Playdate with Maggie

Wednesday morning, the kids and I headed over to the Bixler home for a playdate with Maggie. Maggie and her mommy came to our house back in the winter after I had broken my leg, but this was our first time over to their house. Our schedules have been hard to work around at times, but all the kids seemed to have a lot of fun, so we will be making it happen again!!! Claire and Maggie are a year apart, but they had fun hanging out together (and sharing snacks). And Jake was plenty happy to get to play on a Wii!

New friends!
Maggie reading!
This picture makes me laugh. Claire was having fun playing peek-a-boo under the tent, but her legs were a slight giveaway.

Lydia, the photographer.

Other people's toys are the best toys!

This is Maggie with her mommy, Whitney. (Sorry, Whitney, but I love this picture). I love the look of pure love in Maggie's eyes, admiring her mama. Most of you who I know read this have already been praying for little Maggie. She has been one sick, little girl, battling cancer, at such a young age. What she has had to endure is unbelievable; my heart has ached many a time for her and her parents. Yet, she has been blessed with two parents who love her immensely and her are dedicated to her recovery. The challenges this family has faced have been great, huge, in fact. I have only known Whitney for a short time (about half a year), but if I could put a face on how I feel about her, it would look closely similar to Maggie's sweet, little face above. I have such admiration for her and Andy. I am amazed at their strength, even in the darkest hours. They have been an advocate for their daughter, putting her needs and comforts first and foremost. I am so thankful for the healing so far that has taken place in Maggie's body, despite the horrific journey it has taken to get there. Please keep praying for beautiful, little Maggie, and her parents. I know they would appreciate it.

Summer fun with friends!

What can bring such a smile to this oh, so cute, 2 year old? Why, a play date at the park of course!On Tuesday, we had a playdate at Shoup park with my friend, Becky, and her three boys. This park is a favorite due to the long slide built into the hill. We usually bring wax paper when we go here, but alas, I was out. So, I brought towels for my kids to go down on which worked pretty well, too. I didn't get pics of all the kids going down it, but here are a few of the ones I captured.

Jake! (yes, he was still wearing his shirt from Monday)

Lydia!

Sammy

Claire going down her Claire-sized slide. She was quite the dare-devil this day. I can handle her going down on her tummy, but wasn't too fond of her imitating some older girls who were running down the slide. Once she learned, she kept doing it.

And we cannot go to a park without Claire wanting to swing. But again, she decided to try something new. I push her pretty high, which she enjoys. As I was doing this, she let go of the chains and put her arms out like she was flying. Crazy girl.

There was some tree-climbing...

some lunch-eating...

and some friend-hugging!

Here is a little video clip I took of Claire, Lydia, and Drew.

My Jake Date

Jake and I got to go out on a date on Monday. It was nice to spend some quality time alone with my son. Our first stop was a trip to the library. Jake is going to research the topic of recycling since he is pretty passionate about it. Then he is going to be in charge to "teach" the rest of the family, as we start to do our part. I know we should have been on board a long time ago, but Jake has certainly helped remind us that we needed to be recycling.

After the library, we went to dinner. His first choice was Olive Garden. That was a bit more money on dinner than I was planning on, plus it was no where near our next destination. He settled on Pepito's, where he was going to order a hot dog, of all things (and he'd had one for lunch). I talked him into tacos since we were at a "Mexican" restaurant. Our waitress snapped our picture together for us before we left. I hadn't realized our older camera wasn't on auto. That is the reason for the other blurry pictures.

Bowling was next on the list! I took advantage of a free kids bowling program this summer (http://www.kidsbowlfree.com/) and this was our first time going. We played our 2 free games, returned our shoes, and as we were leaving, Jake asked for a treat. They wanted a dollar for a candy bar, so I said we'd stop on the way home to get something that was worth more for my buck. We stopped at UDF, where Jake picked out a package of donuts. The sun was setting, so I suggested we go to Delco Park right up the street to talk and enjoy the donuts. Jake downed the donuts in no time and in even less time, was done with the talking and asked to go play on the playground. So, we stayed for another 1/2 hour and I even played a bit of tag with him. We got home around 9:30. All in all, I'd say it was a good date. Jake asked if we could do it again so I think he had a fun time as well.

Like father, like son...he got these teeth out one of those machines at the bowling alley.

Our Last Day In Orlando

Sunday (May 17) was our last full day in Orlando. We went to Ihop for breakfast (J & L love this place). We even got a special parking spot there.

This Lydia attempting to perform a trick that Daddy had shown her. Too bad you are not supposed to see the fork. I'd say she's got the body language with her eyes down pat though!

Jake enjoying a mouthful of pancake!

After breakfast, we headed back to the hotel and went swimming.

Gotta love underwater pictures!

Jake and Lydia's first time in a hot tub (which was the same temp as the pool). They loved it, regardless.

We had some beautiful scenery!

After we got cleaned up, we headed over to Downtown Disney, where Lydia and Jake had appointments at the Bippidi Boppidi Boutique. The next few pictures show that experience...

This gal who was fixing Lid's hair was quite grateful when she found out we were planning on donating Lydia's hair after we got back home. Guess the "after" part helped her out a bunch.

Looks happy with the spikes!

Her hair is not as painfully pulled back as tight it looks. They put a gel in her hair to make it appear more like that and to take care of any fly-away hair.Voila...the finished princess!The shoes make the outfit, huh? I forgot to pack dress-up shoes...oh, well.Pirate skeleton with the stylin' Jakester.Lydia with the Lego people & animals.We had to take a ferry to get back to our car. Only we weren't sure which place to get off and ended up getting off farther than we were supposed to. While Daddy went ahead to get the car, I took the opportunity to snap some cute shots of the kids.
They really do love each other!
Jake ran ahead to catch up with Daddy so I took a few single shots of Lydia... The "Noelani Pose" (Lydia's best cousin)!
Close up
We spotted the Mickey ears on our way to Celebration!
I love this picture of Dan and his Lydia. This was taken at dinner, Bahama Breeze. Dan surprised me by taking me there. We had one sort of near us, near Cincy, but it closed.

After dinner, we went over to the home of another of Dan's friends. We hung out there for a couple hours (again, they had a little girl, Dakota, who played with Jake and Lydia, while the adults mingled, so it worked out well).And here are Jake and Lydia journaling while waiting to board the plane in Orlando the next day. If you are not already doing so, I highly recommend having your kids keep a journal. They were excited to do so, it kept them entertained, and it will be a treat for the kids to read them when they are older.

And that is that! I would like to end this post in shouting out a special thank you to my mom and dad who helped make this trip possible. It was such a wonderful memory!