My Baby is Three!!!!!

2007 - 1 year old
2008 - 2 years old
2009 - 3 years old
How is the world did my baby turn three?!?! Being the total loser mom that I am sometimes, I didn't have her cupcakes ready to take to school on her birthday, January 16. In my defense, my car totally died at work on Monday. Is it worrisome when you know the two truck guy personally because he has towed you so many times?!?! My car died several months ago and had to be towed. When I called AAA to be towed again, they sent the same tow truck guy. He remembered our first meeting and he "fixed" my car from what he said was a bad battery terminal connection. I thought the problem was fixed and drove home - Only to have my car refuse to start again. Because I work so late, I haven't had time to tow it to the garage and so my mom and I have been sharing her van. Not great. So, no coopcakes (Regan talk) at school on Friday.

She did request going to Chuck A Cheese (Regan talk again). We went there once when it first opened and she has wanted to go back soooo bad. That wonderful mouse sent her a coupon for 20 free tokens and those tokens paid for her to have 90 minutes of pure entertainment. She had a blast! Her favorite ride was the horse which she rode twice. She is scared of the Merry Go Round, but will ride the horse that jumps and runs. Go figure.

We took her out to dinner at her favorite restaurant, Bob Evvie. She had her favorite fruit plate and was thrilled with her birthday. I was worried that she would be upset with no presents or party, but she wasn't and talks again and again about going to Chuck E. Cheese.

On Saturday, she requested JayJay make her a Barbie cake and she loved the results. Her only complaint was that it didn't have enough frinkles (sprinkles) on it and so she added those herself. Tomorrow I am hoping to have it together enough to bake her coopcakes to take to school and to have some presents wrapped for her to open. We are also hoping to get her a dairy Queen cake as she loves to look at all of them whenever we go to DQ (which is way too often as my backside keeps telling me as it keeps expanding!). The Newton family may not have it together enough to do it big, but we do just keep stretching it out and celebrating and celebrating and celebrating!

We also wanted to say Happy Birthday to our great friend Grayson! He turns two on the 21st! We went to his birthday party this evening and had a great time! His mom owns half of the therapy clinic that I work at in the afternoons and she is the best boss ever and as a bonus and is great friend also! Regan was thrilled to celebrate even if she wouldn't ride the pony. She said she wanted to ride Chuck A's pony, not the pony with frinkles on his feet (his hooves were painted with blue glitter paint). I guess there is no hope that she will ride any pony if you won't ride one with frinkled feet!

I Realize My Blessings

It is stories such as these that makes me realize again how blessed I am .....

I will never forget being told my daughter probably wouldn't survive the night. She did survive and thrive and Regan is healthy and spunky and such a personality. Thankfully, our treatment course for Regan's illness was relatively short. Please pray for the Riggs family as they have a very long, difficult road ahead of them. I can not imagine the fear they must be living with, fearing they may lose their daughter.


http://www.riggsfamilyblog.com/

Walt Disney World Marathon Weekend

Yesterday we had an awesome day! In looking for area 5K races that I could possibly enter, I stumbled upon Disney's Marathon Weekend. Unfortunately, the 5K was full and so I could not enter. Fortunately, they were holding kid's races and they were not full. I signed up Konnor and Regan to participate in the kids' races. It was a blast!!!!

We got up at 5:30 AM and headed to Disney's Wide World of Sports. We arrived around 9AM and the place was quickly filling with very buff, athletic people (unfortunately, I did not fit in this category)! We picked up the kids' packets and I was so tickled that their racing bibs had their names on them! The races didn't start until 11 AM and so we spent the time running on the track, partying to the music, and taking pictures. Regan's race was first and she did much better than the Turkey Trot, but still wanted to hold my hand the entire time. Disney encouraged parents to run with their children because they were encouraing family fitness. It also helped since there were hundreds of kids running around and I wouldn't have sent her into the mob by herself anyway. We were the fourth and last heat of the 100 meter race and had a blast! Konnor was entered into the 400 meter and he was the third and final heat. He did awesome and had a great time! They didn't have awards because they were encouraging running for the joy of running and just having a good time. Each kid got a medal at the end of the race and also had their pictures taken. It was an awesome time. I want to do the Disney Princess 5K and Kids Fest races, but probably we won't get back up there again in March :(.

Following the races, my mom and I decided to hop on some Disney buses and wing it and see where they took us. Another great thing about Disney is that you can take the buses to just about everywhere on Disney property. We love bus hopping and exploring the Disney area. You can do all of this free of charge as long as you don't enter the parks. Jason and Jean decided they would rather go eat at a restaurant and so they went their own way. My mom and I had packed a lunch for us and the kids and so we hopped a bus from Disney's WWoS and headed to the Fort Wilderness Lodge and ate our picnic lunch. Regan really, really wanted to ride the monorail and so we hopped a bus to Epcot where we could pick up the monorail and take it to the Magic Kingdom ticket center. We then took the ferry to Magic Kingdom. We took another bus to Animal Kingdom Lodge where we got to see Zebras, giraffes, white pelicans and many more animals. We thought we were meeting Jason and Jean at Downtown Disney and so we headed down there to meet them. They had already left so we splurged on a quick snack (I love Disney's Rice Krispie treats!). We then had to take a bus from DTD to Pop Century Hotel where we admired the lobby before we headed to Hollywood Studios where we met Jason and Jean. For some odd reason, the only bus to WWoS is from Hollywood Studios via one of the hotels. Our final bus took us to our car and we hit the road at 6PM. We stopped for dinner at Cracker Barrel and got home by 10PM, tired after a great day! Regan and Konnor had a blast and loved riding Disney buses. We loved just winging it and seeing new sights!

Christmas and New Year's Resolutions

My uncle brought down a hand me down car for Regan to have...she loved it!!
Gift from my grandmother. Regan is in awe of her Barbie that is taller than she is!

Hard to open presents with a 150+ lb dog who insists on being in the middle of things.

A shepherd and his sheep.

Regan copying her idol, Ms. Claire.

I am so behind on posting!!! I have had a great couple of weeks off from the school district. I had to work several days at KidSpirit (pediatric outpatient clinic), but am glad that I have that tiny bit of income. My grandparents came down so we could celebrate Christmas on the 26th. We had a blast. We handmade alot of the gifts and I loved, loved, loved getting back to what Christmas is all about. One day I'll have it all together enough to post some pictures of the gifts. Regan and Konnor had parts in our church play. Regan was originally an angel, but got demoted down to a sheep since she tended to wander all over the stage. She was a perfect angel during practice, but when the actual event went down, she only wanted to be with Ms. Claire (children's director). She loves Ms. Claire and tries to copy everything she does.

Regan's obsession continues with Barbie and Elvis and so many of her presents reflected this obsession. Regan was thrilled yesterday that when we got to the library she got to check out an Elvis book. The book practically weighs more than she does and as it is an adult biography, has very little pictures, but she loves to "read" it. She sat and watched an Elvis biography that was on E! yesterday. I'm so puzzled by where this obsession came from as I have no Elvis music or anything collectible with Elvis, but as soon as she heard my mom's Elvis CD she was in love! It was also a banner day yesterday as You've Got Mail was on tv. This continues to be her favorite movie. I don't get it, but I go with it!!! Update: another Elvis show on today and You've Got Mail was on again! Regan was sooooo excited!

Okay....now for my New Year's Resolutions. I've never made them before, but this year I feel like there is a definite need for change.

• Pay off some debt. I am so in debt it is scary, scary, scary. Work is declining during my outpatient evening job, so I'm really worried.
• Lose some weight. Since Regan came home, I have been ridiculous with my weight gain. I'm going to put it out there so that maybe I will be more accountable: 30 lbs!!! It started with her hospitilization and eating junk food. Then it continued with stress and being busy. I also think it has something to do with the fact that I live alone. No one around and so I'm not accountable to anyone for what and how much I eat. It is no excuse, but let's face it, if another adult saw how much I ate then I probably wouldn't eat so much! All excuses, but I really need to do something about my weight, it is depressing. I want to be healthy for Regan and I have never been heavier. I am embarrassed to see anyone that I haven't seen in a while because I am so much heavier. Ugh! I have no money for new clothes, so I need to lose weight to fit in my closet full of clothes!
• Be more patient. I am such a procrastinator, and yet I can also be very intense about getting things done. When I want something done, I want it done yesterday. I also want things done my way and so I have very little patience when it isn't done just so......I need to learn to let things go and not sweat the small stuff. Part of this is that I often have no time management skills and so I underestimate the time it will take to get something done or I just procrastinate so that it doesn't get done at all. I also need to realize that certain things take time (like weight loss!) and not to give up just because it takes longer than I want it to.
• Keep my house picked up. I get so busy that it adds up and I spend my weekend cleaning.

I think that is it for now, I'm sure I'll think of things as we go along.