was not very busy. The first ride we went on was Kilimanjaro Safaris - everyone's favorite ride. The animals were incredible and the ride was fun - huge "jeeps" that sat 6 people per row. I had even worked it out that I could feed Jacob while on this ride. Yes, I was organized! We went on the Kali River Rapids - which was not the girls favorite since they got wet. We saw a show called "Flights of Wonder" with live birds performing tricks. We walked the Maharajah Jungle Trek. We saw an awesome 3D show called "It's Tough to be a Bug" - the girls were totally scared so they just closed their eyes through the whole thing - which was thankfully only 7 mins long. It was awesome though! The girls met Mickey Mouse and then we went back to our house for lunch, a swim and a nap. Then we went back to Animal Kingdom late afternoon (avoiding the worst of the crowd, and the worst of the heat) - the girls met Mickey again, as well as Minnie, Goofy and Donald. We saw the Festival of the Lion King - an amazing show - kinda like Disney on Ice without the ice. :) The girls rode TriceraTop Spin (like the airplane ride at our local amusement park, just with dinosaurs instead of airplanes). Then Shaun, Nathan & I rode Expedition Everest - an awesome roller coaster - while the rest took the girls to see Pooh, Tigger, Piglet & Eyeore. Then we went out to eat and came back to the house - phew - what a day!

We used the Unofficial Tour Guide tours for all our park trips - I highly recommend it, especially if you're going on a busier day.

Here's some pictures! I'll try and post more about our trip sometime soon....

Surgery Update

Edited again: Dr confirmed that there is no infection. There may be some blood that got into a muscle causing a charlie horse effect in my jaw (fun fun!). And also, recovery is simply slower because I'm a mom and can't quit that job! I'm likely clenching my jaw unconsciously and simply overusing it (talking & smiling to my babes!). He recommended resting it as much as possible and using a heating pad to help relax the muscle. Unfortunately, no extra prescription for the pain.

But I think it might possibly be getting slightly better - we'll see how tomorrow goes. Thanks for all your thoughts/prayers!

My recovery is going very slowly. The pain is only marginally better today than it was at the beginning - so it's been 6 days now already. I feel like I'm going to be in pain forever! Of course, I know that it will gradually improve, but it's so hard to stay positive when you can feel so little improvement. I'm also hoping I don't find out that you become immune to Advil & Tylenol after 7 days or something :)

Edited to add: I called my dr to see if he could give me something else for the pain. Since I'm still having this much pain, he wants me to come in today to see him to make sure nothing's wrong. Please pray that everything's ok, and that he can give me someone else for the pain that'll work better. My appointment's at 2.

Wisdom Teeth Surgery

Today I'm going to get all 4 impacted wisdom teeth surgically removed. Fun times.

Please pray that it goes well and that I'm miraculously pain free tonight! :)

Surgery's at 10:30 am and I'm really thirsty right now.

Lost Pictures

OK, I was going to finally update my blog with our girls birthday pictures - and they're gone!

I downloaded them from my camera right before our Disney trip to make sure my camera would have tons of room for Disney pictures. After they finished downloading I deleted them off my camera, like usual. I cannot find them. The pictures I downloaded in February are there. The pictures I downloaded today of our Disney trip are there. The ones in between are not. Which means I have permanently lost all the pictures taken between mid-February and mid-April. 2 months of Jacob's life and Emma & Sophia's birthdays/parties. I don't know what happened. I am so sad.

Five Hoopla

OK, I know it's been a super long time since I posted, and I'll try to post again sometime soon to update you on our crazy busy life, but for now, this'll be a short port doing a Hoopla that my sister Andrea high-fived me to do.....

What I was doing 10 years ago - 1998
We built our very first house and moved out of our apartment in The City and to The Town that we still live in today - though we're on our 5th house by now! We had been married for 2 yrs then and we were 21 and 22 yrs old.

Five things on my to-do list today
1) Laundry, laundry and more laundry (6 loads!)
2) Nap!
3) Exercise
4) Tidy up
5) Enjoy my kids

Snacks I enjoy
1) Chips and salsa (sometimes heated up with cheese whiz mixed in)
2) Graham wafer squares
3) any chips!
4) Cadbury Cream eggs
5) Popcorn

Things I would do if I were a billionaire
1) Build everyone in our families their dream homes
2) College funds for our families kids
3) Donate hugely to Compassion Canada, Gospel for Asia, Samaritan's Purse and others!
4) Go visit our sponsored child
5) Buy a grand piano

Five of my bad habits
1) Staying up too late
2) Being on the computer too long
3) Sometimes waiting till I've lost my patience instead of disciplining immediately
4) Eating too much of the above mentioned snacks!
5) Being late!!!! (Don't even get Nathan started on that one:)

Five places i have lived
1) Town in Western MB
2) Calgary
3) The City
4) The Town south of The City
5) The Town southeast of the City

Five jobs I've had
1) piano teacher
2) hostess, bus-girl and server at a really nice restaurant in The City
3) receptionist
4) administrative assistant to Corporate Sales Manager - fancy title eh?
5) SAHM - my favorite!!!

Sorry, I'm not high-fiving anyone - but hope y'all had fun reading!

I'll try to post more soon...... (don't hold your breath anyone) LOL

Vaccination Controversy

We have always vaccinated our other 3 girls as per the "usual" schedule. For some reason I'm not feeling good about doing this with Jacob. Between the autism, mercury and aluminum it just is not sounding good to me. I don't know if this is a nudge from God or just me being paranoid, but we have tentatively decided on doing a delayed vax schedule. Jacob's appointment is in less than 2 weeks so we'll continue to pray about it, but I'm pretty confident this is what we're going to do.

For anyone that's interested, we're going to follow the vaccination schedule from Dr.Bob Sears (we will probably eliminate the Rotavirus, flu shots, chickenpox and for sure will not do the HPV).

2 months - DTaP, Rotavirus
3 months - Pc, HIB
4 months - DTaP, Rotavirus
5 months - Pc, HIB
6 months - DTaP, Rotavirus
7 months - Pc, HIB
9 months - Polio, Flu (Do 2 doses of flu between 6 and 12 months if nearing flu season, then yearly thereafter, up to age 5, as flu season approaches. Try to use only a mercury-free shot. If its not available, don't get it that year, or get the nasal spray)
12 months - Mumps, Polio
15 months - Pc, HIB
18 months - DTaP, Chickenpox
21 months - Flu
2 years - Rubella, Polio
2 1/2 years - Hep B, Hep A
3 years - Hep B, Masles, Flu
3 1/2 years - Hep B, Hep A
4 years - DTaP, Polio, Flu
5 years - MMR (can group together for this booster)
6 years - Chickenpox
12 years - Tdap, HPV
12 years, 2 months - HPV
13 years - HPV, Meningococcal (once the Meningococcal vaccine is approved for age 2, Dr. Bob will move it there and delay hep B by 6 months)

In case you were curious...

In case you were curious what the girl's name was that we had chosen, it was....

Ava Susanne

Ava ends with the "ah" sound, of course, just like our other girl's names.
And Susanne was for my grandma (my mom's mom) who passed away over a year ago. She was the definition of a prayer warrior and I would've been honored to have a daughter named after her.

In truth, I loved Ava and am kinda sorry we won't get to use it.

We are, barring divine intervention, done having kids so that was not a hint in any way, shape or form!

Boy names - you'd think by our 4th one we would've had a boys name we'd just been dying to use. But no! In fact, we were not totally sold on any of the boy names we decided on with the others - we just decided on them cause we had to pick something! Not at all like our girl names where we KNEW we had the right one every time! Anyway.....

Emma would've been Brendan if she had been a boy. My cousin had a Brenden after Emma was born so...
Sophia would've been Evan. (We were still debating between Joseph and Evan on the way to the hospital)
Olivia also would've been Evan. But after she was born I heard of some girls being named Evyn so we had to change it again! (We like BOY names for a boy).
We decided on Jacob's name only 5 days before he was born. :)

Say What?! Hoopla

I've been high-fived by Andrea to do the Say What?! Hoopla that she created after reading something on our cousin Tammi's blog.

Here's the rules...

1. Post these rules on your blog.
2. Just list 10 things that won't likely ever come out of your mouth.
3. High-five (or 'tag') any amount of people to do the same on their blog.
4. Come back and let me know you did it, so I can go read your list!

1. No, Nathan, I don't think we should order in today.
2. I definitely don't want to drink Pepsi with my pizza.
3. A little less gravy please.
4. I love hemorrhoids!
5. Girls, you're not shouting loud enough in the house!
6. Please stop practicing piano.
7. Don't try your hardest at hockey practice today.
8. Winter vacations just aren't my thing.
9. Poutines are the worst food invention of all time.
10. Anybody want my ticket to the football game tonight?

I gotta go, baby's crying, so I don't have time to high-five anyone. If you feel like doing it, just leave a comment that you did so I can check yours out.