Baptism

Allison in her new dress.

Allison with her Daddy before the baptism. She loves her dadddy.

If you notice the lack of usual energy from the two older Dittmer boys, you aren't mistaken. Both were feeling under the weather. "After much deliberation" it was decided to go ahead with the baptism. It wasn't a decision easily made. I'm honestly very glad to have it done.

This is one excited girl for scriptures. Uncle Grandpa and Aunt Grandma gave these to her with her name engraved.

Reading over the notes people gave her. I love having a girl. I am proud of her and proud to say she's my daughter. I am so thankful to Heavenly Father for sending me such a sweet spirit. She truly is a sunshine.

Allison

Allison looks pretty good, but that Tylenol worked wonders. She was sick the last four days visiting my brother in Carlsbad.

JoAnne and Andy on a leisure hike. Ha Ha. He tried to kill me and his pregnant wife, Trevyan with a mountain climb. I must add that Trevyan is in much better shape than me by far. She's amazing!

Grandpa and Grandma Thomson were able to come with us to California Adventure for one day. Allison thought it was a super nice treat to sit on Grandma's lap, especially after I'd been dragging her around for 4 days straight.

We ate at Ariel's Grotto. This is the dessert for all of us. Quite the gourmet restaurant. Allison loved the white chocolate seashell.

Allison's favorite princess (this year) is Ariel.

Waiting for our name to be called at Ariel's Grotto. Ooh the suspense!

Grandpa Thomson was game to try on a big hat.

One of Allison's favorite rides was the Inspector Gadget Go Coaster. Fairly long line, very short ride, lots of laughs.

How can we not feature Minnie Mouse? Allison adopted her early on in our trip. Minnie was with us for most of our rides and even buckled in for many of them.

Alice and the Mad Hatter were one of Allison's favorites.

She also loved Goofy. He was pretty funny.

Our first ride in Disneyland, the Nemo ride.

This is the Disney hotel we stayed at for six nights that cost us $0!! Loved it!

Allison's 8th party. Such concentration. She must be opening presents.

Allison's 8th Birthday party. Look at those princesses. We might need to send them to finishing school after coming to this party.

Ribbit. Mom wimped out on a fancy cake this year, but Allison seemed happy with this.

Stupid Ecomony

Well it's finally starting to happen to The Dittmer Household. I'm so tired of hearing about "the economy" and "how the economy is today" and "in times like these." It's just causing more problems the more you talk about it.



Justin's work "temporarily" stopped matching our 401k. That's a huge hit! They were matching 100% ! Then they dropped the car allowance from $650 to $450 a month. Whammie!
The trip he won to Seattle for being Territory Manager (western US) might be postponed too. Smackdown!

Now I'm feeling super tight with our money and having a hard time planning on a trip to Disney World this Christmas. Now if it were a trip with Justin to the Caribbean it wouldn't be so hard to justify (wink wink).

New Memories

Ammon has discovered Willy Wonka and the Charlie Factory. Except it's the new one with hunky Johnny Depp. Except Johnny Depp is not hunky in this movie at all.

Ammon has never watched a movie so many times in a row. I'm talking, he asks for it all day long; we try some distraction techniques. I wish I had a copy of the old one. It is so much better, and not quite as creepy. I'll have to look into buying it next time I see it on sale, or watch eBay perhaps. Gotta get his childhood memories straightened out.

Die Hard Fishie

We have owned a 5 gallon fish tank for several years. The kids seem to still enjoy it. Isaac has been wanting a plecostomus (algae eater) for a very very long time. We finally bit the bullet and bought one after Christmas, along with two tiny frogs (super cute!). Well, we still have one frog alive last I checked, but in one week, we lost one frog, one plecostomus, and two blue guppies. There must be something wrong with our water. Cha-Ching! Money down the toilet - pun intended.
We have this orange mollly. We've had it for at least one year and counting. It doesn't want to die! It has lived through all kinds of trials; having to deal with murky waters, algae, new friends, friends dying, and inconsistent feedings. It's a trooper.
I want to be like our little orange fish. It has a willpower to keep going through tough times. Reminds me of Job.

Letter E

Ammon was (as usual) needy for attention, so I decided we'd work on the letter E, even though his friend, Benny, is out of town. He knew the sound of the letter even before we started today. I think it's because we have this fridge toy that plays the letter sounds with a catchy tune. So catchy that Justin goes around the house singing "A says A and A says ah, every letter makes a sound, A says A and ah." We made an elephant puppet, which right now he's snuggled up with in his doggie sleeping bag,watching The Jungle Book. We read Green Eggs and Ham and looked through a picture dictionary and found other things that begin with the letter E. He seems to love the attention. It made me sleepy.
I've been spending insane amounts of time on the internet researching my trip with Allison to Disneyland in about 5 weeks. I am getting excited! I'm also nervous about being alone with a kid, in places unknown. I have a fear of doing things out of my comfort zone. And I'm not talking about how everyone has these fears. I inherited it from my Mom. Blah blah blah, I know it's good for me to get out there in life and just live it, but it's scary sometimes!
I found out yesterday that I have a minor allergic reaction to sunflower seeds. This is ironic because I am so addicted. I can go through a pound in a week easily. Disgusting, I know. I'm going to try not eating nuts for a couple of weeks and see if I notice any changes. This should be interesting. I'm not eating gluten or any milk products either. Very boring diet.

Huh?

Sliding. This is a new term for me. Well at least what Minnesotans refer to it as, which is: sledding. I've now heard two locals call it this, so it must be true. Kind of like Duck, Duck, Gray Duck, and "budging" in line. Funny Minnesota-isms.