Post Race Fun at Walt Disney World

After the race, we took the bus back to our hotel and had breakfast (it was only 9 am). After a short rest, LOTS of stretching and a shower, we put on our walking shoes and headed to the parks. First stop..... the Magic Kingdom.

We were all disappointed that Thunder Mountain Railroad was closed, but we had lots of fun on Space Mountain. After a few hours, we headed over to Epcot for dinner and some favorite rides including Soarin' and Test Track. We stayed for the nightshow and Wendy snapped this awesome photo of the fireworks! We then headed home and to be honest, our feet were hurting and our legs were exhausted.

The next morning (after sleeping in to almost 9 am - what a treat!), we headed to Animal Kingdom. First stop..... Everest, a 1st time ride for all of us. This roller-coaster ride was so fun and the line was short... so we road it a 2nd time!

Around lunch time, we hopped on the bus and headed to Hollywood Studios. Wendy braved the Tower of Terror for the 1st time.... yeah, Wendy!

We were hoping to catch the Fantasmic show on Monday night, but an evening shower cancelled our plans. So we hopped another bus to Downtown Disney for a delicious treat!

Cheers to an excellent, relaxing, challenging and fun girls weekend at Disney!

The Big Race

After months of preparation, Wendy, Jen and I boarded our plane to Orlando for the Disney Princess 1/2 Marathon weekend. This was the first 1/2 marathon for all of us and we were excited and a bit anxious at the same time. (For those of you non-runners, a 1/2 marathon is 13.1 miles.... a loooooonnnnnng run.) On Saturday morning, we picked up our race bibs, shirts and other running goods at the Expo.

We spent the afternoon exploring Downtown Disney and then had an AMAZING dinner at Ohana at the Polynesian Resort. After a little shopping at the Grand Floridian we headed back to our hotel room and tried to get to bed early. Key word... tried. We all eventually fell asleep and before we knew it, the alarms started ringing at 3:15 am. YIKES... that's early, but we had to board the buses by 4 am. So here we are.... Jazzy Jen, Wild Wendy and Sassy Sandra.... dressed and ready to go.

The race itself was awesome.... but what else would you expect from a Disney event. With the crack of the fireworks, we set off on our run. Most of the race was on the "highways" on the Walt Disney World property, but we got to run a small loop though the Magic Kingdom and Epcot. After 2 hours and 30 minutes running time, we were all super excited to cross the finish line. We placed approximately 6,160 out of 15,784 racers. Pretty awesome for first timers!

Blading Brothers

Since Nathan's birthday, he has been eager to get on his roller blades any chance he can. Luckily the weather this winter has been so mild that we have been able to head outdoors quite a bit. After watching his big brother on skates, Andrew has wanted to try. So finally we let him put on Dan's skates and give it a whirl. Needless to say, it was hilarious to watch him try roller blading in skates that are basically as long as his legs.

Happy Valentine's Day

On Valentines Day we all got up a few minutes earlier to share a special breakfast before heading out to school and work. Thanks to Dunkin Donuts for the festive treats! They were a big hit with the boys!

Birthday Fun for Andrew and his buddies

Last Sunday I took Andrew to a birthday party at the Heritage Farm Museum in Claude Moore Park for his friend, Cameron, from daycare. Andrew LOVED riding the tractor.
Here's Andrew and his buddies, Cameron and Calvin, listening to a story.

And of course, the boys enjoyed pizza and birthday cake.

Nathan Scores a Touchdown!

Nathan scores a touchdown and puts six points on the scoreboard this year! And we celebrated at home with friends and family with a football party.
After coloring, the kids did some warm-ups with Dan.

And then it was time to fuel up.
Then it was back to work practicing touchdown passes and field goal flicks.

After that bit of chaos, we tried to settle things down with a round of NFL Bingo.

Nathan had a great time celebrating! At six, Nathan is halfway through kindergarten and he is now reading quite well. He enjoys to write and is very good with numbers. He is as curious and inquisitive as ever. He can be a bit moody at times, but he can also be generous, kind and caring. He is very protective of his little brother and its been fun to watch them play together more and more.

Isabelle is 5!

At the end of January, we travelled to Charlottesville to celebrate Isabelle's 5th birthday, Unicorn style.

In addition to a delicious cake, the kids had fun with unicorn races (can you believe the kids were able to go outside in January with no coats?!?!?), and painting suncatchers.
On Sunday morning, we had a small Christmas celebration so Ethan could open the gifts he missed from the lake.