AN APPLE A DAY. . .

Is apparently not enough for our family. Thank goodness for Dr. Payne! This past week or two has been tons of fun in the LeBaron household. My back was really acting up so I finally gave in and went to see my grandpa about it. He sent me to have an MRI (which by the way, if you have never had one is a horrible experience) and it turns out I have Degenerative Disc Disease. I'm not entirely sure all that that entails, but he first sent me to get a nerve root injection. I was terrified but it worked out ok. They numbed my back and then they go in and poke around on the nerves until they think they found the nerve that was being affected and inject this steriod into it that should take away the pain. For the first two days, I was in more pain than I had been for a while, but today I went on a long walk and it felt great. Tommy has been having sinus infections and he was sent to have a CT Scan. He will be having sinus surgery next month. And Porter had this yucky cold which I won't go into much detail about but he would gag a lot on the stuff in his throat and the result usually meant a change of clothes for him and whoever was lucky enough to hold him at the time. But things are starting to look on the up and up. I'm feeling better, Porter's feeling better, and Tom will hopefully be feeling better. And most definitely the health care industry is happy that we are paying out so much money lately. Hopefully we will have met our deductible by now and it will be smooth sailing from here on out.

Disney World

Here is my synopsis of our Disney World trip. Breif, but gives an idea of how the trip went. Although I had doubts and reservations about our trip to Disney World, it was an incredible trip. I thought Porter might be too young to enjoy it, but he loved almost every minute of it. I worried that we had been suckered into scams because we wanted to save money, but everything worked out so smoothly, I am still a little shocked.
We left Friday night. Porter was not his best on the plane, but we lucked out with the one empty seat on the plane being between Tom and I, so Porter got his own seat. We stayed in a house about ten minutes outside of Disney World with my parents, my brothers, and my Aunt Jenny and Uncle John's family which consists of Madison (10), Zachary (8), Sadie (5), and Joshua and McKay (2). Porter LOVED playing with kids closer to his own age. He still keeps asking me where Josh is (which happens to be the only name he can say out of their family)
On Saturday, we headed to Universal Studios Islands of Adventure. An error occurred in our favor which gave us an additional free ticket. I honestly can't believe how everything kept coming out right for us. Porter's first ride was Cat in the Hat which is a little like you are on drugs anyways, but right after a nap, I think made him question what we were doing to him. It is a great theme park and we had amazing weather until the end of the day when it poured (but we were on the water ride, so it didn't much matter).
On Sunday we went to Animal Kingdom and started the day off with the Safari, which Porter thoroughly enjoyed, as demonstrated below:

After some great rides, we headed over to the petting zoo with Porter. He loved it a little to much for my liking as he tried to kiss the goats and touch their behinds. Sick! We were headed in the direction of the car when it started to pour! We made a mad dash to the car, but didn't escape without our clothes getting drenched.

Monday was the Magic Kingdom. Here is where we started the day:

Porter LOVED this ride! We had this thing called Ride Max which helps you plan your day at the Park to "optimize" your visit. We avoided long lines all day! Totally recommend doing this.

They have a darling Winnie the Pooh playset outside the ride complete with Pooh's house, honey pots, and more. He was in heaven!!


Here is the fam at Magic Kingdom. Note Carl's stylin' hat. I love my dad, but the man is seriously lacking in style. On Tuesday, we headed down to Cocoa Beach. Porter, my OCD child, had a hard time adapting to the sand, mud and water, but soon joined Josh and McKay and could have been happy playing for hours.

Wednesday was Hollywood Studios. This was one of the best rides the entire trip, it's Toy Story Mania and I could have gone on it over an over. However without a fast pass, the wait is 80 minutes!


They have something at Hollywood Studios called the American Idol experience. You can try out at the beginning of the day. They choose three people for each of their seven shows from like over 100 people or so. Trent tried out and made the first show. He won his round one by a landslide. Gag me, my brother is such a performer. Then, at the end of the night, they have a finale with the finalist from each competition. If you win, you got a front of the line pass to the American Idol tryouts in any country. Trent came in second to a large black lady with a booming voice singing Midnight Train to Georgia. Not the best singer, her pitch was off and she may have missed a couple of notes, but man that lady had soul and won the crown with her deep booming voice and back story of getting hurt on a ride at Magic Kingdom and spending the day with her son in Celebration Hospital. Like I said, Trent came in second, but you wouldn't have known it afterwards. After the show, he had like 8 different groups of girls come and want to take pictures with him. We saw people the next day at Epcot who recognized him from the first show and were bummed that he didn't win, and to top it off, two girls stalked him on Facebook. Gag me. I'm still unsure what they are going to do with the picture. "Hey look, its me with the kid who didn't win the American Idol experience!"

We took a break on Thursday and just hung around the house and swam in the pool. Porter needed a good long nap that day, so it worked out great. On Friday, we went to Epcot. Not my favorite park, but Porter loved it. They had a Nemo ride with fish that he couldn't get enough of. And of course, Tom got his German buffet.

On saturday, we headed over to Blizzard Beach. One of the Disney water parks. I love that park, but was a little exhausted to enjoy it to its full extent. Porter hates water, but started warming up by the end.
On Sunday, we attended church in Orlando, went to lunch and then headed home. Porter slept the entire 4 hours and then went right to bed when we got home and didn't wake up until morning. The child was exhausted and totally spoiled. It was a great trip and I"m so glad we decided to do it.

The Proper Role of Government (sorry, its long)

A strange man that used to be in our ward and somehow got Tom's email address sent this to him and I couldn't help but pass it along. President Ezra Taft Benson (who was an extremely politically active man) gave a talk called, "The Proper Role of Government" when he was the Secretary of Agriculture (or soon thereafter). (he was simultaneously in the Quorum of the Twelve and The United States Cabinet) He brought up quite a few very interesting points which directly apply to the current government and its leader (as well as choices of many in the past too) You should read this talk if you get a chance, but here are a few of the points that stood out to me:

". . .A category of government activity which, today, not only requires the closest scrutiny, but which also poses a grave danger to our continued freedom, is the activity not within the proper sphere of government. No one has the authority to grant such powers, as welfare programs, schemes for redistributing the wealth, and activities which coerce people into acting in accordance with a prescribed code of social planning. There is one simple test. Do I as an individual have a right to use force upon my neighbor to accomplish this goal? If I do have such a right, then I may delegate that power to my government to exercise on my behalf. If I do not have that right as an individual, then I cannot delegate it to government, and I cannot ask my government to perform the act for me.
To be sure, there are times when this principle of the proper role of government is most annoying and inconvenient. If I could only force the ignorant to provide for themselves, or the selfish to be generous with their wealth! But if we permit government to manufacture its own authority out of thin air, and to create self-proclaimed powers not delegated to it by the people, then the creature exceeds the creator and becomes master. Beyond that point, where shall the line be drawn? Who is to say "this far, but no further?" What clear principle will stay the hand of government from reaching farther and yet farther into our daily lives? We shouldn't forget the wise words of President Grover Cleveland that "...though the people support the Government, the Government should not support the people."

Students of history know that no government in the history of mankind has ever created any wealth. People who work create wealth. Neither you nor I, would walk up and ring a man's doorbell, hold out a hand and say, "Give me what you've earned even though I have not." We simply wouldn't do it because we would be facing directly the violation of a moral law, "Thou shalt not steal."

Material gain and economic security simply cannot be guaranteed by any government. They are the result and reward of hard work and industrious production. Unless the people bake one loaf of bread for each citizen, the government cannot guarantee that each will have one loaf to eat. Constitutions can be written, laws can be passed and imperial decrees can be issued, but unless the bread is produced, it can never be distributed.

On the surface this may sound heartless and insensitive to the needs of those less fortunate individuals. . ."What about the lame, the sick and the destitute?" is an often voiced question. Most other countries in the world have attempted to use the power of government to meet this need. Yet, in every case, the improvement has been marginal at best and has resulted in the long run creating more misery, more poverty, and certainly less freedom than when government first stepped in.

I consider it a violation of the Constitution for the Federal Government to levy taxes for the support of state or local government; that no state or local government can accept funds from the Federal and remain independent in performing its functions, nor can the citizens exercise their rights of self-government under such conditions.

America was built upon a firm foundation and created over many years from the bottom up. Other nations, impatient to acquire equal abundance, security and pursuit of happiness, rush headlong into that final phase of construction without building adequate foundations or supporting pillars. Their efforts are futile. And, even in our country, there are those who think that, because we now have the good things in life, we can afford to dispense with the foundations which have made them possible.

AMEN!

EASTER

I have been trying to keep a letter for Porter telling him about each year of his life. (I'm off to a good start, but it isn't that hard with one child who is only one!) As I was working on it last night, I realized that however dull or insignificant my blog posts seem, they are invaluable to me in my record keeping and scrapbooking. So for now, I've decided to keep the blog, but probably just do one giant post a month to keep myself from worrying about posting or spending too much time on the computer. Which I confess, I am extremely guilty of between work, deal finding, and just the unnecessary "surfing". So I'm cutting back, but not stopping for now. Tom thinks I did this for attention, but really I'm just looking back at my New years Resolutions and trying to get perspective back in my life.

Easter was a wonderful holiday and we got some great pictures of Porter. On saturday after Tom got home from 4-wheeling, we decorated eggs. In my family this is quite an event because we each dye at least a dozen eggs for the egg fight. Porter didn't have a clue what was going on and wanted to throw his "ball" in the egg dye. Church was great followed by a crazy egg hunt and a good Easter dinner. I don't eat ham, so my mom also made a turkey which was delicious. Porter got to participate in the hunt this year, although I am not so sure he knew what was even going on. He was just happy to be outside running around. The kid would live outside if he could. Today he was bawling at the door wanting to go out in the pouring rain!

The Reign of Terror

Ok, so I know I said I was going to delete my blog, and I have a post I was working on with that explanation (mainly just easing off my internet usage) and I will post that later, but I couldn't resist sharing my horrible day.

Porter is quite a talented child.  Here are a few of his talents as of late:

Jumping off the bed (not falling, jumping)

Pillow fighting with Miko (which does include falling off the bed)

Climbing on the kitchen table (we have one of those high tables and I have no idea how he does it)

Opening doors (ahh!)

Jumping off the couch

Climbing the entertainment center

and finally. . .

Porter has mastered the stair stepper (yes, we have an old school stair stepper we got at the DI for $30.00.  We couldn't afford a treadmill and thought this might work for some of my workouts for a while)

He has figured out how to switch his weight back and forth to move the steps up and down and when he wants to get off, he puts both his feet onto one step and uses his weight (although there isn't much) to lower it all the way to the bottom and then he steps off.  

I do have some pictures but its getting late and I have to get back to my Gilmore Girls addiction (sick I know, and another addiction to work out but I'm almost done).

Lately. . .

I've been slacking on the pictures lately, but I've promised myself I'll take lots of easter pictures. I don't have much to report, just little tid bits that are of no real importance. I guess as a stay at home mom it is the little things that are exciting. This has been quite a good week.

We got back from a last minute trip to St. George with Joe and Carrie. It was really fun but definitely not long enough. It makes me so excited for summer. Thanks Bobbi for letting us stay at the St. George house!

In a period of 24hrs, Porter went off the bottle cold turkey (yes we found a sippy cup he likes and can use), he went back to sleeping 10-12 hours, and finally mastered the stairs. (which is a very important feat in our house) He is such a big kid now it makes me sad. Where did my little boy go?

I got my Mixbook book in the mail. It is an awesome photo book site that lets you upload digital scrapbooking stuff and then make the book there. (for me it's like taking the photoshop step out of the mix which makes my digital scrapbooking time much more efficient)

I got my Rite Aid and Walgreens rebate checks in the mail. I love it! I got some good deals on some things I acutally needed with some dang good rebates. I am not becoming the crazy coupon person, but I am loving saving money with coupons lately. Tom thinks I have an addiction to buying cereal. I can't help it when I see a deal because cereal gets expensive. I think we have like 12 extra boxes of cereal. Which I must confess, I don't really eat it so it will take him a long time to deplete my inventory.

And finally, I have decided to retire my blog and just keep my own little private one for chronicling purposes. (not sure if that is really a word, but it doesn't have a red line under it so I am going to say yes)

Swimsuits

Just an FYI for anyone who is interested.  A girl who went to highschool with me has started her own custom swimsuit business.  Her site is essentialswimwear.com.  Her suits look great and she is coming to my parent's house next Saturday to do measurements and show the fabrics and suits to anyone who is interested.  If you are, let me know and I'll send you the details.