More about our WDW Vacation

Day two was a pretty good day. We went to Hollywood Studios for a character breakfast at Hollywood and Vine. The food was tasty. We got to see JoJo and Goliath and Leo and June. They were very nice to pose for the photos and sign Andy's signature book. There was some sing-a-longs and a conga line which Andy refused to do. Oh well, we were told to RELAX! Here are some photos from this character breakfast:

After breakfast we went to ride Toy Story Mania. The line was pretty short and the ride was AWESOME!!!! I wish we had taken the opportunity to ride that more than once. We also took pictures with Buzz and Woody. (Okay, Off Topic side note - As I am writing this he called his daddy to come here. Eric is watching a football game and asked what he needed. Here is the interchange that followed:

Andy: I need you to come here.

Eric: But what exactly do you need?

Andy: I NEED for YOU to COME HERE!!

This continued for about four times with Eric finally getting up to find out Andy needed help wiping his bottom from going #2. Yet another example of how smart Andy is and how much we need to be on our guard as his parents.)

Back to the vacation: After meeting Buzz and Woody we did the Voyage of the Little Mermaid (not worth the time to go next time), Star Tours which Andy LOVED and throughout the trip rode three times, we watched the Jedi Training show which again Andy didn't want to volunteer because he thought he would get hurt.

Well, I feel this post is getting boring and I don't think you really care to know EXACTLY everything we did. I will just end with some picture previews and let you know that for about half the trip we really enjoyed ourselves. The other half was not that great. Andy got do experience the Pirate Adventure where he got to ride a "pirate ship" and look for pirate treasure. Eric and I celebrated our 10 year Anniversary while we were there and got some extra perks from that. We went out for a special dinner and put Andy in the Neverland Club at the Polynesian Resort. I think my favorite meal was at the Garden Grill where we got to see Goofy, Mickey, Chip and Dale and I think Pluto. The food was delicious and well worth every penny. The GG is in The Land Pavilion and served only organic food that they grew on property.

Every time we would start to get uptight about something one or the other of us would remind everyone of our catch phrase "RELAX". Once I start scrapping this vacation I will try to journal better and if you care to you can read more then.

Have a great night and enjoy some picture previews.

Stephany

Oh here is a funny story. While having breakfast at the Crystal Palace some OSU fans were seated next to us. The wife did something so hilarious that it had me laughing almost for the rest of the meal. She asked Tigger to pose with an O and then an S and then a U. It really had me in stitches because she was trying to make a statement to us OU fans seated next to them. We stuck Andy's OU hat on Pooh in return. Definitely not as funny but here is that picture:

 

I think that is enough for now. We probably took close to 1000 pictures while there but I won't include all of them now.

See ya later!

RELAX!!!

That is what we were told over and over before we left for vacation to see Mickey Mouse in Florida. Let me see if I can remember a little bit so I can share for anyone who actually reads this blog.

The 15th dawned very cold at home. It was a whopping 29 degrees the morning we left (the day before was 79 degrees). Okay I need to back this up just a little bit to share a God-thing on the day before we left. Eric and I are super A-type personalities and we try to plan things out dotting every I and crossing every T. Eric and I decided we would head to the airport and check out where we were going to park and know exactly where we needed to go from there. We didn't realize that we had to pay just to go into the airport. We were there all of maybe 10 minutes. But here is the God-thing. As we were paying our $1 (slightly begrudgingly) the airport employee gave us a coupon for airport parking both terminal and valet. We were planning on paying $10 a day to park terminal but thanks to this coupon we were able to park VALET for $11 a day right across from where our plane was departing and arriving. Valet parking is usually $21 a day so we could see that God was taking care of us and our worries of being late for the plane. Woo-hoo!!! Okay so back to the day we left: not much happened. We got to the airport with our bags already checked in and our tickets we already checked in too. We met a nice couple from Canada visiting their children and then heading to Florida for some warmth during the winter. Andrew did a GREAT job riding in the plane for his first ride. Here are some pictures from what we got to see that morning as we soared over the clouds.

It was so pretty seeing the fluffy clouds. It was a little windy but not too much turbulence. We got to Orlando and the temps were beautiful. After loading onto the Disney's Magical Express we were off to our home for the next 10 days. We stayed at the Disney's All-Stars Movies Value Resort. We knew the Andrew loved Toy Story so we requested a room in the Toy Story section. Our room was on the Sheriff Woody side. The room was nothing really to write home about but it was cozy. Here are some pictures from our room:

Every night we would say "Good Night Woody". Andrew even got his picture riding in RC or I should say on:

We really had no plans except to go to Downtown Disney to start our relaxing vacation. We looked through all the shops and dined at Planet Hollywood. Eric and I loved what we ordered for dinner but Andrew didn't care for the PB&J that he asked for. Come to find out it was crunchy PB and Andrew doesn't like the crunch. Andrew loved the Lego store. He and Eric played with the provided legos. We took pictures on the Harley motorcycles in the Harley Davidson shop. So after dinner we started to make our way back to the resort. We got to bed early'ish. Here are a few more pictures from Downtown Disney:

How cute are these ears!!!

That about covers our first day. I will close out for now but I will return tomorrow to try to blog more about our trip.

BTW, Happy New Year! We have had a terrific day and look forward to what this year has in store for us. I know there will be changes (some good, some not so good) but I also know who holds our future and we are in God's hands.

God bless each of you,

Stephany      

Seeing Less of Me

Is a great thing!!! I weighed myself today and found I have lost about 10 pounds since September when we got our gym memberships. I am so excited about that. Eric and I said that if we could just maintain during the holidays and vacation than we would be doing great. Well, I am actually losing right now and I hope to keep up that trend. I need to lose about 35 pounds from here to be on a more healthy playing field. I have spent most of my life being "chunky" but for goodness sakes...I'm tired of it. I want to lose this extra weight for my son, my husband, myself and mainly God. If our bodies are God's temple than I have really trashed this one and it is high time I start the clean up with His help. If you read this blog and follow along please say a prayer that I will continue to be encouraged to lose weight. I will try to periodically update you with my progress. I might even start doing some before and after pictures to help with accountability.

Until next time, have a terrific day and God bless you and yours!

Stephany

Followers Anybody???

A good friend of mine told me about adding followers to my family blog and to be honest I didn't understand what she meant until I went to blogger dashboard and typed it into the help search engine. Blogger was very helpful in telling me how to add it to my family blog. So it is now on here for anyone who want to follow this blog. Simply click on the link in the right sidebar to follow this blog and *poof* you can follow. I can't really say that I have many people read it and for that matter I don't really keep it up too well but "maybe" now I will be a little more consistent with it.

Well today started out well with us all getting ready for the day but than when Andrew and I got to BSF he told me he didn't like going there anymore. He says this quite often but every time I pick him up from class he just loves being there. Today though he was full of pent up energy. I didn't notice it before I dropped him off but I really noticed it when I picked him up. I asked his teacher if he was like that during the whole time and she informed me that "he had a lot of energy today". She also told me that he still listened and participated. He even answered all the questions after the Bible story and got them all right. I don't get how he can look as though he is totally ignoring you but then he will repeat (almost verbatim) what you said. I know that God is trying to teach me something with Andrew but for the life of me I am just not getting it. He is such an incredibly sweet child and very caring when it suits him. Most days I do feel so blessed to have the privilege of raising him. But then there are moments (not days) that I just don't care for his behavior.

One thing God is teaching me is that if I want obedience from Andrew then I have to be obedient to God first. That sounds all well and good but so hard to do sometimes. For instance, I have been very lack with doing my Bible study on a regular basis. I start off with grand expectations of how much I will get out of the Bible study and then I fall off the proverbial wagon. I need to learn to be obedient to God in having a daily quiet time with Him. I continue to pray for my own obedience to God so that things in my life will fall in line. Until then I know I can't expect from others what I am unable to do.

Here is something that has been taking up some of my time when I should really be reading God's word: Digital Scrapbooking. Last night I was able to complete four new LO's. I really need to learn to balance my time and take care of my priorities first and then some playtime. Hopefully before we go on vacation I will be able to share them with you.

Until next time, Stephany

The Excitement Is Building...

We are getting so excited about our upcoming family vacation. Andrew can't wait to meet Mickey and his Nana Becky has requested he give a great big kiss to Minnie and he has promised to do so. Can't wait to see those pictures.

I have gotten into digital-scrapping again and have 6 layouts just waiting to be finished. After finishing through October I just did not have the drive anymore but now the drive is back and I am loving it. There are so many wonderful designers out there that provide great stuff to work with and it's almost as if my pictures scrap themselves.

Onto another note, we had a good Thanksgiving. We stayed home (and by home I mean we did not travel to our family in OK) and went to some friend's house to celebrate together. It was a really lovely thing they are doing because they invite all the people from our church who don't have family here in the area to their house. As much as we are grateful for this outlet we have decided that this is our last year to participate. Poor little Andrew was one of two children there and the other was a pre-teen girl. Eric and I were the friends and playmates of him and therefore we really felt unsocial because we didn't want Andrew to feel left out. Next year we will probably try to do something at our home or who knows. After we ate dinner we headed out to see a movie because of our unofficial tradition. Friday morning dawned and I woke up at 2:30 am unable to go back to sleep. I decided to hit a couple of places for black Friday before the boys woke up. I didn't have any previous plans to be out so early but what do you do when you can't get back to sleep on such a day.  Then, once the boys woke up we had breakfast and headed out to do some more shopping. I was really starting to drag about lunchtime so we came home for naptime. After naptime we headed out again to go to Six Flags for their Holiday in the Park. It was awesome. We all had such a great time and we were able to practice how things would run at Disney World. Saturday dawned bright and early and we made it a chore day. Eric and I cleaned all but one room from top to bottom. It felt good to have the house clean (like the dusting, vacuuming and moping) again. I do a good job of keeping up with laundry and dishes but I really don't get around to the rest. I am so thankful Eric didn't marry me for my cleaning and cooking abilities.

Well, this post turned out longer than I planned so I will sign off now. Hope you all had a great Thanksgiving.

Stephany and the Stratton Gang