Decisions, decisions

photo taken from….. http://disneyworldsports.disney.go.com/dwws/en_US/events/eventDetail/detail?name=PrincessHalfMarathonDetailPage&pid=pip-0-3

Too lazy to see if there is a proper way to give credit to a photo I didn’t take on a blog.

I mentioned a while back that my mother and I are going to run the Disney Princess Half Marathon.  It is 56 days, 11 hours, 39 minutes, and 14 seconds away.  I am a bit (okay more than a bit) nervous about this, I have never run this far before.

I am not really nervous that I can’t do it.  It’s a matter of not getting kicked out of it.  There is a time requirement you have to make…16 minute miles.  I did a 10 mile last fall and had a 12:20 pace, so we should be fine.  But, there is fun entertainment and the photo stops, the characters are on the sidelines for photos, etc.  So if we want to play we need to watch our time.

We finally have our resort booked, trying something new,  Port Orleans Riverside. Mainly because it’s the cheapest room we can get that has a hot tub at the resort so we can go soak ourselves after the race, and there is boat transportation from the hotel to Downtown Disney, a girl has to shop on a girl’s weekend.

We signed up for the Disney Give a Day Get a Day promo and we are volunteering this weekend.  Love the promotion, great idea….just wish they would let you park hop with it.  It is a one day, one park and because we are there for such a short time we really don’t want to spend $75 for a second day when we would only get a half day in the parks.

Sooo…..my big decision is, if you had to pick one park, for two adults (no kiddos) which park would you choose?  If it makes any difference I will add that Epcot is having the International Flower show….photo below. 

We do get to run through Magic Kingdom, the castle, etc.  I just feel like a trip to Disneyworld isn’t complete without a visit to the Magic Kingdom, but I can only count an handful of things I really would do there without the kids, probably only doing Small World In Fantasyland and skipping Toontown altogether. Something about the magical feeling with the castle, Main Street, etc.

I have just told my mother to pick, I was just there in Nov, but she wants me to pick, ugh!

Another photo I didn’t take, found it here with tons of other cool photos.

http://images.google.com/images?hl=en&rlz=1T4GWYE_enUS315US206&q=Epcot+international+flower+and+garden+festival+photos&um=1&ie=UTF-8&ei=Rx1GS6mAJYToM6SsvIQD&sa=X&oi=image_result_group&ct=title&resnum=1&ved=0CBAQsAQwAA

So, anyone want to help me make a decision?  Also, we are going to do a pasta dinner the night before the race, would you do it with the Princesses or Mickey and the gang?

Wordless Wednesday

Our baggie books

Every year after Christmas we take the photo cards we receive and cut the photos down and make a book.  The kids have fun looking at family and friends, its also nice to help them learn the names of family that we don’t see very often.

I have a few friends that are doing the 365 project, a post or photo each day of the year….I already missed a few days.  I might need to change it to a weekly project, 52 posts, lol!  I’m still going to try.  Plus if I do it more frequently, I will have fewer huge catch up posts.

First Movie

This week we were able to take Liam and Brenna to their first movie.  The plan originally was for Ed to take Liam to see Curious George last Saturday and then I would take Brenna to see Princess and the Frog through the week.

The morning of the movie I told Liam that Daddy was going totake him to see Curious George.  I told him he got to go by himself….you know some one on one time.  He wanted Brenna to go, so I told him that I was going to take Brenna to see the Princess movie.  He said he wanted to see the “Tiana Frog” movie. 

So we changed the plans and were going to take them both to see Princess and the Frog during the week.  We lined up Bumpa to hang out with Braeden so he would be spared the Princess movie.  He went to see Alvin and the Chipmunks with Bumpa the week before.

So the morning we are ready to go and Liam is crying that he wants to see Curious George.  Brenna yelled….”I no want Tiana, I want Cinderella”.  I almost just cancelled it all, but decided to go through with it.

Glad I didn’t cancel, the kids both really like the movie and sat through it really well, especially with it being their first movie.  It definitely wasn’t all princessy and girly, lots of fun frogs and crocodiles, etc.

Here is a photo of the two engrossed in the movie.

As an added note, here is a photo of Braeden at his first movie, The Heffalump movie when he was about the same age.

Happy New Year!

I have really been slacking here the past few months.  Went from Braeden’s b-day, to mine, to Halloween, to Disney, then my ornament making, Thanksgiving, Christmas preparations to New Years.  I have been slacking on my Wii Fit and blogging time, both things I like to do. 

My goal this year is instead of spending all of naptime doing things I need to do, to give myself the first 30-45 minutes to do the things I want to do.  We will see how it goes.

Fingers Crossed!

Day 6 and 7…the end! On to Christmas!

Brenna’s first haircut

We started off at the barber, so Brenna could get her first haircut at Disney.  I wish we could have waited for Liam, but it couldn’t wait.  She was happy getting to play with all the toys and bubbles as she got her hair done.  The best part of it was with the haircut (which was only $14….that is a bargain for Disney) you get a certificate and Mickey Mouse Ears that say “First Haircut”.

We spent the morning at Magic Kingdom, hitting things we missed or wanted to do again.  We finally met Princess Tiana and ate lunch at the Crystal Palace with Pooh and Friends.  We found a cool street party parade which Brenna loved, she got out and danced and danced without a care in the world.  If I get time I will put a short video on, I ran out of memory on that camera.

That afternoon we headed over to Epcot.  We each got a turn to take Braeden on Soarin while Liam and Brenna napped.  While they were napping they got their picture taken with Chip and Dale…..we got a similar one back at Disneyland last year.

This year….

Last year in California…look how they have grown.

 

Ed got a chance to ride the Segway and then we explore the World Showcase.

It was late we headed out.  We were talking about what we wanted to do our last half day and Braeden wanted to go back to Hollywood Studios and do Toy Story Mania.  I knew it would be pushing it, so I looked and HS had Magic Hours for the Resort Guests until 11pm.  So we got the little ones off to bed and Braeden and I headed back out to HS.  The only purpose was to go on this ride and then come back.  We got there and there was a 45 minute wait in the standby line with no fast passes.  We decided to wait it out.  It took about 30 minutes to get on the ride and in the middle of the ride it broke down.  If you aren’t familiar with the game, its like a video game where you aim at the targets and knock things down to get points…and its in 3D.  Anyway, we missed over half of the ride.  Braeden was so disappointed and when we got done I mentioned it and the people behind us said they had the same problem.  They pulled us aside and we waited about 10 minutes and they got us on again…thank goodness.  ONLY to have the same thing happen, AGAIN.  The crazy thing was it was just us.  I am thinking, they aren’t going to believe me. 

When I got back up to the front, I am like, you aren’t going to believe it, but it did it again.  The girls were laughing.  She said they get a signal that tells when it happens and what car it was.  They were saying to each other they hoped it wasn’t our car again, then when we came out, they saw it WAS us again.  Soooo….we went on it again.  It worked the last time and Braeden was happy, he said he just got a few practice rides before playing for real, guess that is one way to look at it.

The next morning we had time to pack and then head over to Chef Mickey’s for breakfast.  We had breakfast and then headed back to the Magic Kingdom for one last time.  We rode on the train, Buzz Lightyear, watched a show in front of the castle, one last monorail ride and then caught the 3:00 parade before heading to the airport.

We have been home for a month now and the kids still talk about “Cinderella’s Castle” and the monorail daily.  We made many memories and I’m glad we did the trip when they were this age, next time (2011???) will be a whole different experience.

Day 5 – Our Free Day!!!

Yikes, been home a  month now and still working on the last few days, if not for anyone else to read, but for me to have for myself.

Originally we were going to spend Sunday would our friends Mike and Debbie who live in Sarasota. Actually that is the main reason we even rented a car, although in hindsight, if you have little ones the car is the way to go.  You aren’t stuck anywhere waiting for the next bus, etc.

As we got a few weeks away from the trip I contacted them to see how they felt about the upcoming visit.  Their son was born at 26 weeks in Feb, actually on Liam and Brenna’s birthday.  They had a long journey ahead, they spent 4 months in the NICU before he arrived home.  With all the swine flu going around, I was a bit nervous about even making the trip to Disney.  (the happiest and germiest place on earth)  Anyway, I was worried what if our kids picked up something and we didn’t know it and they passed in on to baby Alex, it could have severe consequences for him.  After talking to Mike he said he would talk to Deb and see what she thought.  Eventually we all decided it wasn’t worth the risk and we would get a chance to see Alex the next time they visit Michigan.  (hopefully soon)

So we were able to take it easy that day.  We headed over to Downtown Disney and ate lunch at Planet Hollywood, then explored the area.  Braeden loved the Lego store and Brenna loved hanging out with the life size princess statues.  The train was Liam’s favorite, he rode it twice.  We got the kids their first HUGE lollipop.  They were sooo icky and sticky!  As soon as we hit the road they all passed out.  I dropped Ed off at ESPN Zone as I drove around with the sleeping kids.

After the kids woke we went to the hotel playground and hung out for a bit, it was nice to have a place to go to just sit down and relax and not have to worry about losing the little ones, it was a nice peaceful area we had to ourselves.  We ate dinner and finished off the night with a swim.  A nice relaxing day, although we were disappointed we didn’t get to visit with friends, it was a nice carefree family day.  I would recommend an off day if you are spending a week down there.