My Second Greatest Hope for My Sons...

Dancing... because any doorway that has rounded steps in front of it is automatically a stage.

To the three little monkeys dancing in our home under construction...

My greatest hope is that you will at an early age come to know Jesus as your Lord and Savior, and place your trust in Him -- and that faith would never waver.

My second greatest hope is that you will then strive to be as much like Jesus as possible -- learning from Him, having a relationship with Him through prayer and reading His words in the Bible, accountability with others who are also in pursuit of Him. May you put into practice what you (hopefully will) believe to be true, and may lasting effects of your relationship with the Lord be felt by generations to come.

So that your dad and I may not forget the importance of this hope, and for you to one day see why this is "kind-of a big deal" to us, please read this. It's a blog post that has greatly impacted me as your mama and given me a renewed sense of urgency (and patience at the same time) in teaching you about what a godly man should be. Your daddy and I love you so.

2012 Days of Sunshine: Days 8-10

This is the last post about our vacation... I promise. :)

On Friday, June 8, we went back to Magic Kingdom. It was a perfect way to bookend our trip, by starting and ending there!

To begin the morning, we ventured by bus over to Epcot so that we could ride the Monorail to the Contemporary Resort for our breakfast reservation at Chef Mickey's. We had such a good time at this character breakfast! Although we were tucked at a table in an odd little alcove that had a wonderful view of a fire extinguisher, we still had photo opportunities with Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Goofy, and Pluto. The breakfast buffet was divine -- everything from Mickey-shaped waffles to omelets, hash browns to quiches, cereal to crepes. Yum!!

After breakfast, it was just a short walk over to the Magic Kingdom. This was the only day we didn't make the "rope drop" when the park opened (except for the mixup on Wednesday), but we were all okay with that as we had spent one day there already. There were definitely some attractions on our "hit list" for the day, but otherwise we were without "The Plan" -- the only plan being to stay to the end of the fireworks that night, rain or shine not! All of us were a bit tired, but at the same time ready to give it our all and enjoy our last day.

Here's what we did on our final, full day at Disney World's Magic Kingdom:

• Peter Pan's Flight
• Small World (ugh... not my favorite, but a "must" while you're there supposedly. One time of getting stuck on this ride for 45 minutes at closing time will cure you of ever wanting to be on this ride again! That happened several years ago to me on a visit to my bro and sis-in-law, while we played at Disneyland one day.)
• Mickey's PhilharMagic
• Prince Charming Carrousel
• Tried to pull the Sword out of the Stone
• Mad Tea Party (teacups)
• Barnstormer (Toben's first ride on a roller coaster) -- At this point, the rain started falling and really didn't stop for the rest of the day, except for small periods of time. This is also about the time that I stopped taking pictures... My camera rode safe and dry in my backpack after this.
• Ryan, Pop, Caleb and Logan went to Stitch's Great Escape while Mom, Toben and I went to Monsters, Inc. Laugh Floor (it was POURING out!)
• Buss Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin
• PeopleMover
• Disney's Carousel of Progress
• Mom and Pop took Toben to Country Bear Jamboree, the Liberty Square Riverboat, and to watch a parade while Ryan and I took the older two boys on Splash Mountain and Big Thunder Mountain Railroad
• Dinner at Columbia Harbour House
• Haunted Mansion
• Shopping
• Wishes fireworks show (A beautiful fireworks and light show! Unfortunately, due to all the rain that day, Tinkerbell didn't 'fly', boo!)

The whole crew at Chef Mickey's!

Remember how Toben was terrified of the characters? He still was -- but we found that by giving him my mom's camera to take pictures of the characters, he wasn't afraid. Whatever works, right?

Dancing with the music and all the patrons at the restaurant! Notice the sticker on his arm? Those were temporary tattoos that I found to put on the boys with a contact number for us if they somehow got separated from our group. Great for peace of mind!

This makes me laugh. I LOVE everyone's expressions - the boys are T.I.R.E.D. and Ryan and I are "c'mon, it's our last day - let's give it all we've got!" We carried the boys quite a bit this day. Also, can you see how dark the sky is? This was at about 10:30am.

Proof that we did, indeed, get properly serenaded in It's a Small World. Now you're singing the song, too. :)

Logan's pose of the day!

I think he's "excited"!! Spin those teacups, Pop!

And now for the iPhone pics... Soaking wet after riding Splash Mountain - Caleb's favorite ride of the week! Notice Logan's pose again... :)

We opted to give the boys one major sugar high to keep them content and awake for the fireworks. At least the rain was washing away the stickiness!

Out of order here, but whatever. :) The boys' first up close look at the Monorail

Cruisin' on the Monorail

Saturday and Sunday were spent driving back to Texas, as we had family (Ryan's mom's side) gathering to honor his precious Granny's life. We made it home safely through torrential rains along the Gulf Coast. The boys were excellent travelers, and we couldn't have asked for them to do any better at this time in their lives.
We are looking forward to going back to Disney someday. It was such an amazing time for us!

2012 Days of Sunshine: Day 6

Wednesday. The day that could have been so much better, yet we still had fun.

I royally messed us up on this day. Because the forecast called for A TON O' RAIN, we I decided to change up our plans. "The Plan" called for us to spend today at Epcot, but since we had done some exploring there the night before and we were to go there again this evening for dinner, we I chose to start off at Hollywood Studios. I'm not entirely sure what my reasoning was for that anymore, or how I convinced the other reasonable adults in our troupe to go along with me... Sigh.

Anyhow, what I completely overlooked was the Extra Magic Hours schedule for the day. Extra Magic Hours are times set aside at each of the parks for them to either open an hour early or stay open several hours past closing for guests of Disney resorts (of which we were included in this group). I had been advised to avoid parks that had EMH because of the extra crowds in attendance, and so had devised "The Plan" based on which parks had EMH the day before. (Does that make any sense?) In theory, crowds would be less at a given park the day after they held EMH.

Well, let me just say, that theory was proven true in our case.

We arrived at Hollywood Studios at opening time, 9am, or so we thought. In actuality, they opened at 8am that day... which meant the "hot ticket" attractions we were really hoping to experience already had wait times of over 90 minutes (Toy Story Mania) or were completely booked (Jedi Training Academy). So, what to do?? We threw "The Plan" out the window for the day and did what we could.

It ended up being a lot of fun, and I'm probably the only one bothered by how it all went. We still had a great day, and made some great memories -- in the end, that's really what matters! Type A Personality, take a back seat! I am so thankful, so very thankful, to have a husband and parents who are willing to go with the flow (props to my Pop, whose nature is not to 'go with the flow' (Tree? I'm Apple.) yet he did a great job of it on this day!).

Here's what we did on our (first) day at Hollywood Studios:

• Star Tours
• taking photos as Storm Troopers
• Disney Junior Live show
• Lunch at Pizza Planet
• Indiana Jones Stunt Spectacular Show
• Toy Story Mania (Ryan went straight there once we entered the park to pull Fast Passes for us! Yay!)
• Mickey Mouse ice cream on a stick before leaving to have some quiet time back at the resort

It started raining on us as we left Hollywood Studios, and was raining fairly hard when we got back to the resort. We had dinner reservations at The Coral Reef in Epcot that evening, so after drying off we loaded up in our van and headed over to Epcot. We decided to go a little early and try to see a few more attractions prior to eating, but since it was raining (and Toben fell asleep on my shoulder) we spent most of that free time in a huge gift shop. The big boys found hats they really wanted and we found a few other souvenirs we'd had our eyes on for a couple of days.

After dinner at The Coral Reef (which was a nice meal, but not one of our favorites), my folks took the boys to a couple more attractions at Epcot while Ryan and I took off for a little date night. Ryan had purchased tickets for us to see The Blue Man Group for my birthday back in April, and the date on the tickets was finally here! We drove over to the Universal Studios parks and had a wonderful time at the show. Sadly, the Blue Man Group wasn't IN the parks so we couldn't sneak over to Harry Potter world before or after the show. That's for another trip, I suppose!

Making R2 Units at the Droid Factory after riding Star Tours

Two happy Jedi Padawans and one not-so-happy, reluctant tagalong

Walking in Main Street America

One of the few family photos

The Disney Junior show

Dancing at the end of the Disney Junior show

We had desserts with every meal. Hey, it was included on the meal plan...didn't mean we finished them every time. This one, however, was devoured by the boys! A chocolate cupcake with peanut butter-chocolate frosting, topped with a chocolate Darth Vader head... at Pizza Planet.

The Indiana Jones Stunt Spectacular Show. Fun show, although they had several 'technical difficulties' during this presentation! You can see dark clouds forming in the skies... so long to a rain-free day.

C-bug boarding our favorite ride, Toy Story Mania!

You can't go to Disney World without having a Mickey Mouse ice cream on a stick! Believe it or not, this was our one and only time to get this yummy treat.

We had a little time to kill before our dinner reservations at The Coral Reef at Epcot, so some souvenir (and hat) shopping was done!

"Arrr, Matey!"

Caleb pretending to be R2-D2 :)

Date night for Ryan and me! After dinner, Mom and Pop took the boys to The Seas with Nemo and Friends at Epcot before heading back to the resort while Ryan and I drove over to Universal to see these guys. What a FUN show!! Highly recommended!!

2012 Days of Sunshine: Day 3 & 4

We arrived in Orlando at about 3:30 Sunday afternoon, after another successful day of driving. My parents met us in the parking lot of the Disney resort we stayed at, Port Orleans Riverside. (Side Note: We loved staying here!! It met and exceeded our expectations wonderfully!) The boys didn't know that Gram and Papa would be joining us for our Disney adventure, so they were rather surprised to see these familiar faces coming out of a familiar car parked next to us! Let me just say up front... it was wonderful having Gram and Papa along for the week!!

Sunday evening was spent exploring the resort and eating our first "Table Service" meal on the dining plan at Boatwrights, the restaurant at Riverside. After a yummy cajun-style meal we walked around the main pool area and the boys played on a playground adjacent to a campfire area where folks could make s'mores and listen to stories told by a Cast Member (employee).

Monday morning our goal was to be at the Magic Kingdom before the park opened at 9, since we'd heard they have a special ceremony that Mickey and the gang do just before the "rope drops" and the park is officially open. I am so glad we got there to see it! It set off our time at Magic Kingdom just right! The boys got so excited and all showed it in different ways -- Caleb grinned from ear to ear, Logan watched attentively, and Toben was both physically and vocally excited.

So that this post doesn't get terribly wordy, and also that I may remember what happened, here are some highlights and a listing of the rides and attractions we experienced on this day:

• Dumbo
• Barnstormer (the boys' first official roller coaster!)
• Tomorrowland Speedway
• Buzz Lightyear (Fast Passes ROCK!!! This was the boys' favorite of the day.)
• People Mover (strangely, one of the boys' favorite rides of the week)
• Astro Orbiter
• Space Mountain (again, Fast Passes are the BEST! Logan enjoyed this one but it was Caleb's least favorite ride of the week.)
• Lunch reservations at Tony's Town Square on Main Street (Italian style... yum!)
• Pirates of the Caribbean
• Swiss Family Treehouse
• The Magic Carpets of Aladdin
• Jungle Cruise

At this point, it was getting very hot outside and we needed a change of pace. We went back to the resort for a bit of down-time and then boarded a water taxi that took us down to Downtown Disney, an area with several shops and places to eat. We enjoyed a dinner at The Earl of Sandwich and then explored The Lego Store. Ryan and I left the boys with my folks and headed to a Christmas store while my parents took the boys to Once Upon a Toy, where the boys each got to build their own Light Saber. I think that was a definite highlight of the week for all the boys involved... my dad included! 

After our water taxi ride back to the resort, we called it a night fairly quickly since we had plans to explore Animal Kingdom the next day!

Some shots of Monday at Magic Kingdom (notice all the sunshine, blue skies, and shadows... those will not be seen the rest of the week!!!)

We had to purchase these files... The faces on Caleb, Logan and my dad are too funny!!

Toben pointing to Mickey Mouse as he arrives on the train! His whole body was shivering in excitement.

First ride of the day on Dumbo!

Tomorrowland Speedway

The boys' first roller coaster: The Barnstormer! We realized on Friday when we went back to MK that Toben was actually tall enough to ride it, too, so he got to experience his first roller coaster then!

Buzz Lightyear. Totally a favorite - you got to ride in a 'car', and shoot at targets with lasers. Made. For. Boys.

The Littles and me on the People Mover

Astro Orbiter

Tony's Town Square for lunch

Loved seeing this giggling face so much! Aladdin's Magic Carpets

Outside the Lego Store in Downtown Disney

Caleb and Ryan were in their 'happy place' at the Lego Store. Are those the eyes of "want" or what? (no, we didn't get that)