2nd Florida Stop: The Liki Tiki Village

Upon arriving in Orlando, we checked into our resort, the Liki Tiki Village. We explored the resort, readied rooms for our cousins who were flying in late Sunday night, and spent 2 hours at the local grocery store shopping for the week and stocking up to feed the rest of the family for breakfast the next morning. The kids enjoyed playing at the resort a couple times during the week with their cousins. The loved the pool, water slides, mini-golf, paddle boats and tennis courts.

The highlight of the trip was spending time with cousins and all our family.

The girls (Natasha, Jamie, Sidney and Calista) were never apart for long and had a couple of fun sleep-overs with Uncle Mark and Aunt Melinda. A favorite morning of the trip for them was acting and singing along with Uncle John to Hairspray!The boys (Riley and Connor) managed to fit in their sleep over on the last night too and had a great time riding roller coasters and playing together!
Aunt Stacey's favorite part of the trip was hanging with her little nieces and nephews (Dylan, Dane, Kensington, Paris and Fynnley).
By far, Luke was the star of the trip for all of us...we have more pictures of him than anyone else!

1st Florida Stop: Daytona Beach

We loved our couple days visit with Great Grandpa and Great Grandma Shaw in Daytona Beach. After a fun morning at the Flea Market where we picked up some great souvenirs (a blow-up whale float for Riley, a charm bracelet for Jamie and a Disney princess cup for Sidney), we finished off the day with a quick trip to the pool in Grandma and Grandpas neighborhood, dinner at Chick-Fil-A, a trip to the beach and strip, and a very fun game of miniature golf.

This is my favorite picture from the Florida trip!We told the kids to not get wet...they couldn't resist!

We spent the second day at the Beach with Great Grandma, who really enjoyed sitting under the unbrella and watching us play. We went down to the very south end of Daytona Beach to Ponce Inlet. We had a great picnic and the kids enjoyed climbing the rocks, and Sidney especially loved feeding the birds. The waves were a little big for the girls, but Brent and Riley really loved bogey boarding. We made a trip up the beach to find Sonic for dinner, had a mini piano recital for G & G and took another quick swim before bed! On our last day in Daytona we went to Sacrament Meeting in the Daytona Beach ward and did a little bit of homework. We took some last minute photos with Great Grandma, went into Home Depot just long enough to give Great Grandpa a quick hug and slowly made our way back to Orlando. We had a great time and loved our time with G & G, the poached eggs and fresh grapefruits for breakfast were our favorite!!

And we're off.....

To Florida, just in time to miss the 4-6 inches of snow we are supposed to get in MN tonight and tomorrow. The kids are sooooooo excited! They were up bright and early this morning and very eager to help out with last minute preparations. The biggest help was them going to school, so Mommy could finish. Here are some of the things you need to pack to get a family of 5 to Florida for 10 days:

• 8 swimsuits
• 4 beach towels
• 3 pairs of swimming goggles
• 5 pairs of sunglasses
• 5 hats
• sunscreen
• medicine for necessity and 'just in case' circumstances
  
• clothes, pajamas, underwear, socks, shoes for everyone
• video camera with extra tapes and charger
• digital camera with extra charged battery
• 2 cell phones with chargers
  
• computer with charger, headphones and movies
• 3 Nintendo DSs with cases, charges, headphones and games
  
• a boot cast, just in case Mommy needs it
• an ice pack and tennis balls (great for pressure point relief) because Mommy will need them
• reading material for all
• homework folders for all the kids
• 3 stuffed animals
• 5 rain jackets
• 1 umbrella
• And LOTS of other stuff!
  

Gymnastics

Sidney loves Gymastics!
She is very flexible and flips all over the place.
She especially likes taking gymnastics with her best friend Brooke!

The Joys of Living in a New Neighborhood

1. A guaranteed 7:00 wake-up call every weekday morning.
2. 15-20 Extra cars on your street or taking up the entire cul-de-sac.
3. A beautiful turquoise porta-potty right out your front door.
4. The constant noise of pounding, big machines and workmen.

Here are 3 of the houses on our street in various stages of completion. If anyone is interested, they are all available and we would love some great neighbors!

Jamie's First Track Meet

On Saturday morning,
Jamie was very excited to return to her favorite sport:
TRACK!
She had a very fun and successful meet
and came home with 5 ribbons.
Her favorite ribbons were for 1st in the 70M dash
and 2nd in the 400M race!

Grandma, We Miss You!

All 3 kids have walked around the house for 2 days looking like little lost puppies....Grandma left early Monday morning for home. We all miss her very much and are so grateful for all the help she blessed us with the past month. Some of the special things she did for us that we will greatly miss are;

• Brent: late night bowling games on the Wii and help with chauffeuring
  
• Stacey: gentle reminders that I need to be patient with myself and with the kids and the special attention only a Mother can give
  
• Riley: having Grandma walk him to the bus in the morning, and helping with homework
  
• Jamie: help with chores and the endless supply of Gum in Grandma's purse
• Sidney: painting fingernails, doing puzzles, and reading stories at bedtime

We know we can never repay Grandma for all she has done and are grateful she returned home safely! WE LOVE YOU!!

General Conference

We had a wonderful weekend watching General Conference at home. It was an amazing experience to participate in the Solemn Assembly and receive our own personal testimonies the President Monson is our Prophet in these Latter-Days.

Riley, Jamie and Sidney enjoyed working on their conference activity packets and made some very insightful responses to several of the talks. Sidney loved coloring the ties of all the prophets and apostles. Jamie worked hard on learning to spell all their names. Riley tried very hard to listen, concentrate and learn from the inspired words. The kids especially enjoyed Presidents Monson's final talk and the instructions he gave to "never let Daddy near the microwave, stove, dishwasher or dryer!". They were also very attentive to Elder Ballard's talk about Mothers, and reacted quickly with a huge hug for me. Brent and I loved all the sessions and both really enjoyed Elder Holland's talk about continuing revelation.

Stacey Update

I am doing much better....a little improvement each day. I am able to walk on my foot all day. I still have to elevate and ice it after a long day, and won't be hitting the treadmill for another couple weeks, but it is much better! My physical therapy visits have extremely helped loosen up my shoulders and neck, which has also helped the consistent headache. It eases up more now and I am able to get more sleep. I am so grateful to finally see some improvement and am starting to feel a little more like myself. Now, I am just hoping that I get back some patience!

Spring Break Catch Up

Since it has been a couple weeks and I really need to catch up this blog....Here are a few highlights from the rest of our Spring Break!
The last snow we had came on the weekend at the end of Spring Break...it was a very heavy, wet 6-8 inches. This is Sidney's little snowman that she built in the back yard!
Emily braved the crowds and took the kids to the zoo for the day, they loved seeing the farm babies!
We surprised Aunt Mony and celebrated her birthday with dinner and cheesecake with hot fudge sauce.