All About the Four Year Old

I'm blessed to have some amazing, talented friends in my life. My friend, Bonnie Cornelius, took some pictures of Laurel to celebrate her 4th year of life and I am in love with them

I interviewed Laurel and here is a little bit about her at age four, in her own words.

Favorite song?: "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star." She loves this song and I have to sing  it to her every night before she goes to sleep. She is also obsessed with stars and  space. 

Best  friend?: "Emily and Ashlyn  and all my friends at school. Oh yeah, and Bailey too!" I only asked for one! I'm glad she has so many friends.

Favorite game?: "Duck Duck goose and tag you're it. Hey, let's play that right now! We can scamper around and stuff!" You can probably tell from her game choices she loves to run around and  she has a short attention span. 

Who do you love? "Mommy and Daddy. I love you Mommy even when you are sick. I take care of you and give you soup in my bed." I had a cold when I interviewed her. I've yet to get any soup...

Favorite book?:  "I like Fancy Nancy because she is fancy. She also uses fancy words and I use fancy words too!" Laurel loves to use big words and asks what EVERY word means if she does not know. She will then incorporate it into her vocabulary. Her best word  to date was discombobulated!

And that's a little about Laurel. She is a nut and keeps us on our toes and makes us laugh and I don't think it is possible for us to love her anymore than we do!!

Laurel is FOUR!

For Laurel's 4th Birthday we went to Disney World!! From the second we checked in Monday afternoon, January 23rd, everything was magic. We stayed onsite at All Star Movies and we were in the Toy Story building. Laurel loved the huge Woody and Buzz outside our room. She had to play in Andy's room every time we left or returned to the hotel.

Laurel got birthday balloons when we checked in and she was so excited. I don't know why but she LOVES balloons. Disney sure knows how to make a kid feel special on their birthday, that is for sure!

When we got to our room Laurel had some presents from my mom, a Rapunzel water bottle and an autograph book for the characters to sign. Both got a lot of use.

We changed clothes (it was 80 degrees!) and headed to Magic Kingdom.

Laurel had to get in the this car from Toy Story every time we passed it.

The first thing we did was meet Mickey and Minnie. Laurel was so cute with them and asked if they remembered her from last time.

We went on the teacups which is one of Laurel's favorites. I'm so glad we went during the off season this time since most of the lines were pretty short, usually just a few minutes. The only thing Laurel did not like from our last trip were the lines.

Then we met the princesses and Laurel was VERY talkative. It was hard to get a good picture because Laurel was having some deep conversations with them!

After the princesses we met Chip and Dale!

Then we watched the fireworks which were amazing. I loved how they had music that went with the fireworks. It was like a story. Every thing at Disney is magical.

We rode all the rides in Tomorrowland. Laurel really liked the People Mover and the Buzz ride. Her favorite was the Monster Inc show; it was so funny! Then we headed back to the hotel. Laurel went to sleep at 12am which is the latest she has EVER stayed up.

She was excited to get up in the morning because it was her 4th birthday and we had lots of fun things planned. We headed back to Magic Kingdom and got there in time for rope drop. All the characters rode in on the train; it was really cute.

We headed right to Rapunzel because that is something we missed on our last trip. The line was the longest we ever had, about 30 minutes, but it was well worth it for Laurel to meet her hero.

Then we went to the castle for her special birthday breakfast with the princesses. Cinderella greeted us and we were taken up a spiral staircase to the royal dining room. The food was really good and actually being in the castle was so neat.

Snow White sounded just like she does in the movie!

Ariel was soooooooo funny and had a great personality.

Belle was Laurel's favorite and they talked for a good while.

She got to meet a couple other princesses and loved every second of it. Then Laurel got a cupcake and we sang to her. She was so happy!

We then did all the rides in Fantasyland. Laurel loved the carousel and It's a Small World the best.

Mickey's Philharmagic was a big hit too.

We had lunch and got to meet Donald Duck.

It was time for the parade and we got front row seats after only getting there 10 minutes before it started!

Seriously, every character waved to Laurel, blew her a kiss, or said Happy Birthday. A lot also came by and gave her hugs. The Birthday button gets you some extra attention for sure!

Then we had to talk to Chip and Dale again. Laurel was just loving on Chip and Dale was "sad." It was really funny. We have a super cute video of it.

We rode some rides and Laurel's favorite by far was Splash Mountain. We ended up riding that once twice since the second the ride was over Laurel said, "I want to ride it again!"

We got back to the hotel around 8 and went swimming for a bit. They were playing Tangled out by the pool so we could swim and watch the movie! We ended up going to bed around 11pm that night.

Laurel slept in Wednesday morning so we didn't get to take advantage of the extra magic hours, but her being well rested and happy is way more important. We finally got out of the room around 9am and had Mickey waffles at the hotel.

We got to Animal Kingdom about 10am and headed right for the safari. We only had to wait about 10 minutes. The ride was really fun and it was a LONG one, about 20 minutes. Laurel loved every second.

The baby elephants were her favorite. She must have said, "Oh how adorable" twenty times.

After the safari we rode the train over to the petting section. The train station had these baby elephant statues that Laurel loved.

She really liked petting and playing with the animals.

After that we watched the Lion King show; it was really good.

We had a great lunch while we watched the animals. All different kinds of birds came up to us while we were eating. It was so cool!

Then we headed over to Dino Land and Laurel played in the boneyard playground for a long time.

We rode a couple rides in Dino Land and played with all the dinosaur statues. Laurel has been sad ever since because the dinosaurs are extinct and she wants to play with them.

The last thing we did was watch the Nemo show which was amazing! It was the best show and Laurel did not move the entire 40 minutes. The stage was a couple stories high and the people were used as props. It was just really cool. Laurel still talks about it all the time.

We left the park around 4 because Laurel really wanted to go swimming. She played in the kid's area for a long time and then we swam in the big pool for another hour or so.

We got changed and headed to Downtown Disney for dinner and some shopping that evening.

Laurel loved the Lego store and we bought her a little Lego set that she plays with daily. I'm thinking lots of Legos will be invading our house very soon!

Downtown Disney was really neat. All the stores had places for the kids to play and there was even a place to dig up dinosaur bones. We had a great dinner at Wolfgang Pucks. We got free dinning with our Disney package and we put it to good use!

Thursday was our last day and Laurel slept in again. We got to Hollywood Studios around 10am.

Laurel loved the Disney Jr show, especially the Little Einsteins. It was Minnie's Birthday in the show and Laurel was excited that it was her birthday too!

The Beauty and the Beast show was another of our favorites from the trip. The singing and dancing was really good. Once again Laurel did not move until it was over.

We got to meet lots of characters at Hollywood Studios.

This was a real guy!

The Honey I Shrunk the Kids playground was a lot of fun. I think we could have stayed there all day.

We watched the Muppets 3D show and had lunch at Pizza Planet, "just like Andy!"

After lunch Laurel was finally able to meet Sully from Monsters Inc. She loves him so much!

We got front row seats for a really cute Pixar parade. Laurel was dancing and waving like mad the whole time. I just loved watching her have so much fun!

Meeting Buzz and Woody was another dream come true.

We rode Toy Story Mania and then headed home. I was sad to leave the magic of Disney, but honestly I was also REALLY tired too so it was okay. Laurel slept almost the whole way home, which was nice!

For her final Birthday celebration I brought Mickey cupcakes to her preschool class.

This was her face while we all sang to her.

I think it is safe to say Laurel had a wonderful birthday!

Watch Out World!

Laurel got a bike for Christmas. I thought it would be a little while before she really got good at riding it, but she was cruising around like a little pro on the first ride. Looking a picture of her riding makes me a little sad. She just looks so grown! I don't notice it while she is riding though since our driveway is VERY hilly and I'm usually trying to make sure she does not go flying down a big hill and kill herself. Running after her is a good workout, I tell you!

One day I took her bike over to my Dad's neighborhood and she rode in a big flat church parking lot. That was perfect. I wish we had a place like that near us.

Before I know it she'll be going out with Matt on his forty mile bike rides. I swear, she was born, I blinked, and she is almost four years old. Crazy. As Matt and I always say, "Stay little Laurel!" It doesn't seem to be working though.

Happy New Year!!

We went down to FL to visit Matt's grandmother and great aunts for the New Year. Last time we visited Laurel was 7 months old so we were long overdue for a visit. Matt's brother and his family came down for the day as well. Laurel had a great time with her Great grandma, great great aunts, her uncle, aunt, and cousins. Matt's great aunt's daughter and her husband were also visiting from Canada. We love seeing family! We had a great trip.

We decided to leave in the night so Laurel would sleep the whole trip down (7 hours). Ha, what a joke! We got her up at 11:30pm Thursday night and put her in the car. We thought she would go right back to sleep, but she was so excited she stayed awake until 4am! She slept from 4-5 and then stayed awake until we arrived around 7am. We were worried she would have a break down later in the day, but she did fine. Matt and I had taken turns driving and we were tired, but Laurel was wide awake. She was ready to have fun!

That morning, we visited with family. There were 6 adults and Laurel and she loved all the attention she received.

Later, we took her to the beach and she jumped right in the water even though it was freezing. Laurel played in the sand and we raced the waves. She had a ball; she loves the beach! Me too!

Laurel's cousins arrived and they had a great time playing together. After a few hours of playing and us grown ups talking we headed over to the nursing home to see Matt's other great aunt, Thelma. She was happy to see all the kids and I'm glad she was awake and that we got to talk to her a little.

We all went to the park down the street and over to the bayou that afternoon.

We somehow even managed to get a picture of Twyla with all five of her great grandchildren where they were all smiling, a miracle!

The kids all decided to go down to the water and play in the sand. Laurel REALLY wanted to go into the water.

I told her if she looked at the camera and smiled just one time she could go in the water. I am not above bribes!

She then proceeded to have a ball and get totally soaked.

We had a big meal with all the family and after that Matt, Laurel, and I all went to bed at 7:30pm. We were SO tired and we all slept 11 hours. We spent the morning visiting some more. I love listening to Matt's grandma and great aunt, Peg. They have led such interesting lives and they are in their 90s so they are like walking history books.

We left for home at lunchtime on Saturday, New Years Eve. Laurel was amazing in the car for the whole car ride. We got home after dark and we did fireworks right away. We stopped on the way home and bought a bunch and Mat and Laurel were excited to set them off.

We then counted down to midnight with Laurel about 8pm and sent her off to bed. Happy New Year!!

This past year has been really great and I hope this coming year will be as well.