Pumpkin Patch Field Trip

Dallon's class went on a field trip to a pumpkin patch on Monday. I met up with them so Dallon got a chance to ride the bus for the first time (I can handle less than a mile when I'm driving behind the bus).

First we had popcorn and juice, and Dallon sat with his friends.
Then they took a hay ride to the pumpkins. Jace was with us, and he really liked the hay ride.
Dallon with the pumpkin he picked out. He was more excited to get back to the trailer than to pick out a pumpkin.
On Wednesday he will be having a Halloween party at school and he'll get a chance to wear his costume. It should be great fun! Dallon doesn't have school next week because their classroom is being moved to their brand new building.

I found Nemo!

There I was minding my own business, and along came this adorable little clown fish!

Buzz Lightyear to the rescue!!!

We received our Halloween costumes in the mail today. Dallon was so excited, he had to put his on right away. Jace is still asleep, so I'll put some pictures of him on later, but these are so cute I had to share!

Speech Therapy

Today was Dallon's first speech therapy session. We have already done an evaluation with the therapist, but it was before we left for California. It went really well. The therapist is really great. He was happy and cooperative, and much of that was due to how well his therapist handles things. We will continue to do speech on Fridays until we feel he is ready for a switch to an every other week schedule.

Jace is getting soooo big. Today we are going in for his 18 month check up. I expect he will do well on his growth charts. We are also getting flu shots today. With Dallon in school, and both boys in classes at church, I felt we could really benefit from immunizations this year. Chris should get a shot through work, so I'll be the only one left to get a shot. Hopefully it works out that we won't be so sick this year.

Chris is on the shift schedule at work now. He starts his first round of shift work on the evening of Dec 25th. Its a big bummer that he'll be really wiped out for Dallon's Bday, but we'll just have to do something when he isn't so tired. He'll work seven 12 hour nights, then have 7 days off, then work seven 12 hour days with 7 days off. We'll see how it goes. The 7 days off will be nice.

STAR Training

I went to STAR training for Dallon on Tuesday morning. The program seems like it will be really great for Dallon. It focuses on making the children feel successful, and buiding on their pre-existing skills. It is both speech and occupational therapy in one program. His class will be a model class for this new program, if it is a success they will implement it into other classrooms next year. I feel very lucky that he is getting to do this program this year instead of waiting until next year.

His first couple of days of school were rough, but yesterday and today were both much better. Yesterday he had no tears and was generally cooperative the whole 3 hours! Today he only had a couple of problems related to some toys he wanted. Hopefully he'll continue to do well. He goes to school very willingly, and I know he feels comfortable with his teachers and classmates. I'm trying not to have unrealistic expectations, but I am very hopeful that this year he will make some great progress in his development.

SoCal Vacation Updates

Below are pictures and commentary for our vacation we just returned from. We took over 500 pictures, which obviously needed to be picked through for this blog. Hope you enjoy the ones we picked out. We had a fantastic time and it was a great break from the crazy lives we've been living lately.

Hope you are all doing well, and with the Holidays just around the corner we should be seeing many of you soon!

Day 1 Knott's Berry Farm

Our first day of vacation (Sunday) was spent at Knott's Berry Farm. They have Camp Snoopy there. We saw Snoopy and the Peanuts show which happened to be a pirate theme for Halloween I'm guessing. The food is great at Knott's, and they first developed the boysenberry, so you can buy boysenberry punch throughout the park.

This is the Red Baron ride. Dallon rode it 3 times in a row before we finally drug him off of it.
Jace and Dallon both loved this car ride. It just goes around in a circle, but we had a hard time leaving this ride too.
Dallon is in the front seat of this big rig. Chris looks a little too big for it here.
This boat spins and rocks up and down a half-pipe style track. Jace looks really serious about it, but he really liked it and cried when I took him off. Dallon also really liked it (below).
We also saw the Wild West Stunt show which is great. Dallon couldn't stop laughing when they would punch each other and shoot at each other. Unfortunately he thought that he could do the same things to us afterward, and it would be just as funny.

Day 1 Continued

This is the Camp Bus, it goes up and down in a big circle. Dallon and Jace could both ride this. Jace was very serious about it, but didn't want to get off when it was over either.
The Xcelerator is really intense. The last time we visited I went on this ride, but I couldn't get up the courage this time. Chris went though. "The XCELERATOR hydraulically launches you off the line at an electrifying top speed of 82 mph in 2.3 seconds through an exhilarating 205-foot ascent and immediate descent ata 90-degree angle." Its a total ride of only 1 minute, but you travel over 2200 feet of track.

This is the Boomerang. I got up the courage to ride this on our second visit to Knott's (Friday). "This scream machine puts you head-over-heels six times in less than 1 minute! Just when you think it's safe to breathe, it gives it to you all over again -- BACKWARDS!" Its a pretty intense ride, but not as fast or as high.
Dallon had to have this sucker. After it made a big mess (all over him, us and Jace) we found an opportunity to trash it while he wasn't looking. Only about 1/4 of it was eaten.

Day 2 Disneyland

Day two (Monday) we went to Disneyland. After going through some of Adventure land, we went to Critter country and rode the Winnie-the-Pooh ride. It was a hit, but we got stuck on the ride just before we came out of the last doors, so we got to sit in the little beehive cars for an extra few minutes.

Buzz Lightyear was just walking past us, Dallon ran out to meet him, and I barely grabbed my camera in time to catch this picture. Dallon was just glowing and all excited that he just saw the real Buzz. Then we went on the Buzz Lightyear ride to top it off. My highest score for our visit was 149,100, and Chris had something like 277,000. Dallon once got 13,500.

Day 2 Continued

The first stop we made was the Tiki Room. It had been a long time since I had been to the Tiki Room. Both boys were fascinated by it. We also went to Pirates of the Carribbean and saw the new additions (Captain Barbosa, Jack Sparrow and Davy Jones). The Haunted Mansion was decorated as "the Nightmare Before Christmas" and the characters in the parks were wearing their Halloween costumes. Dallon was actually tall enough to ride all the rides except for the Indiana Jones ride. He went on Splash Mountain twice, but the second time he told me he was scared--so we were done with that.
The newest ride was the Finding Nemo submarines. We saw them right away, and also saw how amazingly long the line was every time we went by!!
We went to Toon Town and saw Mickey at his house. Dallon and Jace both got to meet him. Dallon was soooo excited to see "Kickey Mouse." He had to give him five.

Day 2 Continued

Outside of Mickey's house, we met Goofy, Minnie and Pluto.
We went to dinner at the Rainforest Cafe, then rode the Monorail back into the park. This is the entrance of the park done up for the holiday.
This is the only picture with all four of us in it. We are on the Jungle Cruise.
One of the Halloween festivities was a Woody's Halloween Round-up. We saw Jessie there just before they closed up for the evening. Dallon gave her his cars, and they played with them for a minute or two.

California Adventure was all done up with candy corn. So the "A"s we changed to candy corn kernals. It looked a lot better in person.

Day 3 Universal Studios Hollywood

On our way to Universal Studios we hit some traffic and it took a long time to get there. That wouldn't have bothered us except that Dallon vomitted all over himself only 1 mile from our exit. It was really unpleasant, and he had to wear the 'spare' clothes I packed for him. We also spent the first 20-30 minutes cleaning up the car, carseat, and kid.
The first thing we saw was Shrek and Princess Fiona. Dallon didn't want to go up to them, but Jace and I gave it a quick try.
Oh how Dallon loves Spongebob. Unfortunately he was just heading off for a break so we only got a really quick picture of him. Dallon was psyched to see him though!
Watch out! If only they knew how funny this looked to me.
We went on the tour, and it had lots of new stuff in it. They had trick cars from fast and the furious (above), dinosaurs from Jurassic park, the model used for the island on the new King Kong (below), and Whisteria Lane from Desperate Housewives.

Day 3 Continued

They had the Nickalodoen Splash Zone at Universal. They have a warning sign out front that says "you will get soaked."
After this we had to buy some clothes for Dallon, and a towel. Then he got wet again when we got to the Coke a Cola Splash Zone. But they had a great time even if they were a little cold by the end of the night.


The Water World show was great as it always has been. This is the coolest part when the plane flies over the wall. Dallon liked the beginning when the actors are keeping the crowd entertained (and wet) before the show.