Holiday Weekend?????

Back in the day when I used to work in a corporate office I really looked forward to Memorial Day weekend. It was the first long weekend after a long winter of work. It was a great chance to get out, have some fun with the family and enjoy an extra day off. And, if you planned it right, you could make a nice little vacation out of it as well. In fact, for years, Leeann and I would make this out vacation week to go to the beach. Well, those days are gone. I didn't even notice that it was a holiday weekend.

I had a wedding on Saturday in Morristown, an hour away mind you. Most times, the bride has a rehearsal on Friday night before the wedding, but this bride could not have it on Friday and had it on Thursday night instead. That messed me up on Friday. I got up and felt strange not going to a wedding, but I had lots to do anyway.

Friday was Katie's first day of summer vacation and we did a few things together to help me get ready for the wedding. She also enjoyed sleeping a bit late as did all of us. We then went to Gran's condo to get some of her stuff ready to move. OH YEA, we were also moving Leeann's grandmother to an assisted living facility on Sunday. I took her bed apart, got a dresser and a few of the big things ready to go. While I was at my wedding on Saturday, Leeann and Katie were getting Gran packed and ready to go. The wedding was a nice and short wedding (YEA). I was home by 7pm which was really weird for me, most wedding receptions don't get going until 7pm. But, it was nice to get home a little early. I actually got part of the wedding downloaded to the computer Saturday night.

Sunday came and we got Gran all moved in without much problems. I have to say that Leeann picked out a really nice place. I was very surprised at how big her room is. I have seen efficiencies in Washington DC that were smaller than her room. She seemed like she was ok with everything when we left. We had to go back Sunday to take a few things we forgot and a few things that didn't fit in the truck. She was asleep when we got there but seemed to be ok otherwise. Leeann and I hung pictures and arraigned things in her room. Katie just sat and kept her company. She even ate a good dinner for once. I just know that it has to be a bit scary and lonely being someplace new. She lived in her condo for 28 years. She has so much stuff that we have to go through.

I think the thing that makes me most sad is looking at her new room and thinking that over your whole life, can be reduced to a small room in an assisted living facility. It just proves the old saying, "Who ever has the most stuff at the end, doesn't always win".

Disney Ends

Please read this and the proceeding blog entry, they tie together:

I hate to say it, but our Disney trip ended with a big THUD! We decided to leave a day early simply because it was way too hot and WAY TOO CROWDED. We went down there about the same time last year and it was great, but Leeann and I figured that the weak dollar overseas means a lot of Europeans were coming here for "holiday" (and it showed). We ran into people from France, England, Germany and a few Asian countries as well. As Leeann says, we had serious "people overload" but, we still had a great time.

Things at home are slowly getting back to normal (if our life has any sense of normalcy to it). We went to Katie's school yesterday to plan where she was going to be placed next year. We could have chosen to put her in a CDC classroom (think Special Ed) with her being in a mainstream 3rd grade class for social time or leave her in a 3rd grade class and increase her Resource time. We chose the latter of the two. We just feel that Katie does her best when she is pushed to preform and she wants to do well. In CDC we didn't feel like she would have been challenged at all. We both felt better after the meeting, but it showed us how lucky we really are. The school Katie goes to has some of the best people in it. Everyone from the teachers to the office staff all the way down to the janitorial staff knows Katie. There hasn't been a day when we are out and about with Katie that we hear in the distance, "Hi Katie", or "Mom, that's Katie from my school". And it never fails that when we ask her who they are, she looks at us with a straight face and says "I don't know". But, I have seen them at the school and know that is where they know her from.

The teachers have been the best. Each one has fallen in love with Katie and has said on a number of occasions how sweet and kind Katie is. How caring she is. Her teacher last year got a little weepy on the last day of school when Katie left the room. We see her from time to time and she always ask how Katie is doing. I can't leave out our wonderful principal. He stops Katie in the hall and talks to her to see how things are going, tells her a joke or just walks with her. He cares so much, we couldn't have hand picked better people if we tried.

My business is going well. So well in fact, that I have that overwhelmed feeling right now. Here is my schedule for the next month just to give you an idea: Wedding rehearsal this Friday, wedding on Saturday, spring concert on Monday, rehearsal on Thursday in Morristown, wedding on Saturday in Morristown, work on 3 different wedding through the week including a school concert, another rehearsal on Friday followed by a wedding on Saturday, now work on 4 different weddings and a concert, need to get the pool ready for the summer, find some time in there to mow the yard (OH Lawn Mower Fairy, PLEASE COME BACK) and that just gets me up to the first of June. WHEW!!!!!!!

Can't wait for a beach trip, I will need it.

You will need a tissue

If you ever wondered why we love Disney so much, you have to read this story. It is posted on allearsnet.com in their review section:

On our first day this trip, we ended up in the Downtown Disney store, As we were walking around, we noticed that there is a 'little girl spa' in the back called Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique. It is a place where young girls go and get their hair, makeup, nails etc done and dress up like one of the Disney Princesses. I guess in the under 10 demographic, it is a pretty important place.


So… alone, I walk up to the girl at the 'completely overrun with young girls and their family' front desk and ask if they have just nail polish services. She says no, they only do full packages of hair, nails, makeup. I explain to her
that my daughter Haidyn has no hair. She replies that they can work with fine or thin hair. So I point over to Haidyn (age 4), the girl looks, and then… the Magic begins….. You see, Haidyn has Leukemia and has lost her hair from the chemo.


The girl at the check in desk looks at the girl next to her and says "I need room for a special little girl." Then she waves to Haidyn and brings us back into the fancy salon area.


This place is packed with young girls in various stage of princess-ification. Two of the Fairy Godmothers instantly sweep up Haidyn and she is now the star of the whole place. (I feel a little bad for the other little girls - everyone that
works there wants to be part of Haidyn's experience. I counted 5 beauticians and 2 photographers elbowing their way in.)


With her salon cape on, she selects her nail polish, all kinds of makeup, and of course jewelry. After a good 30-40 minutes of princess-ification they apply her sash, a fair amount of pixie dust to her head and spin her towards the mirror to show her the results.


Of the 30 or so people in the spa, there wasn't anyone with a dry eye. In all her glory – Haidyn is now officially a Disney Princess. They had taken a girl with no hair and made her the fairest princess of them all.


Disney is the only place I know that makes every kid feel special and one of a kind no matter what is going on in their life. Katie loves this place and so do we. We will be going back again soon.

3 more times?!?!?!?!

Today was a slow day for us. Slow getting up. Slow getting going and slow moving around Animal Kingdom. Not sure if it is people overload or Disney overload but either way, we were moving very slow today. We didn't get to Animal Kingdom until about 11am. We went for the Kilimanjaro Safari ride. Katie really likes that one because of all the animals. Well, we go on the truck and drove about 100 yards and came to a complete stop. We remained that way for almost 25 minutes. We never did get a good reason for the stop, they just said it was an animal in the road. I felt so bad for the girl driving, she had to keep us entertained the whole time. She told us about the park, the safari, the animals we might see, it got so bad she had to resort to "So, where is everyone from?". Thank goodness we were in the shade or it would have been very bad. I did feel bad for Katie though. When we did get moving again, she had a hard time seeing things because the animals would blend into the background so well, I don't know if she ever really did see them or not.

We then went to lunch at a place called Tusker House. Good food and very nice on the inside. Katie got a nice surprise however, the waitress brought Katie a plate full of deserts, browines, cookies, tarts, you name it, it was on the plate. She also got Katie a birthday card signed by the likes of Mickey, Donald, Daisy, and even Pluto. She got a kick out of that for sure.

We then took a short trek through one of the jungle walks. We got to see a tiger up close (through a window of course). Katie loved that and so did we until a VERY rude woman from England decided that it was more important for her to get a picture than for my little girl to see a tiger. She was so rude that she even put her camera right in front of Katie's face to get her little picture. I almost grabbed her hand and pushed her back. The final straw for us was when Leeann had a great shot of tiger and was just about to take the picture when the British Chick's kid jumped into the shot!!!

We all were tired and decided it was time to go so we gave Katie a choice, Everest or Dinosaur? She at first choose Dinosaur but as we walked there we passed Everest and Katie could not pass it up. So, for the 6th, 7th and yes 8th time we made the trip to battle the Yeti. This kid can not get enough of that ride. I have never seen her love to do something as much as this ride (except maybe being around animals).

To say we are tired is an understatement at the very least. We plan to take it easy tomorrow and maybe go to the Magic Kingdom for the fireworks, we will see.

This was truly a magical day for all of us. We decided to just take it easy and not be in a big hurry for anything. We made lunch reservations at the Liberty Tree Tavern, but other than that, we were on no timetable for anything. We hit TomorrowLand first since there were a couple of things that Katie wanted ride again that she remembered from last year. We did the rocket cars (think the Dumbo ride only with rocket type cars). Then Katie could not wait to drive the racecars with Leeann as the unlucky passenger. With our pass for Katie’s handicap, we were able to ride some ride twice in a row with the racecars being one of them. Katie just loved being able to do that. We then went to the “Laugh Floor”, “Buzz Lightyear”, and “Stitch’s Escape”. They all were fun and Katie really enjoyed them all.
We then headed over to Liberty Square for lunch, which was very good, but you would think for a good size restaurant would have had a bigger bathroom. I had to make a little break for the bathroom and when I got there, I could not believe how small it was, ONE stall, oh well, it worked for me.
After lunch we did the Pirates of the Caribbean. Now, first off, I have not seen any of the movies and nor do I have a desire to see them. So, that said, I really did not know what to expect with this ride, but I was surprised at how fun it was and how much Katie really took it in. She was like a sponge on some of the rides today, just looking around and taking it all in. When we got off that ride, she wanted to do the Big Thunder Mountain. Now let me tell you, this kid loves her roller costars. The faster the better (see yesterday’s blog about Expiation Everest). She rode that thing two times as well.
Then it was off to Fantasy Land for a few more rides, things like Dumbo, “It’s A Small World” (which I have never been on, but it was fun), and what surprised me was that Katie knew all the countries we went by.
We were worn out by the end of today, so we just swam for a bit and called it a day. We took things easy today and really took a lot of breaks and lots of water, so we lasted a lot longer than we have before, so it was a great day.
Tomorrow is Animal Kingdom again. ROAR!!!!

5 times in a row!!

Today was Animal Kingdom. Last year this was Katie’s favorite park and she could not wait to get there. She kept asking all morning “are we going to miss the bus?” and I kept telling her that we had plenty of time and we would not miss the bus. Once we got to the park, her face lit up and she headed straight for the Dinosaur ride. Leeann and Katie had a great time on the ride side by side. We got off the ride the first time and Katie was already saying, “can we ride it again, can we ride it again”. So, you guessed it, we rode it again. She couldn’t get enough.

We then went to a really fun ride called “Primal Twirl”. This is a ride that spins you around and around while going on a small roller coaster. Katie, who loves to do anything that spins anyway, really loved it. She loved it so much we rode it 3, yes 3 times.

Then it was off to the main thing Katie wanted to do most of all. Now you all know that she loves animals more than just about anything, but when it comes to “Expiation Everest”, even animals take a back seat. She could not wait to get on that ride. When she saw it, she almost ran to get in line. We got in line and she could not wait. We rode it not once, not twice, not even four times, but 5 times in a row. The people running the ride kept saying hi to Katie and asking if she was having fun.
We did lunch at the Rainforest Café, again. I will say that the one at Downtown Disney is much better than the one at Animal Kingdom, but we still had fun and Katie was still taking it all in. Sorry Outback Steakhouse, Katie now has a new favorite place to eat.

We ended the day by doing a little swimming, which Katie just loved. She wore herself out. After dinner, she climbed into bed and said, “Can I go to bed now?” We said sure and before we could turn around, she was asleep.
We are hitting the Magic Kingdom tomorrow; we are having so much fun here. We love this place.

A Little Good, A Little Bad and A Lot of FUN

It has been a long day. it started at 6:15 this morning when Kate climbed into our bed and asked if it was time to go to Disney. Well, not really but since we were up and going we got ready anyway. We had a lot of time to spare which was very nice and a lot different then most times we leave on a trip. We usually are trying to get out the door by a certain time and feel rushed all day. Not today, we had A WHOLE LOT OF TIME.

The trip down here was pretty simple and very uneventful. I like trips like that. Well, let me correct myself, there was one little, or should I say BIG bump. We landed in Atlanta and we were getting ready to get off the plane. Leeann was on her Blackberry doing something for one of her clients and I was rushing her to get out of her seat and get moving. I thought she was just texting someone for fun. I was very wrong and needed to slow myself down. So anyway, she got a little upset and jumped up and WHAM. She hit her head on the celling above her. She said she saw stars and had a pretty good headache for a while, but she is much better tonight.

We got to our hotel and we must be very luck or blessed because we have two rooms for the price of one. You see, since Katie takes medicine daily we need a way to keep some applesauce cold for her (she takes about 8 or 9 meds at one time and the apple sauce helps get them all down). So we ask for a handicap accessible room that way we get a fridge to keep her stuff cold. Katie's Dr. gives us a not for this when we travel. Well, we get here and they don't have any of those rooms available so they gave us, at NO ADDITIONAL COST mind you, two adjoining rooms. One room with a King bed and the other with two double beds. How sweet is that. I love Disney.

We decided that we would go down to Downtown Disney for a little shopping (Leeann & Katie's favorite past time) and get some dinner. We went to the RainForest Cafe. If you have never been it is a theme restaurant, but to me, it is the best theme restaurant out there. We had never been and didn't know what to expect. We only had to wait about 20 minutes for a table, not bad since it was 6pm. While we waited, they have this gift shop you can look through, Katie was in HEAVAN. Everywhere you looked, ANIMALS of every shape, size, type, and color. Think of a jungle animal and they had it. She was picking up everything, looking at it all.

Our table was ready and we sat right next to some very life like elephants. Katie's head was turning around as fast as she could trying to see what was all there. She kept petting the elephants and then would point out a new animal she found. She just could not take it all in fast enough. I think she has a new favorite restaurant (sorry Outback). Our waiter was so nice, he rushed mine and Leeann's dinner when Katie's came out so fast. I don't know why we worried about it, Leeann and I, for the first time ever, finished our dinner before Katie did. The wait staff then brought out a HUGE ice cream, brownie, chocolate cake, diabetic coma of a desert. They sang happy birthday to her and she just beamed. Then her eyes got big when she saw the desert thinking she was going to eat the whole thing (it was almost as big she she is).

We left and checked out a couple of shops, Leeann of course found a scrapbooking store to look though. It started to get late and we headed back to the hotel. If you have never stayed on the park at Disney, let me tell you something. The transportation system here is great. You get on a bus and they take you anywhere you want. No driving hassles, no parking hassles, no hassles at all.

Tomorrow is Animal Kingdom, this should be fun.

DISNEY HERE WE COME!!!!!

It is late and I am going to make this a shot blog. We have been so busy today getting ready for our trip to Disney. We don't leave until Tuesday, but we have a VERY full day on Monday so we packed everything today (and tonight) so that we will be ready to go come Tuesday morning.

I did my first Catholic wedding yesterday. It was very nice, but it was also a bit long. The reception was very nice and what I downloaded so far looks really great.

I have a very long day tomorrow, I will write more from the land of the big mouse.

Lawn Mower Fairies

Most every one has heard of fairies. We all know about the tooth fairy, fairy godmothers, fairies in the forrest. Heck, some guys even believe that there is a booby fairy that visits pregnant women. But has anyone ever heard of a lawn mower fairy? Let me fill you in:

We are getting ready for Disney and trying to get all of our errands done on top of all the regular everyday things we have to do. Then add a wedding I am working this weekend and I was thinking that a few things were going to have to get left until we got home next Sunday and one of those things was going to be mowing the yard. I was going to try and get it squeezed in this Sunday if possible. Anyway, Leeann and I went out and did our errands today, then I went to the rehearsal for the wedding I am doing this weekend.

I met up with Leeann and Katie at the mall to get Katie's birthday build-a-bear. We had a blast and Katie picked out a new bear for her collection. I got home before Leeann did and when I got out of the truck with Katie I was looking in the front yard and noticed that something seemed strange. The yard was mowed, the edges were trimmed and the grass trimmings were blown out of the driveway. I thought "WOW, what a great wife I have, she jumped outside and mowed the yard to help me out. What a great wife I have!!".

So I asked Katie when mommy mowed the yard? Katie looked at me like I was from another planet. She said that Leeann was inside all day and that no one mowed the yard that she knew of. When Leeann got home I asked her and she had not a clue how the yard got mowed either. I even went to the neighbors and asked them if they saw anyone in our yard. "Nope, no one that we saw.". What a puzzlement.

The only thing I can think of (other than a lawn mower fairy) is the house on the opposite end of our street who has the same house number we have (there is an east ******** and a west *********. Same numbers on both the east end and west end) hired a lawn service and the service got the wrong end of the street. It has happened before with package deliveries and things like that, so I look at it as a blessing.