Meet the Newest Member of our Family

/ heartswelladventures / Leave a comment

He’s finally here and he made an entrance to remember.

I’d been having irregular, but intense Braxton Hicks contractions for about two days. This was annoying as they’d come and disappear with no rhyme or reason. As we were getting ready for bed last night, I got a few more but dismissed them like the others. 

Then my water broke. This was new for me as my water didn’t break with mini-man. Luckily, Damon had just put mini-man to bed and was able to call my midwife. 

However, it seems our little one had other plans. My contractions went from five minutes to on top of each other instantly. I managed to get on the bed and on my side when a huge contraction hit and I felt the need to push. 

Damon was instantly on the phone with our midwife, telling her he could see a head. Thankfully, Damon had EMS training and managed to stay calm while our midwife instructed him on what to do. Three pushes later​ and little one was here. I only labored for 27 minutes! 

I was relieved it was over and amazed at what had just happened. Damon and I brought our little one into the world together and very quickly. Now here’s the biggest shock – little one was 10.1 lbs and 23″ long. 

You read that right – I pushed out a 10lb baby in 27 minutes with no drugs. Isn’t it amazing what the body can do!?!

Today is our first day as a family of four. Colby slept through the whole thing and knows little one is here but really isn’t interested in him at the moment. I’m recovering and bonding with little one. As you can imagine I’m just a little sore. 

This is great kick-off for our upcoming adventure, which we’ll tell you about soon.

California Adventures: The Kidspace Museum

/ heartswelladventures / Leave a comment

After a few months of braving the LA streets, I decided to get a little braver and take mini-man someplace a little further away – The Kidspace Museum in Pasadena.

While the drive was trickier – going on small roads up the mountains – it was definitely worth it.

The Kidspace Museum is a perfect place for kids. There are three distinct zones – outdoor science, indoor creative play, and outdoor exploring.

We got a three month pass and have loved taking mini-man here. If you have little kids I highly recommend checking this place out. 

Monday Motivation: Six Years of Marriage

/ heartswelladventures / Leave a comment

Six years ago, my best friend and I made it official. However, I felt married to him long before our wedding day. For me, our wedding day was just making our relationship legally binding. 

Damon and I had met five years prior, at Disney right after a hurricane hit. We were friends immediately. 

Soon after we were selected for a special training class. During this class Damon got up to get some pens for the class. He tripped, and the pens went flying. He turned beet red and I thought he was the cutest thing ever. He asked me out later that afternoon. 

I knew he was special immediately. However, there was a point where I wondered if he was too old for me. Fortunately, some part of my brain yelled at me, telling me it was dumb to stop seeing someone fantastic just because of age.

Soon after that, we traveled to Disneyland together and I knew this guy was special. I wasn’t 100% positive that I would marry him but I knew that he would be an important person in my life. 

So as you can imagine, by the time our wedding day rolled around it was just another day of adventure with Damon. We were already an awesome partnership, which continues to this day. 

I love our life and adventures together. It hasn’t been easy but nothing valuable in life is every easy. And I can’t wait to see what this road ahead has in store for us.

California Adventures: Disneyland

/ heartswelladventures / Leave a comment

As a self-proclaimed Disney geek (and proud of it) I couldn’t come to California and not visit Disneyland. Since mini-man was little we decided to just visit a couple of times.

Our first trip was when mini-man was six-months old. Looking back, he might have been a bit too young – but we still had fun. He really enjoyed the outdoor rides – the carousel and Casey Jr. He didn’t quite understand the dark rides – Winnie the Pooh.

However, it was a stressful visit – it was hot, crowded, and we didn’t really have goals to accomplish anything.

After this visit we waited a year to go back. The main reason we went back was so I could see Paint the Night before it left. But this time, I was more prepared.

After the first visit, I realized I couldn’t power through the park and try to do everything – kids just can’t do that.

This time I researched everything and made a loose goals for the day. I wanted everyone to have fun.

In the end, the goals worked really well and everyone had fun. What worked best was taking lots of breaks to let mini-man walk and explore in his own.

And I got to see Paint the Night (which was incredible!). Best of all, mini-man loved seeing it too. 

I am so happy that we got to go to Disneyland and create some great memories. 

California Adventures: The Los Angeles Zoo

/ heartswelladventures / Leave a comment

As many of you know – I hate driving in Los Angeles. However, mini-man was getting bigger and I really wanted to started taking him places where he could explore. I decided to give the Los Angeles Zoo a try.

On our first visit, Damon drive with me so I could get to know the route. However, the route included driving on the highway and even during slow times, people in LA drives recklessly.

We had a blast on our trip to the zoo. Mini-man lived walking around and exploring. I really wanted to take him back but I needed to find a different way.

A few days later, I decided to take mini-man to the zoo myself. But this time, I avoided the highway. Instead I took smaller streets. It might have taken a few minutes more but it was way easier for me. 

I felt so accomplished for facing my fear of driving in LA and thrilled to take mini-man to the zoo.

Since then, we have visited to zoo at least once a week and gotten to explore this really amazing zoo. I highly recommend it to anyone with kids – it’s a great place to let them explore and see new things. And if you get an annual pass, you can come back often and not feel you have to stay all day of your kids get tired. I usually take mini-man in the morning and stay a few hours until he’s ready for his nap.

And be sure not to miss their Christmas Light-Up event – the while zoo is lit up with beautiful lights. Its a great, and affordable, holiday experience.

I will definitely miss having this zoo so close to us.

My Heart is With Orlando

/ heartswelladventures / Leave a comment

I have lived in Orlando for over 2o years. During that time I experienced several hurricanes – including Charlie, a category 3 storm, which did a lot of damage to Central Florida.

Hurricanes are very dangerous and can cause a lot of damage. We are unable to get back to our house before the storm hits, so we hope that everything is ok. Foruntatly, our contractor is doing some work and is keeping an eye I’m things for us.

This is a scary time for Florida. I hope everyone back home old days safe and that there is minimal damage.  We will see you soon

California Adventure: The Queen Mary

/ heartswelladventures / Leave a comment

Over the holidays we won tickets to see the Christmas version of the Queen Mary. 

The area consisted to rides, mazes, an indoor snow tube ride, an ice exhibit themed to ‘A Christmas Carole’, and a tour of the Queen Mary.

First off, I am so Glad we went after Christmas as there were hardly any people there.

We started in the ice exhibit – beautfully themed to ‘A Christmas Carole’. The detail was exquisite. Mini-man was fascinated the whole time.

Next, we decided to go outside to warm up. We took mini-man through a maze and he had a blast! (especially in the ball pit).

Damon really wanted to try the snow tuning so we headed back inside of the ice tent. I skipped since mini-man was attached to me at the time and I felt I couldn’t leave him.

Mini-man was too small for any of the rides, so we headed over to tour the Queen Mary. I kid you not, I felt like I was on the Titanic. There should have been Lord’s and Ladies walking around the deck. I loved getting to go back in time on the gorgeous ship. 

I also learned that several scenes rom the first Love Boat were shot on board (eek!). And, as it turned it, this was the same port where the Love Boat docked and shot their in port scenes (double eek!)

The sun was setting and mini-man was tired so we decided to head home. I’m glad we got to experience this fun exhibit and ship.

Monday Motivation

/ heartswelladventures / Leave a comment

Nothing in life worth having us easy to get. I have an amazing relationship with Damon. 

From the outside, people think our relationship looks perfect and easy. However, it looks this way because one of simple principle – work through the pain. So many couples argue and fight with one another instead of facing the pain and working through the issue. This in turn causes the problems to increase overtime and eventually fall apart. When this happens you are essentially telling your partner that ignoring your problems is more important than your spouse.

How do I know this? Because I lived through it with my parents. They constantly argued and allowed their resistance to face the issues overshadow their relationship. It even spilled over into my sister and me – constantly being bullied and shamed for our opinions because it conflicted with our parents issues. 

This lead to a very unhealthy relationship between me and my parents. I was determined to not have a marriage like theirs and to have a good relationship with my children. My efforts to that end causes a great deal of tension between us and more bullying. I eventually came to the hard conclusion that I can’t fix them. They won’t change and being in a relationship with them was toxic to my happiness.

From the start, Damon saw how toxic my families relationship was and helped me to work on it. The result is an amazing relationship with each other. We agree to work through our pain in the moment. While it’s hard we always come out on the other end a stronger couple and much happier. 

However, we don’t always do this. We accept that we aren’t perfect. That it’s ok to take a breath for a little bit and then return. It shows an ability to question what’s happening and come back to one another with questions. 

It’s not easy but it’s definitely worth it. 

California Adventure: Irving Park Railroad 

/ heartswelladventures / Leave a comment

Last December was our first jolly holiday season with Mini-man and I wanted to take him to some fun holiday events.

Thanks to local mommy blogs, I was introduced to the Irving Park Railroad, which was hosting a Santas Village and Christmas Train.

We went early in the day – 1. to avoid crowds and 2. To not keep mini-man up too late. 

First we rode the train to the North Pole. We decided to skip meeting Santa – mini-man isn’t a fan of people in costumes and he freaks out (and I refuse to force him to do things that scare him). So we got back on the train and headed back to the village. The train ride was cute but mini-man wasn’t quite sure what to make of the whole experience.

Mini-man was too young to enjoy any of the games that were there but he had fun exploring the maze and just walking around.

After a while, we decided to explore the rest of the park. What we found was a beautiful park that’s perfect for families. I wish we could have gone more (it’s 90 minutes from where we are and that’s too long to keep mini-man in his car seat).