Disney!! (Post 3))

The rest!!!

Magic Kingdom:

Be Our Guest breakfast on Tuesday!! Yay for getting into the park before opening because of breakfast reservations!! We ran into our old neighbors from AL while waiting to get in, and their daughter had her hair appointment at the same time as Olivia! Be Our Guest was fun, too! It was cool to see Belle's castle and eat $14 Fruit Loops!

 

Jason loved the carousel and rode it about ten times throughout our visit! He would point and say, "horse!" And when asked now about Disney, that is often his response...or Mouse!

 

 

Olivia was an awesome sport and rode everything! One of her favorites was the teacups! First with Jason and then just us:

 

 

Nicholas and Olivia even did Space Mountain!

 

Later in the afternoon, Olivia got to go to the Bippity Boppity Boutique and get her hair, nails, and make up done by her fairy godmother! She was over the moon!

 

 

Then we had dinner at a funny character dinner with Cinderella's step sisters! Super cute!

 

 

Princess pictures day 4:

 

Leo had fun, too, but he just doesn't like having his picture taken as much, do I have fewer of him...

Animal Kingdom:

Wednesday the kids weren't big fans of animal Kingdom, or maybe they just wanted to go back to Magic kingdom, so we didn't explore much...

 

 

After we did a safari and checked out Africa, the big kids and Nicholas headed to Magic Kingdom and Jason and I looked at animals for a while before heading back for his nap.

 

Later that day we ran into Olivia's friend from school at Magic Kingdom!

 

We didn't have dinner reservations, so we went to the pool and then got take out back to our room!

 

 

On Thursday, we had breakfast at our hotel at Chef Mickey's and then headed back to Magic Kingdom for the morning. Olivia got so many autographs from the characters! Leo even got his picture taken with Goofy!!

 

At the hotel with Jason's bubble wand:

 

Souvenirs!!

 

Dumbo!!

 

More carousel and "It's A Small a World" and "Peter Pan's Flight"... Olivia and Nicholas went on "Space Mountain" and "Seven Dwarves Mine Train"... We did the "Jungle Cruise" and Aladin's Magic Carpets and Buzz Lightyear's ride a few times! I got a Dole Whip and loved it!

 

 

 

Our best meal may have been on our last night in Epcot at Akershus in Norway at the princess dinner. The kids got pizza, but I had a yummy pork chop with some kind of raisin chutney that was awesome!! Olivia loved the princesses, too!

 

The boys and I explored while Olivia and Nicholas waited in line for Anna and Elsa... We found a model train set outside that they liked and saw a bridge going up to let the light show out!

 

We had a wonderful vacation!! It was great to be so together!! This was my favorite photo of the trip...not all the moments were this spontaneously sweet, but I was so happy to see them when they were!

 

Disney!! (Post 2)

Day 3:

 

Our first day at the parks! We bused over to Hollywood Studios in the morning...this plan was because it was the only lace with Lightning McQueen, but we found out before we left that he was no longer there...his exhibit having moved to DisneyLand. We kept with our schedule since we had dining reservations there, though. The bus was fun! The entrance to the park was impressive! Leo and Jason jumped in bubbles throughout the first "street!" We walked further in and got in line for the Voyage of the Little Mermaid. They hated it!! Ha! They were scared of Ursula. We should have known our sweet sensitive kids better. We walked around a bit more and saw some fun stuff. The kids liked our character breakfast and especially when I hammed it up with the characters!

 

 

We did penny presses for souvenirs, saw storm troopers marching down the boulevard, and took it all in before heading back to our hotel for Jason's nap and some swim time for the big kids!

Later that day...

Epcot!! I love Epcot! We walked through the world showcase to Japan for dinner! One of our favorite memories is Leo laughing with excitement and exclaiming "That guy is awesome!" about the chef at Tepon Edo. We all are ready we'll that night--beef, shrimp, and salmon! Yum! 

 

All of us went on spaceship earth later, and  Nicholas and the big kids stayed for our Frozen Ever After fastpass while I took Jason back to bed.

This is the view of Cinderella's Castle from our room!

 

Disney!! (Post 1)

I know that my post will not do our trip justice, but I am going to attempt. All the planning and cost was worth this super fun trip!

Day 1:

We left Saturday, December 3 around nine and drove to Jacksonville, FL with three excited kids!

 

We played at rest areas and took our time!

 

Day 2:

We checked into the Contemporary at 11 on Sunday! That gave plenty of time to ride the monorails, eat, swim, ride a ferry and eat again!!

 

 

The pictures don't do the view justice at all. We were so close to Magic Kingdom that our hotel physically shook from the ten PM fireworks! 

 

You can see the Grand Floridian from this one:

 

The ferry ride to the Wilderness Lodge for dinner:

 

Thanksgiving 2016

We had fun baking and...

 

 

The apple pie turned out great!

Dinner was yummy and it was great that Mutti came so we had family to share our blessings with!

 

 

While the other adults napped ( Nicholas was sick), The kids and I went to the park. I got the biggest kick out of Olivia and her turkey wing!

 

Then Friday we put up the tree!

 

 

 

And we went to another park and enjoyed being outside and together!! Love you, Mutti! Thanks for coming so far to be with us!

Bill and Tamara's visit

As my second most avid silent reader of this blog, I must apologize to Grandpa Bill for being so late in posting about their visit! (Do you all see what losing the Blogger app has done to me? I am practically not blogging anymore!)

Bill and Tamara visited us November 10-13, and we are so happy they did! I got zero pictures of them playing with the kids, but they did a lot! And the kids were thrilled with all the attention--playing Legos, kicking balls, watching every type of show off activity from martial arts moves to violin to Nexo powers to play doh! 

Nicholas and Bill spent a good amount of time repairing the water damage in the master closet, which was a huge help! This was an in-progress picture where the wall was repaired by Bill and the holes were open to dry out the mold and apply anti-microbial paint.

 

Even with sick kiddos--Jason had a double ear infection and strep throats and Olivia had strep--we still made it out to Ruth Chris Steakhouse Saturday night and it was awesome! Having adult conversation, eating delicious food, drinking yummy wine, and just enjoying each other was just what the doctor ordered!! Thanks for coming, Bill and Tamara! And thank you for picking up the tab more than once! We love you!

Disney in December

 I can't wait!!

Halloween 2016

 

Leo was a Lego Nexo Knight named Clay for Halloween! He was adorable at his preschool song fest!!

 

 

 

My boys were out of school on Halloween, so we did story time and had fun there!

 

My group in the neighborhood had a Halloween get together, and Nicholas and I even dressed up...sort of. We were the king and queen, along with our little prince, an angel, and a Lego knight!