Florida: Day 2- Epcot

It was so nice being able to wake up and make breakfast.  Definitely a huge benefit of being in a house over a hotel.
We planned to get our of the house between 9-10 every morning and today, we made good time.
We set the alarm, piled into the minivan and we were off for our first Disney Park adventure.
The kids were excited but pretty quiet for most of the ride.  A few observations here and there about the trees and grass.  More conversation about how they never knew that this is what Florida would be like.  More small talk about the license plates and a few questions about the estimated arrival time.  As we approached the Welcome to Walt DisneyWorld sign, they shouted 5, 4, 3, 2, 1!  WE ARE IN DISNEY WORLD!  (There are my excited kids!  I knew they were back there somewhere!)

 We stopped in first at Nemo's world.  A huge aquarium where we watched a show about dolphins and another about Manatees.  At the end of the dolphin show, the trainers got the dolphins to smile!  It was amazing!

We then made our way to the Epcot World Showcase, the different countries around the lake.  We made a quick character stop to get Pluto's autograph on the way to Mexico.  Our first autograph of the trip!

 

Mexico: We took a mini boat ride after doing some shopping and then stopped for an autograph from Donald Duck.

Norway:  First stop, Elsa and Anna's house for autographs and then we will make our way over to the new Frozen Ever After ride.

The girls were excited to meet Elsa and Anna!  They were super talkative and 'played' their characters well.  We were definitely not rushed through and the girls got to spend a few minutes taking pictures and admiring the princesses.

When we made our way over to the ride, we saw there was a long wait so we grabbed a few dessert pretzels while we stood in line.  About 3/4 of the way through the family was over this wait.  Everyone started to get real crabby and Hannah almost lost her mind.  The girls had brought their phones and Hailey was pretty content watching a video on Netflix but Hannah was NOT having any of this waiting.  We eventually made it on the ride and after waiting almost 90 minutes, our 4 minute ride was over.  No one was that impressed with the ride after waiting that long. 

China: By the time we got to China everyone was pretty hungry.  We ate lunch at a Chinese restaurant and refueled.  Immediately the attitudes were over and we were ready to enjoy the rest of our day.

Germany: Pretzels as big as your head and ice cold beer!

Italy: Loved to see all of the buildings.  Outside there was a street performer that we stood and watched while I enjoyed a Peach Bellini, it was delish!

Japan: When we got to Japan, Hannah really wanted to try sushi.  She has never had it before.  It was a basic California Roll but she decided she liked it and is hoping to have a sushi date with her aunts someday when we get back!

Morocco: It's so fun to walk through the different areas, set up as though you have been picked up and dropped off there.  Street vendors, smells, characters, it all comes together to give you a truly unique experience.  Here we were able to meet Princess Jasmine.

United Kingdom: Almost around the lake and stopped by to meet Alice in Wonderland.

Other rides: The Seas with Nemo and Friends, Test Track, SpaceShip Earth, Soarin', Disney Pixar Short Film Festival.

One of the best rides of the trip was Soarin'.
You sit in a swing-type of chair and in front of you is a GIANT screen. You soar through the world and experience places by site, sound and smell.  Super cool experience and a must do!


Another favorite was the Test Track.  You design a car and then your design is tested throughout the ride.  At one point you are going over 65 mph.  It was a ton of fun!

After the fireworks we left the park that night.  We had a great first Disney Parks day!

On the way to the car, all you could hear were car horns.  People using their keyfobs to honk the horn and light the lights on their white rental mini van (seriously, so many of the same looking vehicles)

Florida: Day 1- Settling In

The girls woke me up at 8, already wearing their swimsuits.  "Momma, can we go in the pool?!"
How could I turn them down?!  And to make things better, Grandma was willing to go in with them.

We didn't have food at the house yet and it was supposed to rain today so our plan for the day was to settle in.  While the kids got their time in the pool, the grown ups showered and around late morning we were out the door on our way to get some food!

We tried to eat at the Waffle House but the 20 minute wait proved to be too long for this hungry bunch.  We found a TGIFriday's nearby and had lunch.

After lunch we went to Disney Springs, a.k.a. Downtown Disney.

We had some drinks and did some shopping.  It felt amazing to be outside wearing shorts, tshirts and sandals!  I think we may need to plan a warm weather vacation every year from now on.  This is the life!

 

After our adventure on the town, we dropped the guys and kids off at the house and then Judy and I ran some errands.  To Publix for groceries, Target for more groceries and the liquor store.  We grilled steaks for dinner and enjoyed our evening at our home for the week.

After the kids went to bed I planned out our week. Monday-Epcot, Tuesday- Magic Kingdom, Wednesday- golfing for the guys and Animal Kingdom in the afternoon, Thursday- the beach, Friday- Hollywood Studios and Saturday- back home- BOO!  When we planned to be here for a week, it seemed like such a long time.  Now that our week is planned out it already feels half over :-(

I spent the last part of the evening setting up Fast Passes and scoping out the park maps.

It did end up raining pretty hard tonight.  We got some texts from home asking us if we were ok and when we turned on the news we found out that the Floridians were calling this severe weather.  Maybe there was some further away from where we were but thankfully we just had a lot of rain.

Things I didn't know

Today is the day.

The Parmley Family trip to Florida.  Hannah and Hailey's first plane ride. 

Our first official family vacation.

Our plane was leaving this evening around 6:15 pm so we made our way to the airport around 3, arriving at 3:30.  This will give us plenty of time to get through security, check bags, look around, get some dinner and get settled before boarding (we hoped).

Steve and Katie dropped us off (which was so nice of them!) and we had already checked in and had our boarding passes so it was a breeze checking our bags at the curbside service.  We walked into the airport and quickly learned that THIS is the time to travel.  The airport was dead.  Apparently Saturday evening travel isn't very popular.  It was perfect.  We got through security with no trouble and the girls were able to talk to the staff and share with each of them that they were getting on a plane for the first time and heading to Disney!

We arrived a little before Grandma and Grandpa so the girls wanted to look around and use the bathroom.  While we were in the bathroom Hannah washed her hands and after she had gotten the soap on them, said to herself "Hmmmm, I never knew this is what airport soap smells like!".

There were a lot of Ohhhhhs and Ahhhhhhs as they looked down each of the halls of the airport.  They had no idea that you could shop at the airport.  "Is it like this everyday?  Like these shops are always here?  Can we go in there and buy some souvenirs?"  (hard to explain that souvenirs are something you buy when you get to your location, not in the airport in the state where you live)

They walked a few steps down the concourse to the huge windows. 

 "I never knew planes were that big!"

When grandma and grandpa arrived we went to Axel's for some drinks and dinner.

We timed everything perfect.  Once dinner was done we made our way to the gate and only waited about 10 minutes before it was time to board. As soon as there was any sort of announcement that it was time to get on the plane they were up and ready.  "Let's do this!"

These two were so excited.  They could not stop smiling.

Each of the girls got a window seat and even though it would be dark for our flight, they were still excited because they never knew what a birds eye view looked like at night.

They were great on the flight.  As expected Hannah talked my ear off and thankfully the guy in front of us LOVED her and kept telling me how much fun it was to hear how excited she is. 

His daughter is now 22 years old and he misses that. 

They ate snacks, watched movies, listened to music and did some of their homework.

Hannah decided to write on the back of each homework sheet where she was when she did the assignment.  She also knew that her class was starting on fractions this week so she asked us to create some fractions problems for her on the back of her homework.

 

The plane ride was very smooth.
We landed in Florida, got our minivan and then we were on our way.

"I can't believe we are in Florida.  I never knew this is what Florida smells like. I didn't know that Florida had trees like that.  This is so cool!"

It was a short 25 minute ride to the house, we got in and settled.  The kids were exhausted but still too excited to sleep, or so they said......took just a few minutes before they were snoring away.
This is going to be so much fun.

Time for Church

Tonight we went to dinner and then the Eric Church concert with the Anderson's and Holtz's.

It was such a fun night out- great food, fantastic music and wonderful company!

He played for 3 hours.  No opener.  Just him with a short intermission.  It was very impressive.  I thought he sounded amazing and although there was not much fan-fare to his show, it was a good one!  There's nothing like a good ol' country show with great friends. (especially the night before we leave for vacation!)

Science Girls

Tonight was the STEM Fair at school.  The girls were all able to be there to present their project to all of the visitors.  I was pleasantly surprised with both groups.  The girls were not shy at all.  They talked intelligently about their project and shared their findings with anyone that would stop to listen.
Hannah and Annabelle got a ton of compliments on the presentation of their board and Hailey and Chloe got a ton of 'thank yous' from mom's wanting to know the best way to keep their apples fresh!

 

Lots and Lots of Tape

 Tonight the girls put their board together.   They choose all of the colors and fonts.  I did the typing but they did most everything else.  They did a great job!  The board looks so cute!

Getting Close!

 

Hailey continues to keep us all informed of the current number of days until our trip!

Today she was super duper excited and added hearts :-)

Refinish

A while back Hannah accidentally spilled nail polish remover on the table.  Ever since then I have wanted to refinish the table.  I have always loved our table however in the new house the color is not my favorite. The light gold fabric on the chairs has seen better days.

Today we brought the table and reupholstered chairs back into the house!  I have a dining room again.

Brian did such a great job on this stuff!  I am so happy with how it turned out.

3rd Grade STEM Fair

Because I didn't have enough fun helping the 1st graders with their STEM Fair project, today Hannah's friend, Annabelle, came over and I got to help them with their project as well. With help from Annabelle's mom, they decided to see which type of bubble gum would blow the biggest bubble.  They decided they would chew the gum for 2 minutes to 'warm it up' then would blow three bubble with each piece then take the average.  With each piece they made a prediction on whether it would blow a big bubble and why or why not.

Rebels BBall AND 1st Grade STEM Fair AND Furniture Movers

Hannah is playing basketball this year.  3-4 graders and GIRLS ONLY! 

She is on a team with some girls she already knows which always makes it more fun.

Hailey is not a huge fan of having to watch her sister every Saturday morning.  Today she occupied her time writing out Math problems.  She's got this fact table down!

Tonight Chloe slept over so the girls could work on their STEM Fair project.

They worked with Chloe's mom one night to decide their project.  They decided to work on finding out which type of wrapper would keep apple slices the freshest.  They tested green and red apples with tinfoil, paper bags, plastic baggies, wax paper and plastic wrap.

Hailey was supposed to be taking notes about the apples :-) 

Guess she would rather talk about Chloe, her bestie.

We wrapped up the apples and checked on them throughout the night.  Smelling, tasting, touching and recording our observations.  Then we did one more observation in the am.

We were all pretty surprised to see that in the am the red apple could actually

 bend and roll into a ball.

 

Tonight while I was assisting the girls with their experiment my lady friends decided it would be really funny to move our living room furniture around.  Before I could stop them they had picked up the couch and started the relocation....

I have to admit I was freaking out pretty good.  I was not in the mental mind for this to happen.

I was SURE that my family would have something to say about it, not to mention I was in the middle of a science project!  They promised that they would put things back where they found them.  I took a picture so that I could look at it later when I wasn't freaking out.  Showed the picture to the family the next morning and they all wondered why we didn't leave it?!  haha- just goes to show, you think you know someone. We haven't made the change yet.  I think we may have to because the more I look at this picture the more the new set up grows on me but right now we need to just focus on one thing at a time.  Well, two.  STEM Fair and getting my kitchen table back.

After all, the other night when we were all eating at the card table in the dining room, Hannah informed us that she was not a fan of this new dinner arrangement.  It made her feel 'poor'.

Here I Go Again- UGH

I have been going round and round and back and forth about what to do about the table.  I knew right away that I wanted the chairs dark.  That was an easy decision.

I couldn't help but think that I wanted to do something different with the table.

I have seen two tone tables in the past and have loved the way they look.

This however means that I have to make yet another decision (and we all know how awful I am at this!).  I went to Menards one night and forced myself to just choose one.  It's not that hard.  Nobody else will have any idea what color I meant to get and there is no way that anyone would look at the table and say "It looks great but you should have used Color 451 instead.    Well, guess what?  I brought it home and it was all wrong.  WAY to bright white.  So I went to Sherwin Williams- easy, right?  I want a clean creamy whiteish.  How hard could that be?  It's a paint store and I already made one mistake, this time I knew that as soon as I saw it I would know. 

Ummmm..... go check out a paint section of a store and look at how many whiteish colors there are. UGH!

With the help of the guy at the store and after walking around the store in various lighting we finally made a choice.  Brought it home to Brian to try it out.  This time it was perfect!

Now my only issue was trusting the process and trusting in my design decision.

 

It's Gone

I mentioned to Brian that I would love to think about having the table refinished someday.  Next thing I knew he had taken a chair away and sanded it down.  Next it was more chairs and eventually the table.  I guess this is happening now :-)

Day 20

Today I caught Hailey in the mudroom starting the Disney countdown.  I think someone is a little excited.  I too am super excited!  I still can't believe that we are actually going to do this.

We have started looking into some details.  We have our dates picked, we have the house reserved, car rental reservations made.  We are watching airfares and soon will purchase the flights and Disney tickets.  EEK!  I can not wait!  First official family vacation!!