Disney's: A Christmas Carol Train Tour

This weekend we took a trip to the Henry Ford to go to the national tour of Disney's: A Christmas Carol. We had a great time! We tried to go Friday, but the wait to get in to the train was over 3 hours! That is a bit excessive since the train tour wasn't longer than a half-hour!! So, we got up bright and early Saturday to be there by the 9am opening time. Believe it or not, we still had at least a 40 minute wait in line! Here are some pictures of us there, and if you click on the link below them, you will be directed to the official site where you can see inside all the train cars.

Us in line, woohoo!! Note the sweaters, it is getting a bit chilly here in Michigan in the mornings already.

Jake was dressed for both Christmas and September. He was super cute!

Alex was thrilled by this cup. When we filled it up for him as we waited in line, he shouted "Look, I am drinking from a CONE!!"

This was at the end of the train part of the activity. Can you tell which of us is the poultry lover?

This is, believe it or not, a theater! We went inside here after our train tour to watch an exclusive sneak peek in 3-D, which was pretty cool after learning how they made the film.

Us inside the movie. The whole thing was lit up with blue lights, so we were temporarily smurfs.

more photos

One of the highlights of our tour was being able to morph our faces into characters from the movie. Our pictures should be emailed to us soon, and as soon as we get them we will post them here on the blog! They all came out hilarious!

Pump success!!

We are official pumpers as of yesterday! This is a photo of Jacob with his pump and his very last shot (unless something goes iffy or his pump breaks *gasp*) that we took yesterday morning before his last class. Things are going really well, in fact it seems too well to be expected. Our nurse we called today was pretty amazed. He was prepared to be doing some serious tweeking of the numbers and no change was needed. So, we will see how it goes and how long our luck lasts! ha So, wish us luck!

All in all this is pretty fun and a lot less stressful that at least I thought it was going to be. Plus, Carl came up with a fabulous alternative to combo bolusing for the pizza we had for dinner last night so that has made it even easier for us! (combo bolusing is a bit confusing for us right now and even more confusing for you I am sure) We will keep you updated on any new interesting pumping action!

Ice Cream Review

Carl came up with a pretty fun and delicious idea, for our blog. He thought that we could spend the rest of what is left of the summer trying new ice cream stands and letting our friends and family know whether they should go there as well. So, he decided to make our first one, our favorite place.


King Kone is located on Ford Rd. just east of Merriman Rd. We used to live across the street from it when we were in our apartment and would go there all the time in the summer! They have very inexpensive prices and creative ice cream concoctions. They sell these frozen cups of mixed up milkshakes and flurries that people order and they mix wrong. They are called Mystery Bars, are super cheap and fun since you never know what will be inside!



On this trip, Alex got a double scoop of Superman ice cream. This stuff is so nasty, it tastes like a nutty fruit mess. I am assuming that kids like it because it is blue and it is ice cream and it is called superman and those are the only reasons, cause it tastes terrible!!


I got a single scoop of one of my all time favorites ,Mint Chocolate Chip. Yum!!


Jacob does not like cones because they are "too crunchy". So he ordered a Sundae. Unfortunately I cannot remember which kind, but they have at least 10 varieties, so it is easy to get them mixed up!

Carl was not feeling the need for some deliciousness that evening, so he passed and was once again the photographer of our journey. I did get a shot of him this time, but it was a pretty silly one and I think I may get in a bit of trouble of I post it, so needless to say, he was there and having a fun time too! So, there is our trip to King Kone. I love them because they have hand-dipped ice cream. That is always such a nice change from all the soft-serve sameness!

This is just a bonus photo from another of our drives. It should speak for itself.

long drives to nowhere in particular

Owning a car that can go more than 10 miles reminded Carl of an activity that we love; namely taking really long drives in random directions, hopefully getting a little lost and then making it back home again! This always proves to be great fun and we have seen some pretty amazing things on our drives. I thought as my first "real" blog return I would chronicle a few of them for you. We always take our camera with us on these adventures. The trick is actually remembering to use it!


This is Jacob, Me and Alex at the Plymouth Art in the Park eating a HUGE plate of sour cream and cheese drenched butterfly fries. They are pretty much potato chips that are all connected. Really the most ridiculous thing to eat as they make a terrible mess and you get it all over you. My shoe still has a cheese stain from this trip! :) We found this taking one of our random drives. The amazing thing is, Carl has lived here all his life, and had never heard of this festival but it has supposedly been held annually for over 20 years! We had a great time.


These next photos are from the same day but earlier in the trip. At this point we were around 6 mile and Eddie Hines. The kids saw this park and wanted to stop. Turned out to be a really awesome park with lots of fun spinning things on the jungle gym and a sweet little river running along side of it. I regret that Carl is never in any of these photos, but he the family camera man, so it is the price we pay I suppose.







I cannot remember what city this restaurant was in, but I just had to take a photo of the enormous moose that was on the side of the building. Of course, judging the speed of the car plus the speed of the shutter and also the general speed of me is not my strong point, so not a real great shot. Ha



Carl stopped the Car so we could take a good shot of this one. We were far out in the boonies on this day and we really couldn't resist snapping a photo of this rooster sculpture that was decorating someone's front yard.


A dream house we passed...oh to own this and make it my own...



I simply love this shot Carl took. This view is what the drives are really all about. Dirt roads like this are a huge reason I love living in Michigan. I haven't had this kind of foliage since I left Northern California. This was one of our best drives, but in the middle of it we had a bathroom emergency and had to head back to civilization. This area had endless possibilities for happiness! The woods went right up to the edge of the road, wildflowers everywhere. We have been trying in vain to find our way back to this spot, but have yet to find it. But that is what makes it fun we know, so we keep searching!


There are a few new places we have found in this state as well. There is a community on Cherry Hill road in Canton where all the houses are painted bright colors, making you think you may have accidentally driven into a movie set, or San Francisco. One one trip we ended up getting so lost that we had to buy a map. Almost ended up in Ohio, about 10 miles from Lake Erie! Funny enough, we were heading south trying to find I-94, ha ha! Neither of us have been that disoriented in a long time!! On that trip we went through the town of Maybee which according to their sign, they "Maybee the best little town in Michigan" hee hee! We also went through Raisenville which is located next to the Raisen River, so that explains the name of the town, but not the river... We also drove through Paris and Milan, how continenetal.

So we have had fun with our drives over the past few months. We can't wait until Fall when our drives will be even better. Nothing like Michigan foliage in the fall! Hope to see you out on the road!

Catching up

Since we were out of the blogging world for so long, there seems to be a lot to catch up on. Not sure if I will be able to do it all, so you should be sure to check our flickr page for a ton of updated photos.

Jacob is getting a pump!

Well, our little boy is growing up. We have passed our Diabetes year mark with no complications and are now eligible to get Jacob a pump. The paperwork is pretty intense, so we won't be getting it for a few months, but Jacob is really excited! His endo nurse fitted him up today with the tubing that he would wear every day with the pump. He is supposed to wear it for two days to make sure there is no problems with the site where it is injected. so, if all goes well he will be starting out the next school year with a new device to wow the school nurses with. The one we decided on was the Animas Ping shown above. Of course he will be getting a blue one, not a pink, ha!

Welcome Back!

Ok, it has been a horrifically long time since our family, well me really, has blogged. But, I hope that this is a permanent comeback as I have always enjoyed sharing our photos and tales here for our family and friends. So, welcome back Bellanger family, we've missed you!