Zoey Bastian our Blue Beagle

Well, Zoey is finally here! After returning from vacation, we decided to spend some stimulus money on a new puppy to keep Ceaser company. We were looking for a beagle and found one on puppfyfind.com. Well, it turns out that the one we found was already sold but they had a new one coming in. When we got the picture of her we were pretty sure we wanted her. She was supposed to come on Wednesday but she had to get her health certificate that day. She was then supposed to fly into Atlanta on Thursday. I had arranged to be off from work to pick her up. We left about two hours before the flight was to land. After traveling a little over an hour we found out she was not put on the plane. We were livid! After talking to them again, we worked out to get her sent today and I worked out an extra long lunch to go to Columbia, SC. We also had the joy of taking the Pyne kids with us. So, one hour later with six kids and ceaser , we picked Zoey up from the airport. Yeah!!! Everyone enjoyed the ride and the adventure inside the airport.

This was the best present I could have received from Tina for our tenth anniversary. Thank you Sweetheart. I love you!
By the way, the kids love Zoey too. You should have seen them. They could not leave Zoey alone for ten minutes. The only one who is not excited anymore is Ceaser. He tries to ignore her and hope she will go away. Too bad for Ceaser she is not only staying but will be bigger than he is.

Florida Vacation 2008

After months and months of planning and organizing, our trip to Florida finally happened. We spent 10 wonderful days in Florida. We spent the first week in the condo at Grand Beach Orlando Florida. I have a couple pics of the beauty that surrounded our condo. We also got to enjoy the on site pool and lake, hammocks and lizards. Kayden could spot a lizard a mile away. After our week in Orlando going to the Pirate Dinner show, Sea World, Magic Kingdom, Animal Kingdom, Epcot, Hollywood Studios (Pictures of each of the days are following this post.)
We drove to Miami FL to drop Grandpa & Grandma Smith so they could take their cruise to the Caribbean. Fun fun. We spent two days in Miami at the Courtyard Marriott. Our last two night were at the Hawaiian Inn Daytona Beach. We only ended up staying one night cuz we were ready to get home. We had the best time on our vacation. We hope you enjoy the pictures. It's a huge post Sorry I know everyone wanted to hear and see all the pictures. I took over 750 so I really narrowed it down and you get to see all the highlights of each day. We love and miss you all...
Bastians in Georgia.

Pirate's Dinner Show

Here we are at the Pirate Dinner show. We had reservations for the 6pm show, however they want you there at 4:30. They do a pre-show and appetizers. They had some yummy food. I think over all Medieval times it better. They have a better show in my opinion.

The Pirate show was fun and they had a lot more audience participation. I was chosen to help with a treasure hunt. I had to find a flag and then hook it on the rope and pull the flag to the top I raced against all the other colors. Our Pirate was Red "Cutthroat Jack" We didn't win. Chandler and Kayden were asked to be members of the British Army. They got to shoot the Pirates. We really enjoyed our time with Grandma & Grandpa Smith. We are so happy and blessed they were able to join us for our family vacation. We had a great night.

Sea World Orlando FL

Once again we our at my very favorite place on the earth. "Sea World" I love this place. We were able to get in free because of the Salute to our Hero's. Every year Anheiser Bush theme parks give Active Duty members and their families up to four free tickets. So we only had to pay for Chandler. We got to the park so early we had about 1 1/2 before our first show we were able to go and watch the Manatee's eat. The kids were amazed that they ate lettus just like we do. How fun is that? We had a great time watching all the shows. Our favorites are
"Horizons" (The Dolphin show), "Believe" Shamu's day show, "Clyde and Symore take treasure island", "pets ahoy" and "Shamu Rocks America" We got special seats for the "Mystify" show that night. It was neat to have our own seats and special dessert. Only the Dessert wasn't anything to scream about. Both Brooklyn & Kayden went on the Atlantis ride. I'm so glad Brooklyn is tall enough this year to ride all the rides. We only have two more years and we will be able to ride all the rides with our kids, it will be nice not to utilize the child swap, or grandpa watch. My Dad was so good to stay with chandler while the rest of us rode the rides. Thanks Grandpa!

Disney Magic Kingdom

Here we are at the Magic Kingdom. Oh my gosh there were so many people... It was so crazy. We had the opportunity to meet Cinderella. A lady stopped us and asked if we wanted to spend 5 minutes with Cinderella we would have to wait for about 2 hours. We just barely got to the park I didn't' know what was going on. I wasn't sure what we would be doing in two hours so I said no. I was kicking my self later I mean come on when would miss Brooklyn have that chance again? That was her favorite princess too. Oh well you can't do it all right? That's what I kept telling myself. Well My dad had a knee replacement last November and the end of this month will have the other knee replaced. So he got a special handicap pass. Not only was it for him he got to include his whole party. My family of 5 and my mom & Dad. We didn't have to wait in any lines the whole vacation. My Dads pass got us right in the line the longest we waited for a ride was 30 minutes. Most of them we walked right on. We loved Dad's golden pass. We also got to park in the Handy cap parking so we didn't have to walk that far either. It's sad that my dad is hurt that he has to have the Handicap signs. But really worked out well for the 100 minute lines. I was amazed at all the accommodations for handy cap. When we went to Hollywood Studios they had a brand new ride Toy Story Mania. We watched a little girl who couldn't get out of her wheelchair. We watched the ride transform to where this little girl could ride and enjoy. Instead of pulling the string she just had to touch a button. I was amazed. Disney World really is for everyone. Even my parents had a great time. Once again the rain hit our vacation. It rained so hard for 1 hour 45 minutes. They shut down all the rides and we just had to wait for the rain to stop. it was so crazy. We got a special pass to Dumbo because we were almost on the ride and they closed it down. So we walked right on Dumbo when the rain stopped. That was nice.
The Electric parade here was amazing. We didn't sit and watch the fireworks. The kids were so tired and it was already 10pm so we walked to the Metro and watched the fireworks, we still got a really good view just didn't' sit and watch them. The good thing is we didn't have to fight the crowds to get out. WE were to our car just as the fireworks were over and out of the park before the crowds. So that worked out... The best of two worlds. My poor kids second night in a row they were not in bed until 11pm.

Disney Animal Kingdom

He we are in Disney Animal Kingdom. This is one of my kids favorite places ever! They really enjoyed all the animals. The very first thing we did today was ride the Safari. It was amazing. WE got to see all kinds of animals up close. it was super neat. You can't really see all the animals carved out of the tree in our family picture but there are 300 animals in that tree. We didn't really ride any rides here. WE did the train ride and a river rapid ride. I think that was it. At 1pm Kayden was pleading to go back to the condo and sleep. He was so tired. We decided to make it an early day. WE ate lunch at the Rainforest Cafe. It was so neat. It rained and thundered. It really made you feel like you were in the Rainforest. They had all kinds of animated animals that went crazy when it started to rain. Chandler loved the Monkeys. WE also went to see "The Lion King" I was chosen to come up and be an Elephant. I had to use my arm as the trunk and then make an Elephant noise. "The Lion King" was one of my favorite shows of the whole trip. I loved it. The kids got to go to a petting farm. They could brush and pet all the goats they wanted. They had some sheep too. We also got to see all the characters from Pocahontis and The lion king. Again we didn't want to wait in the lines to get pics or autographs. It was still neat to see them.