Hallelujah!!

Ok, so it was about 6 weeks ago when my sweet daughter dropped my laptop on the floor and my hard drive completely crashed. For about 2 weeks I was beyond sick about it. I had not backed up to my external hard drive for probably over a year. So, for the past year, all the pictures of my kiddos were gone. ;( And I was really upset about all the Disney pictures. It was such a memorable time and I didn't have pictures. Now, I did have pictures from my phone, my mom's and Shawn's, but I took pictures on my camera of just about everything, especially of Star Wars weekend. Long story short, I have been completely bummed about it.

My dad has a friend that worked in IT and he has been working with my dad over the past month, trying different things (including putting my hard drive in the freezer) to see if they could get it to work. Last week they downloaded a recovery software program and started running it. It took over 3 days for the data to transfer from my hard drive to a new external hard drive. It finished up this morning, so I went over to my parents' house to check it out.

As they were looking through all the files, there were several (like 16,000) JPEG files and we opened up a few and they were definitely pictures that I didn't want to lose. Later we started digging into the files and we found some video from Jase's birthday party this year, but could not find any pictures that were past April 30, 2012. Meaning that we could not find any Disney pictures. All of the pictures that were saved from the recovery saved in a random fashion; I did not see any of my file folders or anything. Then when I looked in one folder, I noticed that it kind of looked like my old hard drive. I ended up clicking in the User folder, then Jessica, then Pictures . . . and there they were!!!! Every single one of my pictures were there! I was so relieved and so thankful! All of my documents, favorites, folders, everything was there!! Praise God! So thankful for my dad and his friend, and the time they spent on it!!!

I had to take this picture with my phone when I pulled it up!

I told Shawn that if we recovered pictures that I would be printing several pictures; photobooks or something! So excited to have these pictures back again and all the memories they stand for!

Garden Gone Wild

So our garden has really taken off.  Some crops are doing better than others, but overall I am really happy with the production.  At first the squash were going crazy, but I'm not sure if the cucumbers are choking them out and taking over, but it looks like the cucumbers have really hit a growing spurt. The two tomato plants are not doing so hot.  Production has slowed down and what is left seems to rot on the vine and they are staying green.  It doesn't look like bugs are getting to them, but something else . . . maybe the heat! Ha!!  I read about what could be causing some of the decay on the way home from Disney, but I just haven't gotten around to treating them.  I planted other tomato plants from the seed and they are starting to produce now as well, we'll see how they do.

The cantaloupe and watermelon have completely went nuts and are growing everywhere.  I haven't seen any fruit from them yet though . . . until today.  I was looking at all of the plants and saw this green ball in the midst of all the cantaloupe vines.  It is a good size too, bigger than my fist.  That is the only one I saw from the cantaloupe and watermelon.

Tonight was the last night for VBS.  I had so much fun with our preschoolers this week and hope they had fun as well.  While it was a good time, this Momma is pretty tired and looking forward to some relaxation.

Jase continued to have a blast and was still going strong as we finished up the week tonight!

When we got home tonight, we ate dinner and then the kids studied the Disney maps.  They have been on the kitchen table for a few days and Allyson will look at them after every meal lately.  For 2 years old, she can tell you quite a bit from our vacation and where things are located on the maps.  I need to finish organizing our pictures and order pictures for the kids' autograph books.  I would like to do a family scrapbook, but that may be may pushed to the back burner since I still need to get around with Finn coming soon!!  There is always another project waiting in the wings!

And for those inquiring minds, Allyson did not have any accidents during her nap time today.  She actually pooped in her potty this morning . . . HUGE DEAL!!  And tonight before bed, she pottied in her potty!  I picked her up some princess panties today and I think we might put them on her early in the morning since we should be home the most of the day (doing laundry!). 

Is it that time already?

I can't believe that we have already spent 6 days in the theme parks and will be headed home tomorrow.

Yesterday we had originally planned to return back to Magic Kingdom, but since Allyson did not care for the main show in front of the castle, I did not want to return and traumatize her even more. She kept telling me "the castle is popping." Poor baby girl. So we decided to go back to Animal Kingdom for the morning. Shawn had a golf tee time at 3:00, so we knew it was going to be a short morning at the park. We got to go on the the Kilimanjaro Safari Expedition again; we all thoroughly enjoyed it. We also got Baloo's signature, from Jungle Book. Kind of a big deal at my house since we are big Jungle Book fans! :)

I ended up getting reservations for lunch at the Tusker House, which is an African/American buffet character dining. Meeting the characters had to be high on Allyson's to do list; she absolutely loves it!! Here is a short clip of her meeting Safari Daisy!

And today was a long, but great day. We spent the day at Hollywood Studios for Star Wars Weekend. We started the day off in the park at 8:20 am and didn't leave until 9:20 pm . . . 13 hours in the park and Jase still didn't want to leave!! Since we were just there on Wed, we were devoting most of our time to Star Wars today. Jase took his picture with a ton of characters today and got their autograph too. Here is a picture of Jase this morning in Darth's Mall.



I think I am still hearing the Star Wars theme song in my head!! I can't wait to download all my pictures and complete their autograph books! :)

Dare to Dream

My mom took Allyson and I to Dare to Dream: Disney Princesses on Ice tonight. Our little princess was very excited to see the princesses. Of course my mom spoiled her with crowns and trinkets and she loved it!! I have a feeling the wand will "break" or "get lost". Haha! Her favorite part of the night was seeing Minnie Mouse in between the acts!