Wordless Wednesday

Vacation - Day 4

I decided to take Miles back to Downtown Disney on the last day while Darrin was working so that he could see Buzz one more time. It was right across from our hotel so we just walked over. Darrin had to use the car everyday so we were limited on what we could do. It's probably a good thing b/c it kept me away from the bazillions of outlets they have in Orlando.

We didn't take any pictures with Buzz b/c I learned my lesson the first time and didn't let him out of the stroller on this trip. He was content to just stroll around and see everything. These characters were all made out of Legos...


After we were finished walking around, I decided to let him play in the jumping fountains.

He liked watching it but wasn't real crazy when it all came out at once....


After Downtown Disney, Darrin was finished working, so we went swimming. Miles always had to say hi to Mickey on the way to the pool. He's actually giving him a kiss here...

And a kiss for mom...


Love it...

After swimming, a nap, and a quick dinner at Chickfila, we decided to go back to Sea World. We got there around 6:30pm. Everyone felt better and it was a lot cooler outside.

First we visited the dolphins. Miles really liked them.


Next were the penguins. Unfortunately they are in a season right now where they only have the lights on in the exhibit from 11pm to 3am in order to portray their natural habitat. You could see them, but I'm not sure Miles could.

On the way in, he gave the penguin a high five...

I feel certain he like the penguin game better than the actual exhibit.


Next we went to the sea lions. They were pretty cool and fairly active, so they were fun to watch. This was my probably my favorite exhibit.


We did a few other things and then decided to call it a day. On the way out, they have an aquarium that was associated with the Manta roller coaster. I really, really wanted to ride the roller coaster. I was prepared to do so by myself, even though I had on a dress, but the wait time never got below 40 minutes. So, we settled for the Manta aquarium. It turned out to be one of the coolest attractions. The fish and stingrays were so pretty.

This is one of those things you climb up in. It was a really tight fit...we didn't linger...

Sea World part II was much better than part I. We left a happy family...

So that is our trip. The next day we were on the road by 7am and made it home sometime between 8-9pm. It was a fun trip. We had plans to meet friends for dinner and see family while we were there, but they didn't work out. It's different when you go on a trip like this for business. Darrin had to spend a lot of time working. Overall, I think it was a productive trip for him...we got to spend Father's Day with him....and Miles and I enjoyed some downtime away from home. Good times.

Vacation - Day 3

On Wednesday, Darrin worked in the morning and then we decided to go to Sea World. We knew we wanted to go to one park but couldn't decide between Sea World, Disney World or Animal Kingdom. Following the advice of many, we went to Sea World.

We arrived at the hottest part of the day....I forgot the tickets in the car & had to walk back and get them...Miles did not feel good...he was coughing a lot and cranky....and Darrin had a terrible headache. I guess it just wasn't in the cards for us on Wednesday. We tried to tough it out for a little while.

He looks like he's really enjoying this but really he just wanted Darrin to hold him.

This is the ice wall in the Arctic exhibit. We all wanted to rub our faces all over it to cool down. This exhibit had to be the highlight of Sea World part I.

After watching Shamu...

....we decided to call it a day. It just wasn't working out and I'm ok with that. When you plan activities like this with a 22 month old, you have to be prepared for things to possibly not go as planned. I've also learned that there is not such thing as "getting your monies worth" with a toddler. You just have to ride it til it won't go anymore...and that's where we were after Shamu. Our tickets allowed us to come back for free within 7 days. We decided to leave and maybe come back the next night, or not, and whichever we decided was fine.

So, we went back to the hotel and went swimming...







Based on these smiles, I'd say it was the best decision we made all day...


For dinner, we went to O'Charleys. We wanted something good to eat without a big production. We ate dinner and brought caramel pie back to the hotel for dessert....second best decision all day.

At dinner, Miles started a new trick....pretend sleeping, which includes snoring. We were cracking up. Now, anytime we say, "Miles show us how you sleep"....this is the show we get...


Day 3 started a little rocky with the Sea World bust, but shaped up with the swimming. Tune in tomorrow to see if we went back to Sea World for more torture fun.

Vacation - Day 2

Day 2 started with a little play time in the room. Since Miles got up between 6-8am every morning, we had some time to kill before going to the pool. Thank goodness we brought a few toys.

Next we headed down to the pool. There weren't many people there at 9am in the morning, which was nice b/c it was peaceful, but it was also kind of boring for Miles. I learned on this trip how much he loves other kids. Any time another kid would get in the kiddie pool he would immediately gravitate to him/her. He doesn't really know how to play with them, but is amused by just watching them have fun.





Everyday we would take a nap and then get ready for dinner before Darrin got back to the hotel. Our room didn't have a bathtub. I was nervous when I saw this, but he did fine in the shower and actually loved it.


This night we did some outlet shopping. I was in heaven but Darrin and Miles were not. We found this play area and I quickly left them to get some shopping done by myself. Here are a couple pictures Darrin took while I was gone.


That's all for day 2. Another fun day, but probably the most low key of the vacation.

Vacation - Day 1

My intention was to blog every night while we were in Orlando, but it just didn't happen. Since we were all in one room, we had to turn the lights and TV off to get Miles to go to sleep. Plus editing pictures on a laptop doesn't really work for me. So, I'll catch up over the next few days with the million pictures I took.

First, it is a L-O-N-G drive from northwest Tennessee to Orlando with a 22 month old...16 hours to be exact. We actually drove to my mom's house on Friday night and left around 6:15 on Saturday morning. We had a DVD player, movies, invisible markers, toys, and books to entertain him. The problem is he wants to be entertained by one of us constantly. The DVD player helped some, but he still wanted one of us in the backseat with him. He would say "Momma" and point to the back seat. Entertaining him was a little draining but you do what you have to do. By the end of the ride home, Darrin and I were fighting over who got to drive b/c the other person had the job of keeping Miles happy.

Another problem was..he slept less than 3 hours total in the 32 hours we spent driving there and back. He just doesn't sleep in the car. I don't think he would sleep if we drove in the middle of the night.

We got to Orlando around 9pm. We finally got to our room, which was very nice and spacious, but it reeked of mildew/mold. Darrin and I are not complainers. We do not like to complain about service, we never send our food back at restaurants, we just don't like to be like that. However, I just couldn't stay there for five nights in a room that smelled awful and could have been bad for Miles. I begged Darrin to call the front desk. He did and they were very nice to give us another room.

With that said, I think they gave us the room that they save especially for people that complain. It was really small, about half the size of the first room. It didn't smell though, and turned out to be fine.

On Sunday morning Miles and I went to a character breakfast at our hotel. Darrin had to work....after all that was the reason we were there. Miles does not like characters but I thought we had to try since we were in Orlando.

He loved them from afar...

But didn't want them close. You can see Goofy in the background...

And, if they ever talked directly to him, this is what happened....

After breakfast, we went swimming. The hotel had two big pools and a kiddie pool. The kiddie pool was perfect for Miles. It was deep enough to challenge him but still shallow enough to be safe. He was ok with the pool the first day and loved it by the end of the trip.

When Darrin was finished working, we went to Downtown Disney and ate at the Rainforest Cafe. This was also Father's Day, so I must say...we love you Daddy and are very happy that we got to spend this special day with you.

This gorilla was practically sitting on our table during dinner. At first Miles was scared to death. By the end of dinner, he was only scared...meaning he never got completely over it. The gorilla talked every 15 minutes, which was like salt in the wound.

He never...
...took his eyes...

...off of the gorilla...

We did a little shopping and bought Miles his first Mickey, which he LOVED.



Buzz was definitely his favorite thing about Day 1. He walked right up and grabbed his hand. Unfortunately there was a line of people waiting to get their picture with Buzz so we couldn't linger. Miles threw a fit when we had to leave. It was kind of heart breaking to see how much he didn't want to leave Buzz.

So that's Day 1. Also packed into this day was a 4.5 hour nap for Miles. He was obviously exhausted from the drive down. Stay tuned fro Day 2.