An Evil Volcano, Floating Cheerios, And Lots Of Tonga Toast!-May 2010 TR-UPDATE Day 2

[cinderella crazy]

Oh my goodness! Anyone else feel like they're summer is jam packed? I know ours has!

We went house hunting a couple of weeks ago and found a beautiful subdivision that is building homes. We came very close to starting the process to have a house built but then the realtor told us how much our house was worth. It's gone down in value about $25,000. So we had to ditch the idea of getting a new house.

So this past week, we started looking at how much it would cost to do some upgrades in our house. we figured if we're going to be living here for awhile, we might as well put some work and money into the house to make it look good. That's what I've been doing instead of posting on here. I've been pricing things and painting the areas of the house that have not been painted yet. I've painted the laundry room, the front stairwell and the upstairs hallway. Phew!

That's what I've been doing instead of posting updates. I hope y'all can forgive me! I'm going to try my best to post an update later today. But first, I need to get the kiddos some lunch!

 

[GaRain]

Another SEC fan! Woohoo! I'll cheer for any SEC team as long as they're not playing UT.
QUOTE]

I will be looking for you when I need some help cheering for my GA Bulldawgs!

 

[MissLiz]

Great first day!!! Talk about jam-packed!!

We were at WDW that same week and we drove down from ATL on Friday, May 21st.

We had a bit of a similar experience in Gainesville on our way down. DH goes to UT for his Pro-MBA currently and we have Georgia plates on the car, but with the Vol logo. We've also got a big Power T cling sticker in our back window.

So, where do we stop for dinner on our way down? Oh yeah, University Ave exit in Gainesville. The restaurant had a gator statue in the lobby and DD7 wanted a picture with her stuffed Smokey sitting on his head.




Can't wait to read about the rest of your trip!

 

[SimmerBaggins]

I'm sorry about your house-hunting. We are unfortunately in a boat that we are hoping to get out of, soon -- owning two houses, and the renter in our other house has been moving out, and still owes us a month's rent. The house we live in needs so much updating and upkeep that I had been hoping desperately to sell our other house, but the market for it has been terrible.

I'm hoping and praying that the buyer for our other house (I know he's out there somewhere!!) comes in soon and rescues us from ... don't even want to think about it.

But, I hope your house upgrades go as you plan (have fun doing it)!!

 

[leamom2princesses]

Good luck with the painting Alicia! We house hunted for about 18 months. We made an offer on two and something odd and almost of unheard of happened with both offers (on the seller's side), so we decided that God didn't want us to move just yet.

I totally undestand on the summer thing. Ours is packed as well. I have less than a week til we go back to Disney and I have a lot to do to get ready. Where has the time gone?

 

[Mommy2LittleVols]

I know exactly what you mean about having such a busy schedule in the summer. We have been going nonstop for over a month now. It's exhausting (but fun )!

 

[MHTeacher]

Enjoy your summer. Think of how glad you'll feel when you have everything spruced up and painted fresh!

We'll wait for more TR.

 

[cinderella crazy]

Well I feel just horrible! I'm so sorry y'all! It seems like when I get one thing back in order, something else jumps up and grabs my time. We're kind of at a lull right now with renovations to the house but now we're fighting a monster cold. I've been trying to get the kiddos better and in the process, I've gotten sick too. Grrrr!

Plus, we were having some issues with our old laptop. It started making a horrible noise and we were afraid to use it in fear that it would die and we'd have nothing backed up.

Here's the good news, I got a new laptop! Yay! So I'm back in action! So an update will be up soon. Really. I promise. I swear. I'm not kidding.

I have to upload some pics to Photobucket and then I'll get an update posted.

 

[cinderella crazy]

Originally, we had planned to go to DHS and go to early entry this day, but after much deliberation we decided we didn’t want to deal with the crowds from Star Wars weekend. So we made this an Epcot day. Woohoo! We love Epcot so this made everyone happy. And since it wasn’t early entry for Epcot, we didn’t have to wake up really early.

Poor Mike was the first person up again. He got up around 6:50 and once again got ready while the rest of us slept. We pretty much repeated this process the whole trip: Mike would get up and get ready, I would get the kids dressed, I would get ready while Mike fed the kids and got the backpack packed, I would eat breakfast, Mom would come into our room and then we’d leave for whatever park. The only thing that really changed was what was eaten for breakfast, what time we woke up and what park we went to. On this particular morning, the kids ate doughnuts and played Legos with Mom while they waited for me to get ready:

After everyone was ready we headed to the TTC. The nice thing about the Tahiti building is that it’s very close to the TTC. So it was a very short walk. We walked up the ramp to take the monorail to Epcot and then we saw the “Tronorail” as we called it. The Tron monorail. It was pretty neat looking. However, it seemed that everytime we rode this particular monorail, we had issues. The monorails to MK were wonderful. The monorails going to Epcot were very slow this trip. Not sure why that was but we eventually started incorporating more time into our schedule for monorail trips to Epcot.

We arrived at Epcot around 8:30. We entered the turnstiles and a photopass person took our picture:

For our first ride we headed to Sourin’. This was the first ride we would have to check Lauren on to make sure she was 40 inches tall. Even though she was measuring well above 40 inches at home, I kept worrying that Disney’s measuring devices might read differently than our measuring tape at home. I was also worried because I had planned on Lauren wearing her tennis shoes instead of her sandals just to make sure she would measure above 40 inches. Well, Mike put her shoes on this morning and as we approached the ride entrance I realized she was wearing her sandals. Oh dear! So I started to really worry. What didn’t help matters was there was a family in front of us who measured their son and he was a good inch below the measuring bar. They continued to let the child stand under it while they debated with the CM about their son getting on the ride. There was also another family behind us waiting to measure their child. After what seemed like an eternity, the CM finally convinced the woman that her son would not be allowed to ride Sourin’ so it was Laruen’s turn to be measured. I crossed my fingers and held my breath. She was almost an inch over the bar. WOOHOO!!!!! So onward we went.

We waited in a pretty decent line for Sourin’. From the time we entered the line to the end of the ride, it was 1 hour. We had never waited that long for Sourin’ before but it really didn’t seem that bad since we were all so happy that Lauren got to ride it. Alex was a ball of nerves riding it, Lauren loved it.

After Sourin’ we made our way over to TT. It was 10:00 by this point. We grabbed Fastpasses that had a return time of 10:40 so we headed to Mission Space. Mike convinced Alex to ride the green side so while they rode, Mom, Lauren and me played in the exit area. When Mike and Alex got off the ride I asked Alex if he liked it and he said “I liked it a little but I don’t want to ride it again.”

We decided to make our way to TT but got interrupted by the Jammitors. Have you ever seen them? If you don’t know who they are, it’s a group of guys (at least it was all guys when we saw them) who bang on trash cans, lids, all kinds of things in rhythm. I had never seen or heard of them before this trip. They were really good! After watching them for a couple of minutes we continued our way over to TT.

Once we got there we had Lauren measured again (this time without me stressing). We pretty much walked up to the waiting doors:

And then, for some reason, Alex decided to start picking on Lauren. He was a little cranky this morning. So he then got put into time out. Here’s what time out looks like on TT:

Lauren was really excited about riding this ride. This is one of the few rides that Alex really likes (although he usually looks worried when he’s riding it). He talked to Lauren about this ride for months. We decided to have Lauren ride with Mike and me so Alex rode with Mom. I had never filmed this ride so I caught this one on tape. As we went through the ride, I kept looking at Lauren to see what she thought of it. She had the biggest smile on her face the whole time. We had our picture linked to our photopass so here’s our pic:

After TT we made our way to Sunshine Seasons for lunch. I don’t know about y’all, but whenever I say Sunshine Seasons it sounds like “ShunShine Sheasons.” It’s a tongue twister for me.

This was the first time we ate there and we were really impressed with it! I sat at a table with Lauren while Mike, Mom and Alex got the food. Alex chose to have a chicken leg which he really didn’t eat much of:

Lauren got a box lunch with an Uncrustable, grapes and a juice box (which we didn’t take a picture of)

Mike had the rotisserie chicken with mashed potatoes and carrots and chocolate mousse cake:

Mom had the stir-fry chicken with rice and stir-fry veggies with strawberry shortcake:

I had the stir-fry chicken with noodles and broccoli with strawberry shortcake:

After lunch we headed to Mousegear. Alex saw Chip and Dale and wanted to get his picture taken with them:

While he and Mike waited in line, Mom, Lauren and me went to Mousegear. Strangely, this was our only trip to Mousegear. That’s crazy! It’s one of our favorite stores. After Alex got his picture taken with Chip and Dale, he had to have his picture taken in front of the fountain:

Alex found a cool Darth Vader car and Lauren found a set of Tiana figures. After everyone made their purchases we headed toward the monorail to make our way back to the resort.


How will we finish our 2nd day? Where would we eat dinner? Would we find everyone for our DIS meet?

 

[cinderella crazy]

Another SEC fan! Woohoo! I'll cheer for any SEC team as long as they're not playing UT.
QUOTE]

I will be looking for you when I need some help cheering for my GA Bulldawgs!

You got it!

 

[Queenofallthings]

What a great update! I remember the stress of waiting to see if their tall enough for the rides...next summer we will be crossing our fingers that my niece will be tall enough for RnRC...it's all she talks about!

The food at SS looks so good, I think I'll be trying that strawberry shortcake for sure!

 

[cinderella crazy]

Great first day!!! Talk about jam-packed!!

We were at WDW that same week and we drove down from ATL on Friday, May 21st.

We had a bit of a similar experience in Gainesville on our way down. DH goes to UT for his Pro-MBA currently and we have Georgia plates on the car, but with the Vol logo. We've also got a big Power T cling sticker in our back window.

So, where do we stop for dinner on our way down? Oh yeah, University Ave exit in Gainesville. The restaurant had a gator statue in the lobby and DD7 wanted a picture with her stuffed Smokey sitting on his head.




Can't wait to read about the rest of your trip!

I'd love to see that picture! I have an allumni sticker on my back window but it's kind of hard to see so nothing on my vehicle screams UT. Although I've thought about putting giant magnetic T's on the van just to see what would happen in Gainesville.

 

[cinderella crazy]

I'm sorry about your house-hunting. We are unfortunately in a boat that we are hoping to get out of, soon -- owning two houses, and the renter in our other house has been moving out, and still owes us a month's rent. The house we live in needs so much updating and upkeep that I had been hoping desperately to sell our other house, but the market for it has been terrible.

I'm hoping and praying that the buyer for our other house (I know he's out there somewhere!!) comes in soon and rescues us from ... don't even want to think about it.

But, I hope your house upgrades go as you plan (have fun doing it)!!

Vickie, I'll be praying for you to find a buyer.

So far our renovations have been going well. Lots of work but we've enjoyed doing it. I like to paint (I know, I'm weird. Most people hate to paint) so I think it's fun to go around the house and paint stuff.

 

[cinderella crazy]

Good luck with the painting Alicia! We house hunted for about 18 months. We made an offer on two and something odd and almost of unheard of happened with both offers (on the seller's side), so we decided that God didn't want us to move just yet.

I totally undestand on the summer thing. Ours is packed as well. I have less than a week til we go back to Disney and I have a lot to do to get ready. Where has the time gone?

Thanks Leanne! That's kind of how we felt about us moving. It seemed like God was telling us to stay put.

I guess you're in Disney now. I hope you're having fun!

 

[cinderella crazy]

I know exactly what you mean about having such a busy schedule in the summer. We have been going nonstop for over a month now. It's exhausting (but fun )!

It always amazes me how busy we get during the summer. You're right, it's exhausting and fun!

 

[cinderella crazy]

Enjoy your summer. Think of how glad you'll feel when you have everything spruced up and painted fresh!

We'll wait for more TR.

So far it looks pretty good! More TR on the way!

 

[cinderella crazy]

What a great update! I remember the stress of waiting to see if their tall enough for the rides...next summer we will be crossing our fingers that my niece will be tall enough for RnRC...it's all she talks about!

The food at SS looks so good, I think I'll be trying that strawberry shortcake for sure!

Thanks! The strawberry shortcake was so yummy! I'll be crossing my fingers for your niece too!

 

[SimmerBaggins]

Vickie, I'll be praying for you to find a buyer.

So far our renovations have been going well. Lots of work but we've enjoyed doing it. I like to paint (I know, I'm weird. Most people hate to paint) so I think it's fun to go around the house and paint stuff.

Thank you!! And, strangely, I like to paint, too -- the toughest part to me is figuring out exactly what color to pick! Those little cards in the paint section are daunting...

 

[Dugette]

Nice update! Looks like a successful start to the day at Epcot. I'm glad Lauren was tall enough for the rides! Yummy, yummy Sunshine Seasons!

 

[cinderella crazy]

Thank you!! And, strangely, I like to paint, too -- the toughest part to me is figuring out exactly what color to pick! Those little cards in the paint section are daunting...

I've told Mike many times, "Just give me something to paint, and I'll be happy forever." I'm glad to know there's someone out there who enjoys painting too!