How is My Baby FOUR?!

I'm having a seriously hard time believing that my tiny baby turned four on Dec. 9th. In some ways he still seems so little and needs to be babied and in other ways he is so grown up and can do everything himself. He climbs the drawers in the kitchen to get snacks/cups even though I repeatedly tell him not to. He could live on chips and fruit snacks for the rest of his life. Something cute that I don't want to forget: he puts a chip on top of his sandwich before he takes a bite. He has to make sure he has enough chips for every bite of sandwich! He loves garlic on everything. Even ramen noodles. He will only drink "plain milk" and will gag if you give him chocolate milk.

He loves Christmas and will happily celebrate it all year.

He loves his big brother. He has the role of pesky little brother down perfect. ;-) I'm so glad I have two boys who will grow up together with a strong bond.

He loves cake!

He could play in the mud all day. Totally opposite from Ethan. There is one patch of dirt in the backyard that he will make sure never grows grass. He pours water in it and buries his "guys" in the mud or make me mud pies.

He will be starting T-ball this Spring. I can't wait for him to actually get to play like Bubba does.

Love that sweaty, dirty face.

He could live outside. He still frequently asks if he can go swimming even though it is freezing outside. He always says "it's not too cold...I'm warm!" He loves swinging on poles...or actual swings. He's my little monkey.

Some art work. The red and blue are for Spiderman. I'm amazed at how he gets which colors are for which superheroes. He'll do green for Incredible Hulk, black for Venom, red for Iron Man, etc.

Speaking of superheroes...he loves to dress up. Anywhere. Yep, that's him in Walmart in his Spiderman costume. And it was nowhere near Halloween. We fit right in. ;-)

Here he is in the Verizon store with his "Robin cape" on. He wears that one all the time.

He was perched in between the front car seats while waiting for Ethan to get out of school.

He started preschool this year and is doing great!

He is still obsessed with Toy Story. His favorites are Buzz and Zurg.

That's Ethan. Weird, huh?

He could eat at McDonald's every day. We rarely get the Happy Meals anymore because he always wants more chicken nunnets. So healthy, I know.

I just love his happiness in this picture. We were about to go to the movies.

He has a strange obsession with eyeballs which peaked around Halloween. It didn't help that Nana bought anything that had eyeballs on it. Those are eyeball suckers on his eyeballs.

Happy birthday to my wild and crazy little guy. You are continually teaching me patience, you give me SO MUCH love, and you give the best "groof hugs" (group). I'm so glad God picked me to be your mommy!

Happy 4th Birthday Caleb!!

Disney #5 - Animal Kingdom

Ahh Animal Kingdom, the last park we visited at Disney. We were excited to go since our kids love animals. But...that morning when we woke up Mondo looked TERRIBLE. He said he wasn't going to make it to the park but might to try and come out later. So I sucked it up and dressed the kids and we were out the door to visit Animal Kingdom by ourselves. (This would be the good time to say that while we both wear one pant leg in the family, I fully give my pant leg to Mondo on trips. He maps things out and puts together the best plans for how to run the day.) I was literally so lost without him. I looked at the map a hundred times and still couldn't figure out where to go. I was almost an hour late for our lunch reservation because I had the wrong time in my head. It just sucked without him. He did completely suprise me when he showed up at lunch. He looked even worse than he did in the morning. But super-dad showed up just so Ethan could ride a roller coaster since Caleb was too little to ride. Mondo waited at the bottom with Caleb while I sucked it up. More about that later.

So...to sum up Animal Kingdom, it was my least favorite park but it really didn't have much of a chance since I was doing it alone with two exhausted kids who refused to walk 30 minutes into the day. It didn't have many rides and had a few shows. Unless Mondo wants to go, we won't go to that park on our next Disney vacation.

There were lots of areas like this. Kind of felt like we were in the Ft. Worth Zoo. There were flamingos and ducks hanging around some areas.

Our first "ride" was the safari. It was my favorite part of the day. We loaded into these trucks and drove through different terrain and saw lots of different animals (real animals, not robotic ones). It really felt like we were on a safari because someone was actually driving and telling us about the animals and their habitats. It probably lasted 20 minutes or so. The kids really enjoyed it.

Playing some African drums.

There was much cuter scenery behind this rock but of course they didn't want to sit on the bench, they wanted to scale the rock...that had a sign on it saying not to climb it. Boys.

We ate lunch at Tusker House. It was an African buffet with characters. I was a little worried about the food. Silly me, we are at Disney! Of course they cater to the kids. There were chicken nuggets, mac and cheese, PB&J, etc. We really enjoyed it and met lots of characters and got more autographs. Mondo showed up right when we walked in. He looked like he was going to pass out at any moment. He was burning up with fever, nauseated, and had a pounding headache. Needless to say, he didn't eat anything.

See that giant mountain in the background? That's the ROLLER COASTER that I rode with Ethan!

It is called Expedition Everest. Mondo rides all of the roller coasters with the kids, not me. I get motion sickness super easy. But, since my poor sickly husband got on a shuttle and traveled 20 minutes to the park and sat through a nauseating lunch all so that Ethan could ride ONE ride....I decided I better be a good mom and suck it up. The line took 30 minutes which was bad news for Mondo. Luckily there weren't any loops but it did go backwards in the dark for a while. Almost did me in. Poor Mondo took off the second we got off the ride. He said he passed out as soon as he got in the shuttle to take him back to the hotel. Poor thing. He wins Dad of the Year for sure!!

There was a giant dinosaur playing area that the kids LOVED. It was like the Honey I Shrunk the Kids area from Hollywood Studios.

They jumped on these tracks and it made dino noises.

Lots to climb and explore.

Then there was this giant climby area. We probably stayed in the dino area for an hour. It was a nice break for mommy to sit and watch them play. :-)

We saw a Nemo show that was amazing. Then we saw this show called It's Tough to be a Bug. It was led by the Bug's Life bugs.

It's hard to see since it was dark, but this is the waiting area "underground".

Of course it was in 3D like most shows. The kids didn't like it. I thought it was cute. It had a few scary parts. Like when they turned off the lights and it was pitch black and we got poked in the back with a wasp stinger. (It was more like a nudge with a blunt stick). Perhaps I would have been a bit scared too if I was little. And then there was a part where it felt like bugs were crawling under the padding of the seat. Ethan didn't care for that.

We were all exhausted and called it a day around 4pm. I made it at the park alone! But it most definitely wasn't the same without Mondo. We went back to the hotel to check on him. He had been asleep most of the day. I took the kids to dinner in the hotel then brought them back and packed and put them to bed.

The next day we had to be at the front of the hotel at 0730. Yuck! Our flight wasn't until 1030 I think. There was a lot of waiting around. By this point, Mondo still looked aweful, I was starting to cough and feel crummy, Ethan was coughing, and Caleb was coughing. In the middle of the plane ride Caleb looked zoned out and his cheeks were bright red. He had fever. And as we landed he was puking in a barf bag. It never felt so good to be home!! All weekend we were sick. Caleb's temp got up to 105!! What a terrible way to end a fabulous vacation. But now that we are all well.....we're ready to go back (with LOTS of hand sanitizer this time!).

Want to know how sick we were? Just take a look at that poor baby. Pretty much sums it up.

Disney #4 - Epcot

We went to Epcot on Monday. I had heard from some people that Epcot wasn't that great of a park. We liked it. It was #3 on our list out of the 4 parks. It kind of reminded me of Six Flags in that there are different countries to visit so there were a lot of food choices. Good for our picky eaters. That night the kids and I ate Chinese and Mondo had Mexican. Haha, that was funny. There weren't very many rides there. Our favorite was probably Test Track. Mondo and Ethan like Mission Mars and Soarin. Soarin is where you are strapped to a hang glider and "fly" above cities and landscapes (all computer genereated). Supposedly you feel like you're actually flying although you never move. I skipped those for fear of motion sickness.

This was the waiting area for Test Track. There was lots to see but our line was so short we walked right past it. It was all about how they do crash testing on cars. Like I said before, lots to see while waiting in line at Disney!

It's hard to see but we were moving fast. We rode in a "crash test" car. First it went around a track inside and tested the breaks, rocky terrain, etc.

Then it went through this heat tunnel. And yes, it was really hot!

Thankfully next was the cold tunnel. It felt great! The last minute or so we drove on a track outside at 60 or 70 mph! A little scary with my 4 year old lightly strapped in the backseat with no roof on the car!

When we got off of the ride we entered a room that looked like a car show. The kids were all over that. Literally. It felt like we were back at the Fair.

Yep. We put things on, take a pic, then don't buy them. We're ghetto like that. ;-)

Luckily Mondo had the genius idea to stack the kids in the stroller. By day 3 they were already complaining about their legs being tired. Try pushing a single stroller with 2 heavy kids in it!

We ate at the Coral Reef for lunch. Highly recommend that place! It was not a character dining but the food was fabulous! One whole wall of the restaurant is a giant aquarium. Complete with sharks circling watching you eat! The kids LOVED it. Mondo worked his magic and got us a table by the wall. ;-)

We had just bought these Duffy bears before we went to the restaurant. Duffy is Mickey's teddy bear. There's a whole story that goes along with it that sold us on them. Of course, the kids had to have them. ;-) They wanted pics "sleeping" with their Duffy's.

My dessert was FABULOUS! A warm, gooey chocolate cake with raspberry sorbet. Yummo!!

The kids got to make their own sundaes for dessert. Ethan was really into it. Caleb just ate the M&M's.

Carrying his Duffy on his shoulders.

This was the waiting area for the Turtle Talk with Crush (from Finding Nemo). The show was cool, but of course no cameras were allowed. It's interactive with Crush talking to you from a big movie screen. Really funny and amazing how he could "see you" and have a full conversation with you like he was real.

There was a big meet and greet with Micky, Minnie, etc. We got LOTS of autographs and pics but I didn't post them all. Here the kids are showing Mickey their Duffy bears.

This was the outside of Mission Space. Mondo and Ethan rode this one. Caleb was too small and I didn't want to be ill so we didn't ride. He said you get strapped into a "space shuttle" and pilot your way through space...complete with feeling the gravitational pull when you take off. No thank you. They rode it twice.

I thought this was pretty cool. Inside this...pyramid thing was a restaurant, a little shopping area, and a ride. The ride was another one of the boat/cave ride type things. It was too dark for the pics to really show up. It had Donald Duck and the Three Caballeros cartoon characters. It was a nice relaxing ride. We stayed on a rode it twice.

Caleb found some maracas that he thought he really needed. He was shaking them and dancing around. It was really cute, but Mommy didn't agree that he needed them. :-)