Disneyworld without the Family

So here is a picture from last year. The only difference this year is that Magan, Sam and Davis were not there.

I finally got to go on a business trip to Orlando, but did not get to bring the family because Anabelle is so little…even tho I still tried to talk Magan into it. But anyway…just a quick blog for the Disney fans.

I arrived on Sunday night and after waiting for baggage, riding the bus to the rental car place, driving to the Downtown Disney Hilton, Checking in, Riding the Bus to the Magic Kingdom, Getting on the Resort Monorail, Waiting for the monorail to begin working due to some computer issues, Riding to the Grand Floridian, then walking through the lobby asking for directions to Narcossees, I finally arrived for my dinner reservation shortly before 8:30 PM in time to watch some of the fireworks over the castle.

My dinner was excellent. The view was wonderful, I had a direct view of the Castle and Space Mountain, while watching the monorail make its rounds. I began with a Ceasar Salad that was delicious, then had one of the best meals I’ve had in a long time…crab crusted Mahi Mahi over potatoes. Here is a picture of my dinner (I found it on another blog of someone who at the same)

And now I will jump to Tuesday where I was able to use my free ticket (I volunteered the week before by donating blood) to enter EPCOT. Wearing my “Honorary VoluntEAR” badge, I quickly ran to the Spaceship Earth ride which I was unable to ride last January during our trip.

And my route for the remainder of the day went as follows:

· Got FastPass for Soarin.
· Took the Behind the Seeds Tour of the Land Pavilion Greenhouses (Please…no one should ever choose to take this tour).
· Rode the new “Sum of All Thrills” build your own roller coaster ride in Innovations (This was really neat).
· Rode Test Track (My favorite at EPCOT).
· Watched the American Adventure at the USA Pavilion (First time for this show…It was really great).
· Ate Supper at the German Pavilion (A Meat lovers fantasy…then the chocolate desserts were awesome).
· Rode Soarin with my FastPass (This ride just makes me smile). Went shopping for souvenirs at MouseGears (10% off with Disney Visa).
· Rode Test Track, then Rode Test Track Again (Did I mention this is my favorite, and if you are in the single rider line, you get to skip the annoying preshow video).
· Watched the Fireworks show (Probably the best of the fireworks shows at Disney).

Fun Day back in the Sun

I will begin my blog on Martin Luther King Jr day with a book recommendation, The Help, by Kathryn Stockett. I am about 2/3rds of the way through this audiobook, and it is great. It tells the story of black maids “the help” working for white women in Jackson, MS during the civil rights movement. It talks about the racial lines that were not crossed in those days, and how those lines were passed down from one generation to the next. It is amazing to me to know that this is the way things were only about 40 years ago. We’ve still got some issues, but we’re making progress, one generation at a time.

OK…just wanted to also write quickly about the fun things we did today outside. Magan and I were cleaning in the basement and the garage, and I looked out the window to see Dave dragging his big wheel up the little hill behind the house. This was strange to me, because Sam is more of the thrill seeker, and Davis is usually scared about speeding down hills. I ran outside just to make sure he was ok, and then he came down pretty fast, but stopped short of the swingset. Sam witnessed this initial trip down, and immediately wanted to join in the fun…but he first ran to get him and Dave some “helmets” (plastic police man hats).

Here are some pics of them as they went up and down and up and down the hill…

And back in the house, Magan had found a barn that works for their megablocks, which we found out made a good base for our tower to the ceiling. So I moved it over to the bunkbed ladder where they could build it really high. They had a blast and made the tower several times. The picture below is 2 seconds before it collapsed…then was kicked and punched to the ground.

And Davis got to hold a little lizard, It was "his friend"

This was the other night, but it is usually where they like to sit on the couch. :)