Things have been busy and certainly crazy, with the evaluation going on. Yesterday was our home evaluation. That is when the evaluator comes to our home, checks out the house and watches our family together, how we interact. I think it went quite well. We had a great time. We made cupcakes, which Maddie calls pup cakes. We also finger painted. We where sad to see Nicole go home for the rest of the summer. We will not see her until school starts. We where very blessed to have her for the last 5 and a half weeks. I hope this evaluation goes in our favorer. It is all in gods hands now. I love my girls and I just don't think I could bare them being split apart. Today was a nice break from everything. Besides Maddie having tonsillitis and a 104 degree temp the night before, it was a fun day. Maddie and I went to the Dinosaur museum with My mom, her boyfriend, and his son Lucas. Lucas is ten and Maddie just thinks he is great as she does most boys. After spending a fantastic day with Maddie, I got to spend the rest of the evening with my husband, while Maddie spent the night with grandma at Rachael's house. Jake and I spent most of the night talking and just enjoying one another's company. Latter we caught a movie. What a fantastic non stressful day. I am grateful for days like today. I needed it.
August 2007
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July 19, 2006
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July 10, 2006
Trip to Florida
We all had allot of fun in Florida!!!!!! The Flight was Awesome, Nicole and I got to fly first class. I never want to go on a long flight without first class again. My heart does go out to Jake and Maddie who flew coach on South West. We stayed at the West Gate Resort, which I was gravely disappointed in. We spent allot of money and they put us in the crappiest of their Resorts. Near by was their nicer newer resort, which we had to drive to each day if we wanted the free breakfast or amenities. Each time we went to the other resort we where reminded how crappy the one was we where staying in. NEVER STAY WITH WESTGATE...EVER!!!!! I can't complain about the room though it was very lovely and Jake and I had a separate bedroom from the girls. I rather stay in a hotel....less money......made service......and oh the same amenities. At least at a hotel you don't have to drive to their free breakfast. We did get to paddle boat. I get a kick out of this picture. Notice the way Jakes side of the boat tips...... ha ha ha.........
The first park we got to was Sea World. I love Sea World!! It was very crowded that day, so it was hard to feed the Dolphins(which is my favorite part). It was hot and muggy, I suppose like most days in Florida, but towards the end of the day it cooled down and rained. Maddie was a bit scared while feeding the dolphins. I was hanging her over the side as low as I could so she could pet a dolphin. She was frightened that I might drop her in so she she began to cry. Maddie was very cranky that day anyway, we had left her allergy medicine at home. She woke up that morning with no voice, feeling miserable. When Maddie's allergies act up she gets sore throats. Nicole had a great time. We choose seats as close as we could to the water at the Shamoo show. I cried when I watched the show it was so cute and I was so excited that my children had this opportunity to be this close to animals like a whale and dolphins. We where soaked by the end of the show. The water was sooo cold. After the show Maddie was mad. She whined, "I didn't want to get wet." Which was bull, because she helped choose the seats knowing we would be soaked before it started. She was just not feeling well. We had a fantastic time despite Maddie not feeling well.
We attended a show at the resort (the other resort). The show was about animals. They brought out a baby bear, baby white tiger, alligator, dingo, cougars, leopards and so on.... There was allot of other animals. At the end of the show the kids got to touch and take a picture with an animal of their choice. The girls had their picture taken with the young white Tiger. I could not get a very good picture of my own because there was so many people in the way.
Monday Night they had warnings of the first hurricane of the season. They said Tuesday it would rain all day. We had planned to go to Disney World that day, but figured we would not be able to go. We woke up on Tuesday morning and it was dry and cloudy, we decided to go to Disney World after all. When we arrived it began to rain so we bought rain ponchos. The rain just poured down, It was great!! We had fun in the rain and it kept things very cool. The first ride we rode on was Snow Whites Scary adventures. I should have paid attention to the name because it scared the poopy out of Maddie. In fact when I asked her how she liked the Dumbo Ride all she could say was "the Snow White ride scared me." Nicole Could not wait to go on the haunted house ride. She had talked about it the whole way to Florida on the plain. Nicole covered her eyes the entire ride. Maddie loved it, she thought it is was allot less scarier then the Snow White ride. I just laughed at the fact Nicole closed her eyes the entire ride. We all loved Splash mountain of course isn't that everyone's favorite. Pirates of the Caribbean was closed. Every time I would say "oh no, my favorite ride is closed," Maddie would hug me and say, "I'm so sorry mom." We didn't get to see allot of characters personally but we saw most of them in the parade. I also stood in a line for 2 hrs and I am not kidding. Jake took the girls to do other stuff while I stood in a line for 2 hrs to see princesses. When we finally got to see them, the only princesses there was Cinderella and Belle. The two Princesses the girls care the least for. When we left Maddie broke my heart. She got all sad and said, "where is Princess Aurora and Jasmine." At least she got to see them in the parade. When I had asked the girls what there favorite part of Disney world was. Nicole said all the Princesses and Maddie said Tigger. I guess it wasn't such a waste waiting in line for two hours if it was Nicole's Favorite part. Maddie's Favorite ride was it's a small world and Nicole said all the rides were her favorite. At the end of the day there was a beautiful fireworks display with music. We had such a great time. It truly is such a magical place. Here is our Mickey mouse picture. I know my hair is hideous but it had rained all day. 
We spent allot of the vacation watching Disney Chanel and Swimming in the pool. I asked Maddie if she could live at home or in a hotel, where would you live? she replied, "a hotel, it has a pool."
We went to Disney's Animal Kingdom. I have been waiting to go there since it opened. I remember watching the Disney Chanel when Maddie was a baby. They announced it's opening and I remember wanting to go there so bad. It defiantly is not as great or even comes close to the Magic Kingdom. But it is great for kids. There are so many animals. The Cons of the trip where the fact that it was a gazillion degree's out and everything was so spread out and the lines where soooo long. I had a great time on the safari, I figure that might be as close as I'll ever get to a real safari. That is one of my life goals among many, to go on a safari. I absolutely loved the new dinosaur ride. It scared the girls but man was it fun. The girls favorite part was the petting zoo and seeing the tigers. Nicole was excited because she got to see a Cheetah her favorite animal. All of us loved the bugs 3-D movie. We finished that day with a Lion King show. 
Towards the end of our trip we drove to Ft. Lauderdale. Jake's Work extended our trip a few extra days so we drove to Ft. Lauderdale. Motorola paid for the last few days of our trip. Can't beat that and we got to stay in a very nice Sheridan. I was excited because My Aunt which I had not seen since I was 13 Lived close to ft. Lauderdale. We spent all day Saturday talking and having a great time. The girls had fun playing in the pool (as always) and just adored my aunt. We had so much fun we returned the next day. The last day of our trip we spent on the Beach. Nicole and I flew home the next morning from Miami. Poor Jake and Maddie had to drive back to Orlando to fly home.
July 09, 2006
Sea Shell Boogers
June 19th 2006 from our trip to Florida
Sand in my ears, sand in my swimming suit, sand up my nose including a small sea shell, the sand was everywhere. I don't know how anyone deals with having their home on the beach, it bothers me when the girls get sand in the house from their little sand box. We went to the Beach in Ft. Lauderdale on our last day in Florida. It was Dania beach. It wasn't Nicole's First time at the Beach. I do believe it's been some time, so in a way it was new to her. It was Maddie's First time though. I enjoyed it, I really wish Jake was there with me. I wanted him to watch the girls so I could swim. He was at Motorola fixing computer stuff, so I just sun bathed. Maddie was intimated by the waves that constantly knocked her to her bottom. She also freaked out over the fact that water kept getting in her eyes, I was only freaked out that it was getting in my mouth. To be honest the ocean scares me to death, it's so big that it intimidates the hell out of me. Also the fact of...what is under there? Sharks, weird fish, dead bodies, nuclear waste? I feel venerable without my mountains. Not to mention without the mountains I can't tell East from West. Besides all my fears, it was absolutely beautiful. I felt like I was in a dream. I had allot of fun watching the girls play in the sand. I took allot of Pictures, it was just to beautiful. We where completely covered in sand still on our arrival back to the hotel. No worries...we went straight to the pool to rinse off.
Maddie and Nicole's Birthdays
Today is Madelynn's 4th Birthday. We had a Birthday Party for both the girls on Friday. It was great. The theme was Halloween in July. It was Maddie's Idea, but Nicole wanted to do the same thing. I love combining the girls parties, it saves allot of money. Nicole's birthday is June 26th and Maddie's is July 9th, so we usually find a fair middle to have their party, but this year we tried to plan it for the time my sister, Becky, and her three boys would be out to visit. Nicole wore her fairy costume. Maddie wanted to wear her black Halloween cat costume. Maddie has been talking about this party for several months, she couldn't wait to wear her costume. Guess what? I couldn't find it. I thought all this time it was hanging up in her closet. The night before I frantically looked through the house for it. I tore the house apart and still no sign of her costume. I had to brain storm. I found one of her black leotards (thank goodness their was a dress code for black leotards in her dance class.) I found one of my black Knee high stockings and stuffed it with black tights to use as a tail. Then I created ears by buffing two pony tails in her hair. She was very pleased with the results. I totally forgot to draw whiskers on her face, but she couldn't remember I hadn't and thought in her mind they where there. A ton of kids showed up, my house was filled with wild children and adults. We had the party in our unfinished basement. We decorated with allot of streamers and jack-o-lantern balloons which I found on Oriental trading. We made ghost balloons out of white balloons skirted with white tissue paper and drew scary faces on the balloons. I found really cute spider balloons which hung from the streamers like they where hanging on their webs. We played buried treasure. We popped plain popcorn and covered a treasure map table cloth, then hid candy in the popcorn. Each kid had 30 seconds to dig for as much candy as they could. We also played what I call the candy dance game. We put Halloween pictures all over the floor, we then played Halloween music, like; monster mash, ghost busters, scooby doo..... When the music starts they dance around the room and when it stops they have to stand on a picture. We would then pick a Halloween Character and if you where standing on it you won....Candy!! The funniest thing about this game was that Maddie would dance around one picture and land on it each time. Can you guess which character was on it?....Yep, the Halloween Cat! We also did a witch pinata and pin the tail on the black Halloween cat. It was fun to plan and fun to decorate. I just wish I would have had more time to decorate. Well overall it was a fantastic Party.
We just did Cake and a balloon for Maddie today. I took Maddie to the store to pick a balloon out. She picked a large scooby doo. It was a 6 dollar balloon which then turned into a 12 dollar balloon after she stabbed a pencil into the first one while we where in the store. This is also after she turned her cake upside down in the cart. I wanted to cry maybe even beat her a little, but I refrained, After all it was her birthday. After I explained to her that just because it's your birthday doesn't mean you can destroy everything she bucked up and the day got better.
For Nicole's Birthday we celebrated a day early because we let Marina have her this year on the actual day. She had a Bratz cake. Here's a Nicole moment for you... She asked me how many candles I would be putting on her cake, I told her 7. She says "but I am still 6, I wont be 7 till tomorrow." She likes to be a smart alec just like her dad. Having to be precisely correct yet a bit arrogant at the same time. So I replied with, "okay well we will have to wait till tomorrow then to do cake because you are not seven yet". She quickly replied back with, "No it's okay mom 7 is fine. We will just pretend I am 7." She is such a smart little thing too. It drives me crazy because she always has to correct me, It won't be long until she surpasses me in intellect. Not only does she look like her dad, but man...She acts just like him. For her Birthday she and Maddie got a pool, it is about 12 feet around and 3 feet deep. It is a huge hit even among Jake and me. We all love to swim in it together. HAPPY BIRTHDAY GIRLS!!!!
