Fall Fun

We headed out to Cox Farms for a day of fall fun with MOPS. The kids had a great time. Here we are going down the big slide. Wesley got off to a faster start than Lydia (who was sitting on my lap) and I did but we passed him.
Both kids loved "driving" this little train. They also both pushed themselves in front of other kids to have a turn. That is something we have to address - waiting for turns.

Lydia went down a lot of slides on my lap. When she went down by herself in sitting, she spread her feet and one foot would always get caught which would spin her around and flip her over. She did much better on her belly, feet first.

Here is Wesley on the valcano slide. The next time down he lost his hat but we were able to get it back.

Wesley and Lydia did not like feeding these goats. As soon as we walked in the pen, the goats took wesley's cake cone of food. This scared him and made him cry which made Lydia cry. The nice lady who sold us the cone gave us another for free (without me asking) but I ended up feeding the goats.

Wesley climbed this obstacle course to get to a rope swing. The yellow ladder on the left wasn't very high and he easily climbed it but he did need a little help to get over the top of the blue ladder.

Here he is on the rope swing.

Wesley was very proud of himself for climbing up on the hay bales.

Here is a close-up of Lydia on a small slide. She got such a great workout just walking around the farm and up the hills to the slides. On one of her numerous falls she got a boo-boo on her knee.

Lydia and I are on the now waterless water slide.

At some point Wesley started asking for a hotdog. I packed a lunch to take with us and he ate it fairly well, but later he wanted a hotdog. So when it was around 4:00, I said to him, "If you get in the stroller so we can leave, I will get you a hotdog." He climbed right in without protesting leaving.

Here they are with their hotdogs and the pumpkins we got. The price of admission includes a small pumpkin. The kids really had a great day. We were there for over 5 1/2 hours. Lydia has never gone so long in the day without a nap. She fell asleep within a few minutes of the car moving. It took Wesley about ten minutes.

Random Thoughts about a Thought Provoking Book

Today’s post will be a departure from the usual kid filled blogging.

This week I read The Hiding Place by Corrie ten Boom. Wow! One of my friends recommended that I read it. She recently blogged about her visit to the Beje, the ten Boom house in Holland.

While reading the book, I was crying even before WWII even started. Father ten Boom had so much wisdom to give his children and their mother set such a wonderful example of showing love to others in very practical means. The family laid an excellent foundation for what they were called to do – hide Jews and others who were trying to escape from the Nazis.

When Corrie was a child she asked her father to explain something she had overheard others talking about and he responded by asking her to carry his heavy case off the train. She was unable to move the case. Her father said, “And it would be a pretty poor father who would ask his little girl to carry such a load. It’s the same, Corrie, with knowledge. Some knowledge is too heavy for children. When you are older and stronger, you can bear it. For now you must trust me to carry it.” Corrie writes that she was “more than satisfied” with this answer, that the answer gave her peace. Later when other hard questions came up, Corrie asked God to carry the load for her.

I was blown away by her father’s response when the man Corrie loved became engaged to another woman. Her father told her, “Love is the strongest force in the world, and when it is blocked that means pain. There are two things we can do when this happens. We can kill the love so it stops hurting. But then, of course, part of us dies, too. Or, Corrie, we can ask God to open another route for that love to travel. God loves Karel-more than you do-and if you ask Him, He will give you His love for this man, a love nothing can prevent, nothing destroy. Whenever we cannot love in the old human way, Corrie, God can give us the perfect way.”

Corrie wrote that the advice her father gave her was “the secret that would open far darker rooms than this-places where there was not, on a human level, anything to love at all.” Decades later, after she survived the concentration camp, she was able to forgive the person that betrayed her family and the guards and officers who were responsible for her suffering in prison.

Other than reading Night in high school and seeing Life is Beautiful, I really didn’t know a lot about WWII and the concentration camps. I was deeply moved by how bad life in prison was for Corrie and her sister. I was also encouraged by her deepening faith in God and how the Bible came alive for her while she watched the world go darker and darker with evil.

“Look at the Dinosaur”

"Look athe Dinosaur." It is right there, don't you see it?

One day over the summer Wesley asked me to put his backpack on for him so I did. Then he said, “We are going to look for dinosaurs. Come on Lydia.” She followed him around the house "looking" at dinosaurs.

Here Wesley was motioning for her to come over to the only thing I saw that resembled any type of animal.I don't know what Lydia was thinking about the "looking at dinosaurs." She seemed very happy to play along with him. We have noticed that she started doing imaginary play earlier than Wesley did. We are tempted sometimes into thinking that she is very smart (which she is, of course) but we also realized that Wesley often models imaginary play for her and she often copies what he does.

This "dinosaur" was one that they could ride so it was a big hit with both kids.

Our Vacation Comes to an End

Can you guess where were are?

We are at the Disney lost and found and the kennel. They share the same lobby area. I called lost and found on Thursday and Friday mornings to see if my sunglasses were there and I thought I should make one last effort to find them. Lost items from all over Disney are brought by cast members to the central lost and found at the transportation center. While I waited to find out about my glasses Lydia slept in her stroller and Wesley played with this puppy. The puppy's owners visit Disney frequently and they wanted to get the puppy accustomed to the kennel. The puppy was already very well behaved. The man said something about all of his clients loving the puppy so I asked what he does for work and he said, "Buy and sell exotic homes all over the world for over 35 years and we aren't even in the phone book." Sounds like a cool job.

After riding the pirate ride again, we met up with the Powells for one last ride together. It was a tearful goodbye. I always cry when Nancy and I part. Lydia cried because she saw Pooh walk by and I guess she wanted to go see him. Lydia cheered up on the Buzz Lightyear ride. Look at her, she looks like she is ready for video games but her score was zero. Wesley asked to ride the people mover again. The lights were on in Space Mountain so we could see everything. It is not a very attractive rollercoaster when it all the lights are on.
It was past nap time but we kept Lydia awake by reminding her we were going on the Pooh ride. Here she is with Chris. She looks like she is barely awake. After this we rode It's a Small World one more time. She fell asleep on the ride.This is how the kids napped every day. Notice Wesley is wearing his socks and Tevas which is what he wanted all summer but I wouldn't let him wear the sandals and socks together until he hurt his toe. It stopped bleeding on Monday, a week after the injury. His new sneakers gave him a blister on his little toe on the same foot so we went back to letting him wear his socks and Tevas. The nail is still there but it doesn't look good.
We headed to Epcot for dinner. We ate in Germany. I don't love German food but the entrainment was great. When it was time for the kids to get up and dance, Wesley had a great time acting crazy. The second time the band performed, Lydia got in on the action.
I think this is a good picture of Wesley.
We were blessed to have a truly wonderful vacation. It included great family time, friend time, and couple time. We had so much fun at the parks. We loved Disney before we had kids and went numerous times as a couple. Now it is fun to experience it with them and watch them enjoy it. The lines for the rides were very short and often there were no lines at all. For a few of the rides that had longer lines, we were able to use the fast pass system (you get a special ticket to return later in a certain time frame, thus allowing you to go through a much shorter line just for fast pass holders).

Here are the kids playing together as Chris and I packed up our stuff to go home.

An Incredible Meal

Grandma bought Lydia this baby Pooh. She adores it.

On Friday we went back to Epcot to walk around and have lunch.

Some of you know that I hardly ever give Wesley juice; he usually just has milk or water. I did let him sample a fruit soda at the Coke place in Epcot. You can get free samples of sodas from around the world. I even let Lydia have a little. It was a cultural experience. Ha Ha. At least I remembered how much I dislike the soda from Italy so I avoided it. The rest were pretty good. We enjoyed seeing the fife and drum band. Our kids have no idea who these characters are but they liked posing with them.

The kids napped as we made our way over to Magic Kingdom. When Wesley woke up he immediately requested his favorite ride, Pirates of the Caribbean; his choice surprised me. After riding Pirates we went over to Tom Sawyer Island which is a fun place to explore if you have extra time. At first Lydia had trouble walking across the Barrel Bridge but then she got the hang of it.

At Magic Kingdom certain nights in September and October are Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party. The park closes early for the party. This is an additional fee but people rave about it. The kids get some candy from certain places throughout the park. All the rides remain open and we heard that all of them were "walk right on" and the characters wear their Halloween costumes. I would like to go one year. If we ever do go, I want our whole family to dress up. We saw a few families, including some grandparents, dressed as pirates. We sat beside of this Incredible family at dinner on Friday night. I think half the restaurant came by to take a picture of them. The manager and the chef also came out to meet them.

We met with Wayne and Dianna and the Powells for dinner at Ohana's in the Polynesian. This is one of our favorite places to eat at Disney. The food is served family style at Ohana’s and I love eating family style on vacation with friends and family . The meal started with pineapple coconut bread (so very yummy), salad, chicken wings, and pork dumplings. The side dishes were green beans and snow peas and fried noodles. The beef, pork, turkey and shrimp were served directly from skewers. They were well seasoned and cooked to perfection over an open flame. Dessert was bread pudding a la mode with Bananas Foster Sauce.

Did I mention that we got the dinning plan for free? It took about $500 off the cost of our trip. September is typically a very slow month at Disney World so free dinning is one way they entice people to come after school starts. The free dinning includes one snack a day (up to $3.99), once counter service (quick service) meal that includes drink, entrée, and dessert, and one table service meal that includes a drink (non-alcoholic of course), entrée, and dessert. We ate very well. For the snack credits we often got iced cappuccinos, or even cappuccino floats, or fruit smoothies. Finally on our last day at the park, we found a roasted nut cart and used a couple of snack credits there. We love sugar coated roasted nuts!

After dinner we went to Downtown Disney, or Downtown Mickey as Welsey called it, with Wayne and Dianna while the Powells went back for a late night at Epcot. We were all pretty exhausted when we got back to the hotel room. Only one more day at the parks remained.

It's All About the Toys

Thursday got off to a rough start. I went to put my phone in my purse and realized that I had lost my sunglasses and case sometime on Wednesday. This did not make Chris very happy and he let me know about it. I tried to make coffee in the in-room coffee maker but I forgot to plug it in so the coffee wasn’t ready when I wanted it. I did plug it in but we had to leave before it was ready. I am used to eating breakfast every morning but I was doing okay this week with skipping breakfast until Thursday. I think not eating, not having any caffeine, Chris being mad at me, and the sun bothering my eyes made me really grumpy until I ate lunch.

We went to Disney’s Hollywood Studios. After taking photos with Donald Duck, we headed to Toy Story Mania, Disney’s latest attraction. The stand-by wait time was already up to an hour. We debated getting fast passes, split up with the Powells, then decided to get fast passes (the fast past return time changed from 11-12 to 12-1 which was better since we needed to eat an early lunch due to our early dinner reservations). We rejoined the Powells for Playhouse Disney which is different this year. This was fun for Wesley but Lydia mostly acted crazy. This year the featured characters (like puppets) were from Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, Little Einsteins, Handy Mandy, and Winnie the Pooh.

Wesley liked this touch screen coloring in the animation building.

I think Wesley was also grumpy from not eating anything but half of a banana. He didn't want his picture taken with Mickey.

After lunch I felt so much better and happier! I love this army man costume. I want one for Halloween!

Wesley has only seen about three and a half movies. Fortunately one them was Toy Story. We enjoyed Toy Story Mania and the area around it. Here is Wesley with his 3-D glasses on for the ride. It is very cool how you get to play games during the ride. Wesley kept aiming for the ceiling so his score was zero but he didn't care.

Across from the ride there is a neat little area where you wait in the AC to see Buzz and Woody. There are several photo stops along the way. We were the last people in line before they closed the line so the characters could have a break.

"Pick me. Pick me!"

Lydia was very intrigued by this toy. Remember him from Sid's house?
Both kids liked being velcroed to the rocket. Lydia complained when we took her out.

Woody tried to help position the kids for the photos.

After having several pictures taken with Woody, Lydia went over and stood in front of Buzz Lightyear! At least the photographer and assistant laughed and took more photos of the kids.

While the kids took much needed naps, I rode the Rock 'n Roll Rollercoaster with Chris and the Tower of Terror with Mark and Nancy (who then rode the rollercoaster). I love both of these rides so I was very happy to get to ride them.

We had a very early dinner at 50s Prime Time. The food was good and the atosphomere was great but it took a long time. I think our server was just very slow. Here is a picture of Ainsley and Wesley playing with one of the tvs.

Grandma and Grandpa oversaw the kids going to bed while Chris and I went to Downtown Disney for a couple of hours. (The Powells stayed at the park a little longer than we did.) We had a connecting room with Wayne and Dianna which worked out great.

We saw a fabulous fireworks show in Downtown Disney. I don't think they normally have fireworks but someone who works there said it was the American Pyrotechnics Association's annual meeting and that they did the fireworks. They were more impressive than the ones we saw at Magic Kingdom the night before.

The Men Go on a Five Hour Tour While the Women Watch the Kids

On Wednesday we all headed back to Magic Kingdom. Chris, Mark, and Wayne had a tour at 8:30 so we all went to the park early. There were 19 people total on the tour. They wore ear pieces so they could hear the tour guide who was talking into a little microphone. That way the tour participants hear the interesting facts but the people passing by can't really hear the tour guide.

Nancy, Dianna, the kids, and I had a short wait before the opening ceremony and then we were off to ride the rides. Lydia loved all the rides again. Later in the morning Nancy and I were discussing what to do next and Lydia started saying, "Pooh, Pooh" so we went back to the Pooh ride.

Wesley also loved the rides. He was a little over excited and wasn't well behaved while waiting for Dumbo so he didn't get to ride it. He also ran away while we were walking to the Teacups so he didn't get to ride those either. Well, he didn't get to ride those rides until much later in the day.

Here are Wesley and Lydia on the carousel.
Isn't this a great picture of Nancy and Ainsley?
After lunch we met up with the guys and walked around and rode more rides. Wayne and Dianna walked around on their own. Here Nancy is showing off her hulahooping skills.

Lydia napped through The Presidents and both she and Wesley napped through us taking turns with Mark and Nancy to ride Splash Mountain and Big Thunder Railroad. When our kids woke up they joined Ainsley who was playing at the Laughing Spot playground. We then rode the train around the park one and a third times and the adults got to ride Space Mountain.

Chris took this picture of Nancy, Wesley, and me on the teacups. He was in another teacup with Lydia. We are laughing so hard because Nancy and I kept trying to spin the cup as fast as it would go but then Wesley would try to spin it which would slow us down. We kept having to remove his hands so we could go faster.

The cast member letting people on and off the ride loved Lydia. She said her teenage granddaughter looked just like Lydia when she was a baby. She let us ride again without waiting in the line (which was very, very short) as long as all five us rode in the same cup. We barely fit but it was fun. Again, Nancy and I "fought" with Wesley over who was going to turn the teacup. Lydia loved it.

We had dinner at Liberty Tree Travern that evening. This was the one evening that we did have a seperate table from the Powells; all the other restaurants were able to put all nine of us at the same table. The food is served family style at Liberty Tree Travern and the meal is an American feast - bread, salad, turkey, ham, beef, stuffing, mac and cheese, green beans, and apple pie. It was very good.

Minnie and her friends Pluto, Goofy, Chip and Dale all came by the table. Wesley's favorite character this week is Pluto.

Here are Wayne and Dianna with Minnie.

We stayed for the fireworks show at 8:00. We ended up in a great spot thanks to Wayne. We sat at a table outside of the ice cream palor at the end of mainstreet. Both kids seemed to enjoy the fireworks.

"More Ride"

On Tuesday we went back to Magic Kingdom. Lydia liked the rides a little too much. When it was time to exit the magic carpet ride, she started screaming "more" and threw herself down on the sidewalk and held on to the metal bars. I scoped her up and carried her out and she got over it rather quickly. For the rest of the rides her protests were less intense but she continued to request "more ride". She said this even after the Haunted Mansion. In this photo, you can see Lydia and me, Mark, Ainsley, and Nancy in the carpet behind us, and then Grandma and Grandpa.

After having lunch with Grandma, Grandpa, the Ramseys, and the Powells, we headed back to Animal Kingdom. The kids napped in their strollers as we were leaving MK and continued to nap in the car on the way to AK so they got decent naps.

This rhino walked up right beside of our safari truck. After this ride, Lydia said, "more bus" several times.

Wesley seemed to enjoy the 3-D movie, It's Tough To Be a Bug. I think it did scare Lydia a little, she laid down in Chris' lap. After the movie, Wesley inspected his eat to see if he could see the "bugs" that "crawled" under his bottom.

After the movie, we went to see Pooh, Tigger, Piglet, and Eyore. Lydia loves Pooh. We have a stuffed Pooh at home that she really likes and we have two Pooh books. It is usually easier to see Pooh and his friends at AK than MK because the line at AK is shorter. We only waited behind two other families. At first there was no one behind us so we had a lot of time with the characters. Here are the kids with Piglet.

Pooh is one of my favorite characters.

This evening we had dinner at Boma's at Animal Kingdom Lodge. It is an African Buffet. It was so delicious that Chris said it might have to be a must-eat-at restaurant for us in the future. The AKL is also beautiful. We had to make a quick exit after dinner because our kids needed to go to bed.