March 2024

I'm going to include it because this year was a leap year and my birthday was postponed a day due to Feb 29th. My desk at work got decorated with my UK blue. 

Someone at work raved about how good a Baskin Robbins ice cream cake was so I decided to get one for my birthday this year. I was a little disappointed and I believe that Dairy Queen makes a better ice cream treat. The kids enjoyed lighting all the candles. 

The next morning we tried a new restaurant for breakfast, Biscuit Belly. I had my first ever corn dog shaped item. I had sausage links dipped in pancake batter. They were delicious. 

I stopped over to see my little niece Nora after breakfast. I held her so that her parents could eat their food while it was still warm. 

A few years ago I had a person tell me that they run their age. I tried to do half my age one year and I bike my age another. This year I just went for 3.9 miles to celebrate by 39th birthday. 

You get so many great freebies for your birthday and I definitely didn't want to miss out on any of them. We picked the kids up from school early and then stopped by Starbucks. I got my free drink, but then I gave it to Brinley because I don't like Starbucks. She was very happy to drink it!

The kids were both very surprised when we checked them out of school. I told them it was because I wanted to eat at a certain restaurant and wanted to beat the dinner rush. That was only partially true. I wanted to eat at Buca de Beppo, but we had a much bigger surprise for them after dinner. The food was delicious and they brought out this ginormous brownie sundae for us to eat and sang a birthday song to me. All four of us tried but were unable to finish off this treat.  

The kids were so surprised when I told them that we were heading to the airport and flying to Disney for the weekend. They couldn't believe it, but quickly got excited for the adventure ahead. 

Our flight got in after the park closed so we got up the next morning to begin our adventure. We rushed back at the opening of Epcot to ride Ratatouille. The ride broke down but we decided to wait it out. I had been watching the lines and they had gotten up to 2 hours long. Total we ended up waiting just about an hour. I call that a win.  

Since the line wasn't moving Jennifer took the opportunity to get a little nap in. The kids played on our phones and I people watched, which is quite possibly one of my favorite activities. 

I found some shoes that were Buzz Lightyear designed so I decided to wear them at Disney. They were made for the design and not for comfort. I felt like I had been walking around barefoot all day. Not sure I will ever wear them back for a day at Disney. I had someone ask me if I had them custom made, but they were just from Wal-Mart. I had to get a picture with the floral version of Buzz Lightyear. 

The Flower and Garden Festival was going on while we were there. They had designed so many beautiful floral arrangements of Disney characters. 

Brinley with her favorite treat, a Mickey ice cream!

One of my favorite rides. We couldn't get the girls to ride it and Landon looks a little terrified in this picture as he is gripped onto my arm. 

Thankfully we got a spot in the virtual queue for Guardians of the Galaxy. This is one of the kids favorite rides in all the parks. 

I love this picture of the kids with Ratatouille.

The rest of the family has decided to follow along with Brinley and get all the Mickey shaped ice cream. 

Instead of the Mickey ice cream for me I got a funnel cake with ice cream, oreos, and hot fudge. It was delicious. I was even nice and shared with anyone that wanted some of it. Crazy thing is that it was about the same price as the Mickey ice cream.

Brinley got excited about meeting some characters finally. She met Alice and Snow White. Then we spotted Stitch, which is Brinley's favorite character. I made everyone wait in line so that we could meet talking Mickey. Well, apparently he stopped talking about four years ago. That was kind of sad, but Mickey was very animated and we had a good time with him. 

I love finding hidden Mickey's around the park. Some are easier to find than others. Most of these were found in one of my favorite rides, Living with the Land. 

Since we went to Disney for my birthday then I had to get my birthday pin. I even spotted a large birthday pin for a photo op. Lastly, I had my favorite treat a Dole Whip. It is the best on a warm, sunny day. 

My favorite restaurant is Giordano's and their deep dish pizza. We had some leftovers and I took them to the park instead of buying anything to eat in the park. I got some weird looks walking around eating my pizza because it is not something you can get in the park. 

Another one of my favorite photo shopped pictures that we got at Disney. They are supposed to be holding me down so I don't fly away. 

These professional photos were ones that they added into our photo pass. These are all places in Animal Kingdom with two pictures from Avatar world and one of Expedition Everest. I just really thought these pictures were beautiful. 

Every year our church does a weekend where we pack a million meals for people around the world who don't have anything. It is a really fun and easy way to show children how to volunteer. This year we invited our Rampage family to work a table with us. 

Brinley's team showed up the next day to compete in a softball tournament. They ended up coming in second place in the tournament and getting themselves some rings. 

Brinley signed up to do her school's DanceBlue Mini Marathon. All the students that signed up stayed after school and played games, learned the line dance and had fun with friends. Her school raised just under $18,000 dollars. After they announced a parent in the crowd donated some more to push them over. It was the most that her school had ever raised for DanceBlue. Brinley had a lot of fun and thought it was cool that her dad knew most of the college kids who came and ran the event. After the event we went out and got some ice cream. My little girl is growing up and has such a big heart. 

Landon also participated in his school's first ever DanceBlue Mini Marathon. This one was really special because one of the kids in Landon's class is actually one of my patients. His school raised $8,110 dollars which was awesome for a first time event. His was during school and I came to participate at it as well. It was split into grade level activities and I stayed to see a couple of the grades come in and participate. It was great to see my little guy dance around and have a good time with his friends. I haven't been volunteering in school much since the pandemic so it was great to see him in his environment. 

After getting done with volunteering at Landon's DanceBlue Marathon I headed over to spend the rest of the day with McKinley and Nora. I held this little beauty and we even got to play a board game too!

It is also really weird seeing her as a cougar which is what Jennifer and I were. Her school mascot is the Panthers, but they split the 6th graders into three groups - Cougars, Lynx, and Bobcats. This young lady was named Student of the Week! We are so proud of this young lady. Middle school has been so good for her. Maybe it is that she gets to sleep in for another hour or maybe she enjoys the new freedom that comes with middle school.

The true start of spring isn't until it is free cone day at Dairy Queen. Landon and I enjoyed ours right after his baseball practice. 

Although the calendar says spring is here, the softball tournament Brinely played felt nothing like it. It was in the 40's and I don't believe that any of our girls wanted to be out in it playing ball. They all had on sweat shirts and were carrying around hand warmers. They went one and one in pool play and then lost the first game of the tournament. It was a blessing though because everyone wanted to go home and the championship wasn't due to be played until after midnight.  

The city came by and did some brush clearing in Jacobson Park behind our house. I thought it looked horrible and wanted to see if we could get it cleared out and cleaned up. This gave me a starting point, but it is still going to be a lot of work. 

Grandma and Grandpa stopped in Lexington on their way up to Ohio for Easter with the Maitland's. They wanted to see their grandkids so we all met up at McKinley's house to visit for a little while. 

I treated the kids to Starbuck's one day and they had an extra lavender Frappuccino that they had made for someone and they never came to pick it up. They said we could have it. I brought it home for Jennifer, but we quickly discovered that lavender should not be consumed! It was awful.

Our church decided that with all the crowds coming for Easter that they would offer services on Saturday night. We went to this service and even met up with Nora for her first trip to church. Landon came straight from practice so he was still wearing his cleats. Brinley and I both volunteered. We went to this service so that we could get away to start spring break. 

We had planned to take the kids back to Disney for Spring Break. We were planning to drive, but I found some cheap flights to Orlando so I surprised the kids again with flying. One of the kids said they were actually upset because they were excited about driving. Our flight was delayed. We were supposed to leave at 5 am, but it got delayed until 10.

The early morning got to Landon and I. We fell asleep waiting to get off the ride at It's a Small World. 

The kids are always getting onto me about them not getting to try all of the Disney foods. So this time we gave the kids a budget of $50 each. Both kids were so excited about being able to get whatever they wanted. The kids first purchase of the week was their staples popcorn and Mickey ice cream. They were very good about trying to budget their money.