The First Disney Experience

Last weekend I headed to Orlando for a cousin's wedding. And I couldn't be in such close proximity of Disney without making a detour to the happiest place on earth! I LOVE Disney and look forward to many future trips with Grayson as he gets older. My husband couldn't make the pre-trip, and made me promise not to hit the Magic Kingdom without him. So we decided to venture to the Animal Kingdom instead.

As we drove through the gates that said "Welcome to Disney World" I was so excited to be sharing the moment with my little man. I turned around to tell him how exciting it was and get a smile out of him, and instead, he gave me a confused look and projectile vomited all over himself. Truly a moment I will remember forever. His first disney experience and he gets sick. (Thankfully it wasn't a bug or anything...just a result of my mom deciding half and half mixed with skim milk would equal whole milk for a baby - um...wrong). After we got him all cleaned up, he was feeling great and we were on our way.

We headed first to a character breakfast inside the park. My sister Brenda - who is the queen of all things Disney World - came with us with 2 of her 3 boys.


He really didn't like the characters at all...and I really can't blame him. They are kind of scary.

Meeting Mickey for the first time

Sheer terror. Love it!

Hanging out on a bench with his cousin Ashton...after having to leave "It's a Bug's Life 3D" due to again...sheer terror.

Passed out in the stroller from a busy morning.

Wrapping up the afternoon with tea at the Grand Floridian. He loved the strawberries and cream and made a HUGE mess...but he loved every second of it.

It was a great trip and I so look forward to future jaunts to disney. In January 2011 we will be at a work convention down there, so I'm sure that will be our first full family experience at the parks. I'm ready to start planning now! But...sigh...disney won't let me book anything this far in advance. But I'm planning in my head already!

Oh...and this trip was Grayson's 8th round trip flying and 16th flight. The kid is a pro at going through security!

The Big 3-0

Today I leave my 20's behind and all the fond (and not so fond memories) of it.

I say good bye to:

-The decade in which I married my wonderful husband
-The decade in which I welcomed my beautiful son
-The decade in which I said goodbye to three precious babies
-The decade in which I saw so much personal and spiritual growth as a result
-A wrinkle free face
-A working metabolism
-A body unaffected by gravity

And I say hello to:
-A new decade to welcome new babies (I prayerfully hope)
-The decade in which I will celebrate 7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16 years of marriage to -my amazing man
-The decade in which I will *gasp* send my baby to school
-The decade in which I will at some point "retire" from work to be a full time mommy for a bit
-The decade of my *ahem..cough, cough* "peak" (or so people say)
-A time for making friendships stronger...and expanding my horizons with new ones
-Embracing every day of life...cause it's almost 1/2 way over at this point. Scary!

I've got to say, I feel very odd about the whole thing. I thought it wouldn't phase me but it is really making me contemplate life, what I've done, what i HAVEN'T done and more.

Any advice from any of you out there? Did you have a tough time with 30? How did you get through it?

National Dress Like a Cow Day!

I've been a new kick lately. I am a coupon cutting, spreadsheet building, budget queen these days. Always looking for a good deal, searching the internet for discount codes, free stuff and more.

Today is a great day because all Chick-fil-a's across the country are giving away free meals if you dress like a cow!!! Sounds silly, I know. But hey - it's a free meal from a great place! Today I'm wearing all black (as is Grayson) and at lunch time I will apply the white stickers I've cut out into cow shapes all over us, and head to the mall. I'll be sure to get a pic or 2 and post.

If you want to partake in the fun, but haven't done any advance planning, not to worry. Just print out one of these cow masks and wear it to a chickfila - and you'll get a free entree!

http://www.leehansen.com/printables/masks/cow-mask.htm

http://www.freeprintablecoloringpages.net/showcover/Circus_And_Carnival/Cow_Mask

For more details on the cow day click here

My Mother's Day

Since tomorrow is Father's Day...I thought I'd finally write my Mother's Day post. ha!

Last mother's day, Grayson was still in my belly. So...it was kinda my first, but kinda my not. He arrived just 2 weeks later.

I was looking forward to the first time that I could celebrate my own motherhood on Mother's Day. For years it had been such a bad day for me as I longed for a baby of my own...I know so many of you have been there, and are still there.

At church, I got to sing a song about my little man called "Miracle". It was so perfect because that's what he is to us. Our little miracle that we waited for and prayed for and God gave us in His perfect timing. The biggest goal I had was to make it through the song without crying. We have 3 services so each time I made it through 1, I breathed a sigh of relief, and hoped the next service would be tear free as well. At the 3rd service, my mom decided to bring Grayson in to see me sing. So there I am on the stage and there he is smiling at me from the front row. I SO almost lost it there, but somehow managed to hold it together. At the end of the song there was an instrumental interlude and I went down and brought him back up on stage for me for the end. It was one of the sweetest moments of my life as I got to sing to my little guy. I must say...even though I made it through without crying, there were many non-dry eyes in the house. My church is awesome and they know our story and are so happy for our little miracle as well.

The rest of the day was spent hanging with David's family for a great lunch, and we took lots of pics to mark the occasion. After lunch my mom offered to watch Grayson so that we could see a movie. So we dropped him by at her house, then decided a nap sounded like a better use of the babysitting services. Ha! I must say that it was just about the best nap I've ever had though!

My husband also got me an amazing mother's day gift to commemorate our angel babies. I had been searching for a long time for the perfect piece of jewelry to remember them by, but often find all the birthstone stuff ugly or cheesy. I found these one day online and they were perfect. They fit my simple style for jewelry and can be added to should we ever experience another loss. (A morbid thought, I know, but I can't help but think practically about our future baby-making ventures). I got the silver rings with birthstones for October, June and December, marking the 3 due dates. I wear them every day now and they remind me of where we've been and make me even more thankful for what we have now in Grayson.

Here are some pics from the day. It was a great one and I look forward to many more.

Family Pic

Our future golfer

Grayson and his cousin Brady who is 9 months older - he is truly our "little" man!

Mommy & Grayson

My gift - thanks to my awesome husband

Singing to my miracle

MIRACLE

Lyrics: Linda Thompson
Music: Stephen Dorff

You're my life's one miracle
Everything I've done that's good
And you break my heart with tenderness
And I confess it's true
I never knew a love like this 'til you

You're the reason I was born
Now I finally know for sure
And I'm overwhelmed with happiness
So blessed to hold you close
The one that I love most
Though the future has so much for you in store
Who could ever love you more

The nearest thing to heaven
You're my angel from above
Only God creates such perfect love

When you smile AT me I cry
And to save your life I'd die
With a romance that is pure in heart
You are my dearest part
Whatever it requires
I live for your desires
Forget my own, your needs will come before
Who could ever love you more

There is nothing you could ever do
To make me stop loving you
And every breath I take
Is always for your sake
You sleep inside my dreams
And know for sure
Who could ever love you more

You can see the video of the song here. Disclaimer: I am definitely no Celine Dion but it sure was fun to sing to my baby from my heart.

I'm an Aunt again!

I am so excited to introduce Tiernan Michael Z to you - my most recent and probably last ever - nephew. He was born at 4:13 a.m. Saturday morning and has red hair. I LOVE him and he sure makes me have the baby itch. Pray for him as he is in the NICU right now for a few days. He's having some blood sugar issues and has a chance of infection so he's on some antibiotics.



My sisters, as well as David's brother all say that their done popping out the kiddos. So now it's up to us to continue keeping the grandkids coming for our parents. A task that we are definitely up for.

Miracle Times Two

At the beginning of this journey to our little G-man, I had one friend who helped me weather the storm. She's been with me through all the ups and downs, and I in turn have loved being there for her during her journey. We've laughed together, cried together and consumed many a bottle of wine...and dump cakes...together. She and her Grumps tried for 6 years before having a successful pregnancy and have finally received their 2 precious miracles. I'm so excited for my friend Sunny and her beautiful babies - a boy and girl, born on June 8th just before 4 a.m. The middle of the night phone call I received that her water had broken was one of the most joyous moments of my life...after my own water breaking of course.

Head on over to Sunny's blog to wish her congrats. I don't think she's posted anything yet, but I'm sure it's coming soon. She was on hospital bedrest for almost 6 weeks before delivery, so she's recovering and will be back in the swing of things soon. For now, just take my word for it. Her babies are absolutely beautiful and are true miracles!

We often joke, wondering if we each didn't have all these crap times in our life, if we'd still be friends. Our friendship has always centered around being there for each other in the tough times. I am so looking forward to a change of pace and being able to share all the joys and good things in life together. I love you Sunny! You are going to be one amazing mama!

Grayson Turns 1

I am now a mom to a 1 year old boy. No longer an infant...he's now creeping on to that toddler phase. So hard to believe!

I have been a bad, bad blogger over the past year. I just checked and I only posted 21 times in Grayson's 1st year of life. And most of those were just picture posts, nothing really too them. My goal is to be better in year 2. I want to do a better job of chronicling this whole crazy ride of motherhood.

I have so many posts in my head, things I want to share and say. I'll try my best to get those out over the coming weeks. For now, here's some info on the big, bad b'day party.

Theme: Cookie Monster

Who was invited: All the family in the area, plus the babysitter (cause she's family too since she's here every Friday night). There were 26 people packed into my house.Thankfully it was a nice day and we could use the deck too.

Menu: Kept things simple with sandwiches (chicken salad, ham salad and tomato/basil/mozarella), pasta salada, fruit salad, spinach dip, bags of chips. Everything was bought from the store so I just had to set it all out and worry about presentation.

The Cake(s): I decided to go with cupcakes and found a great recipe here. They were easy...just time consuming. I dyed the frosting with blue food coloring, cause I wanted his face to be as blue as possible when he was all done. I displayed the cupcakes on this stand from William.s S.onoma.

I also got a cookie cake from Mrs. Fi.elds which was a huge hit. And it was still in theme...which was nice.

The decorations: I found stuff online and at our party city, all with this theme. Couldn't find anything that was solely cookie monster, so had to settle for the whole sesame street gang.

The goodie bags: Everyone went home with a bag with some chips ahoy cookies, as well as a thank you note from Grayson and a pic from his 1 year pic.ture people shoot the day before.

Since his b'day was on a Sunday, he also had goodie bags for all his little friends in the church nursery. Inside were some of his favorite things, mum-mums, apple crisps and a bibster.

The loot: Man did the little man score some seriously good stuff for his b'day! I was thinking half of it would be stuff he'd never play with, but it's all great stuff. Some of his goodies were:

• A Mickey Mouse Ride-On Plane (this thing is seriously cool - and is so far his fav)
• a V-tech learning walker (helpful since he's just now doing the 1st step thing)
• a Dump Truck (fun since his daddy is in the construction industry)
• A Tot-Rod motorized car (really cool cause parents can control it until the kiddo is old enough to)
• An Activity Table
  

Advice: Thanks to Katie for the advice that she'd heard about not stressing if the birthday boy needs to nap. He actually missed half the party as he napped upstairs despite all the noise. We finally woke him up towards the end when it was time for cake and presents. It would've just been mean and not fun for anyone if he was up and grouchy. The 1st bday is about the only one that the guest of honor can sleep through without it being rude. So my advice - let the honoree nap and miss everything except the cake and presents. Cause that's all that really matters for the photo opps.

Here are some pics of the big event, plus his formal shots from pic.ture people:

The Invitation - thanks to Amber for this one!

Look who's 1!

"G" for Grayson!

mmmmm. cake.

the cupcakes

enjoying his new ride

Grayson, my mom, David's mom and me

he wasn't so excited about taking this family pic

or this one either

Our happy little man. Happy birthday Grayson!