February in Orlando, You Never Know What You're Going to Get.

[chicagoshannon]

I have to take a little time out of the TR to complain about my new computer. I had an iPad, but it died a couple of weeks ago. Last week I got a new laptop. It came with Windows 10. I HATE it. Oh my goodness it is horrible. I start typing a reply and then the cursor just disappears and I have to re click on the reply to continue typing. it is so frustrating.

So if you have the choice do not get Windows 10!

I am so glad I didn't get the free upgrade to Windows 10 on our desktop!

 

[macraven]

Yea, no kfc buffets in the north

Didn't see them until southern ky and Tennessee

 

[chicagoshannon]

Ok. Sunday we woke up ready to move on to bigger and better things. But first we had a date with some characters. We head back to the Beach club to Cape May Cafe.
We were seated pretty quickly and were able to get our food before characters started coming.



Duncan was not in a picture mood so Goofy tried to sneak one in.

Here Duncan was watching for Minnie. She's the one character he wanted to meet.

I think that was my plate. I was not enjoying the selection on the buffet. It wasn't much better than a free continental breakfast that most hotels give.

finally Minnie came!

So we headed out, hopped in the care, and drove a couple of miles down the road to our next accommodations. We were going to spend a week at the Marriott Imperial Palms. It is a time share attached to the Marriott World Center. We were told we could enjoy all of the amenities of the hotel. These amenities included an indoor pool. Music to our ears. Well our room wasn't ready so we decided to head to Universal to pick up our Annual Passes!

We drove to the guest drop off area and Eric ran out to pick up the passes. I waited with the kids in the car. We were not in the mood to pay $20 for parking. This worked well. It probably took 20 minutes for him to trudge through City Walk and make it to will call at Universal. No one gave us a hard time for just waiting in the drop off area. With tickets secured we drove out, turned the corner and headed to the parking garage.

We chose Universal for our first park. As soon as we walked in we saw these guys with no line.

As you can see it was a bit chilly today.
Next we walked across the street to these guys.

And then a little farther down there was a little show or parade going on.




With a bunch of characters met we decided to head towards Kid Zone. The Barney show was about to start so we headed over there.



It was a cute show and we got to meet Barney afterward. Unfortunately something happened to my picture so we have no blackmail.

We then decided to try out E.T. Duncan was, of course, terrified. He hung on to the bike handles for dear life. He proclaimed he would never ride it again. The rest of us enjoyed it.

We then attempted to do a couple of other things but the lines were too long, it was Sunday after all. So we headed out. We decided to finish up the afternoon at Sea World. That's coming up next.

 

[schumigirl]

Nice pictures.........never seen Shaggy with a coat before!!!

Aww, bless your little one who was scared on ET........maybe when he's a bit older he'll enjoy it again.......shame about the Barney pics.........

 

[Gina-Gina-Bo-Bina]

Great photos! I love the Universal parade, it so fun and full of energy.

The character breakfast at Cape May looked like lots of fun. The characters are so cute in the beach wear. How sweet of Goofy to still try and sneak in a picture when Duncan was not feeling so photogenic, LOL!

So ET was a bust for your little guy, huh? Too bad, but something to aspire to for the next trip. Did he give the Twirl & Hurl a go?

Looking forward to hearing about your time at SeaWorld......as you know, is one of my faves!

 

[macraven]

your pictures are so bright and vivid, it really captures the delight on the children's faces.

havent seen many barney pictures in a long time
but then my sons outgrew him years ago......lol

 

[chicagoshannon]

Ok. Universal got too busy for us so we decided to go redeem our Sea World passes. We were also getting pretty hungry. We arrived at Sea World and it didn't seem too busy. Took about a minute to print our passes and get through security. Of course it took about 10 minutes for them to register my fingerprint. I seriously have issues every time. I hate those fingerprint things!

Our first order of business was to see if Madeline was tall enough for Manta. Well, they let her on but I don't think she was really tall enough.


Two thumbs up. She loved it!

I then told them to go try Kraken while Duncan and I checked out the penguins. The Antarctica ride was down but they were letting people in the exit to observe the penguins. We got in with no line. When Duncan and I left the building the line was HUGE! A show must have just let out or something. Anyway, they wouldn't let Madeline on Kraken. She was too short even though she had just ridden Manta. Ah well. She was fine and they just went on Atlantis instead.

With that accomplished we decided we wanted to try the new pretzel place and check out the passholder lounge. The pretzels were yummy and the lounge was very relaxing.

We had our fill of the free pop and headed out.

We decided to finish up our day in the Shamu play area and then hit the polar bear ride on the way out. Apparently, 39 is the age where you just can't do motion simulators anymore because Eric almost lost his pretzel on that ride!

I guess those are the only polar bears you can see at Sea World now a days.

We headed for the exit but I think we got distracted by ice cream.

When we arrived back at Imperial Palms the room was ready. Actually, I think this might have been the night we stopped at Golden Corral for supper. I don't remember. In any case our room was ready. We got a first floor unit. I was so glad because there are no elevators there. It was a very large condo with the biggest master shower I have ever seen. It was like a cave and it had multiple shower heads.

It was cold so we just spent the rest of the night in the room. It was Super Bowl Sunday so Eric watched that while I caught Downton Abbey I think.

Tomorrow we had a special day planned for the kids.

 

[chicagoshannon]

Nice pictures.........never seen Shaggy with a coat before!!!

Aww, bless your little one who was scared on ET........maybe when he's a bit older he'll enjoy it again.......shame about the Barney pics.........

Yes, I already told Eric that Duncan will be going on ET in the fall. I thought he would love the end where ET said his name but that did not impress him. I think I'll have the kids watch the movie sometime soon.

Great photos! I love the Universal parade, it so fun and full of energy.

The character breakfast at Cape May looked like lots of fun. The characters are so cute in the beach wear. How sweet of Goofy to still try and sneak in a picture when Duncan was not feeling so photogenic, LOL!

So ET was a bust for your little guy, huh? Too bad, but something to aspire to for the next trip. Did he give the Twirl & Hurl a go?

Looking forward to hearing about your time at SeaWorld......as you know, is one of my faves!

The characters were cute and very patient. There were a few tables around us that had to get each person alone with the character, and then multiple group configurations. I think they were glad when they got to us and only had to take one picture.

your pictures are so bright and vivid, it really captures the delight on the children's faces.

havent seen many barney pictures in a long time
but then my sons outgrew him years ago......lol

I think that was the only time I put Eric in charge of the phone/camera. I have no idea how he managed to loose the picture. If I can get it recovered I will post it later.

 

[chicagoshannon]

I forgot to post these pictures earlier. They were on our way out of Universal. The cowfish will make repeated appearances. Duncan was obsessed with that thing!

 

[chicagoshannon]

Monday Feb. 8.
The kids had been begging for over a year to go to Lego land. We weren't sure it was worth the price of admission. A friend of ours had taken her 5 kids there a couple of years ago and said it was not worth it at all. They actually ended up getting their money back somehow.

Then I heard about a homeschool rate. I looked it up and it would be only $12 each for the kids and $24 each for Eric and I. We decided for that price we would definitely take the kids. I just needed to figure out how to get a homeschool ID. You see, in IL, we don't have to report to anyone at all so there is no "official" proof that we homeschool. Luckily, I could get a free ID from the homeschool buyers coop. So Eric and I took pictures of ourselves and we printed out the ID's. Then I just laminated them. I was a bit nervous but they took them with no problem.



We have arrived. I think this is the place the kids were most looking forward to. I'm glad we got it out of the way early.



So I went to ticket booth number 13 and presented my ID and got the tickets. We were about 30 minutes early but there were a lot of people getting in already. So we hopped into the line. Apparently, they let annual passholders and hotel guests in early. We got lucky and they just let us in early too. Our original plan was to run to the driving and boating school area first. Unfortunately they don't open that area early. So we decided to roam around for a bit. This was a mistake that we would pay for later. We should have headed for the knight/castle/ dragon area first.



We looked around the lego city area. They have huge displays of different parts of the country and world, all built out of Lego.





There were a lot of interactive elements to it. The kids could push a button and make a volcano erupt or the space shuttle take off. They had fun doing that.

At 10am they finally opened the entire park. We headed to driving school.


They separate the ages. 5 and under go to one school while 6 and up go to another. I took Madeline and we had to wait and watch a instructional video. They finally let her out on the track.

She obtained her license. They give out a paper license and you can spend $16 to get one with your picture if you want. We passed on that!

Next up was Boating school. I really enjoyed this. You got to drive a boat and it wasn't on a track at all.

It was actually a pretty long course. We rode them twice.

We then headed to a submarine type ride. You ride on these vehicles that sort of launch you our and back in again. People can shoot you with water while the watch. It was decent.

Next the kids got to meet Emmett.

Duncan really wanted to meet Unikitty but I guess she only meets on the weekend.

I think it was at this point that Eric took Duncan to the store. He is our child that needs a souvenir immediately. I took Madeline to a ride in the Lego Friends area. She rode it herself because it looked nausea inducing.


It was a bunch of horses in a circle. The giant circle spins and goes back and forth on the track. She seemed to enjoy it and I was glad I passed on the ride.

The ride empties into the gift shop where you can take your picture with the Lego friends.

It was then time for the ski show. I was most looking forward to this. We used to go to Cypress Gardens when I was a kid and always enjoyed the ski show.


It was cute and there is an interactive water element in the show so beware if you attend the show.

We then had a small snack. I think it was around 1pm. We decided to head to what remained of the garden area of the park.


When I was a kid they had women or girls dressed as Southern Bells roaming the park. Now they were made of Lego.


The old Banyan tree was still there from years ago. I don't think they really touched the garden area at all.

We then split up and Eric took Madeline on some rides that Duncan wouldn't go on and I took Duncan to the Duplo area. He is really too big for the area but he still enjoyed it. After a while, Eric and Madeline joined us. The area had a couple of small train type rides that took forever in line because they only held about 6 people each trip.
We split up again and Eric took Duncan to the jungle playground and I took Madeline to meet Stephanie from Lego friends.





We then rode a couple more rides. There was a cute "jousting" ride that the kids enjoyed.




We then decided to go on one more ride in the Chima land. This involved water and we DID get wet. We had our jackets on so we just took them off and finished the day.
We headed over to the Lego hotel to check it out.




It had a small general type store, a small bar, and what looked like a food court that wasn't open for the day yet. The hotel also had a pretty small pool. I doubt we'd ever stay here. It might be worth it in the summer to get the extra hour of park time though.

From here we headed across the street to Perkins. Apparently they have free pie on Monday's. We lucked out there! We ate an early dinner, around 4pm, since we really hadn't had any lunch.

We then headed back to our condo and I proceeded to throw our jackets into the dryer. Unfortunately, Madeline had placed crayons into her coat pocket at dinner and I neglected to check pockets before drying. We ended up with some very colorful jackets and a dryer that had red crayon all over the inside. Not what I was looking forward to on vacation. Luckily we were able to get most of the crayon out of the dryer. We weren't so lucky with our coats. I think it took about an hour of scrubbing that dryer though. I was not a happy camper that night.

Next up: We head back to Universal.

 

[Gina-Gina-Bo-Bina]

Somehow I go a couple of updates behind.....

I am glad to hear good things about the Pretzel Kitchen at SeaWorld. We haven't tried it just yet (its not one of the places on the dining plan, which we usually have) but I'm desperate to give it a try. I am generally not a huge pretzel fan (not that I dislike them per se....they just normally aren't my go-to snack) but if you put a meatball in it, its a whole different story .

I am super, super impressed that Madeline rode Manta! That's an intense coaster....well beyond what I could endure but my guys LOVE it.

Your pictures of Legoland are excellent! So many cool photo ops! Your kids looked like they really enjoyed themselves, too....there are certainly lots of smiles all around. Nice that Duncan found some rides he could enjoy within his comfort level.

So, so sorry to hear about the Great Crayon Debacle that occurred in your dryer. So not fun . That is frustrating enough when it happens at home, but 10 times worse when you are trying to enjoy a vacation!!

 

[chicagoshannon]

Madeline is definitely my dare devil. I won't even ride Manta. I bet she'll go on Mako when it opens too. IF I let her. I'm still afraid she'll fall out of those rides. I have a feeling Duncan and I will be riding the penguin ride or walking through the shark tunnel a lot when we go in September. Or maybe we'll just camp out in the pass member lounge.

I need to get another update up. We had new flooring installed last week and somehow our dryer broke when they moved it. So we had to spend a chunk of Saturday finding a new dryer. Not something fun especially after spending all that money on new floors! It's so frustrating because even though the dryer was almost 12 years old it was working just fine. Plus it wasn't computerized at all and now all you can find are computerized machines. I just hope our washer holds our for a while yet.

 

[chicagoshannon]

I'm back!

Tuesday morning we went to Islands of Adventure. Our goal was to hit rope drop and follow all the people with the wands to Forbidden Journey.


The last time we were in IOA was in 2008. We were a bit disoriented upon entering the area. We ended up sitting outside of Dragon Challenge for a few minutes before I realized we were in the wrong place. haha
We finally headed for Forbidden Journey. We were doing child swap and I got to ride first with Madeline! I thought the ride was pretty neat. When we swapped I took Duncan to hear Moaning Myrtle in the bathroom. I think I ended up taking Madeline in there after her ride. We then had to go get Miss Madeline a wand. She wasn't picked for the show but she spent quite a while picking our her very own magical wand. I ended up taking Duncan to the Forbidden Journey gift shop to buy something. He got one of those pink furry ball creatures. I have no idea what they are called.

With souvenirs in hand I was on a mission for butter beer. I had promised a few people back home I would try it for them. We wanted to get a discount and apparently you can't get a discount on the drink at the carts so we wandered into the bar.

Mission accomplished. I can't say that I really liked it though. I'm not a huge root beer fan so I wasn't too surprised when I didn't like it. I'm glad I tried it though. I think both kids even tried it.

At some point Madeline and Eric also rode Dragon Challenge. We skipped the kiddie coaster because the wait time seemed long for it.

Next, we headed to Dr. Suess land. First ride was Trolley in the Sky which Duncan declared sorry (oh brother!) and refused to go on again during the trip. We then decided to try the Carosuessel.


At least he enjoyed that one.
We also went on One Fish, Blue Fish and they were nice enough to NOT have the water on this day. Next up was Cat in the Hat. At first Duncan said he didn't like it but we ended up riding it about 10 times on the trip. Sometimes it takes him a while to warm up to things.

I sent Eric and Madeline ahead to Super Hero Island to ride Dr. Doom. Duncan and I puttered around for a while.
We played in the Dr. Suess zoo

and then tried out this car

We got to see all of the super heroes ride out to their meet n greet on their bikes/cars. That was fun. Of course Duncan didn't want to meet any of them.

Finally, Eric and Madeline were finished with Dr. Doom. We planned to hit up Spiderman but the line was pretty long so we went ahead to Jurassic Park. Eric an Madeline braved the cold and rode the River Adventure while Duncan and I played in Camp Jurassic. Finally something he enjoyed. It's one of the only things he wanted to do for the rest of the trip.

At some point we ate lunch back in the Dr. Suess landing. We had pizza. We then hopped on the Hogwarts Express to see some more things in Universal.

that's up next.

 

[Kivara]

The last time we were in IOA was in 2008. We were a bit disoriented upon entering the area. We ended up sitting outside of Dragon Challenge for a few minutes before I realized we were in the wrong place. haha


I ended up taking Duncan to the Forbidden Journey gift shop to buy something. He got one of those pink furry ball creatures. I have no idea what they are called.

1. HILARIOUS! I love that! Glad you enjoyed the real one when you found it!

2. Pygmy Puffs

 

[macraven]

Love you are sharing more with us !!

 

[chicagoshannon]

1. HILARIOUS! I love that! Glad you enjoyed the real one when you found it!

2. Pygmy Puffs

Thannks. I"m not completely familiar with all Harry Potter things. Madeline is reading the books and hopes to have them all read by September. She's on book 2 now.

 

[schumigirl]

How funny you waited at wrong place......lol.......still you got there eventually.......

I'm not the biggest butterbeer fan either, but we always get a frozen one to share for some reason or other.......prefer pumpkin fizz.

Nice pics, looks like a lot of fun was had..........

 

[chicagoshannon]

Tuesday part 2:
I forgot this picture earlier

We explored the Jurassic Park Discovery center for quite a while. My kids enjoyed doing the DNA dinosaur thing. If they would update the technology they could make it really cool. They also liked watching the dinosaur hatch from the egg. That is something I hadn't seen before.

So back to the train. We thoroughly enjoyed the trip! Even Duncan liked it. We then explored Diagon Alley for a while. Madeline used her wand I bought some Butterbeer fudge for some friends back home. Not a wise choice even when it's only 60 degrees as we found out later.

After exploring the area for a while we headed over to Men In Black. Duncan loved this ride but Eric was starting to feel a bit nauseous. I guess his age was catching up to him.... or was it?

We then decided to try the Simpson's ride. But the line was way too long so we decided to test out something we thought we'd have for breakfast sometime. It's best to try something before you count on it for a meal, right?


It looks like we then headed over to ride Transformers.


We bribed Duncan to ride it. We thought he'd love it since he loves Transformers. We were wrong. Shocker! I'm still going to make him ride it in September.

We then decided we'd had enough of crowds and headed out of the park.

We took that picture on the way out because there were too many Brazilian tour groups hogging the photo op in the morning.

And of course we had to visit the Cowfish again.


I'm guessing it was around 3pm at this time. We decided to head over to Sea World I think. I don't have any picture though so maybe we didn't.

I do know, however, where we ate this night. None other than Hash House a go go. I believe I first read about it in one of Gina's reports.
They had fun stuff to climb on



I don't know how your kids are with pictures but mine generally want one of themselves alone with whatever the pic opportunity is and then one together. It sometimes takes a while.

So we were seated in a nearly empty restaurant and our waiter helped us decide what to order. It was easy for the kids. They each got

giant chocolate chip pancakes from the kids menu. I should have had them share but I thought since it was from the kids menu they'd be smaller portions.

I got

I can't remember what it was called but it was the dish that the Man vs. Food guy had on his show. It had about 10 layers of stuff. It was pretty good but not so good as left overs.
Eric got

chicken and waffles. It was pretty big too. We both had more than half to take home. We enjoyed the leftovers a couple of days later.

We headed back to the room. I think this might have been the night that we decided to check out the indoor pool at the World Center. We walked a waze to get there. We were the only ones there and soon found out why. Apparently they leave the AC blower on no matter how cold it is outside. It was FREEZING in there. We lasted a very short while. I think this sent Eric over the edge into a full blown virus. We took about 4 towels each and wrapped ourselves up for the walk back to the condo. I think Eric then took the kids to play video games at the club house. They fell in love with Lego Harry Potter and we soon bought our own copy upon our return home.

Tomorrow: more Universal!

 

[Gina-Gina-Bo-Bina]

Great pics!! I am glad you have Hash House a try, sounded like it was a win?

The photo of the two kids with the Big Pink Donut is my favourite photo so far. Love their expressions! I think you need to frame that one and put it up on the wall.

I hope that Eric didn't get so sick that he missed out on any components of the trip . That would be SO not cool. It really stinks when the weather is less favourable than you hope it will be: it really can make or break a vacation.

Looking forward to more!

 

[chicagoshannon]

Wednesday!

We were up bright and early again today. Our plan was to hit Universal and ride Despicable Me first thing. Hotels had early entry so we were at a bit of a disadvantage but it wasn't too bad. It was Mardi Gras week so there were a LOT of people from Louisiana in the parks.

I think we only had to wait about 5 minutes. After Despicable Me our plan was to hit Gringotts. We did and there was only a small wait, thankfully.

We did kid swap again so I could keep my purse and things. That's one thing kid swap is good for. I think Madeline forgot to bring her wand this day so we'd have to come back to explore the area more later.

We then headed for Back to the Future er I mean Simpsons but the line was way too long. I think we rode MIB again instead. We then found these guys.



We then decided to head to Sea World. It was probably about noon. We ended up stopping at Panera for lunch on the way.


The plan was to see the Dolphin show. Duncan really wanted to see the penguins so he and Eric went there while Madeline and I waited at Dolphin Stadium for the show. The theatre was undergoing some refurb so there were no acrobatics by the vulture guys or anything up high.


These were pilot whale I believe. I had never seen them in person before. They're really cute. Sea World does such a good job of educating about animals! Duncan and Eric made it back just in time for the show.
After the show I had Eric take Madeline over to Kraken to see if she was tall enough while I took Duncan back to see the penguins. The ride happened to be down for refurb the week we were there so we used the exit to see the penguins.

Duncan said they were doing a performance just for him.


Turns out Madeline wasn't tall enough for Kraken (even though she was tall enough for Manta the other day) so they rode Journey to Atlantis instead.

Then it was time for The Sea Lion Show. Last time we were in Sea World this show was down for a retheme. Goodbye Pirate Island and Hello High School.

It was cute but we sure did miss mime.
We took in some other sights around the park, probably the sharks, and then headed back to the room.
Looks like we decided to check out the pool area when we got back.

I'm sure they went to play video games after that. Eric was starting to feel worse. He still thought it was motion sickness at this point.