Congrats Dean!

This morning our family all gathered in Jacksonville to stand aside my cousin Dean (far left in black/white) as he pledged his life and service to the Air National Guard. We are very proud of you Dean and wish you the very best on this new journey!

After the ceremony we toured outside to look at some planes...Gabe loved it of course!

Once everything was over, Dean stayed to sign his life away, Jaime had errands to run, and I got to play with their kids, our littlest cousins, Zane & Peyton at the park! The boys had lots of fun running, sliding, swinging, and looking at boats.

Peyton just relaxed and looked pretty...and watched the crazy boys! :)

Tool Time...

Gabe LOVES his tools! He used to have plastic "play" tools, but he knew they wouldn't fix anything and were just for fun. At 4 years old, he needed real tools for real men...he has real things to work on! :) He was willing to get rid of all the toys and wait on a real tool bag to arrive for Christmas! He was one very happy boy...I mean little man! LOL! Anyway, a couple nights ago our living room lights all blew out, but not due to the bulbs. My dad came over to help Jon look into the wiring, and my little Mr Fix It put on his cape, grabbed his tool bag, and was ready to get the job done!

Thanks to Gabe's expertise and tools, the men were able to figure out the problem and get our lights working again. Gabe works for peppermints and strawberry milk if you have anything that needs fixing around the house! :)

Happy Birthday Amelia!

This afternoon we headed to the park to celebrate with Miss Amelia! She had a really cute cowgirl party...with horses!!! Happy 6th Birthday!!!!

Can you tell they are a little excited....and definitely a bit goofy!

Kate wanted to ride with a friend and Ava was more than willing to hit the trail again!

Then the girls headed back to the party and playground to join the rest of their friends!

Gabe didn't want to ride alone either, so he rode with Miss Madeline. :) These two have been friends since babies...and are still so sweet together! Also riding along side of them, Cowboy Griffin!

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The Greatest Show on Earth!

Tonight is the night for our annual trip to "The Greastest Show on Earth!!!"

I always try to "theme" the kids outfits to match wherever we're going; I also like for them to match of course. ;) The only problem that I am starting to run into from time to time is...Kate likes to pick out her own clothes! Here's the thing, she too wants her outfit to match where we're going...it's just not always what I had in mind. :) Tonight's choice....my old clown costume made for me by an aunt and worn at Halloween when I was about 4 years old. I couldn't argue...

We arrived at the circus in time to enjoy the pre-show on the arena floor.

The kids were able to see some of the animals, clowns, and even one of the motorcyclists up close.

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Kate especially loved the preshow and even got in the ring with other kids to dance with the clowns on several occassions! Gabe, on the other hand, was content sitting outside the circle...

Once the pre-show was over, we headed up to our seats and met up with cousins Zane & Peyton, sitting just a couple rows behind us. Cousin Hannah was also here, but she was sitting a couple sections away...

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The Dragon show was great...one of the best I've seen I would say!

Kate & Gabe had a great time...and so did we!

A Day at the Zoo

The kids have an extra long weekend, the weather is beautiful today,

so what better way to spend our Tuesday afternoon than at the zoo!!!

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We almost always have to feed the giraffes. :)

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Then we hoped on the train to tour behind the scenes and see the brand new 4 day old baby giraffe!!!

I usually make the kids choose between feeding the giraffes or birds, but this time I let them do both. But, Gabe remembered that one tried to bite him last time and did NOT want his own cup of juice. In fact, this was about as close as he wanted to get to them today. :)

Kate, on the other hand, was ready to bring a few home. ;)

She loves the birds!!!

We had a fantastic day at the zoo followed by dinner and playtime at Grammy's house!

What a great day....but back to school tomorrow....

Beep Beep

The kids were outside playing in the backyard before dinner. I started to wash dishes, looked out the window, and this is what I saw! I wish I would have also seen how they managed to get these cars up the ladder onto the trampoline! :)

Downtown Disney

We checked out of our condo this morning and decided to make one final stop in Orlando....to meet up with Kate's kindergarten teacher for lunch at Rainforest Cafe!!! We love Mrs. Cobb and were so glad it worked out to meet up with her family today! Pictured below is Kate with Mrs. Cobb and her daughter Abby. We'll see you back at school in the morning!!! :)

Condo Day

After so many days of fun, we were all a little exhausted and ready for a lazy day at the condo today! But, we weren't going to let the whole day pass by without at least a little bit of fun!

We slept in for the first time all week and then headed down to enjoy some of the condo amenities. Our first stop, Swan Lake! This was a bit more of a workout than I realized it would be, but so much fun!

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Next on the list: Thomas the Train!!!

Finally, our "old" friends from Atlanta showed up to play! We haven't seen Angie and the girls in years...actually we had never met the baby Zoie....so it was really nice to see them again and catch up a bit. Unfortunately, Angie's husband Nick couldn't join us today; maybe next time! Once the kids were all "introduced," we decided to try out the dino putt-putt course. Our kids have never played putt-putt before so it was kind of a mess, but they sort of had fun. Next time we will have to take them to a bigger course and show them how to jold a club!

The kids saw one of the playgrounds in the distance and decided to ditch putt-putt after a while and go play! I loved how crazy Samantha's hair got every time she came down the slide! :)

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Last but not least, our time together was almost done, but not before ice cream!!!

Thanks for coming out to play today!!!!

Universal Studios - The final day

Today is our final day in the parks! We have had so much fun this week, but I am exhausted. :) We started out our morning waiting in a line of people to enter The Islands of Adventure. As soon as the gates were open we took off on a mad dash with hundreds of others from the entrance to the very back of the park to The Wizarding World of Harry Potter! We jumped into the castle ride line and only had to wait about 30 minutes!!! Yippee!!! :) We were all worn out and trying to catch our breath during those 30 minutes in line, but it was worth it! We really wanted to ride this one again but we were not going to wait through another two hour line. Afterwards we made our way back to the front of the park...taking a few pictures along the way.

Next, we left Islands of Adventure and entered Universal Studios.

Today was sort of our day to do again all the things we loved and get to the things we have missed. Jon and Kate went off one way and Gabe and I headed in another direction...and stopped to see Dora and Diego!

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Then, while Jon & Kate were off riding rides, Gabe and I headed to the Looney Tunes area to play! Eventually Kate joined back up with us to meet and ride Woody Woodpecker's rollercoaster and to see Barney LIVE!

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Fun on the ropes coarse!

After lots of Looney Tunes fun, we went to the animal show

where the kids were able to meet the dog from the movie "Men in Black!"

So professional.....






Terminator Time!
Gabe did NOT like this show, but we survived it without having to leave and afterwards he was all smiles again. :)

It wasn't all that hot, but who can resist a giant coke mister?!?

The sun was setting and our night was quickly coming to a close.

Jon & Kate ran off to ride more rides while Gabe and I spent our final 45 minutes riding Woody Woodpecker's rollercoaster over and over.

Universal Studios closed and we had one last hour to run over and enjoy Islands of Adventure!

We tried to pack in as much fun today as possible! It felt like we spent most of the day running, but we fit everything in! We planned to try and ride the castle one last time, but when we got to it, we discovered it was shut down for the night due to a mechanical error. So instead, we spent an hour riding The Flight of the Hippogriff over and over and over again! Kate and Gabe both loved this little rollercoaster so it was great! I think we were able to go 5 or 6 times in a row. Unfortunately, they made us get off and run around and through the line each time instead of just getting to stay on. Maybe that was better though or we would have been on it closer to 10 times before the park closed! :)

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Once the rides were officially shut down for the evening, we took our time enjoying Hogwarts at night...and wth so many less people roaming the streets!!!! We were actually able to see all the window displays and buildings! This place is truly incredible - can't wait to see how they maybe someday expand!

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It was finally time to say goodnight to the theme parks. The kids wanted pictures on every photo prop possible, but I'll only post a couple because there are so many! :)

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