Icatar Family Blog

For the third day of our vacation, we contemplated sitting around the pool or hitting another theme park.  We were pretty tired from Animal Kingdom, so a nice relaxing day would have been nice.  But, we also knew that the next day would be New Years Eve and we had a 7am flight back home on New Years Day.  We didn’t decide until Wednesday morning that we would actually do the theme park that day.  We figured that the parks would be really busy on New Years Eve, and we could relax on Thursday so we wouldn’t be too tired for the flight home.

Click the Read More button below to continue, or view the slideshows and videos below.

On Day 2 of our Florida vacation, we went to Disney’s Animal Kingdom.  Tuesday was a little warmer than Monday.  It was still only in the 60s so we brought some long sleeve shirts with us to the park.  Since the Nickelodeon Suites hotel is only a couple miles from the park, it was a quick ride.  We weren’t quite sure what the parks would be like during this holiday week, but we soon found out that a lot of people like to go to Florida during this time of the year.  Once we got to the park, we got a bunch of maps and immediately tried to map out what we wanted to see and in what order.  Check out the slideshow below, or click the Read More button to read about our Animal Kingdom adventure!

Traditionally, whenever we went on vacations we would never get any family shots or pictures where we were all in the picture.  I also didn’t like the idea of lugging around a large tripod, then having to set it up whenever we wanted to take a picture.  However, I recently found an accessory called the Gorilla Pod which is a mini-tripod with flexible legs.  This cool little tripod can be mounted in a variety of positions and angles so that you can get that perfect picture.  On our recent vacation, we attached the Gorilla Pod to the handle on our stroller and we were able to take many pictures where we were all in it!  The Gorilla Pod also has a quick disconnect feature so that when we wanted to take traditional hand-held photos, we could just quickly remove it from the mount and snap the pictures!  If you haven’t seen it, I urge you to check it out!

Between the Christmas and New Year’s holidays, our family took a trip down to Orlando, Florida for a nice vacation.  We were hoping to get away from the cold and snow that was hammering the Northeast.  It was a relatively short 5-night, 4-day vacation, but so that we wouldn’t be completely exhausted at the end of it, we decided to do theme parks for two days and relax by the pool the other two days. (You can view the slideshow below or click on Read More to continue with the rest of the story.)

On behalf of our family, I'd like to wish you all a happy and prosperous New Year. It is hard to believe that another year has past. I know we all feel as though every year feels like they are passing by faster and faster and this year felt no different. But this year, I have tried to make a conscious effort to "stop and smell the roses" and enjoy life. To quote the great Ferris Bueller:

Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.

I'm compelled to compare this year with where we were last year because it is such a drastic difference of where our family was a year ago with where we are today. Last year, New Years (as were Thanksgiving and Christmas) was completely different from all other years. Julianne and I spent New Years at the hospital with Isabella while Annalise and Nathaniel stayed home with our relatives. While hundreds of thousands of people were celebrating a few blocks from us at Times Square, we watched the ball drop on the tiny hospital television in Isabella's room.

This year, we are all in Orlando for New Years. We spent the last few days after Christmas enjoying the sun and warmer weather here and caught up with Mickey and Minnie and the gang. For the midnight countdown, we went to Downtown Disney where thousands of people walked around and a band was playing some music. When we finished the countdown and midnight struck, everyone around us screamed and yelled, but the five of us joined in a group hug and exchanged kisses and New Years greetings. For those few seconds, it was as if those hundreds of people around us did not exist and Julianne, Annalise, Isabella, Nathaniel, and I were the only ones there - the only ones that mattered. It was a very surreal experience and one that I will never forget.

But since I do have a flight to catch in a couple hours, I thought I would post one picture of us at the Magic Kingdom with Cinderella's Castle shining in the background. Check back soon when we will have more pictures and videos from our vacation.

The whole East coast was blanketed by a snowstorm this weekend, and Norwalk, CT was not spared getting more than a foot of snow.  As I was shoveling the driveway and digging out the cars from under the snow, I was reminded of how much I love summer.  But after I was done, the whole family went out and enjoyed some sledding for the afternoon which was loads of fun – except for Nathaniel, that is.  On the first ride down, I rode with Nathaniel on my lap, and at the bottom of the hill, he was crying and did not want to ride anymore!  Unfortunately, this meant that Julianne and I had to take turns sledding and watching Nathaniel.  After a couple hours, we were finally too tired and too cold to ride anymore and headed home for some hot chocolate.  OK, so maybe a couple hours of snow is reasonable. :)
Check out these photos and videos from the snowstorm of 2009.

 
As the Northeast is blanketed in an early winter snowstorm, we’d like to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.  For the first time in a long time (maybe since I was a kid), I’ve never felt so excited for the Christmas season.  We have the tree up, the house is decorated, and right on schedule, we’ll be getting a few inches of snow to top it all off.  Last year at this time, Julianne and I had been splitting our time at the hospital with Isabella for weeks and we didn’t even have the tree up yet or have time to go shopping.  I urge you all to not only be festive and joyous during the holiday season, but to carry that with you all year, because you never know what the future brings.

Here are a couple pictures and videos from our holiday season so far.  Enjoy!