Vacation Post #5 - Wednesday

Wednesday was a nice day - hot, but nice. Again, the girls went swimming at the pool and the beach. Grandma and Papa surprised the parents by offering to babysit that evening so we could go out to dinner and hit the town. We were given a strict timeline-6 pm until 10 pm. Four hours by ourselves, what would we do with the time??!!

Keith and Tiff wanted Outback but I wanted to go somewhere off the beaten path so we split for dinner. Kevin and I headed to a nice seafood restaurant called the Sunset Grille. We had wonderful service and a tasty meal complete with banana daiquiris. YUM!

After dinner, we hooked back up with Keith and Tiff and went into historic St. Augustine for a nice walk. By 8:30 pm Keith and Tiff wanted to head home but Kevin and I decided to go to the lighthouse for a walk. NICE! We didn't head back to the condo until 9:30 pm. Such rebels!

Vacation Post #4 - Tuesday

Nothing much but lots of swimming at the pool and in the ocean. The girls got along really well and are really liking to copy each other. Isabella is a water bug and is really adventurous - trying to swim WITHOUT the swimmy and doing quite well.

Vacation Post #3- Monday

Monday was a fun day of swimming at the pool and in the ocean. For those of you that know me, I hate the beach. I like to look at the ocean and see the beach - from a distance. I hate sand. It's hot, scratchy and get everywhere. The ocean is full of sand, fish and lots of fish poop. So I rarely go in. But since the water so so warm, I decided it wold be nice for Isabella to experience the waves. I actually took her out in the ocean as deep as my shoulders. She didn't like it either!

That evening we met up with my cousin, Kristy, and her youngest daughter, Mackenzie, at an Applebee's in Ormond Beach. It was so great to see them and for the girls to meet again (They first met at Hopkins when Isabella was just 10 months old.)

After dinner, Kevin, Isabella and I went to the world's largest Harley dealership - boring - and then to the Russell Stover store for chocolate and ice cream.

Vacation Post #2 - Sunday

So we all got to bed really late and hoped to sleep in, but with three toddlers in the condo, we should have known better. We were all up and dressed and eating breakfast before 9:15 am (for those of you that know me that is really early for me and Isabella who usually sleep until about 10 am). When we got out of bed Kevin noticed a big dead spider in the center of our room. He wanted to me to throw it away so I picked it up in a Kleenex and flushed it down the toilet.

The girls all were so excited to go swimming in the pool. Aunt TT got her girls moving faster than me so she headed down to the pool before 10 am. I got Isabella dressed in her suit and started to head down to the pool when I noticed something on Isabella's arm. In the sunlight, I noticed two bug bites on her right arm that had swollen to the size of a baseball. I examined her other arm and found another bite, swollen, but not as bad. I immediately took her back to the condo and showed Kevin who immediately grabbed her up and said to get in the car. We were heading to the hospital. Grandma came, too, since she knew the way.

We only waited about 20 minutes in the waiting room before being taken to see a nurse who did an initial workup and sent us to a room the room where we waited nearly three hours to see a doctor. We never really even saw a doctor but a physician's assistant who examined Isabella's bites and prescribed Benadyrl and Prednesone for 4 days. She said if the bites became infected to start her on the antibiotic she prescribed and to return ASAP.

After another 30 minutes of waiting for the first doses of drugs, a nurse came in with what appeared to be two large syringes - at least they looked like that to Isabella who immediately started screaming. It took two of us to hold her down and another one of us to "shoot" the meds down her throat. Most of the meds got in her hair and on her clothes but enough get in to help.

While we were at the hospital Papa Al was on the phone with the rental place to get someone in to clean the condo of bugs and dirt. When a housekeeping lady told him we should move, he immediately got with the rental people and got us two side-by-side rentals - which turned out to be bigger and much, much nicer than the first one.

We headed back to the condo by 1:30 pm, just in time for lunch. While the other girls napped, I took a very tired Isabella who refused to lay down to the pool for some girl time. After moving to the new condos, Aunt TT and I went grocery shopping and filled Isabella's prescriptions before helping to make spaghetti for dinner.

That evening we all headed to the beach for a nice evening walk and romp in the very warm water!

Vacation Post #1 - Saturday

We took a late afternoon flight out of Cleveland on Southwest since it was the best deal. We left our house about 2:30 pm so we could stop and eat a late lunch at McDonald's on our way to the airport. Isabella got a Happy Meal with chicken nuggets and apples. She mostly ate my French Fries so I packed her leftovers in her carry-on for dinner.

We parked at FastTrack Parking Services off Engle Road. This new parking place had such great service. We pulled up to the door; they unloaded the car, placed the baggage (8 pieces in all) on the tram and parked our car for us.

The driver dropped us right at the Southwest Curbside check-in. No line. Fast check-in. And on to security.

Isabella was in her stroller so we got to go through the wheelchair line at Hopkins. We walked right up to security, took off our shoes, took Isabella out of the stroller and walked through. No problems. No waiting. We had plenty of time to find our gate and wait for the flight.

Once to the gate, I checked us in for pre-boarding since Isabella was in her stroller. We could check the stroller at the gate and the airline would have it ready for her at our destination.

During our wait, Isabella said she had to go to the bathroom. I took her and sat with her for 15 minutes. No pee-pee. She said she was done. Not two seconds after I set her down off the toilet did she pee all over the floor, my feet, her feet and her shorts. Good thing I had a change of clothes in her carry-on.

Uncle Keith, Aunt TT and Kelsey & Kylie arrived just before pre-boarding and it was time to go! The plane ride was uneventful except for the fact that Isabella didn't understand that she had to sit in her own seat. She never did. She sat on Kevin's lap, my lap, the floor - anywhere but her seat.

Once we arrived in Orlando we gathered up the bags - everything made it! - and proceeded to the tram to go to the car rental place. By this time it's 9 pm and the girls are tired - so are the moms and dads. We had to wait in line to check-in at Thrifty for 45 minutes, then load the vans and head to a gas station for snacks and a potty break.

We didn't get to the condo in St. Augustine until 12:20 am. Papa and Grandma were so nice and had pizza ready for us to eat before everyone went to sleep!

What a day!

"I'm flying. Look out my window!"

"Uncle Keith, I see you!"

"Aunt TT - Where's Kelsey?"

"We are so tired!"

"I love my Papa!"

We're Home!

Florida was amazing and I plan to have a day-by-day story for you later this week. We are still catching up on sleep today and running errands - getting to the grocery store and pharmacy, heading to Grandma Mary's & Papa Steve's, taking long afternoon naps (I hope). Watch for a new post soon but to keep to coming back, here's a few pics of our "little mermaid" enjoying her vacation.

It could happen to you

Identify theft! We hear about it everywhere - TV, radio, newspaper, but we never think it will happen to us. We're careful with our account numbers, our credit cards, our banking information. We're safe!

But let me be the first to say this - It does happen. We should know. It has happened to us.

We found out yesterday.

I'm religious about checking our online banking account each morning to confirm what posted the night before. Yesterday morning was no different, except for a mysterious debit for hostway.com. I called Kevin right away to make sure he didn't make the purchase. Nope.

So I immediately called the bank. I had to go in to fill out a form to recoup the money, but while I was there the banker noted four new charges that hadn't yet posted. We didn't make those purchases. In fact, they were made online with overseas companies.

So I called one of the companies. They had my credit card number, my name, but a different address. This address is unlisted. So, to be safe, we had to close all our accounts to make sure no more activity would take place. Right before a vacation in which we planned to use the bank card for expenses...

Plus, I had to place a hold on all the credit cards so we can monitor those accounts.

But we had to go farther since we knew someone had our names and numbers; we had to place alerts with all the credit bureaus. We purchased service from Equifax using our both social security numbers to check recent activity. And it's a good thing we did.

Kevin has three mysterious accounts opened in his name that he does not have. All with purchases on them. All with up-to-date payment activity.

I have four mysterious accounts, again, with purchases and up-to-date payments.

We've contacted one credit card, and they say the account does not exist so the next step is to work with Equifax on Monday to remove the activity.

Hopefully, this all works out, and we can relax some on our vacation.

Off to Florida

Well, I'll be going a week without Internet access so don't expect any pics or posts until at least next Sunday. But, to keep you busy, I've got a 14 minute video for you to watch over the week. It covers everything Isabella has done this summer. We'll finally be all caught up on pics. I am excited to start fresh when we return from St. Augustine!


Summer 2007

Pictures Galore

I am so behind in posting pics from this summer!

We have been so busy - zoo trips, birthday parties, visits with the cousins, swimming with friends and neighbors, picnics, cookouts, boating on Portage Lakes, playing outdoors - too many to count. Plus we leave Saturday for a Kramer family vacation in St. Augustine, Florida.

I'm hoping to post a LONG video recapping everything really soon! For now, check out these pics - Isabella in the backyard drawing with sidewalk chalk.

Time with Papa Steve

Isabella loves spending time with Papa Steve, so she wanted to wish him an extra special Happy Birthday. He takes her fishing and reads her fun fish books. Here they enjoy some bonding time at Portages Lakes.

The Help Me Grow Evaluation

Toady, I received the formal evaluation from Help Me Grow on Isabella's development. And it was great!

She scored in the 28-30 month range in the following areas: cognitive, receptive language, expressive language, gross motor, social-emotional and self help. She scored 24-30 months in fine motor. What this means is that Isabella is developing well above her normal 25 months and there is no need for additional one-on-one services.

Some of the comments given by the evaluators:
"When handed a book upside down, Isabella was able to turn it right side up. She point to and talked about details in the book. Isabella is able t match and name the colors red, green, yellow, blue and orange. Isabella can match animal sounds to pictures of animals."

"Isabella will answer yes/no questions and who, what, and where questions through words, phrases and pointing."

"Isabella is very expressive. She uses facial expressions, pointing, gesturing and words to communicate her wants and needs."

"Isabella can become easily frustrated with some fine motor tasks and will not be persistent." (We have to work on this one.)

"Isabella is a very capable girl."

"Isabella is a very independent little girl."

Overall, a wonderful assessment from the doctors and social workers! They did offer a few suggestions to help Isabella with her toe-walking and sensory integration issues which we have immediately implemented.

We are so happy that she's doing so well. Now we have confirmation to our feelings that she's doing outstandingly.

Fisher-Price Recall

Fisher-Price recalled millions of toys today because lead paint may have been used in the manufacturing process.

Isabella has several of the recalled toys, and I have already taken them away. For those of you with children who have Dora, Diego or Sesame Street toys purchased since May 1, 2007, please take them away, look at the product code on the back and visit http://www.service.mattel.com/ to see if the toys appear on the list. You can take the toys to any retailer to get a voucher for a new toy or can get mail-in information from Fisher-Price.com.