Mini Stephen

I've definitely got a mini me in our family...and in my opinion, so does Stephen (S says he doesn't see it in this picture....but I'll let you be the judge). Everything about Gabe in this picture reminds me of Stephen.

What do you think?

This morning

My camera was within arms reach as I was making my morning coffee, and poor Gabe happened to be my early riser this morning.

This is his "I need my morning milk" look.

Is it just me, or is he not the cutest thing ever?!




I think we should try for another.....

Oh wait, that's not possible. And, I'll be glad that's not possible in about...2 minutes.




Here is my cutie eating his morning Raisan Bran. What is it with kids (even at Gabe's age) wanting to do things all by themselves.



His shirt was a complete milky mess, but he managed to shovel in 2 bowls of raisan bran. That was after eating a small bowl of grapes and 3 cheese crackers.



Thank you bud for wiping your mouth. Now we'd be in business if you could run upstairs and change your own clothes.



His sister was present, but not so cooperative. Pappy, I think she learned this from you!

See, 2 minutes, and I'm good with 2 again!

Disney World

A great time was had by all at Disney. I think Stephen was most surprised by what a great trip it was. At one point he mentioned needing more time to get it all in. It really is hard to do it all in 4 days. But we sure tried.

By the way, this is a great time to go to Disney. The crowds were minimal. The longest we waited for any ride was 20 minutes. And walked right up to some.

This is not the best family shot, but one of the few I got. And as you can see from our attire, it was COLD!!!! We didn't exactly pack right and had to re-wear nasty park smelling clothes over and over.




Of course the highlight for Allie was meeting the Disney Princesses. We met them all....Belle, Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, Jasmine, Snow White, and Ariel.

We had breakfast with the princesses in the castle. Allie never took her eyes off of them and knew where each princess was at any given time.




S and his dad (and Gabe drinking a soda) at Magic Kingdom. Sorry you missed your big softball game Pappy, we were sure glad you decided to stay!



A HUGE thank you to Pappy/Grammy and Pop/Maw-maw. We appreciate your help with the kids over this trip. I don't think S and I could've/would've wanted to attempt this without you.

One rainy day the grands took the kid back to the hotel around 4:00 pm. S and I decided to brave the elements and head over to Epcot. We had a nice romantic dinner at Mexico and hit up the adult rides over there. (Note: DO NOT RIDE MISSION TO SPACE! I had no idea what it was, took the "extreme" option and almost had to use the barf bags that were conviently stowed directly in front of you on this ride.)

Anyhow, thank you grands!




This was Allie's favorite ride. We rode it 4 times?

With the exception of the fantasty land rides at Magic Kingdown, the minimum height requirement for most rides is 40". Allie is 39". She was a sport though and didn't seem to mind.

We are already planning our next trip back....when Gabe is at least 40 inches.



Speaking of Gabe....this little guy was a trooper! We drug him and pushed him for 4 full Disney days, and he did awesome!

"It's a small World" put him to sleep 2 of the 4 days around naptime. It did other members of our party too. But not Allie, she was the one singing.



One of my favorite parts of the trip was the Spectromagic Parade. Check out the evil queen staring us down. It looked like she was looking directly at me and she held this pose until she passed where we were sitting.

I will never forget Allie sitting in my lap making her little light up tinkerbell (thank you daddy) fly around in the air.

The girl was loving everything about Disney!

I was loving watching her eyes light up in amazement.



Walt - you are one brilliant man. Thank you for the memories.

4 inches

Final snowfall total was 4 inches.

Don't laugh PA family....it's not 25 inches that you currently have on the ground. But for us southeasterners....this is our BIG snow for the winter.



Allie and I were out first thing this morning to enjoy the fluffy white stuff before the sun melted it away.

I think this is cute....she wrote her name in the snow.



I enjoyed this snow. 4 inches. Plenty of time to play. By noon Saturday, it was all melting away.


Stephen used most of the snow in our yard to construct this masterpiece.

He's gone (the snowman). He had a major lean going on and fell over a mere 3 hours after coming to life.



Gabe having a snowball fight with himself.

He would make snowballs and throw them into the air....and they would land on his head.

(Don't worry about him not wearing a coat. It really was warm out. Other pictures I took he didn't have shoes on. Don't tell my mom. )

Baby, it's cold outside!

We are back from Disney World....a COLD Disney trip, but a great one! More on that in a couple of days after I sort through the hundreds of Disney pictures.

I am not surprised to return to a frigid snowy Greenville, because Orlando, FL...was FREEZING!




It started snowing here about 4:00 pm and it hasn't stopped.

These pics were when it first started snowing....no ground stickage yet.




Miss Allie has never liked hats and kept fighting us with this one wanting it off.




The kids (and Stephen) were anxious to get out and play in the snow.

Stephen and Allie were sledding on a LUVs diaper box in our yard. The pics I took were blurry because it was dusk and I was quickly losing lighting. Hopefully I'll get better ones tomorrow.



We have about 4 inches right now and it is still snowing!!!

Tomorrow morning should be fun.

M-I-C....see you real soon.

Have I mentioned we are taking the kids to Disney World this weekend? We will be there for 4 glorious fun filled Disney days.

We made the mistake of talking it up to Allie starting about a week and a half ago....WAY too early for a 4 year old.

For the past week, we have frequented youtube's "Meeting Disney Princessess". We have watched over and over again various strangers meeting the different Disney Princesses.




The most exciting part of our little trip is the fact that, not 1, but 2 sets of grands will be joining us.

Stephen and I are looking forward to dumping the kids on the grandparents and acting like kids ourselves at the happiest place on earth.

We have even managed to talk both sets into taking a kid at night to sleep with them in their rooms!



So, we will see you on the flip side (with lots of Disney World pictures to share).

Living proof

Here's living proof of Iz. You will just have to trust me when I say this picture was taken yesterday.

(Trae and Lindsey - to get Izzy to give me a head tilt, all I said was, "Mattie, Mozelle". I think she remembers them.)




And here we have my parents via Skype. We keep trying to talk these two into adopting our little gem of a dog.

I'll keep working on them.