Florida: Days Two and Three...

Two more days at Universal Studios (they have a deal -- buy 2 days and get the 3rd free!)  Again we headed straight for the Harry Potter stuff. 

  Hamming it up on Hagrid's Motorcycle

 Playing with a bunch of stuff that we weren't going to buy. 

 

 Here's where you meet Anna (blog nickname).  She's basically one of the nicest people in the world.  Plus she gets summers off and we had room for a 6th so we invited her along on our trip to Florida. She was awesome to have around, and I think she had fun too :)

At the Leaky Cauldron in the London part of Harry Potter world.  Yummy English food and Butterbeer.  (it comes frozen, cold or hot, I was not prepared for those choices!)

 So two people on our trip had nosebleeds...

 Photo-bomb! 

  I've always been fascinated by the E.T. ride, who else remembers the commercials from back in the day?  Well I finally rode it!  Twice!  We even got to ride the bike that holds E.T. both times--how much do you envy me?

 Suddenly Yoda loves Woody woodpecker! 

 We rode this like 8 times....

 Yoda is also into cars lately!  He likes to figure out cars by their symbols since he can't totally read yet.  He was so excited to see these old Chevy's (this one is from the American Graffiti movie)

 Storm clouds rolling in...we stayed through the rain all the way to closing! 

 Day Three, this day we wore our bathing suits! 

 He ran up to him and gave him a hug! 

 Pretend you're mad like Yoda. 

Pretend you're not mad, Yoda isn't pulling it off.  

 Crossing Delancey...Get your hands off her! 

 Running after the Knight bus

 holding together the leaky cauldron.

 Platform 9 and three quarters

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Here's where you walk through the wall of the station and disappear. That's me yelling "go!" at the end because the people behind us were getting a little antsy...

 Sometime during day 2 we caved and bought the crazy wands that you wave at windows in Harry Potter world and make stuff happen.  It's fun, but also kind of hard to get the hand motion just right. 

 Mimi LOVES Nancy comics, so we were happy to eat at the comic cafe

Still HOT!

 Parker wanted a coin minted just for him for his souvenir.  They made it a fun experience.

 Playing in Jurassic World

  Scanning for fossils. 

After water rides and LOTS OF RAIN, we got some goodies in Dr. Suess land and called it day.

More to come....

Florida

As a family we have done: 

Family reunions

Trips to see family

Holidays to see family

A few weekend and day trips

Never a vacation all on our own...

This was our year...

DAY ONE -- a very long drive, even for us.  We drove all 15 hours in one day. 

 we bring along the "earmuffs" and people take turns using them to have a little silence now and then. 

 Parker didn't bring enough graphic novels and ran out in the first few hours...

Greg drove most of the way, very serious...

 DVD player with 80's Saturday morning cartoons, a must!

DAY TWO

 We started at Universal Studios Islands of Adventure, and headed straight to 

The Wizarding World of Harry Potter.

 Most of the rides Yoda could go on, but a few he couldn't, so he tried out the seats just to be sure he was too small. 

 Yikes!

 Basically it was HOT!  But most of the rides were in shade with fans or with water misting, or even inside with A/C. 

 Off of the hippogriff ride, one of Maureen's favorites. 

 Hogwarts and another of their favorite rides, Forbidden Journey. 

 Hogsmeade

 Parker was pretty excited for Poseidon's Fury.  He says Poseidon is the best Greek god. 

 One of the best parts of going when we did was there were very few lines.  We rode the carousel and many other Dr. Suess rides over and over without any waiting. 

 Our first of many overpriced meals. 

 We got most of the way through our to-do list for one Universal park and decided to head to the other one.  There is a replica of the train Harry Potter takes to school that goes between the parks.  Very cool. 

 Now we are in London at the other Universal park.  There's a giant dragon in the top of the picture above--you can barely make it out.  It would breath fire every few minutes.  People stood there with cameras waiting for the fire to come, not realizing it was on a timer.  We started telling people to look up every 10 minutes, they looked relieved to not have to wait with their arms in the air.  You could actually feel the heat standing under it!  

 Butter-beer ice cream. 

I got a Pumpkin juice. 

 Opening the walls in London to Diagonally

 it was so hot.

We walked into the Simpsons World, we didn't take many photos, oops. 

Next few days coming up!  

What Mimi wore

While she is still a brownie I wanted to get a photo of her in one of her brownie shirts, she's quickly outgrowing it! 

And here she was getting ready for the 3rd grade field trip to the old village in town (you would love it, Chris) she's wearing the bonnet that Grandma Shauna made for her. 

 My mom made me a bonnet, too!  

She was pretty darn excited for that Dilly bar when the whole thing was over! 

A moment in the park with Yoda on the monkey bars

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hugs

Me to Yoda one day when he looked like he had grown a few inches overnight, "What if you get so big I won't be able to hug you any more?"
Yoda, very concerned and re-assuredly, "I'll just have longer arms to hug you!"
Me *aw!*

*****

Greg took an exam this month-- keep your fingers crossed until we get the results in a couple months!

When he got home everyone was SO happy to see him!  It's like we don't see him at all while he's studying.