HAPPY NEW YEAR!

The Tarleton Family wishes you a very Happy New Year! May all your wishes come true!!!!!!!

2006 brought many ups and downs for the Tarleton family. A short recap so we may never forget:
Up: Banastre's Birth!!! Watching him grow and change in the last 1o months has been amazing.
Down: Elizabeth having mono and a recurrent abdombinal pain that no one could figure out what it was. They sent us to oncologists and many specialists.
Up: Knowing Elizabeth does NOT have cancer.
Down: Still having no idea of what is causing her daily stomach pains.
Up: Matt's job with Indian Trail United Methodist Church as Minister of Music , My job with ITUMC as Administrative Assistant. (How many other jobs let you bring your baby to work with you?)
Down: Matt and his Father's business burning down the Monday after Thanksgiving.
Up: All the family and friends who have been there for us during these rough times.
Up: All of our family time together. We love and cherish every moment that we are together as a family and this year even provided us with two trips to Walt Disney World and many magical memories together.

There were plenty of other ups and downs, but we are looking forward to this new year and all it holds. May it be filled with more ups than downs for our family and yours.

(I promise to continue working on the trip report as soon as possible!)

Pics of Day 1

Ok...these are all out of order, but here are some pics... Nativity scene at MGM Studios, we loved the fact that Disney does not hide the fact they are a Christian company. Everywhere you went the Cast Members always said Merry Christmas, not Happy Holidays. It was very nice.
Another pic of the family!

Christmas Tree at Animal Kingdom

Osborne Family Spectacle of Lights

Matt, Elizabeth, and Banastre..the white specks are the "snow".

More Lights!! Aren't they beautiful?????????

Sorry for the delay!

Matt has been a computer hog this whole weekend. Well, actually he has had some house plans to work on for a customer and has been hard at work. I have been rearranging and organizing Banastre's room. I need somewhere to put all those toys! And to think that his birthday is now only a month away! AAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!! I will work on the rest of our trip and all of our Christmas activities Sunday night while the kids are sleeping and Matt is doing the Watch Night service at church.

Chapter 2 of the Holidays

Ok, so where was I? We are on our way to Disney. The pics below were taken with the windows down. The weather is beautiful and already 70 by 9:00am. We stop at a McDonald's and grab lunch by the Drive-thru and we are still on our way. At 11:45, we are in Disney!!! We pull up to our hotel, Disney's Pop Century resort.

Matt went to check us in and the kids and I headed off to the bathroom to change into shorts and t-shirts. I never expected for them to have a room ready for us this early in the day. We really just wanted to get checked in so we could have our tickets and get started visiting the parks. Surprise!!! They did have our room ready. We headed over to the room and unpacked the Jeep and then we headed out to Animal Kingdom. It felt very weird going to Animal Kingdom first. Every trip we have taken we have always gone to Magic Kingdom first. We walk in the park and wow, there are people every where!!! We head straight to Expedition: Everest, but all the fast passes are gone and the wait time is 90 minutes. So, we head over to Dinosaur and grab fast passes and a Baby Swap ticket. We get to ride Dinosaur several times and enjoy ourselves immensely. But, this will be the only ride we do here today. Instead, we head over to the Animal Kingdom Lodge. I have always wanted to check out this hotel and I also wanted to see the Christmas decorations. It was beautiful there, but I don't think it is a hotel I would ever like to stay at. From there we head to Disney's MGM Studios. I haven't been to this park since I was pregnant with Banastre and I was really looking forward to the thrill rides!!

*side note* It won't let me add any pics right now, so I will add more in another post...

We make it to MGM Studios and finally get inside. It's an Extra Magic Hours night for Disney resort guests and we fully intend to use it. We head first to Tower of Terror and get our fast passes and then two baby swap tickets too. Matt and I both take turns riding with Elizabeth and then Matt gets a fast pass for Rockin Roller Coaster. I had one too, but decided to do Tower of Terror again with Elizabeth instead of riding Rockin by myself. After these rides, the park is closed to regular guests and we decide to go to the Great Movie Ride. With this completed, we head over to the Osborne Family Spectacle of Lights. This is the most amazing Christmas Light display I have ever had the pleasure of seeing. Millions of lights and they are even choreographed to music that plays every 15 minutes. Snow is being blown as you walk down the street and it's just amazing. We stopped and got Matt an adult beverage and Elizabeth and I split a Sprite with a flashing light cube inside. We stopped for lots of pictures and noticed how the mood here was completely different than in any of the other parks. No one here was in a rush and there were smiles on every ones face. Kids were playing in the "snow" and we were all singing the Christmas carols that were being played. This definitely helped put me in the Christmas mood!

After this we slowly made our way to the bus stop and back to our hotel room. We were all very very very tired and were asleep within minutes of our heads touching our pillows.

Up next...Epcot and lots of food!!!

I'm stopping now to add some pics and them will continue with more on our trip!

So much to talk about...

Ok, this post is going to be long. Hopefully I can fit it all in one post. If not I will do as many as needed to fill you in on everything that has happened in the past 2 weeks!

Sunday, December 17

This was the day of the Children's Christmas Play and the Christmas Cantata at church. All went very well. The Children's part was titled "Christmas through a child's Eye." Elizabeth did great and remembered both of her lines perfectly. She was the letter F and W.

The Christmas Cantata was beautiful. Matt wrote the narrative and picked all of the songs for it. Him and the choir worked for months to prepare. All of their hard work paid off. Unfortunately, I don't have any pics of the cantata. I was the narrator, Matt was the choir director and my mom was busy with Banastre. Hopefully someone else from the church will give me a couple of pictures so I will have them! (Elizabeth made a beautiful angel!!!)

Right after all the activities at church we were on our way to Walt Disney World! We were all very excited. We stopped about 2 hours into our trip and had dinner at Cracker Barrel and then continued on our way. Around midnight, Matt decided he had enough of driving and we stopped at a Hampton Inn in Savannah. Both kids were very good on this portion of the trip. We actually woke Banastre up to go into the hotel to sleep for the night.

Monday, December 18

6:00am The alarm clock goes off. Has it really been 6 hours? I think we all need more sleep, but we hop in the car and continue our journey to Disney! We didn't even bother to change the kids clothes. They were both still in their pajamas!

OK...tonight is taking longer than I expected to get this done. I am stopping for now, but promise to continue tomorrow!!!

I'm too excited to sleep!!!!

Sorry, but I am just quoting the little guy from the Disney commercials. It's midnight and I am still awake. I should be in bed resting, so I can finish packing in the morning, but I am on the computer copying pictures to CD's.

Matt's brother Art married his fiancee' Jimena today and we used my camera for all the pics. They had a beautiful small ceremony and I wish them all the happiness in the world!!

We will be back from Disney on the 23rd. So, I will have lots of pics to share from the Children's Christmas Play, the Christmas Cantata, (all tomorrow), and then DISNEY WORLD!!!

Until then here is a picture of each child to hold you over!

She was the prettiest flower girl I have ever seen!!!

The smile says it all!!

Well, Matt is going to sleep with out me and I still have some work to do! (Who can sleep when you know you are going to Disney World???????????????) As Mickey Mouse would say, "See ya real soon!"

Only 7 Days left!!!

Here's Elizabeth smiling for the camera..but she closed her eyes!!!

Here's little man! Doesn't he look all grown up???

Only 7 Days left!!!!

Till what????

Our Christmas trip to Disney!!!!!

Things are really getting crazy around here. I had a candle Open House Saturday at the church and then we had a Christmas Party that evening. (Banastre didn't cry much with the babysitter Saturday!!! Only when I first left. This is great news for me!) Then today, we had church and CHristmas Play Practice. Then banastre decided tonight wasn't a good night for sleeping. He went to bed at 8:30 and then was up from 9 until 11. Nothing I could do would help, so I left the room and he went right to sleep! Go figure!!

So, it's now midnight and I need my sleep, it's going to be a wild and crazy week!

A New Tooth!

This morning I have discovered why Banastre is being a Bear instead of a Biscuit the past few days. We have another top tooth that has broken the surface!!! That now makes two on the top and two on the bottom. When this one fully comes in he will look like a "snaggle tooth" , but I am sure it will be as cute as a Biscuit!
Yesterday he finally decided to crawl. We were in Pastor Jim's office and Banastre decided he wanted the dust buster to play with. He crawled right to it as if he had been crawling all along. I just hope he remembers the love for the dust buster as he gets older. It does seem that most men forget how to use these items as they grow!!!

A few pics to start with!

Ok, so these were just taken a few minutes ago!! I now officially have pics on my blog too!!!

Angels and Biscuits

I thought I would try to explain the Angels and Biscuits.
When I was pregnant with Elizabeth, I was very sick with pancreatitis. I spent many weeks in the hospital and they almost lost us twice. No one was sure if I would make it...let alone Elizabeth. So, when we both pulled through and she showed up 5 weeks early, I gave her the nickname of Angel baby. I honestly don't know if I would have had the strength to go through everything I did had I not been pregnant with her. I knew how much she needed me and I wanted to be here for her. Angel just seemed fitting at the time and it has stuck now.

Banastre is our little Biscuit. Matt just started calling him this yesterday, but my how it fits and has stuck already. (Although I am sure I will still call him Batman sometimes!!) When I asked why he was calling him Biscuit, the reply was: He is so cute I could eat him up! I have to agree!

Now we have a blog called Angels and Biscuits. I hope they aren't too embarrassed when they grow up!!

Wow!! My first Blog!

After months of checking out a friends blog and getting satellite internet at home, I have decided to start a blog for Elizabeth and Banastre. This way family and friends can see how they are growing and check in with us whenever they wish! So WELCOME to our blog. I will explain the name later! I also hope to get some pics up today too...but tonight is dance class so I won't promise anything!