A Day At Wild Waters!

We arrived at the opening of the park...10:00a.m. which was perfect! Today was a special price day of $10.13 per/person admission because the radio station 101.3 was there today and if you mentioned them, you got the special price. Thank goodness I did because the lady taking our money was really paying attention to what I was saying. I guess if you don't say the right words you will be paying the regular $29.99 per person.....NO THANK YOU!  We had a blast today...please don't get me wrong...but we did not have a $29.99 day...plus parking was $7.00, plus to get a small locker you pay $13.00 and then get $5.00 of it back when you return your key..so all in all the day came to $30.00 admission + $7.00 parking + $8.00 for locker + $15.00 in gas = $60.00 total for 5 hours at Wild Waters (We brought our lunch from home). That is for the discount price. WE HAD A GREAT TIME! However...I must keep things in perspective and adding up every penny and what was spent makes it REAL and plus I will know for next time. We were able to hit all the slides before the crowd arrived at noon. This was a huge bonus! With this being Steven's 1st time it gave us an opportunity to "test the waters" (ha ha..no pun intended..but it was good) Steven did awesome. And let me add that the life guards were everywhere in the park and ready to assist. Steven went down every slide (minus the "Gator" which you have to be 48 in...everything else is 42 in and he just makes it). Steven made us so very proud. He went down the the "Hurricane" which you sit on a tube by yourself and go town this 3-4 story wrap around type slide. He did great! He loved the "Kiddie" area because this gave him an opportunity to swim without assistance. There were three to four lifeguards in the kiddie area who were watching the kids like they were a bomb about to explode. If you wanted, you could request a life guard be ready for your little swimmer and they would be at the bottom of the slide ready to catch them. We were SO IMPRESSED with this. Because we had not been there for a while, we had a lot of questions and because there were SOOOO many lifeguards around the park it was easy to find one and ask. Steven loved the wave pool and did not want to leave. He was in a life jacket for this one, but continuously wanted to go in the deep end for the waves. Mom attempted this, but Steven did not understand that mom does not have legs that are 12 feet long so we quickly came in and hung out on "shore". Steven even went down the "Silver Bullet", but because our son is so light, he had to push himself ALL THE WAY DOWN (one of the fastest slides at Wild Waters). Steven got to the point where he stood up on the slide to get to the big drop and even when he did get to the drop, he still had to push himself in the pool at the end of the slide. I was dying laughing. The process of going down the slides was daddy 1st, then Steven, then me. This way Steve could either be ready to catch Steven, or he would be telling the lifeguard to "get ready" for Steven all at the same time I was at the top of the slide getting Steven ready and having him listen to the lifeguard tell him when it was his turn to go. THIS WAS AN AWESOME 1st visit. Is the park a little old...well yes...but we knew that going in...does it need a little TLC? Yep...but even with all that the slides were great, the lifeguards did an OUTSTANDING job...and we ALL had a great time...I would have to say that today was a great day....Thank you God!

P.S. If you click on the title to this post, it will take you to the "Wild Waters" homepage!

A Night at the Landing!

Here is a picture of Steve and I at the Jacksonville Landing last night. We had a WONDERFUL time. While in Jacksonville for work Steve came and stayed with me for the night. We went and had some "Hooters" wings  at the Jacksonville Landing (click on title of this blog to go to Jacksonville Landing website) and then after came back to the hotel and visited with some co-workers in the hot tub. Of course I am quite tired today because I did not get to bed until around 12:45a.m. this morning, but WELL WORTH IT.  What a treat to have Steve with me for one of the evenings at the hotel. Being here for a week is a long time, and the fact that he took the time to come over, take me out to dinner, and spend the night was such a treat. Some of the ladies in the training got to meet him and he really hit it off with them. He is such a little social bug. I am also grateful for my mother giving me the money to still attend this training for work after my wallet was stolen on Saturday. Because she did this, I was able to still come and receive the training I need and also to have a night out with my husband. Thank you mom....you are a blessing...always there when I need you!  I would also like to say Thank you to my mother & father-n-law for taking care of my son for the past two days while Steve was at work and here with me for a night out. Every opportunity Steve and I have to spend out on the town together is such a gift and we really had a great time. Thank you Kay and Mike so very much! What a long list of things to be thankful for. I am so lucky! Thank you God!

Oil and Smoking 2 yr Olds

On my lunch break I was on my "Twitter" page and saw a link to a video of a 2 year old boy who smokes up to 40 cigarettes a day. In so many ways this is wrong, and boggles my mind. I just had to attach a the link listed below. Let me know what you think. Also, while eating my lunch and "Twittering" I was listening to CNN regarding the oil spill and the status of doing the whole mud, cement, topkill thing.  They shared a very cool link where you can take the size of the oil spill and compare it to any city or town in the world. You can compare it to your own location to see how LARGE this oil spill really is. Check it out.

http://www.break.com/usercontent/2010/5/26/ardi-rizal-the-real-smoking-baby-1844126
2 yr. old Smoking Boy

http://on.cnn.com/b4L8TJ
Oil spill size in your city or town

Looking to Work From Home?

 

Looking to work from home? Just click on the title to this post (Looking to work from home) and it will take you to a list of 195 company's listed with the Direct Selling Association that you can sell such things as jewelry, aromatherapy, spa products, handbags, skincare, holiday decorations, candles, scrapbook's, food/gourmet items, etc. This list goes on and on. Just about any service or product can be purchased through direct selling, and you don't have to do it on your own...lots of these company's have the option of a website doing the work for you. Some of these companies include names like "AVON", "Amway", "Celebrating Home", "Creative Memories", "Initial Outfitters" and "Initial, Inc" among many others!  If I had the time, this is where I would begin my WAH journey. They have contact phone numbers listed for each company and direct links to each company's website to get yourself started. Pick one, pick ten...the opportunities are endless. Before you get started there are some questions that you should ask:

1. What are the start up costs?
2. Be sure to ask how much inventory (if any) you will be required to purchase and what the terms of return are if you decide to leave the business?
3. Is the money you earn based on the sale of products or services?

 

A Nice Break!

The weekend started off great! My mother arrived in town on Friday, and my husband had a last minute date night planned. He sent me a text on Friday afternoon asking if I was up for going out and let grandma have an evening with little Steven. Yes! Yes! Yes! We had a wonderful time out on the town. The next morning my mother, Steven Jr and I left for a day of shopping. Our first stop "TJ Max". Though we did not find what we were looking for, someone found my wallet and refused to return it. Yes...my wallet was stolen on Saturday.  This is a first for me. I only have one credit card and my debit card so going through the number of people you have to call was very easy, but the uneasiness was still there....now what?  I was able to cancel my cards before my credit card or debit card was used...thank you god....my mother was in town for support....thank you god, and my son was a well behaved trooper with all this going on....thank you god...I have learned that even with my wallet being stolen, there are things that can be done to fix the situation....thank you god....I have not lost a limb...or gotten into a horrendous accident...or lost a loved one....I am here, and it can be fixed....thank you god....what wonderful gifts...even in such a stressful situation...the tools are there to fix it and now I am in a beautiful hotel room, in a wonderful city, I have a great job, an awesome husband, a beautiful child, and a great mother...these are the gifts that god has given me and STILL provides me even with a stolen wallet he is still sending gifts my way...THANK YOU GOD!!!! 

2010 Gator Football Women's Clinic

Last year I was reading the Gainesville Sun the day after this occured and thought to myself "Man...If I would have known about this I would have been all over it". Well...Thanks to "Twitter" and following "GatorZone.com" I saw yesterday that this was being announced and registration was open....Well...guess what...I did it...I registered for the UF Gator Football Women's Clinic ($90.00 later). I CAN'T WAIT!!! Myslef, along with all the other women will be running out of the tunnel onto Florida Field, participating in football drills, getting our pictures taken with Urban Myer (when they give us the okay...special source informs me that there will be designated times when this can happen) and of course getting my Free T-Shirt! 

Happily Ever After!

So when I used to work as a Protective Service worker, I was working with families who had their children removed by the state due to abuse and neglect. Part of my job was to assist these families with the reunification of their children back into their home. In this job it is so common to have, and have heard more sad stories than happy. Yes, I have my few really happy stories, but today I had an e-mail forwarded to me by my old supervisor from a grandmother who I had placed some children with about three years ago. I had removed these children from their mother who had a serious methamphetamine addiction and placed them in the care of their maternal grandmother. Shortly after this had occurred I accepted a position as a trainer for the protective supervision agency that I work for now. The e-mail that was forwarded to me today stated that the children that I had placed in the grandmother's care had just received "Student Of The Month" awards on top of being very active in ballet and football. The oldest child was about to turn 15 and have her braces removed. On top of that, this child had also won a scholarship for college and is making A's and B's at school. The life that these children were living before was with a mother who was addicted to methamphetamine, and living in a methamphetamine lab. Though the mother tried, and tried, she just could not learn how to acknowledge her addiction. When I read this e-mail today I wanted to cry. I was so ecstatic at how well these children were doing and it only remedied me why I do what I do. Now as a trainer, I am no longer in the field able to work directly with these families, and have absolutely no idea how any of the children that I removed as an Investigator with the Florida Department of Children and Families, or as a protective service worker, are doing. I thank my old supervisor for taking the time to share this with me, and I also applaud this grandmother for doing everything she has done for these children. This e-mail was a blessing and a beautiful gift that I received today. I am so thankful and appreciative that I was able to receive it. These children wake up every morning and survive. It is such an amazing strength that they have that I have had the privilege of watching happen in front of my eyes.

A Deceptively Delicious Night!

Okay, so I was visiting my brother and sister-n-law in Feb and somehow we got on the topic of little picky eaters. My son has ALWAYS been the type of child where he will decide that he is no longer hungry if there is any "black" on his chicken from the grill. My sister-n-law introduced me to Jerry Seinfeld's wife's (Jessica Seinfeld) book titled "Deceptively Delicious".  This is the BEST cookbook for picky eaters! One of my most current recipes that I have done from the book is "Pita Pizza's" with spinach. My son loves these pita pizza's. I have made about 12 of them and then put them in the freezer for quick dinner's for when my husband is at work. I don't want to cook for just myself and for a child that does not eat a lot, so I prepare these meals ahead of time and then freeze. They work beautifully!

I took frozen spinach (it's cheaper than fresh), thawed and then pureed in the food processor. I spread the pureed spinach on the whole wheat pita and then covered the pureed spinach with caned tomato sauce (cheaper in the can than the jar). This is the key to ALL of these recipes (very deceptive). Make sure to cover the spinach with the sauce so they don't see the healthy stuff.

I then placed a slice of mozzarella cheese over each pita and baked in the oven at 350 degrees until the cheese has melted.

Viola....they turned out great and even smelled delicious...as the cook, I just had to have one myself. I must say, these are some good pita pizzas. I then wrapped in wax paper and placed in the freezer. I now have two weeks worth of dinner's.

Let's just say the proof is in the pudding! My son is eating spinach! I could not believe my eyes and I knew that I just had to take a picture while he was enjoying it and before he noticed there was "green" stuff on that pizza.

In addition to the "Pitta Pizza's" with spinach, I have also made Chocolate Chip pancakes with sweet potatoes, and tonight we ate "Mac-N-Cheese" with cauliflower. He finished the entire bowl. All of these meals are made in abundance and then frozen. I then heat everything up in the oven at 350 degrees (time varies depending on what I am heating). I love this book and would recommend it to anyone who has picky eaters (or not...they can only be good for your child because all recipes are made with vegetables).

So, even these have nothing to do with my Deceptively Delicious Night, I figured I would post the most recent pictures of my little man. The first is of Steven ready for bed drinking his night cap of chocolate milk. The second is his T-Ball trading card, and the third is his most recent school picture. I love my bubby!

Have a Deceptively Delicious Day!

Watermellon Festival and T-Ball (All in One Day)

What a busy weekend! From the moment we woke up Saturday morning I knew it was going to be a day filled with fun...no Wii today Steven...we are spending it outside. Our first stop...Newberry Watermelon Festival Parade! I think my son got more candy at the parade than he did at Halloween. He had just learned how to chew gum and we got plenty of it at the parade. After the parade was over it was off to T-Ball. This was Steven's last T-Ball game. Don't get me wrong, I think sports are great for kids. I participated in sports all my life as a child up until I graduated college for that matter, I was always active in something. But as a wife to a fireman who works 24 to 48 hours at a time, and a working full time mom, I gotta tell ya...I was happy that I no longer had to get off work at 2:00pm to make it home by 3:00pm, to get Steven off the bus at 3:50, leave at 5:00pm to make it to practice twice a week at 5:30pm which lasted until 6:30, and then we did not get home until 7:00pm which meant we were having a late dinner. By this point in my day I was exhausted. Please don't get me wrong, there are SO MANY positives to Steven playing in organized sports, but boy I tell ya....there is a lot of energy used to keep things in a positive perspective especially when you are so very tired. However, Steven is thrilled beyond belief that he has not one, but two trophy's now! They are placed next to his bed to see every night before he goes to sleep. He has come such a long way from last year in T-Ball. Last year there was a lot of playing in the sand and throwing grass in the air, which was actually quite funny to watch as the ball rolled by him during a game or at practice. Steven started out as catcher this year and before every game he would tell me that he was going to let his coach know that he was going to be catcher. By the end of the season he was wearing his catchers uniform and sitting on the ground behind home plate. I would walk over to him and ask "Whatcha doing big guy"? His responce would be "I'm tired". He was still a good sport though. Even with not wanting to do it anymore, he would still go up to home plate and try to hit the ball off the "T"...in slow motion at that. Let's just say that even with as hectic as it is, I got lots of pleasure out of watching him play.