Here comes the sun...

..and I say it's alright.

"To Appreciate the Beauty of a Snow Flake...

...you have to stand out in the cold."

Edging Toward the Tween Years

Last weekend we had Eliza Grace's 8th birthday party. I think her choices were indicative of the fact that she is moving away from some childish ways and moving towards early adolescence: a horseback riding party...with a Scooby Doo themed cake.

Thankfully the weather was not too cold or wet and I think everyone had a really great time. There was a little something for everyone: pony rides, horse drawn cart rides (although it was really more of a seated chariot ride), turkeys that followed you around and pecked at the back of your knees, geese, ducks, peacocks, goats to feed, dogs...you get the picture.

After we were done at the barn, we headed back to our house for pizza, cake and presents. Afterward, Eliza Grace declared it the "best birthday party in my entire life!" Now that is something every parent loves to hear!

These proud fellas followed just about everyone around. Their gals stayed close to make sure they were not tempted to stray

If you gobbled at them, they gobbled right back...loudly!

Hmph..they gave me their rear view

They enjoyed pecking at Eliza Grace's reflective tag

on the back of her jacket. The girls were obviously excited about getting on the ponies. You can practically hear Ms. Ali saying,"girls, please do not run up behind the ponies."

Eliza Grace letting Chief check her out

Waiting to mount up

I wonder what tale Eliza Grace was telling here?

Apparently my girl knows how to pose

Heading out on the trail This is how Will patiently awaited his turn:

Aunt Heidi and Cousin Gretchen
heading out for their ride The cart rides were a big hit!

Then we took the gang back to our house for
the yummy stuff

Selfishly Thankful.

Scott was supposed to be in Jacmel, Haiti this week working on a building project for the Haitian Children's Home.

The trip was postponed.

Instead he is safe at home.

Thank you, Jesus.

Yep, that would be me...

My friend, Amy, gave me a mug for my birthday last month. I think she knows me fairly well.
Believe it or not, I thought I was a fairly focused and attentive individual until I met Scott. I guess, given that I grew up with three sisters AND attended an all female high school, I had spent so much of my formidable years surrounded by like minds that I had not noticed that perhaps I could be a wee bit, shall we say, scattered?

So imagine my surprise when Scott would often interrupt my stream of consciousness well thought-out conversations with phrases like "focus, Jacque, focus" and "shiny objects" while shaking his head. I mean, so what if I change the subject matter in any given conversation 5 times in 2 minutes. If the male mind cannot keep up and multi-task like I can, is that my fault? (snicker, snort)

Of course, I can sometimes recognize my wandering mind when I speak. Often, I can actually catch myself, stop and finish my original thought before moving on. Mind you, it has become much worse since I had kids. But I blame that on a variety of hormones and the fact that I constantly have thoughts like, "has everyone gone potty" and "I need to get teacher gifts" floating around in my subconscious.

Regardless, if I were a kid today they would probably label my distractedness with some sort of acronym, accompanied by some sort of pharmaceutical aid. Thankfully, we all know better.

Although, perhaps that pharmaceutical aid...

Eight.

Dear Eliza Grace,

Today you are eight. EIGHT! I know I do this every year and I do not know why it surprises me that you are getting older, but I cannot believe you are already EIGHT YEARS OLD!

You are an absolutely amazing child. You have the imagination of an artist, the vocabulary of a scholar, a heart full of God's love and compassion....and the ability to go into full drama mode at the drop of a hat :)

You are unique, absolutely one of a kind. I think that there are likely very few eight year olds who would have asked for filet mignon (medium rare, please), guacamole and lemonade as their birthday meal! That you are truly unique is one of the things I love most about you.

I thank God every day that He has given you to Daddy and me to help you grow into the woman He wants and needs you to be.

Happy birthday, my sweet girl.

We love you!

Mommy & Daddy

Disney Trip 2009 - Best Moments

We had a great time at Walt Disney World back in mid-December. We went to the Magic Kingdom 3 times, EPCOT and Hollywood Studios twice and Animal Kingdom once and believe it or not we still did not ride every ride or see every show! We had a lot of great moments but here were some of the best:

- The big reveal: I picked Will up at pre-school wearing Minnie Mouse ears. Naturally, he asked why I was wearing them, to which I responded,"Do you want to go to Disney World today?" I wish you could have seen the look on his face because it was a perfect combination of surprise, excitement and joy! We headed to Florida about an hour later. And three minutes after that, he began asking if we were at Disney World yet.

- Crystal Palace Character breakfast with Pooh and the gang: The buffet was really good and Scott and I did our best to eat our money's worth! We chose this specific character breakfast because Will loves Eeyore and we wanted to make sure he got to see him. The bad news is that Will absolutely, positively would not look at, touch or talk to 99.9% of the costumed characters we saw. The good news is that he literally launched himself into Eeyore while calling "Hi Eeyore, hi Eeyore!" and would not let go of him for a good 2 minutes. When you see the pictures, it is evident that Will has a complete and unconditional love for Eeyore.

- Meeting the gang from "UP": UP is by far our favorite new movie of last year. Since we saw that movie, I don't think a single day has gone by where one of us has not yelled, "SQUIRREL!" and then posed for a moment. Once again, despite Will's complete love of Dug, he would not even get near any of the characters. Eliza Grace, however, had no problem and was thrilled when they lavished attention on her for a good 5 minutes. In fact, the character handler finally told them that they had to move onto the next guests! Of course, shortly thereafter, we had two talking Dug plush dolls heading to the hotel.

- Will's love of fast rides: I have said it before and I will say it again, the boy has the need for speed. We rode Big Thunder Mountain a couple of times, and rode Test Track a total of 5 times. On both rides, Will was smiling ear to ear and screaming "woo hoo" and "can we go faster?" Although he loved the Speedway cars he kept asking me to go faster and I could not get him to understand that I had the pedal to the floor!

And now for the obligatory photo glut:

Cinderella's Castle, of course

Sibling kindness while hanging out
on the train at the Animal Kingdom

Shooting the breeze,
getting autographs with Russell, Dug,Mr. Fredrickson and Kevin

"Hi there, my name is Dug. I have just met you and I love you."

Riding a giant ant at Hollywood Studios

Lots of Christmas trees, decorations and lights! (A tiny Eliza Grace there at the very bottom of the tree)

The Osborne Family Spectacle of Lights,
complete with "snow"

Hugs with Tigger

Tigger, bless his sweet heart, tried so hard to getWill to look at him, but Will pulled the old
"if I pretend to drink my juice he will go away" routine.

Eliza Grace offered Pooh some honey Eliza Grace and P-p-p-piglet matched! Ah, the moment he had been waiting for!

Sigh...love that Eeyore

"This is fun!"

"Make it go faster, Mommy!"

THE Goofy & my Goofy!