We were so excited a few weeks ago when Payton was invited to go to Disney with his little friend, William, from school to celebrate his friend's birthday. William's uber-creative mom surprised the boys with matching personalized Lightning McQueen Disney t-shirts (that she made!!) along with a wonderfully planned day at Disney.

The day finally came yesterday and we all had such a great time! September is "the month" to go to Disney, as kids are back in school so the park was empty! We walked on to almost every single ride and we were able to ride several rides twice. The boys were treated so great by all the staff members. They got stickers, special "drivers licenses" and they even got to steer the boat on the Jungle Cruise ride!

Payton was thrilled that he was finally tall enough to ride "Thunder Mountain"... I could have done without it... especially the second time! But going to Disney with a 4-year old makes you realize why it's such a magical place. Tears actually welled up in my eyes as I watched him jump up and down waving and yelling "HI MICKEY!!!" as the parade rolled by. It was so precious!

Thank you so much Colleen & William! We had a wonderful day celebrating with you!

"Orange & Blue, Orange & Blue, Orange & Blue!"

Payton is finally old enough to realize that Gator football is a very important element in the Heckman household. Brian has been prepping him for weeks now, watching videos on YouTube of old football games in the Swamp, Gator cheers, Mr. Two Bits... basically any & all Gator traditions you can think of.

Now Payton wants to be Tim Tebow, and he's so excited to watch the 1st football game tomorrow night with a big group of Gator fans! Here are some pics of his pre-game warm up...

Go Cart Racing

When I was growing up, we had this great little Go Cart track near our house (Lil' 500... anyone remember this??). My brother and I would go there with our friends and race each other (really try to push each other into the wall and crash) and have so much fun.

Brian had the idea of taking Payton to a Go Cart track last weekend, so we found a place about 20 minutes from our house. We had so much fun! Payton LOVED it and they had a great arcade and minature golf course. Check out the photos...

Payton's 1st Day of School

Our little man started his final year of preschool the other day. I can't believe he's old enough to be going to school 5 days a week now. He's growing up so fast!!!

4 1/2 years old!

Birthdays are so magical to children. That one day out of the year when the attention is totally focused on them. Everyone brings them gifts, showers them with attention and you get to eat a cake that was specifically made just for them! How fabulous! So, with that in mind, we decided to enjoy this wonderous time twice a year by celebrating Payton's half birthday.

He was so excited when we told him that we were going to celebrate him turning four and a half. When he went to bed the night before, we decorated his door with streamers, I baked and decorated half of a cake (monster truck themed, since that's the obsession of the week), and we took him to Busch Gardens at night (which he's never done).

Basically, just spent the day celebrating what an awesome kid he is! It was such a fun day, I wish I had thought of this idea when I was a kid!

Thomas Live!

Yesterday was a big day in the Heckman household. One that Payton has been looking forward to for almost 6 months. It was finally time for "Thomas Live!" a musical at the Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center where Thomas the Train (and his friends) perform live on stage. I must say, it was truly one of the best shows I've been to. That sounds embarrassing to say, but it was really cute! Of course most of my enjoyment came from watching Payton & his friend Michael react each time another train came out on stage. They were so excited! Overall, it was a wonderful experience and one that I highly recommend to any "Thomas lovers" out there!

I'm posting some pictures here from the show; most are self-explanatory except for the first one where they're eating ice cream (some ice cream vendor gave them ice cream "on the house" before the show)... just what the needed. :) Then the last couple pictures are of the boys picking up the confetti off the ground after the show. We were literally 6 rows from the front so they ran up after the show and gathered up all sorts of confetti. So much fun!!

More Thomas...

Had to post these two videos... they're priceless.

Hang tight through the first one, it gets dark at one point, but then comes back.

The second video is the final song they did and shows the big confetti explosion at the end. Every child's idea of fun!!!