Should have stayed in Orlando

Talk about getting a blow to the head. We come back from Orland and I head back to work this past Monday and get hit with a huge bomb. If you have been reading my Blog, than you know about Leeann's surgery this past winter. I took FMLA (Family Medical Leave Act) to take care of her. That was at the end of December and I was going to go back to work in January. Well, Leeann had a complacation and I needed to take more time off. I spoke wth my HR person and she told me that since the leave was part of the same occorance I would not have to use any of my paid time off (PTO). If I came back to work for one day in January, I would have had to use 5 PTO days. I didn't go to work until Leeann was home and doing well. I asked my HR person if everything was OK and to confirm with me (on at least 3 phone calls) that I would not loose any PTO time. You see, I have to be careful of my PTO time as they take sick time and vacation time out of the same 13 days I get per year. So, you can understand, 5 days is a big hit. Anyway, I was told that I would not have to use any of those 5 days.

Well, I got an email on Monday saying that I was, in fact, being charged with those 5 days. Talk about being upset!!!! I have emailed my HR person 3 times and have asked her why the change, and not once has she given me an answer. Instead she is trying to push me off to someone else. I don't even know if they are going to pay me for those 5 days. I don't know what I am going to do about this. As it stands right now, I have only 1 day left for the rest of the year.

On top of all that, we are having to deal with Leeann's grandmother. She is 85 years old, is not in the best of health, has a very poor memory and is being a pain. She has been in the hospital for almost a month with a bad infection in her leg. She is not able to walk without the help of a walker, she cannot pick the walker up, she has to slide it accross the floor. She can't remember her own phone number, or our for that matter. She is not able to get herself off the floor with the help of a chair. So, living at home alone is not an option for her at this time. (If ever) She she is having to go to a nursing home and she is being a big pill about that. She enough pride to fill the state of Texas alone. She thinks she can do anything and that she is still in her 40's or 50's.

To make matters worse, Leeann's dad is not being much of a help, leaving most of the decision to Leeann. I am hoping that Leeann just throws her hands up with all of this and just tells her dad that he needs to deal with it. If someone callse about her grandmother, give them her dad's phone number and tell them to ask him. But, I know Leeann too well. She can't do that, it is not in her. She is geting better standing up for her self and being more self confident in what she is able to do.

I need to vent more on this blog, it is my only outlet.

Home Again :(

Yep, we made it, back home after a great 6 day vacation to Disney World. The trip home was pretty un-eventful for the most part. We had a pretty good time getting home, just a few bumps, but fun for the most part. We got up at 6am so that we could finish packing and get the luggage down to the check-in area. I found out I could not check in unless I had the luggage with me, so I made the trip all the down there for nothing, such is life. Katie was a bit grumpy getting up this morning. I don't think she wanted to leave (guess what, neither did I). Well, we were able to get off and going without any problems.

Then we had to wait for the bus to take us to the airport. About a 10 minute wait, not too bad. The bus was mostly empty except for about 6 people that were already on the bus. Well, we filled the bus up at our stop. God Bless Leeann for not wanting to wait, she inched her way up to the front of the line and we were the fist ones on the bus. (we were not the first ones there, she we had waited the least amount of time, but if the they just wanted to stand there, we were going) We got on the bus and waited for the others to get on and such. While we were waiting, this guy who was on the bus when we arrived, became fustrated about having to wait for the rest of us to load. He got mad, jumped up and grabbed his wife and kid and got off the bus. Seems that he felt it was taking too long to get loaded up.

The airport was fine except: Orlando International Airport is not a very good airport. It is nice looking and all, but not marked very well as to where you are or how to get to where you want to be. It took us 10 minutes just to figure out which way we needed to go to get to our gate.

Well we made it and now we are back home and back to reality. And right now our biggest reality is Leeann's grandmother. She is still in the hospital, still waiting to see where and when they are going to move her. We were hoping it was going to happen while we were gone, but no such luck. The hardest part of all this is Gran is not going to handel the move that well. She still thinks in her mind that she is going to go home and jump in her car and just go on with her life the way is was before. I don't think that is going to happen for her. She is not able to get up off the floor if she fell down. she has a hard time walking without a walker among other things.

I just really think this unfair to Leeann. We are here and Leeann's dad is just shows up from time to time. Leeann is the one dealing with the daliy task of Gran. The complaining, the moaning about this and that. We are going to have to get her set up in a care facility, deal with the condo, the car, the insurance and so on. Her dad is going to be sitting in NC not having a clue what is going on. But what can you do.

Back to work tomorrow. yeeeppppiiiii (NOT)

Wet and Wild Day

Today was a much better day than yesterday. We started the day off a bit better, took our time and got ready for a fun day of water fun. Since we were off to a water-park today, we didn’t get really dressed up or anything, we just put on bathing suits and sandals and off we went.

It was a beautiful day and much to our surprise not that many people were going to the Typhoon Lagoon. I am not complaining or anything, it was just a nice surprise. Since we are staying at a resort, we got into the park an hour earlier than non-guest. That made a huge difference in finding a nice spot to camp out at. I found a nice one; Leeann got us water shoes and locker key. We put our stuff up and hit the rides.

The only ride we went one was a water roller coaster. Not bad, but not the most fun things I have ever been on. The put Katie up front, which I was not, thrilled about, and then sent us shooting down the ride. Katie had her earplugs in and we told her to cover her ears at the end so she would not loose them. Well, she lost one on the way down. We got to the bottom and she told us she lost it I thought our day was done. I was looking all over the pool area trying to find it. I even asked a lifeguard, but didn’t see a thing. THEN Leeann saw it off to the side and we were able to have fun the rest of the day. If it had been mid day and a lot of people in the park, there is no way we would have found it, but lucky for us we were one of the first ones to ride.

We then jumped in the lazy river ride. This is like a slow moving waterway that you ride on in an inner tube. That was lots of fun and we spent most of the day doing that.

We went to an area called Shark Reef where you get to swim with fish and a few sharks. Not the dangerous ones, this is Disney after all, but small sharks that are harmless. Leeann and Katie jumped in and floated along, but I couldn’t do it. I have a hard time breathing with a snorkel and mask. I just panicked and jumped out and went around to where Leeann and Katie got out and meet them there. I felt so bad.

We then went to the wave pool. This thing shoots a 6-foot wave at the crowd about every 90 seconds. And I do mean a 6-FOOT WAVE. This thing was huge. But, it was lots of fun. We all went out a little too far at one point and got hit by a wave and it knocked Katie and me off our feet and under the water. Leeann was right behind us and when the wave hit, she ended up on top of us. I had a hold of Katie and was not going to let go no matter what. That was very scary to Katie, but she did really well with it. She did not want to go back into the waves for a while, but we didn’t want that to be her memory of waves since we like going to the beach some. So we took it easy, and worked our way back into the waves and she did great by the time we left.

Now for the worst part of our trip, PACKING UP. We are flying out tomorrow morning and I don’t want to go just yet. I have had a lot of fun this past week. We have gotten to see things through Katie’s eyes on so many things. She has been wide eyed and amazed with so many things. She has been on rides that I never thought she would have even tried before. She has meet princesses, characters and some of the nicest people around. But most of all, we have gotten to have time as a family. Time to play with one another, time to laugh at and with each other. Time to just be us and so many times it seems we are missing that the most, time to just be us. I know I said this yesterday, but I still see it, parents here with cell phones doing business back home. I saw a few people at the front desk yesterday getting or sending faxes. This was our vacation, a vacation away from stress, from problems, from the world. I do know this, when we land in Knoxville tomorrow, the world and the problems will still be there, but for now, they are a million miles away. I only hope they stay there when we get home. Here’s hoping.

Not so great day, but......

This has not been the best day we have had so far. I don’t know if we are just tired, if we have done too much, if it is the heat (90+ today) or if it was just too many people but Epcot was not all that much fun. There is no shade in the park, lots of wide-open spaces, just no shade. And lots of rude people, I mean LOTS of rude people. If this is supposed to be the “Happiest Place on Earth”, why are there so many kids crying here???

I want to make a few observations about this “Happy Place”: Some of the parents here should not be parents or be here. They are here with the mentality of “we are here and your going have fun weather you like it or not!!!” I thought this was for the kids to begin with??? I have seen parents dragging their kids onto rides with the kids crying, “NOOOO, I don’t want to go”. Why do that to your kids?? There were several things I wanted to do here but didn’t because Katie either didn’t want to do it or would be a bit too scary for her. I am not going to drag her into something she doesn’t like.

I have seen parents here at the hotel not paying attention to their kids. I watched a mother this morning read a book while her kid (not more than 3 years old) CLIMBING on a deck chair. I heard a mother tell her child to “go play with some kids, I need 10 minutes to my self”. I was walking back to the room tonight and I saw a man sitting on the steps with a cell phone up to his ear telling someone “I fell so out of touch, I don’t know what is going on back at the office, what is going on in the world?” YOU’ER ON VACATIOIN!!!!!! You are supposed to be OUT of touch with the office and IN touch with your family, your kids, your wife. Why spend thousands of dollars to go somewhere and complain about being out of touch????

The worse of all with the “Alpha Mom” standing in line with us at “Soarin” today. We used our pass for Katie and it still took about an hour to get to the ride. Standing in line in front of us was using her BlackBerry to send e-mails to people at work. She was riding the ride alone, I don’t get it. You are at Epcot and you are riding something alone while you send emails to work.

The only ride that I really liked today was Mission: Space. They have two versions, one that spins and produces G-Forces and one that doesn’t spin. We did the one that doesn’t spin first to see if Katie liked it. She loved it so we had to do the spinning one. It was great. Katie wanted to do it again and I wish we would have. We then did the GM Test Track. Not my favorite. The fast part of the track was great, but the rest of it was not that great.

Well, tomorrow we made a change of plans. We are going to Typhoon Lagoon Water Park. We are great about that; being flexible enough to change plans when we feel it is necessary. Katie is doing great, it is mom and dad that are wearing out. Anyway, we are excited about going to a water park for the day. This should be great.

No picture today, nothing really to remember from this day. Just glad it’s over.

See Ya…

Animal Kingdom Day

Let me start off with an apology for all those who read my last blog. I was very tired last night and I wanted to get my thoughts down before I fell asleep and I did not do a spell check so…. SORRY!!!

Today was Animal Kingdom and it was a blast. Today is Katie’s real birthday so we woke her up singing happy birthday and she started smiling really big, what a way to start.

We had breakfast in Animal Kingdom at a character breakfast with Mickey, Donald, Pluto and my favorite, Goofy. It was so much fun, but the best part was when the staff sang happy birthday to Katie and she was laughing and smiling so much, she even clapped along with them when they say to her.

So after a great breakfast, it was off to Dinoland and rides some of the rides. The first ride up was Dinosaur, the ride. I was afraid it would be a bit too scary for her. WRONG!!! She was yelling “Yaaaahhhhh WWWWHHHHOOOO!!!” all the way through the ride. She loves dinosaurs and she got to see so many up close and a in some cases a bit personal. We got off the ride and got a few gifts, including a couple of photos of us on the ride. That will be a great memory for her. She surprised me by asking if she could ride it again. Well, we thought we would make it back, but were not able to. Anyway, we went off to ride a spinning roller coaster that Katie and Leeann just laughed so hard on, that we went back and rode it a second time and we laughed just that much harder.

Then it was on to much bigger things. Expedition Everest. This is a huge roller coaster that forward and backwards, in the dark, around quick turns, hits about 50 miles an hour and so on. I was not sure about this one after the whole Space Mountain thing from yesterday. Well again, SURPRISE!!! We rode that thing 3, yes 3 times in a row. She laughed and screamed harder each time. The last time, she rode it with her arms up in the air. Katie never ceases to amaze me with the things she does. She wanted to go again, but we wanted to do a few more things. We walked around the park the rest of the day and saw so many animals and birds, this place is just amazing.

We have this special pass we are able to use because of Katie’s handicaps. We have a letter from her doctor and Disney gave us a pass that helps us get to either the front of a show because of her vision problem or we can go thought the fast pass area because Katie is not good waiting for long period, so with that pass, we were able to get on Everest 3 times in a row without much of a wait.

Katie was taking it all in. The animals, the birds, the plants, she was looking around every corner wondering what was next, what was in the trees, what was behind the next bush. Leeann and I both know that Katie is going to do something with either animals or plant life.

I don’t know if any of you have ever seen this commercial, but there is one for the Orlando area that show a mother and daughter running around the park, at some point the mother turns into a little girl like her daughter and they play around the park like they are best of friends. Then at the end of the commercial, the mother turns back into an adult and meets up with her husband. That is what the past couple of days have been like with Katie and Leeann. They have just been having so much fun with each other.

Well, tomorrow we have made a change in plans, we are going to MGM Studios and ride the Rockin’ Roller Coaster with Aerosmith, then head off the Epcot in the late afternoon so we can stay and see the fireworks so there may be a blog tomorrow night, there may not be one, you will just have to check back and see.

This has been the best time of our lives.

MAGICAL DAY!!!!!!

I don’t even know where to start. This has to have been one of the most Magical days I have ever had. But, really it was all for Katie, but there is just something about Disney that makes you a kid all over again. To see the things through her eyes, it just makes you feel so great. So let’s start the days recap:

We all got up early (one of us ---- Leeann ---- up at 4am, GO FIGURE) and headed off to breakfast which wasn’t too bad. We then caught the bus for the Magic Kingdom and got there right when they opened the park. They have this little song and dance show with a countdown at the end to open the park, that was kind of neat to see.

Then walking into the park was amazing. Seeing Cinderlla’s castle was just …… I can’t put it into words, it was fantastic for lack of a better word. We planed a treasure hunt for Katie so she could find a special birthday and since that did not start until 10:30, we hit a few rides. The first was Buzz Lightyear spin coaster something. Katie and I rode together and was just shooting the lights out of everything. I have never seen her smile so much. She was loving every minute of it. Then we headed off to see the Carsoul of Progress. This was neat, but Katie wanted EXCITEMENT and lots of it. So, we hit the Indy speed track where she got to drive a race car around a track with poor Leeann in the passanger seat. They were laughing so hard I could hear them 2 cars back.

Now it was time to head over to the castle and start the treasure hunt. This is where it gets really MAGICAL. We were supposed to go to the Wishing Well, but ended up at Cinderella’s Fountian. We meet a cast member there that saw Katie’s Birthday Button and let her make a wish using “Fairy Dust”, gave her a citerficate of signatures from all the Disney Princess. That was cool, but wait, it gets better. We found the Wishing Well and started the treasure hunt. The first clue took us to Pooh’s playland. While we were there, the cast member (Phillip) who gave signatures to Katie tracked us down and asked if we could be back at the fountain in about 10 minutes. We looked at each other and said “Sure???” We didn’t know what to expect. When we got there, we had to wait a few minutes and then he took us into the back part of the castle. At this point Leeann and I both thought Katie would get to meet one of the Princesses from Disney, but as you can see by the photo, she got to meet ALL of the princesses and Peter Pan and Wendy, and a few Princes as well. Leeann and I just looked at each other and both shead a tear or two.

Katie was in shock. She was surrounded by reality at it’s best. We were with them for about 30 minutes. Phillip said this was his way of making a wish come true. He did just that. I can not even begain to tell you how special this was to us and to Katie. She got autographs from all of them, hugs and all the attention a special little girl could every want. We were able to take a group photo at the end, but nothing will ever come close to the feeling we had when we walked through that door and there stood 3 princess that every little girl dreams of.

We were able to finish our treasure hunt and Katie got two stuff lions from Lion King (her favorite movie ever). She was so thrilled to get those since they came from Simba (wink, wink). She is asleep as I write this with both her arms wrapped around them dreaming about Simba and the whole gang.


Then it was ride time. Our little girl rode Big Thunder Mountian and loved it. She wanted to ride it again (go figure). Then we took a spin on the tea cups that I thought was going to make Leeann sick. This was followed by one of the scarest moments we have ever had. We rode Space Mountian. This is a roller coster that is all indoors, in the dark, in single cars. That means we could not sit beside Katie and we should have known at that point, time to leave. But NNNNNNOOOOOOOOO! Off we went and I think Katie almost cried. I was sitting in front of her and I heard say “Dad, I don’t think I want to be on this ride!!!!” When we got off, Leeann was almost in tears, and I felt so bad for putting her on that ride, but Katie just shook it off and wanted to go on some other things.

We did Mickey’s Philharmagic. That was so much fun. It is in 3-D and Katie sat on my lap so she could see. And did she ever see, she reached out several times to try and grab a hold of something, a gem stone, Donald’s feet, a part of a magic carpet, she just had a blast.

We ended the day there and came back to the resort and swam a bit, wound down a lot. Katie and I went to the video arcade to end the day and we had a blast.

It is now 9PM and we have a full day on tap tomorrow, but let me say this, I could have to pack my bags tomorrow and fly home after just one day here and I would be just as happy and thrilled. Seeing the look on her face today, the smiles that just would not stop made this trip all worth wile for me.

More tomorrow, but how will it ever compare to today????????

e are here in Disney. We had a great trip down here once we were able to leave. Our flight from Knoxville was delayed an hour. No big deal, we just ate a lazy lunch that allowed Leeann and I just spend some time talking to each other. That is one of the things I love about taking trips with her, we are always able to just spend quality time talking to each other. Katie always joins in on the conversation too.

We were able to board the plane about an hour past our departure time, and we had a huge milestone on Leeann’s weight loss journey. We have made many trips by plane and almost every time she has either hid the seatbelt or had to ask for an extension, as the standard seatbelt did not fit her. Well, not anymore, the belt fit and had a little extra to spare.

When we got to the Orlando airport and started to get off the plane, Katie gave the fight attendant a big hug and said thank you. That is just like Katie. Part of this trip that I have been looking forward to is using the Magical Express, this is where they take care of your luggage for you, take you to your resort hotel and all you have to do is just ride along. Well, it sort of worked. We got the resort pretty well, but our luggage is still not here (9:21pm as I write this, and we checked in at 5:30 pm AAAARRRRRGGGG). When we got off the bus at the resort, Katie even gave the bus driver a hug and said thank you.

As we were checking in to the hotel we were telling the desk person that this was for Katie’s birthday. She looked over the desk and asked Katie how old she was and Katie said “I will be 8, but I am still 7 right now”

We have a room that over looks the pool area, so of course as soon as Katie saw the pool you can guess where she wanted to go. This worked out great as it allowed her to blow off some of that pent up energy she had. She blew off so much energy that as soon as we got back to the room after having dinner, she fell straight to sleep. In fact, so has Leeann. I think they both got wore out playing in the pool.

Well, I am going to go that way my self, more later