Taylor's Make-A-Wish Trip

Here is our only family photo from the trip.  This was our beautiful villa at Give Kids The World Village in Florida.  Can you tell that the girls were ready to explore?  They didn't have time for such things as photo ops!

This was the first of many rides on the wonderful carousel in the Village.  They could ride as often as they wanted for free!  I don't think it gets much better than that!

This was our very first family vacation together, and we got off to a fantastic start!

Erin loves the carousel.  I think she feels like she's flying.

Riding on the train through the village.  Another thing we did over and over again!

Our first park was the Magic Kingdom.  It truly was a magical day!

While we were waiting for the parade to start, there were things for the kids to do.  Jade showed us that she is a hula hoop champ!  She definitely did NOT get that from me! :D

This is Mayor Clayton, the Mayor of Give Kids The World Village.  Our first night in the village was his birthday party (which they do every Saturday night).  The girls absolutely loved him!  We had to take a picture with him every day.  I'll just post one!

Mickey and Minnie came to the Village one morning before we left for Animal Kingdom.  The girls were THRILLED to meet them!

Riding to the park.  This was our "limo" each day.  For the girls, riding on a bus NEVER gets old.

Erin had the option of riding the bus in her chair, but she preferred to sit in front (most days).

I think this photo needs a clever caption.  Kevin was giving the girls a comparison for the hippo skull, and I think it's hilarious!  I love that my husband can be goofy with the girls.

Surfer girl Jadie at the pool.

So Cute!

Each Wish child writes his/her name on a star, makes a wish, and the star is placed on the ceiling of the Castle of Miracles.  We were given the location of the star, and it will stay up forever.  If we ever return to the Village, we can go in to see Taylor's star.

Taylor's star (with a little fingerprint smudge).

There is a spa in the Castle of Miracles.  The girls all had a manicure, they got their faces painted, and they each got an airbrushed tattoo.

The girls were so excited to meet the Grinch.  To this day they ask me if he was the real Grinch.

Riding the carousel at Seuss Landing.  Jade picked an elephant, of course!

Daddy even got to ride with Erin on this one!

The smile says it all!

Spinning...  Do you see Erin's head peaking through?

This was the highlight of our entire trip for Taylor.  She wants to be a dolphin trainer someday, so she was in heaven when she was able to feed the dolphins.  Everyone loved Sea World!

The dolphin actually came up onto the ledge to see Erin.  She was the only one they did that for.

Jade was a little nervous, but after the first fish she couldn't get enough.

K.J. even got in on the fun!

We all loved the Shamu show, called "Believe".  The girls were amazed!

This was on our last day as we were preparing to leave Give Kids The World Village.  We wanted to take some pics to remember our amazing stay.

Here is the ice cream parlor that is open every day from 7:30 a.m. until 9:30 p.m.  Remember, everything there is free, so we definitely made our fair share of visits to get ice cream!

This is the carousel and to the right of that is the Castle of Miracles.

Here is the Gingerbread House.  This is the restaurant where we ate breakfast and dinner every day.

The girls playing inside Old Elmer (a sleeping tree) at the Castle of Miracles.

This is Amberville, where they have an AWESOME, gigantic train set, an arcade, RC boats, and the train the girls loved to ride.  There is also a very cool mini-golf course here.

One last ice cream cone for the road!  Daddy had to finish Jade's cone.

Jade was trying to show off her Shamu necklace.

Erin decided she wanted to ride in her chair in the back of the bus for our last ride in Florida.  This was THE BEST TRIP EVER!!!

First Snow!!!

We received our first snowfall on Saturday, and you wouldn't believe the excitement in our house (including myself)!!  I just love the snow!  It snowed all day, and it was pretty wet and slushy, so we waiting until Sunday to go out and play.  We had a very small window of opportunity, because the temperature was going up, but we definitely took advantage of it!  The girls all love to go sledding, and they have chosen our front yard to do it in.  No, we don't really have a hill in our front yard, per se, but it is enough of a decline that the sleds move (when given a big push by me).  No matter what, we had a fantastic time playing, and we stayed out until our yard was more mud than snow.  As in all things we do now, Erin can't wait until our next snow and we have SOLOMON with us. 

Yes, this is our very small snowman.  He doesn't look very happy about his size either, but he is trying to show off his muscles!!  Ha!  All three girls made contributions to this little guy, and they were extremely happy to see that he was still there this morning as we left for school.  I'm not so sure that will be the case when they get home....

Erin was trying to push herself back up the hill in her sled when her sisters came down and pushed her all the way back.  The smile on her face is evidence that she wasn't too upset about it!  However, she had been working really hard to get back up by herself, getting mad at me if I tried to give her any help.

I haven't even gotten photos of the girls playing in the leaves yet (because they're still on the tree).  Those are usually some of my favorite pics every year!  As you can see, some of the leaves are actually still GREEN.  Most of these leaves fell during the snowfall.

SOLOMON's Graduation Day

I wrote all about SOLOMON's big day on our other site, but I wanted to share some of our photos here.  I didn't have the opportunity to take many pics that day, because both ceremonies were inside the prison, and we weren't allowed to take our cameras inside.  They did have a few photographers there, and we should be getting copies of the photos fairly soon.  I will post some when I get them.  Anyway, it was an absolutely FANTASTIC day full of excitement and wonderful people.  We will begin our transfer training very soon with SOLOMON, and we should have him with us full time right before Christmas.  The excitement in our house is building!!!

Taylor and her friend Madison at the
reception.  They had a great day
together!

This is Jade and her new love, Nikki!
Nikki's owner, Sharon, thought she
might have to take Jade home with
her too!  Jade absolutely loves this
dog!

Jade took about 30 minutes to say goodbye!
She couldn't bear to let her go.

This was the only picture I got of all three
girls with SOLOMON that day.  We were
just getting ready to go, and we had to say
goodbye to him.

"Conjoined Twins: After Separation" on TLC tonight!

I just want to remind everyone to watch TLC tonight at 9 pm ET. The show we are on, called "Conjoined Twins: After Separation" is going to air. We had the opportunity to watch it this afternoon, and it is outstanding! You will get to see Erin and SOLOMON together. I will post more about this tomorrow, and we would love to hear what you think of the program. Our internet and phone are down right now, so I am posting this through my phone, and it's way more effort than I have time for now. We just got back from our trip to WV for SOLOMON's graduation, and we're still trying to unpack and get the girls ready for bed. The weekend was fabulous, and we were thrilled to spend time with the amazing friends we have met on this journey, and Erin was ecstatic to see her dog. We won't have him with us full time until right before Christmas, but we are one step closer. If anyone is interested in learning more about paws4people, the organization giving Erin her service dog, you can visit their website at http://www.paws4people.org
More tomorrow. Have a great night! Enjoy the show! ;0)

Watch TLC on Sunday night!!

This is the show we have been working on with Figure 8 Films.  There are two other sets of formerly conjoined twins who will share the hour with us.  We can't wait to see it, because we know it is going to be fantastic!  Please watch it (or TiVo it, DVR it, or record it with whatever means you have)!  :0)  Oh, BTW, these were the post cards they sent to us so we could send them out.  Obviously I couldn't send them to everyone (we don't have your addresses), but we wanted to share it with you.  O.k., so here is the key information:  November 15th (Sunday night), TLC (The Learning Channel), 9 p.m. (Eastern time), "Conjoined Twins After Separation".

Thank you to everyone who has always been so extremely supportive through the years.  We could not have made it this far without you!  We love you all!!!

Kennedy Krieger Institute in October

Here are the photos from our trip to Baltimore in October (finally).  I mean, that's not too bad... it's only November!  The pics definitely don't do our trip justice, especially when Erin started initiating some steps.  You'll just have to watch the videos to see that!  :0)  It was an amazing week of physical therapy, and we couldn't be happier with how hard both Erin and Taylor worked.  Absolute heroes, both of them!  And Jade did a great job helping out and being a good distraction.  We're so proud of them all!