week ending may 27, 2007:

Week ending May 27, 2007: This week I took the kids strawberry picking and the kids were very excited about going to the strawberry field again, but didn’t really do much picking. When we arrived at the field Grammy Carole had already started to fill her box, so Alex and Chloe just filled their baskets from her box and started noshing which was fine because the object lesson wasn’t for the kids to work hard for their food, just to see where food comes from. Chloe doesn’t believe that she eats animals. I said what about chicken? And she said that the chicken she eats isn’t the animal chicken. I didn’t press the issue. We also went to a pig roast where there was a slip-and-slide. I remember our neighbor’s slip-and-slide when we lived on the Eastern Shore with no a/c. That thing really got a lot of use! Anyway, at the pig roast Chloe slipped and fell on the slip-and-slide and bumped her head, so she wasn’t fond of it, and Alex wouldn’t go fast, but he did use the slide frequently throughout the day. For the last few weeks I’ve been noticing that Alex tunes out most of what everyone says unless they say “Alex” and he turns around and looks at the speaker before they start speaking. Getting his attention is sometimes a chore. I find myself saying “Alex”, “AL-EX”, “ALEX!” quite a lot. I can’t really blame him though because he’s such a quiet kid and Chloe talks so much, I think he just has to tune everything out now and again to get some peace and quiet. The kids are really starting be good friends. Everyday Alex wakes up before Chloe and he likes a little quiet cuddle time with Mom and then he starts staying “when’s Chloe going to wake up?”. When Chloe gets tired or hungry and Alex tries to leave the room Chloe starts howling. When I ask her what’s wrong she cries “I need someone to play with”, and I’ll say “I’ll play with you” and she’ll cry “No! I need my brother!” She really gets heartbroken when he won’t play with her. I was talking to a friend who has 2 year old twins and she was saying how they fought all the time and she couldn’t stop refereeing long enough to pour a glass of iced tea before the fighting started up again. I do remember a time like that, but now the kids play nicely for long enough for me to get some chores done before I need to intervene or redirect them. They get lots of practice everyday negotiating with each other (“you be the prince and I’ll be the princess”, “no, I want to be Spiderman”), taking turns, and sharing. I’ve read that people learn much more from their siblings than they do from their parents because siblings spend more time interfacing with each other than they do with their parents. At this point that seems to be true.

week ending may 20, 2007:

Week ending May 20, 2007: This week the kids and I bought a Father’s Day present for Casey and I told them not to tell him because it is nice when presents are surprises. Casey came home from work that evening and the first thing Chloe said to him (in a stage wisper) “shhh… I’m not supposed to tell you that we bought a Father’s Day present for you. It’s a surprise.” Also this week we planted our first ever vegetable garden. I’d been meaning to plant a garden (I’ve been “meaning to do” about a hundred other things too) but never got to it. Then Bubbe said she had started some seed and would we like some seedlings? She gave us 18 vegetable plants, 5 herb plants, and 12 marigolds (to keep the bugs away). So, we spent all our spare time this weekend tilling a patch of back yard and planting. The kids were really excited about it and “helped” with the tilling for quite a while. Each of the kids has gardening gloves and Alex’s has Garfield on them. Alex kept mixing up the words and saying that he was helping me with the “Garfielding” instead of the gardening. Earlier in the week the kids presented me with some challenges in trying to answer their questions. Alex realized that he has testicles separate from his penis and while I was on the phone with a girlfriend, Alex came out of the bathroom naked with a handful of scrotum and said “Mom, what is this big thing called?”. My girlfriend also has a son and so I asked her. She said the kids call them “balls”. Later I told the story to Casey and I said that I remember kids calling them “nuts” and I didn’t want to tell Alex the wrong thing. Casey said that when Alex goes to school the kids will tell him what they are to be called. Chloe’s challenge to me came when we were looking at the old family photographs that we have in our stairway. Chloe was asking who each person was and when we got to my Dad’s mother I said “that is Granddad’s mommy, she is called Nana”. Chloe said she wanted to meet Nana and I said she couldn’t because Nana is in heaven. Then Chloe made the most amazing leap and said “who’s going to be my Mommy when you go to heaven?”. She’s so young to have to worry about things like this, but I think I convinced her that there will always be people to love and care for her.

mother's day

Mother’s Day 2007: Today Casey got up with Alex at 6:30 and I fell back to sleep for about an hour. Then he watched the kids while I worked on the blog, and he watched the kids while I took a long shower. We went to lunch at a Thai restaurant and they didn't have a kids menu, so we ordered chicken satay and Pad Thai (chicken skewers and noodles) for the kids and after objecting for a while, they actually ate it. I was very proud that they would even try something so exotic. I asked Casey to take them to the dollar store so they could each pick out something to give to me as a gift and they picked some silk flowers and a can opener (Alex really liked that it had a handle that he could turn round and round). We dropped a card and gift off at Casey's mom's and visited her neighborhood playground. Then we went over for a joyously boisterous dinner with cousin Natalie and Uncle Dan and Aunt Danielle. All told it was exactly what I wanted!

may 9-12

May 9 2007: Today we went back to the Magic Kingdom since we’d only seen one show and one ride before we had to head over to Epcot for lunch on Monday. Pictures are at http://picasaweb.google.com/constance.phelps/DisneyDay22007 When we arrived we could smell smoke in the air from nearby forest fires and the air was hazy. The first thing we did when we got in the gates was to grab a park map and put some sunscreen on. As we were doing that a WDW employee came up to Chloe (who was dressed in her Cinderella costume) and said hello and asked if Chloe would like to meet Cinderella. It turns out the lady was in charge of scheduling private meetings with Cinderella and she randomly selects 30 children a day to get a 5 minute meet-and-greet with Cinderella. She gave us an appointment time of 2pm. After that we walked by the castle and happened to catch the show again. Since we’d already seen the show we left just a few seconds before it ended and headed around the other side of castle just in time to find Sleeping Beauty and her prince with only 3 little girls in line waiting to greet them. By the time it was our turn to greet them we heard a lady walking by say “holy cow!” as she noticed how long the line for greeting Sleeping Beauty had gotten. Then we headed over to the Dumbo ride. The kids were pretty tired and Alex spent our entire wait with his head on Casey’s shoulder. The ride perked them both right up and they were ready to run to the next ride. We did the carousel again, and then Alex tried to remove the sword from the “Sword in the Stone”. The line at the Winnie the Pooh ride said it was 30 min, so we got a fast pass so we could come back later and wait in the short line. Alex wanted to ride the race cars and Chloe wanted to wait in line to meet Tigger, so we split up. As we waited in line Chloe got hungry and started a non-stop stream of complaints so by the time it was her turn with Tigger, she was so grouchy she wouldn’t get out of the stroller. Alex and Casey faired better because Alex wanted a blue car and you don’t get to pick which car you get in, you just have to get in the next available car when it is your turn, but they got a blue car. Alex loved the ride, and then we went to lunch. At the restaurant the kid’s meals came with 2 sides with a choice of grapes, applesauce, or carrot sticks! All week the kids have been running like mad and eating enough calories to feed a professional athlete, and this lunch was no exception. Chloe’s good humor returned and she cuddled up with Daddy. After lunch we went back to Winnie the Pooh and the fast pass line was only 2 or 3 minutes long. The ride was inside and much of it was in the dark (the blustery storm) with fake thunder and lightning and it was too scary for Alex. The next ride we attempted was the Buzz Lightyear ride. It was also inside and Alex got scared just waiting in line, so he skipped it, but Chloe loved it. We let Alex pick the next ride and he wanted to ride the Tomorrowland Transit Train. It was getting close to our appointment time with Cinderella so we hopped on the steam train and headed back to the town square. True to her word, we walked right in to a private room with Cinderella and a photographer. Chloe showed her glass slippers to Cinderella and got to twirl with Cinderella. The photographer posted the pictures at http://www.disneyphotopass.com/ with the ID # WDWD-47D3-64P3-3P6F (you have to register your e-mail address with them and create an account, and it is REALLY slow). We then headed over to ride Aladdin’s magic carpet for a fun ride, had an ice cream snack and got a spot on the rope just in time for the start of the parade. After the parade we walked right in to the front row of the 3-D movie called Philharmagic. Alex’s comment about the movie was “Donald Duck fell out of the movie!”. The 3-D effects were really spectacular. It was getting late so we rode It’s a Small World for our last ride and took the ferry back to our car. What a day! Again the kids had no screaming fits, and everything we tried to do worked out like clock work.

May 10, 2007: Today we headed over to Clearwater Beach for lunch at Frenchy’s and swimming in the gulf. Pictures: http://picasaweb.google.com/constance.phelps/Clearwater2007 Alex took a brief nap during the 1hr 40 min ride and both kids behaved very nicely while we had a relaxing lunch in the beautiful weather. After lunch we headed to the beach for about an hour. Until this year Alex has been somewhere between tentative and terrified by sand and surf, but this time he ran right onto the beach, changed into his suit and ran right into the water with no urging and no pausing to acclimate to the sensory overload he used to experience with the gritty shiftiness of the sand under his feet, the pounding noise of the surf, and the constant assault of the breeze. The kids jumped over waves for a while and then settled in to dig in the sand, build sand castles and fill their hole with water. The temperature of the gulf was probably in the low 80’s, so none of us minded. We headed back to Kissimmee for dinner at Margaritaville. It is a huge restaurant with a volcano that makes noise and smoke and flows margaritas about twice and hour. It also has colorfully dressed people on stilts who make balloon hats for kids and for people celebrating birthdays and special occasions .

May 11, 2007: Today we started packing up and the kids fought the whole time. After we were packed we took them out the playground with their new shovels and pails from the beach and they played nicely for over an hour with other kids from the condos. We made the kids take a break from playing to eat lunch at the picnic benches. In the meantime another little girl arrived at the playground with in sight. It was all Chloe could do to stay sitting for lunch, and she kept saying “there is a little girl over there, I like her! I need to go play!” Chloe is such a social butterfly. The kids were turning purple and running with sweat so we “made” them go to the pool and cool off (they actually argued about it). I kept yawning so Casey told me he’d handle the kids while I took a nap. I fell asleep for over an hour and the kids made new friends at the pool. When Chloe told me about it later she told me about the 3 little girls and said that the one with the dark hair was her best friend, “except for Angie, she’s by best-er friend”. The kids were incredibly active the whole day until they got hungry at which point they’d get surly until we fed them, and then they’d immediately go back to bouncing.

May 12, 2007: Casey and I got up at 5:30am and packed the car. We got the kids up at 6:30 which they were really not happy about. On the day of the flight to Florida they jumped right out of bed and helped us get ready. This time they were not excited about flying at all. The only problem we ran into was at security. Alex was wearing overalls with large metal buckles which set the alarm off and he had to get patted down by a security guard. He didn’t cry, but since he’d spent so much effort avoiding strangers at Disney World, I know he must have felt very uncomfortable. We got home by 2pm to long grass, dirty laundry, having to cook for ourselves, and bad news when stepping on the scale. Back to reality.

may 8, 2007

May 8, 2003: Still no sleeping in for us today. We puttered around all morning and I spent an hour on the phone with the insurance company (Allstate claims process is TERRIBLE!). Casey and his uncles went off to play golf and Barb and I took the kids to Rainforest Café for lunch. The kids and I had never eaten at Rainforest, and now we’ll never have to do it again. There were pretend thunderstorms about every 15 minutes that the kids did not appreciate at all, they weren’t impressed with the animated elephants and gorillas, and the food was grossly overpriced. We got there before they opened and got seated and fed right away, so that was nice. The aquarium at the Café was better than the one at Epcot and you could walk underneath the tank and one point and watch the fish swimming overhead. The kids spent the rest of their money from MomMom and turned down the opportunity to ride on a little ride at Downtown Disney. I thought sure the kids would fall asleep in the car, but they didn’t. They high temperature of the day was only 80F so we didn’t spend much time in the pool.

may 7, 2007

May 7, 2007: link to pictures: http://picasaweb.google.com/constance.phelps/Disney2007

The kids were so excited they got up at 6am. We had planned to get to the park before rope drop, but we didn’t realize that after arriving at the parking lot, you have to wait in line and ride a monorail to get to the actual park, so it was about 9am on the nose when we got to the park.

We’d read that all the Disney characters arrive at the park by steam train shortly before 9am, but we missed it. We did find the Big Bad Wolf still hanging around the town square and Chloe waited in line to greet him (Alex wasn’t having any of it).

Chloe had been talking for days about riding the carousel, so we headed there 1st, but Alex was more excited about spending the money his MomMom gave to him, so he skipped the ride and went straight to the gift shop.

After that we saw a show in front of Cinderella’s castle and the show had Mickey and his pals, 3 princesses, 3 princess, Peter Pan and Wendy, Captain Hook, Smee, and Malificent the bad fairy from Sleeping Beauty.

Chloe was disappointed that she wasn’t allowed to get on the stage and dance with princesses, but she settled for twirling around the audience. The kids really enjoyed the show it very energetic and had smoke and fireworks during the dramatic moments.

After the show Chloe went to a gift shop to spend her money and Alex sat the stroller and played with his new toy while Chloe debated the relative merits of each dress, tiara, and pair of shoes in Tinkerbelle’s Treasures. In the end Chloe decided that she already had a dress so she would get glass slippers and a “build-your-own” crown with snap-on veil and jewels.

After that we had to take 2 mono-rails and hike half-way across Epcot to get to Akershaus Castle for our scheduled lunch with the princesses. We had to wait 10 or 15 minutes after our scheduled reservation, but it in the low 70’s so it was perfect weather for standing outside.

When they finally called our party, they filed us in for a photo shoot with Sleeping Beauty (Princess Aurora) and again, Alex was having none of it.

The inside of the castle looked like an authentic banquet hall and we ordered hot lunch off of the pre-fix menu and then headed to the cold buffet for appetizers. Every 5 minutes or so as we ate our delicious lunch a different princess would come by the table and talk with us and pose with Chloe.

All of the princesses tried to talk to Alex but he would tuck his head into his chest and cover his mouth in his typical “hiding” pose and I’d say “he’s very shy” and they’d leave him alone, except for Alice in Wonderland who was especially charming and tried a little harder to bring him out of his shell.

Chloe lapped up all the attention and hugged and kissed Grammy Barb and told her “I’m having a wonderful time”.

Daddy found what he liked about Epcot with Margaritas in Mexico, Carlsberg beer in Norway, etc.

After lunch we walked through the butterfly tent and Chloe played on the playground a little before we headed over to the Living Seas.

We waited about 15 minutes to get on the Nemo ride which involved riding in slow moving shells past an array of large tv screens cleverly disguised with fake coral. The screens displayed the Nemo characters who would appear to swim from one screen to the next behind the coral.

After the ride we walked around the gigantic aquarium tanks but weren’t really impressed because they didn’t measure up to the tanks we’d seen in the Atlantis resort in the Bahamas. Our favorite part was a big sea turtle who was curious about the people watching him.

In the smaller tanks Chloe pointed to a fish and said “that’s a lionfish”, and sure enough it was (I had to read the tank label to be sure, it is hard to be outsmarted by your 3 year old).

At this point is was 3pm and we had reservations for 10 for dinner on the boardwalk with Casey’s family at 5pm (another hike across the park and a ferry ride away), so we decided it was better to let the kids get a little nap in the stroller than to try to squeeze in another attraction.

The kids had a tough time waking up for dinner, but as always seems to happen when you dine with a large group, it was 6pm before we got our food and they were awake by then. Chloe enjoyed the heck out of her dessert which was a build-your-own sundae.

It was a little after 7 when dinner was over and we decided we were too tired to wait until 9pm for the fireworks so we hiked back to the back entrance to Epcot, walked though the whole park to the mono-rail, rode the monorail, and then took a tram to the parking lot. By the time we got the kids and all our junk in the car it was 8:45, so we changed our minds and decided to drive back to the Boardwalk to watch the fireworks. It turned out that the boardwalk had a very obstructed view of only the highest fireworks, but the kids had never seen a fireworks show, so they giggled and squealed whenever we did get a glimpse of the fireworks. It was well after 10pm before we got them in bed. After the kids were in bed, when Casey and I reviewed the day we realized how well the day had gone. The weather was perfect, we made it on time for all of our reservations, we got to do everything we set out to do, and the kids did not melt down even once. All told it was a pretty magical day.

may 6, 2007:

May 6, 2007: Today started off with a little Disney magic as there was at least a half dozen hot air balloons passing over our condo at 7:30 this morning. None of us slept terribly well, and I would have greatly preferred to be asleep at that hour, but at least we had something fun to see.

Chloe cried at the drop of a hat all morning and I thought we were in for a miserable day, but once we got moving she did just fine. We went to the grocery store to stock up on supplies and bought the kids some $3 squirt guns. They enjoyed the pool for quite a while and then Casey watched them at the playground while I took my mother-in-law shopping. On our way to the store we were sitting the car at a red light at Seven Dwarfs Blvd (I’m not making that up) and the car got rear ended. It was pretty minor and the other driver was apologetic and kind, so everything will probably be ok, but when we called Enterprise Rent A Car, a guy there read us the riot act about how we were responsible for the car and the loss of business to the company until the insurance companies were done duking it out. We had a really fantastic afternoon thunderstorm that cooled things right down for our day at Disney tomorrow.

may 5, 2007

May 5, 2007: Our trip down went without incident. We got the kids out of bed at 6:30 a.m. and had them dressed, pottied, teeth brushed and in the car by 7am. Chloe and Alex each have a small suitcase with wheels and I packed each one full of toys and books and crayons. Alex walked all through both airports pulling his wheeled bag with the Thomas the tank engine character on it, but Chloe quickly got bored with it and handed her Barbie bag over to us to deal with.

Alex fell asleep on the plane, and Chloe stayed awake and ate lunch and several snacks.

At the Tampa airport there is a monorail between two buildings, so Alex enjoyed riding the “train”.

Once we got into the rental car Alex was fed up with waiting in lines and following us around strange places and he said “I want to go to Florida!” I said “this is Florida” and he said “I want to go to a different Florida!” He was thinking that the fun would start as soon as set foot in Florida, and our Florida experience up until that point had not met the criteria. Chloe fell asleep during the hour ride to the condo, and everyone felt much better once we went to the pool at the condo. We brought the kids’ “floaties” and it took them no time at all to figure out how to propel themselves around the pool and start having a wonderful time. After a few minutes in the pool I asked Alex if he was happy with “this Florida” and he gave an enthusiastic “yes”. Chloe made a friend at the pool and the friend also had a “floaty” and she jumped off the side of the pool holding her floatie which kept her head above water. Alex and Chloe both tried that and thought it was great.

week ending May 6, 2007

Week ending May 6, 2007: We are leaving for Florida early Saturday morning, so I figured I’d post now because we aren’t likely to have an internet connection down there. The kids are really excited about riding an airplane, swimming in the pool, seeing princesses and princes, riding on a train, and seeing fireworks. We’ve never taken them to see fireworks before, so I’m a little worried about how they’ll react to the noise, but I found a video of fireworks on-line, and warned them about the noise, so all I can do now is hope for the best. I told Alex that fireworks are like little rockets, and then he wanted to ride the rocket. I tried to explain that the rockets were too small to ride on, but he insisted that someone had to ride the rocket. Starting last Sunday the kids told everyone who got within listening distance, “On Saturday I’m going to Florida on an airplane”. And everyday since, the first thing they as when they wake up is, “is it Florida day today?”. I’ve been giving them a count-down by saying “no, we leave for Florida in 5 more days”, but they don’t seem to understand because they’ll respond by saying “is it ‘5 more days’?”. They just don’t know what “5 more days” means. Every year I take a picture of the twins in front of my azalea bushes at peak bloom. I’m afraid I will miss peak bloom this year, so I took a picture as soon as it started to bloom. Alex has invented a creative new game. What ever vehicle he is playing with he says, “you press the tractor button and it is a tractor”, then “you press the airplane button and it is an airplane”, and then “you press the racecar button and it is a race car”. That way he can use whatever vehicle he has to do whatever he wants. This week Chloe brought a pair of her shoes to me and said “Mom, it says ‘Disney’”, and she pointed to the word Disney. Later in the day she did the same thing with a hat with the Disney logo on it. She doesn’t have to know how to read to recognize the logo!