Millie Mae Jack (needs pictures)

 Our family has added a new sweet member. Millie Mae Jack was born on April 8th at 4:01 pm. It was kind of an interesting day to be born because everyone was excited about a solar eclipse that the US was experiencing. I’m going to try and be a little better about journaling and realized I want Millie to have a journal entry about her birth. When Mom passed away Dad sent out journal entries to each of us that either he or mom had recorded about us. They were such treasured memories. I hope I can be better about journaling for my children's sake. Millie was born screaming. She had opinions right from the start. When they took her out she gave some good screams. Then they took her into another room to measure and clean her up and when the door to the OR would open I could hear her screams from the other room. Once she was swaddled up and Ben put her up to my cheek she calmed down and was calm for us during the rest of the procedure. I absolutely hated the surgery. Didn’t throw up this time, but did still have a mild panic attack when the spinal tap was first taking effect. Experiencing the spinal tap is a great example of the need to speak up for yourself in medical situations. Only I knew how I was feeling and just by telling them I was panicking they were able to give me stuff to help with that. After what feels like an eternity Ben finally came into the room. He distracted me with talk of some man running across Africa or something…just whatever random things he could find in the news and soon we had our baby. It felt like another eternity when Ben went with the baby until he came back. They sewed me up pretty quickly and soon we were wheeled out to the recovery room. One of the doctors told me that I’d healed really well from my previous surgeries. Well thanks, I’ll take any compliment I can get at moments like this. I remembered things getting much better once they could take out my catheter and I could walk around, I didn’t remember it was 12 hrs until they’d do that. So that meant I was stuck in the bed until 4 am, 12 hrs after her birth. Those first 12 hrs were rough. The pain is the freshest, you can’t get out of bed, you’re bleeding onto this pad you’re laying on and don’t feel very clean, you have a catheter in, and ontop of all that Millie was not sleeping well that first night. Ben and I were exhausted. Just trying not to fall asleep while holding her so we didn’t drop her. After those 12 hrs they took out my catheter, I was able to go to the bathroom and clean myself up. Soon after that Millie decided to finally have some good sleep so Ben and I were able to catch up on some sleep in the early hrs of the morning. We were so grateful to Meredith for coming to watch Nelson and Riley while we were in the hospital so Ben could just be there for me instead of trying to get home and watch the other kids at night or something. 

Our first impression of Millie was that she was feisty. So it made it easier to decide to name her Millie instead of Amelia. Amelia would be far too proper to scream at any nurse who dared take her temperature. Millie, as is well documented, is an homage to my mom. Her maiden name is Miller. I had been really wanting a name that connected this daughter to my wonderful mother, but I had been really struggling coming up with anything I 100% liked, and if I wasn’t 100% in love I wasn’t going to convince Ben to choose it. When I finally considered mom’s maiden name I immediately came up with Millie and loved it! After presenting 5 or 6 of the names I’d come up with to my sisters and hearing them all love Millie I knew that was going to be her name. It took Ben more time to warm up to it, and I’m not sure if he really ever was thrilled about it, but you know once the name has a baby attached it’s a lot easier to love. Since I felt like I’d kind of pushed the first name on Ben I wanted him to be the one to choose the middle name. We had talked about Jeanine, being mom and my middle name, and it also happens to be the name of Elder Scott’s wife, a couple that we’ve always wanted to emulate in our relationship. To get other ideas he just went through a list of popular middle names. In the end it was between Jeanine, Mae, and Faye. Faye is a name from my family tree and Mae has some beautiful meaning behind it. We decided on Mae. We liked the almost opposite meanings to the name. It can mean bitter, but it can also mean pearl. This baby is definitely a beautiful pearl, but she definitely grew in a bitter time of life. Ben also liked that Mae comes from Mary which can be seen as a connection to Meredith, Ben’s mom’s name. 

It has been so sweet having Millie in our lives. Riley and Nelson are both regularly asking to hold her. Nelson still hasn’t attempted to say her name haha. I think he tried one time and then decided that was way too hard so she is still just Baby to him. The other day I heard him saying, “Hi cute baby,” as she was swinging in her swing. Riley loves having a little sister and I just pray that their bond will continue to grow throughout their lives. A sister’s bond is the most special there is. Millie mostly just sleeps still, being just 2 weeks old, but the moments she’s awake seem to be getting more frequent. It’s too hard to predict at this point, but part of me really wants Millie’s hair to end up red like mom’s. :) 

A Whole New World

The idea of going to Disney World while we lived just 4 hours away, have family that we can stay with, and don't have to pay for Nelson's ticket sounded like a great idea. As the trip got closer and closer I was starting to doubt how great of an idea it was. I hadn't really considered being pregnant while going on this trip and I also hadn't really considered needing to entertain the free two year old in all the lines we'd be waiting in. We had already purchased Disney tickets so we were committed, but I was getting nervous that we'd have a really rough time. After Marco Poloing with Erica she gave me a little more hope that we'd have fun. The Disney Magic is real right?? It also helped that we had Ben's Aunt Jane who is a Disney pro and helped us navigate the park the first day. 

The trip started off on a bit of a negative for me because I'd be hoping we'd get on the road, at the latest, at 6. We pulled out of the driveway a little after 7. But that did mean that Ben was able to finish everything he needed to do and didn't have any notes or things hanging over him over the weekend which was good. In the end, the kids did fall asleep on the drive so it probably didn't make much of a difference except for Ben and I missing an extra hour sleep before a big day at Disney the next day. 

When we arrived at Paul and Jane's house the transition to beds for the kiddos was not a seamless as I hoped. Riley did just fine once we had a night light and some stuffies set up for her, but Nelson was a basket case. He was loosing it when we got inside, unconsolable for a time until I started rocking back and forth while shushing in his ears. (Those newborn tricks never die I guess.) Once I had him calmed down I put him in his crib. Ben and I finished getting some more things out of the car and sneak into our room assuming that Nelson has fallen back to sleep. Nope. I find him just flipping through some books that he has pulled off the bookshelf next to his pack n play. So we confiscate those and hope he will go to bed. I didn't sleep super well and when I woke up around 2 am I still heard Nelson talking to himself. I don't know how he survived the next day because he must have gotten only a few hours of sleep! 

The only downside to the free lodging is that they are an hour away from Disney. So we were up and out the door a little after 7 so we could get a ride or two in before the lines get super long. We didn't pay for the DisneyGenie+ thing which I think was the right call for this trip. There was really only one line that we stood in that ended up being way longer than we bargained for, but luckily that was the last ride of the day and Nelson had passed out on the way so Jane sat with him for the hour and a half it took us to do the dang Buzz Lightyear ride! We had been talking about the ride earlier and Riley really wanted to do it so we did it, but if Nelson wouldn't have been asleep the whole time it could've ended up being a real bummer to end the day on. 

Day 1 pictures:

Jane's yearly pass gets you free pictures! So whenever she was there to tap her pass we got to get some real pictures taken. It also saved us the $30 for parking! Pretty awesome!

Overall this was a trip for Riley. We went to the rides we thought she'd like the best and we didn't worry about the more popular rides that adults enjoy. The one exception was TRON. Jane showed us how you can try and get in a virtual queue and since we did get a spot it seemed like a waste not to do it. Since I couldn't go on even if I wanted to because I'm pregnant I braved Disney on my own for the hour or so that it took Ben and Jane to ride the ride. I'd say this picture made it worth it. 

While Ben and Jane were doing TRON we hopped over to the Aladdin ride which ended up being one of Riley's favorite rides. We rode it three times since the line was never more than 30 minutes. I think it helps that there are three different rides in the park that are a similar ride experience and the Aladdin one is kind of in a less popular area of the park. The Dumbo ride that is virtually the same thing would sometimes have an hour wait!

The nice lady in front of us in line offered to take a picture of us on the ride and even offered to let us sit in the front of the carpet if we wanted. I didn't have the heart to point out that she was supposed to sit alone in her own magic carpet and this was just supposed to be ours. Haha she was sweet and had Riley direct her if she wanted to go up or down so we didn't mind sharing our magic carpet with her. I just wonder if she noticed that carpet #11 was completely empty in front of us. It reminded me of a bit by a comedian where he talks about going to Disney alone and how they do make you ride all the rides by yourself if you aren't with anyone. "A car pulls up and they say, 'That's all for you!' 'What about all the hundreds of people waiting in line?' 'We don't want to inconvenience them with your presence.'" 

The Winnie the Pooh ride was one of my favorites partly because it had things kids could play with as we were waiting in line, but mainly because of the delightful giggles from Nelson and Riley when we were "bouncing" along with Tigger. 

Our first day we didn't do much with meeting characters partly because Jane didn't seem to think that is your best use of time at Disney, but also because Riley had seen a lot of her favorite people in a little Disney performance they did and we thought maybe that was enough for her. I knew she would probably be shy meeting people up close so I didn't know if we really needed that to happen. But when Chip and Dale had a very short line when we walked by we figured why not? When Chip held out his arm for me I was a little thrown off. It took me a minute to decide he actually did want me to link arms with him. I was like you know I'm a grown up right? I don't actually want to interact with you fellow grown up in a costume. 

End of the first day! Haha Riley really was in good spirits, but apparently didn't want to show it for the picture. On the way out of the park we realized we hadn't taken pictures in the ears that Jane let us borrow! Nelson wasn't going to wear his ears for anything, but I asked Riley if she would be willing to take a picture in the pretty ears while we were with Jane and could get the free picture. At first she said no, but then she did agree to do it eventually. (Which is why we are a little far from the castle)

Jane really helped us have Disney fun while also saving money. These ears are like $35! She also gave us some refillable popcorn containers that were the best! That way we got popcorn just for $2.50 which is the best deal you will find for food at Disney. 

Day 2 Pictures:

Day two we were on our own! Jane was running a 15 mile race on Sunday so she needed to rest her feet on Friday. We had planned to do Animal Kingdom on Friday, but Riley really wanted to redo 4 of her favorite rides so we figured we'd do Magic Kingdom again for half a day and still have time to do the few things on our list at Animal Kingdom. The day didn't start out on the best note because our reservation was still at Animal Kingdom and we were under the impression it would be easy to just check in there and then park hop over to Magic Kingdom. Because Animal Kingdom opened at 8 am we could check in there early and we could still get to Magic Kingdom by 9 am when it opens and you get the shortest line. Riley really wanted to do Buzz again, but we were not gonna sit in another hour long line for it! So being on time was very important to me. Well everything seemed to be going okay, we were heading to the park hopping buses around 8:30, plenty of time, until I see the sign under the bus to Magic Kingdom says "Starting at 10 am". WHAT?? Jane had been in talks with us about doing the park hopping and either she was unaware or didn't think to mention that you can't actually park hop first thing! Ben was going to turn around and just make the best of it in Animal Kingdom, but I was not having it! Riley was going to be so disappointed. We had promised we were going to Magic Kingdom first so we could make sure we had time to do all the things she most wanted to do. So I went up to the nearest worker and asked him how we could get to Magic Kingdom. He gave me like three different options and honestly left me a bit confused as to what the best option is, but then on the walk over to some other buses I asked another man what the best option was and he recommended the same thing the other guy had said first. So, we took a resort bus to the Contemporary Disney resort which is like right next to Magic Kingdom. It was a real short walk to Magic Kingdom and we ended up getting inside the park by 9:20. So I did have 30 or 40 minutes of struggling to have a good attitude, but by the time we were in the Buzz Lightyear line and the wait ended up being just 25 minutes my spirits were much higher and we didn't let it affect any more of our day! 

Other than Buzz Riley requested to ride Winnie the Pooh, the Carousel, and the Aladdin ride again. Since Buzz and Winnie were the only ones that really get long lines it seemed like a very doable list. She also requested to watch the Mickey Friendship show again, which she absolutely loved. 

 

This show was so cute, and had almost all of Riley's favorite Disney characters. It was a bit of a tender point for me. On the first day when we finished riding Aladdin and Jane and Ben were still waiting for Tron I noticed this show was going to start and decided to take the kiddos to see it. We were all enjoying the show and then the final song started. The song sings about "the magic feels like home". As I listened to this song and looked down at my daughter having such a great time I started to cry. Grief can hit you in the most unexpected moments, I didn't see it coming at all, but all the sudden I'm trying to keep myself from sobbing uncontrollably. I knew this was the last song and Ben and Jane were waiting for meet up as soon as it was over. Having sweet, special moments with my kids is always a joy, but there is always that feeling of wishing I could share what we are doing with Mom. 

Even though it's just a carousel it's still magical at Disney right? :) 

After doing most of the things Riley requested I noticed that the line to see Tiana and Rapunzel wasn't too long. Riley had dressed up as Rapunzel that day (shout out to me for throwing in a few of her dresses knowing once she found out we were going to Disney she may want to dress up-also notice the tiara. That stayed on almost all day!) So we waited in line to get to interact with the two princesses and I'm so glad we did. It was so sweet seeing her shyly talk to them.

Tiana was awesome and made Riley feel so special by saying she was going to hide her behind her dress and then she could jump out and surprise Rapunzel with her matching dress. 

Mickey pretzels! Gross to eat, but fun to look at. 

Meeting Daisy didn't go quite as planned. Well it wasn't unexpected, but I was hoping since Riley really liked Daisy she'd be happier to see her. Riley would not make eye contact. Later, Riley did point out that Daisy didn't really look like herself. It's true these were circus inspired Mickey friends so Daisy was a fortune teller and was dressed like it. 

The Disney photopass is an absolute JOKE. Do you know what you'd have to pay to get all the pictures that they take of you throughout the day? $73! Or you can get pictures from every day of your trip for $200. $200!! To take off the dang watermark. 

Minnie was a hit!! Riley wasn't afraid of her and they even twirled in their dresses together. Nelson was also excited about meeting her and I wish we had taken a picture with him too. When we were next in line to see Minnie he kept saying, "Hug! Hug!" He ran and gave her a hug once I said it was our turn to go. So sweet! 

Sweet little Nelson let us just totally disrespect his nap time. He would take some rests on our shoulders, and did eventually fall asleep. 

Poor boy had no idea he was sleeping through the Dole Whip. This picture also makes me a bit emotional. I remember after taking it having the reaction that I would text it to Mom and say, "Hooray he was able to fall asleep!" Because I knew that she would've been thinking about us trying to have a fun day together, but knowing Nelson would be skipping a nap and she'd be hoping that he could nap on the go.

After we finished our Dole Whip we were ready to head back to Animal Kingdom to maybe do one or two things before getting in the car to go home. We wanted to watch a little 4D Bugs Life video and maybe see if there were any fun things in the dinosaur area. The Bugs Life video was a bit of a failure with Ben having to take Nelson out because he was screaming at all of the air and water they were shooting at us. Not wanting that to be the last experience of the day we decided to venture into the Dinosaur area. The first thing we saw when we entered was a fun, open play area with slides and ropes to climb. Riley had an absolute blast and Nelson found some sand to play in so everyone was in heaven. 

I love this picture of a princess showing she can do it all and not let a dress slow her down. 

We considered trying to do a third day on Monday, Presidents Day, but ultimately decided against it. Riley had it in her head that we were done with Disney, she was happy with where things had ended, President's Day would be extra busy, and this way we could get home with an extra day to get regular life back in order. 

As we drove away from Disney on the second day I told Ben that I felt like I had just accomplished a really difficult thing. Taking two young kids to Disney and not leaving in tears is a huge accomplishment! We aren't planning to be in this area for forever so it is so fun to enjoy it while we are here! 

Christmas 2023 (no pictures)

 This Christmas was so special. The first Christmas without Mom. It was going to have difficult moments. When Britt asked me if it wouldn't be inconvenient for her to come for Christmas I was so excited! Of course, we wanted her to visit!! We were lucky enough for the previous three years in Maryland to have Britt as part of our Christmas morning so it just felt natural that she be there with us. 

Let's rewind just a little bit to the beginning of Christmas season. Putting up the Christmas tree is one of my favorite parts of this season. Setting up a bright, beautiful new decoration in your home is so fun. I was a bit worried about Nelson and the tree, but we didn't have any ornament casualties. Not that he didn't try. 

This was the first time I had to deal with a spirit week at a kids school. We tried to dress up appropriately with each day, but I wasn't going to spend money on it. One of the days was a grinch theme. We had nothing grinch related, not even in his color. About 10 minutes before we have to head out the door I decide that I could try and create something. I grab a white shirt we don't care about, felt, a hot glue gun, and some needle and thread. Lo and behold I create a grinch shirt!! I was actually very proud of my efforts. I don't consider myself to be very creative or artistic, so whenever I do something artsy that looks half good I'm very proud of myself. 

I was so excited for Riley to get out of school for Christmas Break. Sure, having Riley in school has been very helpful these past few months while I've been sick and sad, but I miss our slower mornings and outings together. 

Britt got in on the 20th after the kids went to bed, so we had her surprise Britt in the morning. Britt came out of her room when she woke up, and Riley was shocked! We had SO much fun having Aunt Bo back in the house. It was so fun having Nelson get to know her better. Kids grow up so much in those first few years so he had much more personality than when she last saw him 6 months earlier. 

Christmas Eve was an emotional night. We had a family call and while we did read the classic stories we also talking about Christmas memories with mom. After rereading some emails I'd had from Mom I realized how much pressure she felt to make Christmas wonderful for her children, no matter how old we got. Of course, I can relate to that feeling. We always want the best for our kids. I remember the Christmas I came home from my mission Mom had someone put up Christmas lights and we went and got a real Christmas tree. The year I was gone they'd had a fake tree and no lights, she knew how much I loved those two things so she went to the extra work to make the year I came home extra special for me. 

Christmas morning was a blast! I was a little worried they wouldn't be excited about their Santa gift. I had sort of taken a gamble with this gift, I had seen them enjoying a giant Squishmellow at Ana's house in November. I wasn't sure it was exciting enough for the big reveal in the morning, but boy was I wrong! They loved those things! They were jumping on those things non-stop for weeks and weeks. 

 

Halloween 2023 (No pictures yet)

 Our first Halloween in Georgia. My main goal for this Halloween was to help Riley choose a costume that wasn't another troll. We started talking about costumes months before Halloween. I knew she'd change her mind plenty of times so I waited to commit to something until it seemed like her answer to the question, "What do you want to be for Halloween?" started being consistent. She decided she wanted to be Detective Hops, the main character in one of our very favorite movies, Zootopia. 

I think it's so cute that people put together these family themed costumes, but I also don't like spending money on things for one night of cuteness. Riley wanted us all to be characters from Zootopia, so I figured I could at least get a costume for Nelson from the movie. We wanted him to be a little fennec fox, but it may not surprise you a fennec fox costume for a two year old was not easy to find. Ben came up with the idea that Nelson could be the fennec fox when he dresses up like an elephant in the movie. Perfect! Elephant costumes were MUCH easier to find. 

Putting together Riley's costume was fun. I didn't want to just buy the Detective Hops costumes because they weren't very cute and it didn't look very hard to put together. I bought some bunny ears and police outfit. I also looked up some ideas for bunny face paint. Painting on her bunny face was one of the proudest moments of my life. I was very impressed with my own work! 

On Halloween night Ben came home right before we were going out to trick-or-treat. He disappeared for a minute and came out in the perfect Nick costume! It almost made me regret not getting any sort of costume for myself, but the three of them were cute enough. 

We were invited by a friend to come trick or treating with them in their neighborhood. Our neighborhood doesn't have sidewalks so we gladly accepted the offer to go to a more little kid friendly area. One interesting thing was that everyone puts their candy out on a table, we didn't knock on any doors! Some people sit out with the candy so they can see the kids go by, but my guess is that since it's such a popular neighborhood they don't want to have to come to the door every 10 seconds. 

Riley and Nelson had an absolute ball. Nelson was absolutely adorable in his little elephant costume, and even though it was definitely too warm for that costume he wasn't phased at all. He was laser focused on collecting candy, no matter how rosy his little cheeks were getting. I should've taken off his outfit, but he was just getting so many compliments! Once it got dark we took off the hat and let his head breathe. He also was holding on to his pumpkin for dear life, but it got pretty heavy after we'd been going for a while. Ben had to start stuffing candy in his pockets so sweet Nelson could still carry that heavy thing. Riley was so jazzed the whole night. Saying things like Halloween is the best night! Isn't it the best Clara?? We are having so much fun! But she didn't have never-ending energy. When we suggested heading back to the car she was definitely on board. She just wanted to start eating some of her collection! 

I'm not a huge lover of the creepy parts of Halloween (like the house down our street with it's yard full of severed body parts!), but I do love the sweet little kids dressing up and living there best lives! 

Rileyism (no pictures yet)

 *Nelson hearing the crinkle of any wrapper* TREAT! TREAT! TREAT!

Watching the Grinch cartoon. Riley: Cindy Lou doesn't have any legs. She has...something else. 

Ben asking me if it's okay to do something that I didn't want him to do, but Riley did. Riley: You don't always have to ask your wife permission to do things. Sometimes you can ask your daughter.

Riley and I were playing a game that I was a cat and she was my owner. We played it for a while and then she went off to the play room to play with something else. It had been a few minutes and I started talking to Ben when I hear a yell from the other room, "Mom, remember you're a cat!"

Riley trying to figure out what happened to all the cookies we had left over from an event. Talking to Ben she said, "If Nelson didn't eat them and I didn't eat them and you didn't eat them....WHO ate them??"

Riley talking to a bug: "Go live your life. Go find a mate and try and see if HE'll like you. Go and have babies and make a family."

Riley: I'm already kind of like Jesus.

When we were visiting Utah and the adults were being a bit loud after I put Riley to bed she came out with her hand on her hips and sternly said, "All this talk, talk, talk, is making it hard for me to sleep, sleep, sleep." 

I was asking Riley if she knew the names of the other teachers that help do Prek pick up. She told me a few of their names and then she says, "Ms Jennifer is the really old one that calls our names. I wonder why she's not dead yet." Thank goodness we were in our car for this conversation! 

Riley: "I found another weed pretending to be a flower!" We've tried starting a very low stakes garden, but it does prove to be tricky when you can't figure out what's a weed and what is a bud of something we are trying to grow! 

Riley randomly while in Utah: "I wish you were Grandma and Grandpa's granddaughter and I could have grown up here playing with the doll house."

Riley: "Welcome to Riley's Restaurant...that's alliteration!" I'm always so excited to hear things that Riley is learning in Prek come out at home. She doesn't seem to remember a single thing they've done once she gets in the van and I ask her about her day, but every once in a while something slips out. 

Riley: Do you know my leg hurts?

Mom: Oh I'm sorry.

Riley: But just when I hop on it. (Begins hopping vigorously.)

While watching the original Grinch cartoon, "Cindy Lou doesn't have legs. She has...something else." Haha I explained that she just has a long nightgown and we can't see her legs because yes that would be some weird anatomy if that was her bottom half. 

I've never been prouder of my girl than when while we were carving pumpkins Riley asked, "Can we listen to music from the month after November?" Haha yes! We are an early Christmas music family! 

Nelson brought the book Love You Forever over to me and asked me to read it. It was not long after Mom had passed and I knew I wasn't gonna get through it without some tears. When I inevitably started to cry Riley asks me what's wrong. When I explained why she said, "Ohhh...but you're going to see her again!" An important reminder. 

While playing legos with Riley she begins singing, "You're not better than me at legos. I'm the best at legos. I'm better than you."

This moment was witnessed by a few people on the family call. When Riley first heard the idea to use the name Millie for our baby girl her reaction was, "I agree with that! I will help you tell Daddy to say yes!"

Usually when you go to get your child out of his crib you'd assume his "Up, up!" is referring to him being picked up. Not so with Nelson. Before he request for me to pick him up he insists I put my hair up in a bun. Haha I guess I'm not myself when my hair is down. 

Nelson and Riley have entered the stage of being siblings where they will play nicely together occasionally. Usually it's Riley just telling Nelson what to do and him following blindly. 

Walking On Sunshine…and Then Rain…and Then Sunshine Again

After spending the majority of our July moving to Georgia and trying to get our new life figured out we decided we deserved some fun! We drove the four hours to Florida to join in on the Rollins Reunion for Ben’s last week of freedom. 

I’d never been to Florida and Ben had only been recently for a conference, so that hardly counts. Four hrs is just about the length of a reasonable car trip in my book. Six hours is too much for a day, but four is just about right. The kids did great on the drive, and I was so impressed! Nelson is getting a lot better at putting up with car rides and I’m gradually getting better at prepping for these rides as well. 

We arrived Tuesday evening and got settled. Walked around the area of our Airbnb and saw some baby gators! 

Wednesday was going to be a big day. Ben was a huge Harry Potter fan when he was younger and still can do remarkably well with Harry Potter trivia games. Of course, when they created Harry Potter World he really wanted to go! Unfortunately, his family first went to HPW a week before he got off his mission (it was in connection with a reunion so they couldn’t choose the date). The second opportunity came around the summer he started Med school so he had to miss that as well. Finally, the Florida reunion would be a time that he had time off! And as a bonus we were moving super close to Florida! Ben’s mom and dad were the real heroes by watching Riley and Nelson after getting off a red eye flight that morning. They arrived around 8 am, we passed the kiddos off to them, and headed for Universal! We had Ben’s brother Tim and his wife, Annaliesa with us which made it fun! They had done Universal the previous summer so they were able to suggest which rides we should seek out and how to use the Universal App to our advantage. 

When we were planning this trip I realized I hadn’t been on a real rollercoaster probably since senior year of high school, maybe freshman year of college. And those rollercoasters were just at lagoon so not the coolest rollercoasters. The rollercoasters at universal were amazing! After the very first ride I was like, ok that was worth the $200 ticket. That was amazing. The kind of 4D, virtual rides were my favorite. Also, the butter beer was amazing! It was $9 a glass, but we still got it twice! Overall, we had a super fun time. I will say having not been to an amusement park it’s crazy how much money you have to spend to get to ride like 8 rides. The lines are so long you spend so much time trying to ride one ride. We did the single rider line a few times that can make the wait faster, but I wasn’t going to Universal just to ride rides I was going to experience it with Ben, not some rando. It’s fun to hear the screams and sounds of the people you know next to you. So I requested not to do the single rider line too much. 

We lasted at Universal until about 7:30. It had started raining and thundering at 6:30 so that really diminished the options of things we could do. I was perfectly fine being done a little early. It was a long day which lots of walking, but such a fun time! 

Thursday was sort of a down day because a lot of the crew was sleep deprived either because their red eye had been delayed and they’d arrived at 5 am or because they’d been out late kayaking till 3 am. So most of the morning I was just trying to keep the kids quiet. Eventually Ben’s dad suggested taking the kids to the aquarium. Aquariums are always fun for the kiddos so I was onboard! When we walked in they had us pose for some pictures that came with the price of the ticket, good thing too! They turned out so well I would’ve had to buy them if them didn’t. I was holding Riley so I couldn’t tell that she was actually following the directions the camera lady was saying to look up and look scared so when I saw how the picture turned out I LOVED it. 

After the aquarium we took the kiddos on a carousel. Riley was having the time of her life. Nelson was not. Everything was fine until I had to move him so I was in between both him and Riley. He was NOT happy to be picked up and then discard so quickly. He spent the whole ride grasping at my shirt trying to pull himself off the horse. 

Thursday night it was our turn to go do some bioluminescence kayaking. It was the best part of the whole trip. I kind of feel bad the best too outings were just Ben and I without kiddos, but it was also really fun having adult fun together which hasn’t happened in forever. I realized that the day at Unviersal was the longest I’d been away from both children since Riley was born. 😨 So yeah this trip was good for us. Uncle Paul took a group of us out to this lagoon that has these algae that glow when you touch or move them. It’s incredible. As you row your ore is making the water glow. You trace your finger in the water and can see marks of where you’ve been. You pull your hand out of the water and watch the glowing water run down your arm. Kayaking through a school of fish is the best, it’s midnight so you don’t see the fish, but when you disturbe them all the sudden you see flashes of light speeding away from your boat. It was the most incredible night! 

Well the incredible night made for a rough morning. We kind of drew the short straw in that there was an early morning activity planned for Friday morning. So we were up and ready to go at 8:30 after getting to bed around 4. Also, did I mention we were sleeping in a bed with Riley in between us? So none of our rest was super restful. That girl likes to go horizontal in the bed and then start to kick. So we drove up to some blue springs and went swimming for a bit. This activity would’ve been more fun if the water hadn’t been so cold! Nelson was immediately not a fan and was in hysterics on and off the whole time. 

Most of Friday was a daze because of how absolutely exhausted I was. I definitely passed out on the couch at some point while Nelson was napping and maybe I’d let Riley watch a show. 

Saturday was our last day in Florida. We still hadn’t been to the beach and I realized it wasn’t gonna happen unless I just did it and said hey people can come if you want but we are going to the beach. I’m so glad we did because we had such a fun time! I wish we’d had more time, but we had to be back at 12 for the birthday party tradition they have. So we only got a few hours, but the good news is we live very close to some great beaches here in Georgia anyways. 

We hurried back to the house, had a fun birthday party, which Riley was a HUGE fan of. After the birthday party we said our goodbyes and got out of there as quick as we could because it was already 2:30 and our arrival time at home was going to be later than I’d hoped. 

But even when we left it didn’t feel like the reunion ended because Ben’s parents actually followed us back to Savannah for two days! It was so fun hosting our first guests and getting to share a small bit of our new life with someone. It was also a bonus for me was having Meredith in town to show me some of the basics on the organ so I could play the organ instead of just sticking with the piano. We went to Forsyth Park and and awesome wildlife nature center.  

I told Ben I’d wait for him here and then I turned to see this sign. 

It was a wonderful end to our month of vacation, we so enjoyed having Dad at home, but I’m happy to report we’ve found a bit of a rhythm to our days now that Dad’s back at work as well. Riley is now doing PreK 5 days a week and so far hasn’t put up too much of a fuss to going each day. We will see if it starts to wear on her after a few weeks of this, but I’m hopeful she’ll just be a girl who enjoys school 🤞🏻. 

Rileyisms

These posts always speak for themselves. These quotes range quite a few months...enjoy.  

"Mama you really need to take care of me a lot today." Don't we all wish we could tell the world to be gentle with us some days. 

Riley likes to dictate how I'm feeling or things I say when we play together. This one cracked me up when she said, "Can you be sad because there isn't a lot of beautiful things in the world?"

 Riley has started enjoyed jokes, she told me a pretty good one the other day. "Why was 6 afraid of 7? Well because 7 was a vampire!" Then I tried to tell her the classic why is 9 afraid of 7 joke and after I told her the punch line of because 7 8 9 she said, "I don't have an answer for that." 

Another joke moment. She was pondering this horse joke her dad told her, "What did the horse say when she fell down? Help, I've fallen and I can't giddy up!" She disagreed she said, "He would just ask another horse to help him!" Pretty simple guys.

Ben had his Ukulele out recently and Riley was putting on a little concert for us. After playing for a few minutes she looked at us and said, "So you guys know, I don't know how to change the notes." Haha thanks for the warning after we're already in our seats for the concert. 

One of those classic little kid burns. Riley says to me, "Your teeth are more gold than white." 

Riley telling me about playing red light, green light during her primary class. "One kid was really good at it! But some of my little friends just kept on running!"

Standing tall tapes. There is a song in the love one about a Dad who now lives at a different house, but "still there is love". Riley really related with the kid because she told me, "My dad doesn't live here sometimes too." 

"I can help so you don't have to live your life doing that alone." Haha encouraging...I think. 

"I just like pepper when it's mixed with mint."

Riley's been really into dad jokes recently. Ben will tell her the joke and she'll come tell it to me. While one of the jokes he told Riley was, "What did the horse say when she fell down? I can't giddy up!" Riley responded, "She would just ask another horse to help him." 

Me trying to teach Riley the real Spanish word for things. "I like making up Spanish words, that's just about being a kid."

Just totally out of the blue, "So Nel is gonna be another dad huh?"

Playing with Riley and she pretends that she's having twins. After giving birth to both babies she makes a motion of doing up a jacket and says, "Zip!" 

Grandma Jack wanted to capture a cute Riley moment, but didn't have her phone. She said, "I wish I had my camera!" Riley responded, "It's okay, you can just look at me."

One day I hear Riley singing, "Mama works day and night." She comes in the room in my shoes and says, "I'm being a mama. I'm very busy."

We were reading a book that mentions a pilot whale. Riley says, "Pilot whale! Did you know pilot whales are actually dolphins?" The knowledge she holds onto amazes me. 

No specific quote, but I just wanted to remember walking through Costco with the kiddos in the cart. Nelson was trying to "eat" Riley and she was just laughing and laughing. It is so fun seeing Nelson and Riley play together. It doesn't happen very often without Nelson getting hurt or Riley getting upset he's taking her toys. So I enjoy the small moments. 

So far the list of things Riley wants to be include: firefighter, bug girl, opthamologist, and most recently "a pediatrician so I can work with Daddy."

I think I was bringing something out to the car, but Riley was concerned I was leaving her behind. She called to me, "You can't just skip away with out your child!"

Riley was playing on the couch, slipped off, and landed on a tub of magnatiles. Through tears she exclaimed, "I told you we shouldn't have the magnatiles there!" "I'm sorry sweetie, I didn't hear you say that." "That's because it was in my mind." 

A hilarious out of the blue question. "Mom is your life gonna be hard when we have lots of kids?"

We were reading some Kratt Brothers books where they talk about getting different creature powers. I ask her what creature power she would want. She responded, "A spider! I could scare everybody in my reach!" Haha her joys of scaring her aunt Bo with spider things runs deep. 

I'm sure this was referring to remembering something that I didn't, "It's funny that my little brain is better than your grown up brain."

"Life will be hard if I don't get a baby sister." "But we will love all our baby brothers right?" "Well....depending on how cute they are."

I made molasses cookies the other day and while they may not be much to look at they are very delicious. Apparently Riley felt the same because when I offered a cookie to Ben she told him, "They are better than you think!" Then she repeated the same phrase when I offered one to Britt. 

We were over playing at her friend Lily's house. I was playing a game with Lily's little brother that was similar to Memory, but it was all in Japanese so I was definitely being beat by a two year old. Riley gave me a pep talk, saying, "It's okay if you aren't good at it mom! You'll just be a little slower, but you can do it!"

"I can't sleep! I'm so excited for Father's Day!" This girl loves any reason to celebrate. 

Another moment of her book knowledge: "Camouflage means using colors to blend into your surroundings. Adapt means change over a long period of time. It says that in the glossary."

Riley coming in from outside commenting on her state of cleanliness, "Pretty dirty huh? And I don't smell good either!"

Hops on my chair and says, "I'm warming your seat for you." A few minutes late after I've totally forgotten, "Should be warm enough now mom!"

Playing doctor with Riley is hilarious. She's got to work on her bedside manner. "Oh no, this isn't gonna be good." "Oh, you aspirated a kitty." "We have a problem with the lungs. Kittens."

Overhearing a conversation at soccer practice said to her friend Sarah, "I can help you, what do you need?"

I just realized maybe I should add a few little Nelson things. 

When you give him a hug he responds with a grunt. That is because his Dad loves to hug him and make a mmmm sound as he squeezes him. He now things that sound needs to accompany each hug. 

If the pantry is ever left open you can expect this little boy to be walking over to you with a bar in hand requesting it be opened. 

When he's really happy with you (usually because you gave him yummy food) he'll look up at you and give you the cheesiest little grin. 

This is Britt and Nelson's relationship.

This may look like a touching picture between siblings, but really Riley is yelling at Nelson to stop taking her flowers. Note how many flowers are all over the yard.

Riley's soccer practice was such a fun few weeks. This coach was hilarious, he kept me laughing on the sidelines.

Riley went to a Paw Patrol party at a fire station. She refused to sacrifice either theme. 

Her face when Marshall showed up. But don't let that fool you she refused to look him in the eye or approach him in any way. I can't imagine Disney is going to go very well. 

Always riding in style.

Trying to capture his cheesy grin.