Disney on Ice

Here are the pictures from Disney On Ice last Thursday night. For this show, they did "The Little Mermaid", "The Lion King", "Cars" and "The Fairies". Kids love it because they recognize the "stories" and characters and adults really appreciate it because of the skill and incredible skating show. Before the show started, we walked around a display for all the princesses. Each display included the princess's formal dress and other items from the movies. There was also a stage where someone dressed as Cinderella and then Belle would come out for a few minutes at a time. Kaelyn really loved all of that of course. As I already mentioned, Kaelyn struggled a little bit with all the people and noise but for the most part, she enjoyed it. The pictures are not great quality because of the lighting and movement and stuff so the slideshow is short(comparatively).:) This is the slideshow format where you have to actually push play to start the show and you will want to slow it way down because it goes really fast if you don't. Enjoy!

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Where did the little girl in the pictures go?

Believe it or not, though I lead quite an uneventful life, I do have some things to blog about. We went to Disney on Ice down in Ft. Lauderdale Thursday night, a Brent Vernon concert Friday night, and another BV concert tonight. That's more entertainment than we usually get in two months! :) I'm going to try to post some pictures from Thursday night tomorrow hopefully. We really enjoyed the Disney on Ice show and Kay loved it (other than a few loud noises and all the people). I just thought I would post a quick "blurb" until I get a chance to "really blog". (Not that anyone is sitting around eagerly waiting for me to update.) I have also been contemplating doing a blog titled "Deep, dark confessions about rodents" - seriously. :)

I decided to look at old pictures from March of 2007 and 2008 and then randomly choose a few pics. of Kaelyn to post just for fun. I think I wanna' cry now - not quite but I think you'll see what I mean. My baby's gone.

This was taken March of '07. I had set her up on

the counter while I was making sandwhiches.

She couldn't figure out that it was easier to pick

the sandwhich up but, where there's a will (and a

hungry belly) there's a way.

This was also March of '07.

I chose this one because of the perspective. She

looks SO little here. She was not quite two in all

of these '07 pictures.

At the Palm Beach Zoo over Spring Break. '07

She will always love me for pictures like this! :)

Her hair had just started getting long enough so it was

right around this time she started "sporting" two

pony-tails that were cute as could be. '07

Camping while Jess was here for her Spring

Break. '07

This was a few months before she became

a successful "potty goer". We worked so

long and hard on that! March of '08

This was taken a year ago. I can't believe how much

she has changed even in a year!

We had gone to the beach one afternoon and

she was so worn out. As soon as we got home

around 6:00 she got a bath and was watching

a movie. She conked out almost immediately.

I love the stage [in life] she's at now but it's a

shocking reminder of how fast time goes by to

look back like this! This started as a quick

project to post a "couple" of fun pictures and

obviously I had a hard time choosing and it

got a lot longer than I intended. Oh well, I

hope that you enjoyed all the "few" pictures.

The never ending flu, bathroom phobias, and other things.

Well, apparently the flu that's been going around here was the "flu that never ends" or so it seemed. Thankfully, Kaelyn seemed to be over hers (except for a cough and runny nose) in 4 or 5 days. I wasn't so lucky. I had heard reports of how long this bug lasted but I was sure I would get over it sooner because we all take our vitamins so faithfully. When I went into CVS the third day I was sick to get some medicine, the manager said, "I think I'm getting that too" (when he heard me talk). He was like, "My wife has had it for about 10 days". I wanted to look at him and burst into tears. :) That's not typically my personality but I had been sitting huddled in a chair back by the pharmacy shaking because I had the chills so badly and I felt so awful while I waited for them to fill my prescription. It was very distressing to think of it lasting for that long! (By the time I got home from the dr. and pharmacy my fever was back up in the 103s so I'm sure that explained my "emotionalness".) It took 5 days before the fever, chills, and achyness went away. I would get up and do stuff thinking I was over the worst of it and then I would end up back on the couch or in bed huddled under blankets. It was really annoying 'cause I couldn't get up and get anything done without getting a fever. After that part was over, I still had the cough and congestion. Then I had issues with the antibiotic. I always do but I thought if I ate LOTS of yogurt and took a probiotic I might be able to handle this one. By the fourth day of the five day prescription, I could not eat anymore because my digestive system was so messed up. So thus began trying to build my digestive system up as well as everything else. All last week, I would get up early, take Kaelyn to school, then come home and sleep till about time to pick her up. Then sometimes after she got home, I would doze on the couch (in between Kaelyn flopping down on me or needing attention) until I needed to get up and fix dinner and give her a bath. It was awful but I just couldn't seem to get my energy and strength back. By last Friday (10 days after I got the flu) I finally felt much better. I actually was able to eat all 3 meals for the first time in days and when I got home that day I cleaned the kitchen good rather than sleeping. I still have a cough and my taste/smell is still kind of messed up but at least everything doesn't taste terrible like it did for days. Don't feel bad for me though - it really didn't hurt me to not enjoy eating anything for 10 days! :)
Meanwhile, we have a perplexing issue with Kaelyn at school. About 2 weeks ago, she decided she didn't want to go to the bathroom at school anymore. We have all wracked our brains endlessly. She acts terrified and flips out even at the mention of going NEAR the bathroom in her classroom. No one can figure out what happened and she doesn't tell us anything. She has no problem going at home or anywhere else. I've tried to take her myself thinking surely she would go for me but she bolts for the door if she sees me walking toward the bathroom in the classroom. It might sound funny but we're quite concerned because she holds it all day long from 7:50 till 2:00 and I know that can't be good for her. We've tried all kinds of "tricks" all to no avail. I have kind of narrowed it down to something with soap or washing her hands because the last couple times she has gone to the bathroom in a public restroom, when I put her hand under the soap dispenser, she cringes like she can hardly stand it. It's the strangest thing but if I am holding her and I walk over toward that bathroom, she grabs onto my neck and gets this look of panic about her. Some days, her teacher has gotten her to walk in and just sit on her lap on the step stool and they read a story that Kaelyn likes, then other days, they can't even get her to walk over there. We've tried to think of any noise that would set her off because she seems to be getting even more sensitive to noises lately but we can't find anything. Anyway, if you could say a prayer (or if you have any creative ideas that we haven't tried) I would be happy to hear them. I even sat [forced] her to sit on the toilet one day. I had to hold her on and she was so traumatized that I just let her get off. The thing is, it could be something really simple but we just don't know. Other than that, she still loves school and all the kids and teachers! Well, now that you have read probably the oddest thing you've read on a blog recently... :) Tonight Kaelyn wanted a band-aid (which still just cracks me up since she never would have anything to do with them until the "doctor lesson" and role playing at school). Her boo-boo this time was a bruise on her knee and I'm pretty sure she discovered it AFTER she asked for the band-aid and I was asking her where she wanted it. I really don't care if she has them, it's just amusing to me. So I put the band-aid on her and she walked away saying, "Thanks Mommy! That's very all better!"
The pictures I'm including are from a few weeks ago but I thought you might enjoy a couple random shots.


Kaelyn and Kevin playing with her princesses. (He
was providing the voice of Sebastian the Crab I believe)
I thought it was cute.

The icky flu and tender moments - the two are not related.

I just thought I would give you all a quick update. We (just Kaelyn and I so far) have been battling a terrible flu. Kay was coughing and sneezing and had a little bit of low-grade fever here and there last Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. By Monday, she was really sick and pretty much wanted me to hold her most of the day. By that evening, her fever got up to 104. By the next morning, she was much better. She didn't seem to have any fever. She still wasn't eating and she wasn't completely perky but she was much better. I kept her home Wednesday also just to make sure and she seemed back to normal other than a little cough and a runny nose. She went back to school Thursday after being out for a week. I got the flu Wednesday. It is the achiest flu I have ever had. I couldn't find any way to sit or lay that felt comfortable and when I walked around everything on me hurt besides the cough and stuff. By Thursday I had a fever off and on all day. When I woke up yesterday morning, my fever was 104.3. I got out of bed long enough to get Kaelyn ready for school and then went back to bed. I went to the dr. in the afternoon and got a couple different things to take so I'm hoping it won't last for 10 days like I've heard some people have had it. Anyway, between the two of us, we've been doing a LOT of sitting/lying around. Kaelyn doesn't understand what's going on and why I'm not doing as much with/for her as I normally do. Thursday after she got home from school, I had been in bed and I finally sat up and was on the computer. She came in and climbed up beside me, sat up on Kevin's pillow, and leaned back against the headboard. She said, "Hold my hand Mommy?" I said, "Sure" and took her hand. She said, "Tool (cool), that's much better." Then she said, "What did you do for today school?" Which of course is what I normally ask her (minus the mixed up wording). Her teacher always kneels down when the kids come in if she's not talking with a parent. She talks to them and gives them hugs and stuff. They really work on the kids making eye contact when they talk and answering when someone speaks to them. I told Kevin that Kaelyn seems to be showing more affection since she has started school. I'm not sure I had ever heard her (if she did it was rare) say "I love you" without her just repeating it after we said it to her or if we told her to say it. I've heard her on several occasions now telling various toys or us that she loves us. After we "talked about school" Thursday, she climbed on my lap and put her arms around me and said, "Oh I love you so much Mommy!" I know that probably sounds like a really little thing to most of you but it was pretty big to me. So, once again, Yeah for school! :) If you think of it, say a prayer for us that I will get over this flu soon, that Kay's cough will completely go away, and that Kevin doesn't get it. He's been doing pretty much anything that's been getting done around here - bless him!


I couldn't get much done Monday because Kaelyn wanted
to be held. I finally let her watch video clips of songs from
Disney movies on youtube because I really needed to get
supper going.


Then when her Daddy got home, he helped her play
some things on the computer.

For the bored at heart.

As my title suggests, this will probably be only for those of you who are REALLY, REALLY bored. I have finally put together a bunch of pictures from when we were at Disney in December. I used a bunch of Kaelyn's favorite Disney songs to go along with the pictures so if you are curious as to what Disney is like at Christmas or you just like the music, you might like watching the slideshows even if you are sick of my pictures! When we went in December we actually stayed in one of Disney's [lower end] resorts since they were doing a special promotion for Fl residents. They have these "themed" resorts that are so cool. One of them is movie themed, one in music, one is sports, etc. They have all these larger than life "decorations" that go along with the themes. For instance, I know at the sports one they have a gigantic, larger-than-life foosball game in one of the courtyards. All of the steps at all of the resorts are enclosed in themed things. At the music resort, we saw that a couple sets of steps were enclosed to look like giant speakers and you'll see a pic. we took at the sports one where the steps look like a giant can of tennis balls. The night before we went to the park, we walked around some of the very expensive resorts owned by Disney to see their decorations. One of the resorts had a 40 ft. Christmas tree that went all the way up the five stories in the main lobby. There was a hand bell choir there that night. Another resort had a replica of a building made entirely of chocolate. They also have a wedding chapel near one of the resorts that is within view of the castle at Magic Kingdom. We got to see the bride arrive in a Cinderella style coach and we peeked through the windows of the wedding planning building and saw this Cinderella's castle wedding cake on display(there is a picture of it in the slideshow).
The next morning we went to the park. It looked so cool decorated for Christmas and since it was the week of Christmas, we got to see the Christmas version of the parade. We were worried about how Kaelyn was going to do at first because she seemed overwhelmed and in a daze over all the noise and sights. It took her a couple hours to adjust and kind of get used to what was going on. At night (during the Christmas season) the castle is completely blanketed in white LED lights besides the lights that change colors that you normally see on the castle. It was beautiful and we got our pictures taken by several of the photographers in front of the castle and on Main Street that night. It was chilly all day and by the time it was dark, we were freezing. When we got back to the car and saw that it was only about 45 degrees out we were like "No wonder!" (That was cold for us.) It was a great day for us! (I am going to include a couple more little stories about Kay-Kay down in the next post.) Forgive me if these posts bore you.

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Kaelyn sings with Ariel

Kaelyn got to meet several characters she had not met before such as: Pinocchio, Mary Poppins, Chip & Dale, Snow White, and Ariel from "The Little Mermaid". When she went in to see Ariel one of the times, Ariel was asking her questions - her name, age, etc. Kaelyn just sat there looking at Ariel. She had done this most of the time with the characters. She didn't seem to know what to say or do or know how to answer. However, after sitting there for a few minutes, she started quietly singing Ariel's song "Part of Your World". When the girl playing Ariel heard, she caught on right away and started softly singing it along with Kaelyn. They sang through one whole part of it and Kaelyn was just looking at her in amazement. It was the cutest thing and Kevin and I were so impressed that the girl caught on and took the time to sing it along with her.
We had taken Kaelyn's halloween costume (the Cinderella dress) and so when she was going to see the princesses, we changed her into the dress. Every time she sees the pictures now she refers to herself as "Cinderella Kay-Kay". The other day she was looking at the pictures and she said, "Look! It's Cinderella Kay-Kay and Belle."
She is terrified of the noise from the fireworks. They have a fireworks display by the castle every night. We knew she would be scared so when we knew it was about time for them, we headed back to "Toontown" where you can meet several of the characters. We were standing in line to see the princesses again and we didn't realize that the echo would be so bad that they seemed louder in the building. Kaelyn was had her arms locked around my neck and she was just sobbing and then they called us in. "Cinderella" came walking over to her and knelt down and was asking her why she was crying. Kaelyn said something about fireworks. I don't know exactly what Cinderella said to her but she assured her it was okay and took her hands and led her over to the seat. Kaelyn instantly calmed down and seemed to forget all about the fireworks as she talked to Cinderella. Once again, we were quite impressed. Anyway... that's that and I hope you get some enjoyment out of the pictures and music.

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Border crazy

We pre-paid for a CD of all the pictures Disney took so that we could get a discount. Since we knew we had already bought the CD and it's the same cost whether they take 20 pictures of you or 200 pictures, we just got our pictures taken everywhere. :) Of course, when you select the pictures that you want them to put on the CD, you can also add copies with various borders. They had some really cool Christmas borders so - once again, no extra cost - I added various borders to a lot of the different pictures. Our CD ended up with half again as many pictures on it as their photographers had originally taken. So you will see a few that are the same or very similar poses but just with different borders added.

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New feature

I have decided to include a new feature on my blog. If you scroll down the page a bit and look under the pictures, you will see it. I am calling it (for now) "clever quotes". I would like to give you lofty promises of having a new quote at least every week but who am I fooling. It's not intended to be specifically inspirational, political, humorous, or even deeply thought provoking. Honestly, I have a whole bunch of quotes that fall in the "sarcastic quotes" category to start with. (I know those of you who know me well are shocked about that) :) So, check back occasionally if you are just dying to read a new quote from someone. :)

Boo-boos and a school update

Kaelyn has always hated having stuff on her. She very rarely will tolerate having anyone put a sticker on her, she does not like to have her hand painted for a hand print, she bugs out if you put a cute little stamp on her hand and on and on the list goes. We can almost never get a band-aid on her and when she does get a scrape or scratch, she's more bothered by the fact that there's a mark on her skin rather than the actual pain from it. A few weeks ago at school, they did a whole week's lesson on going to the doctor and every since then, she has gone from flipping out just over the sight of the band-aid box to wanting them on her toys (her little characters) and occasionally wanting one on herself (for about 10 seconds anyway). We are hoping that she will also do better the next time she has to go to the doctor because the last time I took her, it was a nightmare. It had been so long since she had been to a doctor's office that she didn't know what was going on and by the time the doctor came in, she had a death grip around my neck and was crying uncontrollably. The doctor could hardly get near her to look in her ears, listen to her heart and do any of the basic stuff because she was so bent out of shape. I should have expected that since it has always been a battle to clean her ears, clip her nails, and stuff like that. Put her in a place she's never been with people she doesn't know and it was aweful! After watching her teacher and the other kids look in their throats and pretend to listen to their hearts and stuff, her teacher said she finally started to go along with it so here's hoping... Anyway, the other day when I picked her up, she had some dried up food stuck to her pants. I didn't think that much about it but after we had been home for a little bit, she kept asking for a band-aid. I was busy so - I'll admit it- I just kind of ignored her. Finally, she went and got the box herself and got a band-aid out and brought it to me. When I asked her what she needed a band-aid for, she pointed to the food on her pants and said "Uh, boo-boo". I was quite amused at her reasoning but I guess a boo-boo to her is anything that is not supposed to be on your body - period. Thus the dirty pants were a boo-boo and once I put a band-aid on it, that seemed to fix it. What's more, she left it on because of course she couldn't actually feel it on her skin. :)




I took these pictures the other morning
right before we left for school. Her teacher
said she's the little princess of the classroom.
I guess that's what happens when you are
one of two girls in a class of ten. This
morning one of the moms was trying to
get her son to talk to and acknowledge
the teacher. She finally laughed and said,
"Well, he gave Kaelyn a greeting. He won't
look at or talk to anyone else." She seems
to have several little "boyfriends" according
to the teachers and when we went to her
sensory lab open house, one of her friends
that she's constantly talking about, walked up
to her and gave her a big hug. The teacher said
that was pretty amazing given the fact that
when he first started pre-school there last
year, he would stay in the corner and not interact
with any of the kids or teachers. It makes us so
happy that she seems to be doing so well at school.
Even though she can't really tell us much when
we ask her about school, her teacher tells us all kinds
of things that she does and participates in and though
it is hard for us to imagine, we're excited about it.

Too much fun!

A week ago this past Saturday, we had a very busy day. We started out by going up to Jensen Beach to the highschool there for a walk-for-autism event. Meanwhile, John called Kevin to see if we wanted to go to the Martin County fair that evening so we spent a little more than an hour at the walk then we went for some ice cream before meeting Rach and John back in Stuart for the fair. Not only did Kaelyn get into the fair for free but, much to our surprise, she could ride all the [kids] rides for free. Since most of the adults in our group seem to be getting too old to enjoy most of the rides, we just put Kaelyn on a lot of the kid's rides and enjoyed watching her looks of terror. :) (No, really we didn't force her on anything and she loved everything she rode - she seems to thrive off the scare.)


As soon as we got to the walk-for-autism, Kaelyn spotted
this tiger. I believe he may have been the highschool's
mascot where the event was taking place but she thought
he was Tigger and since she is on a HUGE Pooh and
friends kick right now, she was more thrilled then you can
imagine to see "Tigger".


Kaelyn and "Tigger". (Actually, the kids
walking around with him were referring
to him as Tigger also but it was a pretty
bad costume if it was supposed to be Tigger)





Kaelyn in one of the bounce houses.


Toys"R"Us was a big sponsor of the event so
their [walking] team had Geoffrey the giraffe
walking around with them. Even though Kay
doesn't know him personally, (isn't really
familiar with who he is) :) as long as it is a
big soft lovable animal, it's an instant friend!


Giving the giraffe a hug.


This cracks me up. It looks as if Geoffrey
just swallowed her whole head while she
was giving him a hug! :)

Here are just a few pictures from the [Martin County] fair.


This was the first ride that Kaelyn rode. She can
handle the spinning rides - the rest of us, not so much!


Here she is on the little "circus train". Since she rode
everything for free, she pretty much rode whatever
she wanted (or whatever we put her on is more like it).


She was so excited to ride the "bunder tholt". She has
a Berenstein bears story on one of her movies where
Papa rides a roller coaster called the thunderboldt
so as soon as she saw that there were rides, she was
begging to ride the "bunder tholt roll toaster".


I love the expression on her face. She always looked
terrified the first couple times around and then she
just loved it.


These cars went very slowly around a track but every
time they would get to the ends of the track, they would
whip around very fast.

Another Fair

This past Friday night, we went to the St.Lucie County fair. Rach and John had free tickets and parking passes because out where John works, they had been given a whole bunch of tickets. This fair was much larger (seemed about twice as big)as the Martin County Fair that we went to last weekend. There was a lot going on and a lot to see and do. Kaelyn's favorite part was the little feeding/petting area. I said little but it wasn't really that little and they had a lot of cool animals that you don't see very often. There were llamas, alpacas, a zebra, a miniature donkey, camels, kangaroos, scottish highlander cows, brahma bulls, besides regular sheep and goats and some other animals that I don't specifically remember. We went in when we first got there and then again before we left. For a dollar, you could by a cup of sliced carrots to feed the animals. Of course Kaelyn, with her love of any kind of creature, loved it! She also did a lot of the kid's rides and loved those too! We were quite tired and worn out when we left around 10:30 but it was a lot of fun!
P. S. Just a couple quick things about the slideshow - you will probably want to change the speed and drag the arrow about half way between the middle and the very slowest speed or else it goes very, very fast (even half way between fast and slow.) Also, it doesn't start automatically like most of the other slideshows so you actually have to click on play or you can just manually go through the pictures by using the plus and minus buttons.

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