About our vacation 2010

ON the airplane. Love that look on Zane's face

The view from our hotel room.

Our hotel room at the Wydham Bonnet creek.

After a fun night at Epcot.

Claire lovin' on MM...she loved all the characters! Too much!

Where we ate dinner for Travis' birthday.

The kids at Animal Kingdom.

Claire at Typhoon Lagoon...so much fun!

See what I mean? ha ha ha

The Williams' in the pirate shop

Daddy and Zane on Thunder mountain..poor kids too short so we cheated with napkins in his shoes! (shhhh!)

At the "Not So Scary Halloween Party" (after a rain)

At the Halloween thing. Not crowded ...yet.

Aww..what a cute family!

The boys going on their "pirate adventure" at the Grand Floridian.

The boys racing at the "blizzard Beach"

Claire loving up Sleeping Beauty at the Epcot food Fair.

Some favorite rides....Splash Mountain

Awhile back we were hanging out with some friends and playing the not so newlywed game. All 3 of our husbands were asked "where is your favorite family vacation spot?" They all answered "Walt Disney World" after that night we decided to start planning a trip and we did. Unfortunately one family couldn't make it but the Williams and the Campbells went on a wonderful fun family vacation to the happiest place on earth. We took many months to plan out the perfect get away. Starting with picking dates so that we would be able to get everything in and not get in the way of other things. Sadly, after many phone calls the athletic director at Flagstaff high school told me that homecoming would be in the middle of October but changed it after I had gotten my plane tickets using points on our American express and Melissa ended up missing her homecoming week. (pretty important stuff for a HS senior) We planned out what park we would go to each day according to crowds. We planned where to eat in advance and many other little details that made out trip perfect and it was great! I could of done with out the heat and humidity but it felt great at the water parks which I enjoyed more than I thought I would. ( I hate getting into a bathing suit) Our hotel was so nice and such a great deal.(found on Craigslist) I highly recommend it for a large family. It was the size of a small house and very nice! Brian, Trenton, and the older girls even enjoyed a day and night at Universal studios and did theHalloween scare night (too scary for me). We had such a good time and loved almost every minute except for Claire and sometimes Zane's temper tantrums. I hope to do it again in 3 years when they have completed a new section in the Magic Kingdom. It truly is a magical place.

Thankful but sad

This house no longer has a roof and is 2 doors down from our old house.

Our friends house. They just moved in 1 months ago.

This looks so scary.

Our other good friends house..took her 3 hours to get her kids to come out of the bathtub where they were taking shelter during the tornado.

Wow...what a mess!

Thankfully no one was living in this one.

Melissa's friend from cheer lives in this one..or DID live here.

It's 7:30 a.m. and I can hear helicopters over our neighborhood surveying the scene of yesterdays terrible act of mother nature. It had been stormy all day Tues. and all through the night as winds, hail, and rain just beat all the houses for hour upon hour. I woke up many times during the night just listening to the storm and wondering when it would let up. Then at 5:15 or so the house just started shaking and the winds were crazy, stronger than any we had experienced before. Brian and I were sitting straight up in bed ready to run down the hall and gather the kids at any moment. The windows seemed to be ready to shatter at any moment and so we took off down the hall with our cell phones as flash lights. I do keep one in my nightstand drawer but didn't think about it at the moment. Our kids were already up and scared as the house was shaking as if in an earthquake.....little did I know that just across the park on the other side of the lake many of my friends and neighbors houses were being torn a part and glass, wind and debris were flying all around inside their houses. One friends kids were screaming upstairs as their dad was trying to get up the stairs to help them. Their house has been condemned as it is literally falling apart at the seams. One whole wall has come away from the frame of the house. They had just moved in there a month ago. Some houses lost their roof and another lost half of their house that is out behind them somewhere in the forrest. One friend even had a boat lodged in their roof right above their sons head. I spent all day with friends and their children over, running back and forth to their house trying to get items that might get ruined with their roofs leaking and caving in. Brian, along with church members worked all through the day putting up plywood on windows, doors and even garages that were completely gone. One sister in our ward brought out pizzas to all the men working so diligently in the horrible weather. Without power, our bishop and stake president came over to check on us and let everyone know that dinner would be out here for all as our wonderful Relief Society and my Young women president arranged the food. I probably had 75 people over eating dinner that night which was a lot even for my house. I am so thankful that as my house only got a couple broken windows and shingles, that my friends who have no home at the moment had somewhere to go. I am thankful that I belong to a church that is always there to help any and all in an emergency. I am also thankful that we were sparred but sad that my friends don't have a place to call home for awhile. It was a day I will not soon forget..actually, never forget.