More photos from Disney

Grace with Belle. All these characters were very good and so very friendly! Grace is just absolutely in love with Princesses.

Ariel was really cute. She was calling the kids little fish, and asked Grace if she'd seen Flounder.

Snow White gave her a big kiss on the cheek and left lipstick lips. We showed Grace in the mirror, and she didn't want to wipe it off. Belle left lipstick on the other cheek. It was really cute.

Grace wanted to wear her Sleeping Beauty dress on this day, but it's very long on her and wouldn't have fit. Most of her princess dresses we got from church-sponsored resales, and the dresses were "Halloween" costumes purchased for very cheap-but they are authentic Disney dresses.

I'm usually the one behind the camera, and we therefore have very few pictures of Grace and I together. However, for this trip Brian insisted on taking the pictures. I was a little thankful because I really was able to enjoy myself without having the camera stuck up to my face the whole time. He did a pretty good job with the photos. He said that perhaps he'd like to get into photography as a hobby himself.

Grace did such a good job this trip. We didn't bring a stroller because she doesn't usually like to use one anyway. She actually did great. I think it was the fourth day before she started complaining that her feet hurt. She hardly ever asked us to carry her, and she was in such a good mood the whole week.

Since we've been home, she's talked non-stop about the characters we saw. I've shown her the DVD I made of all the videos we took, and she was so thrilled. She loves to watch herself on the movie, and she really enjoys watching all the shows we saw. We were allowed to videorecord whole performances. The only requirement was not to use flash or an extra light. As most performances were well-lit, the video turned out great. She can watch all the shows to her heart's content!

I also was able to get our photos printed. I made extra copies for Grace, and I'm helping her make her very own scrapbook. I purchased a scrapbook kit from Disney, and I'm currently working on it.

I started having the characters signing pieces of fabrich, which I am going to use to make an autograph quilt for Grace. Brian wanted to have signatures in a book also, so I purchased a small autograph book for the characters to sign also. She will have lots of things to remember her trip. I'm actually looking forward to another trip-and to see if we can save even more money than we did this time!

I'll post photos of the autograph quilt once it's finished. I have the first row complete. I have ten large 12*12 squares with the signatures on them. I then take 6*6 squares of patterned fabric to match the signatures (so Mickey Mouse fabric will go with the large piece that has Mickey's signature). I also have white squares with iron-on pictures. I will also be using iron-on photos of Grace from the trip, too. It sounds ambitious, but I did a lot of the cutting and iron-ons before our trip, I just need to sew them together and arrange the fabric.

On another note, I'm currently planning Grace's birthday party. For the first time, I'm planning on inviting her friends for a children's party. Grace wants a Princess party, so I am going to have the girls be Princesses and the boys be Knights. I'm a little nervous and a little excited at the same time because I've never planned a children's party before.

Vacation!!!

Well, Brian came home from the hospital on January 3 feeling great. All the phlegm was out of his lungs, and he was ready to go back to work! As a matter of fact, he went to work that afternnon after enjoying lunch with us.

On Saturday the 8 we left for our vacation. The traveling went really well, and Grace loved the airplane. We had six full days to visit Disney, and a 5 day park pass. On Saturday we arrived late so we just had dinner at our hotel. On Sunday we went to Epcot. There were a lot more live shows than I expected, and Grace loved them all. I wish we had seen more live performances at the Country pavilions, but we did see a couple.

On Monday it was rainy all day, and instead of wasting the rainy day at a park, we went to Downtown Disney for some window shopping. There was a huge Disney store, and Legoland. We had a nice day despite the weather.

On Tuesday we went to Hollywood Studios. Again, I was surprised at the amount of live shows there were. Grace saw a lot of characters. She loved getting their signatures and sitting for pictures.

Wednesday was Animal Kingdom, and it was the coldest day there. I don't think it got to 50 degrees. In the morning, Grace had to wear gloves to keep her hands warm! We had fun, though, between seeing the characters and going on Safari.

Thursday and Friday we went to Magic Kingdom. I figured that Grace would prefer this park more than the others, and I was right. Not only did it have some nice shows, but it also had rides that she could go on, and Meet-and-Greets with the princesses, the fairies, Rapunzel, and Tiana. On Thursday we stayed to see the Lights parade, which was nice. We also saw the fireworks show. It was really cool. Grace was so tired she fell asleep in my arms while we were waiting for our bus to take us back to the hotel. Speaking of being tired-Grace did really well, and she didn't have a nap the whole week. We didn't feel like hauling her all the way to the hotel for a nap and knew that she would probably be too excited to sleep! She did really well, and didn't get cranky-just a little more touchy.

On Friday we had breakfast at the castle with Cinderella and the other Princesses. She had such a great time. I am so glad we were able to allow her to go to this. She did not want to come home on Saturday. However, the vacation had to end sometime. She was very disappointed and sad to go home. She wants to return to Disney again-she has asked about it almost every day since we came home.

Christmas came and went...

Wow, Christmas went by so fast! On Christmas Eve, Brian had the day off, so we celebrated with just us. Grace doesn't know any better, so we just said St. Nick came a day early. We slept in and then all came downstairs together, where we video taped and photographed Grace opening her presents. I think the one on the bottom says it all. She recieved a doll house with accessories and a whole bunch of Disney Princess stuff which we will be using on our trip to Florida on Saturday.

After we opened presents, we had pancakes and then just spent the rest of the day relaxing. Later in the evening we left for Indiana to spend Christmas with our families. On Christmas morning after everyone had eaten and was dressed, all the kids sat very patiently for a photo of all the Reynolds girls. Yes, the Reynolds have all girls. We then allowed the kids to open all their gifts, and it was a nice time. Grace received some clothes and ZuZu pets. They're interesting little things. Later in the afternoon, cousins came over and we all had lunch together. It was a very nice, relaxing day.

On Sunday we were going to go to church, but Grace had a really stuffy nose and was coughing a bit so we decided not to go. Around noon or so we went to my brother's house where we exchanged gifts and had lunch. It was much less stressful than it usually is, and we had a great time.

Now-on to other news. The day Brian was supposed to return to work (that would be the 27th), he wasn't feeling well. We took him to Immediate care, and they sent us to ER. He had pneumonia. 70 percent of his lungs were full. Unfortunately, he was there an entire week, so Grace and I spent New Years by ourselves. He was released on January 3rd and immediately went to work. He had to get in a bit of work because we are leaving for vacation soon and we needed some income to pay the bills that will come in. Anyway, he is doing well and has instructions to do his therapy even when he doesn't feel like it. So far this week, I think he's only missed twice. I'm a little nervous about the vacation. Perhaps I can convince him to start the antibiotics once we return. Especially if they cause digestion issues, we don't want to be walking around Disney and get him dehydrated again. Well, I'll just see what happens. We are super excited about our trip. We leave for Disney on the 8th and will return on the 15th. We don't plan on taking a laptop with us, so we won't have internet access. We plan on having a great time, however.