This past week it appears my luck ran out (and now my $$$). Here is a rundown of what happened:
Sunday = Projector broke (and when I say broke I mean the motor stopped the fan which overheated the bulb, which exploded and broke the color wheel.....yep, that is the end of that projector)
Monday = Had to work until 8:30pm (no homework done and forgot my sister Amber's birthday) I SUCK!!
Tuesday =
- Babysat Sienna from 6:30am until 10am while little Sierra got tubes in her ears (supposed to go until 8am, but it wasn't Stacy's fault)....thus late for work and had to do 2 conference calls from the road (not super effective!)
- Got to work never actually made it to my desk all day due to meetings
- IM'd Nicole to confirm her fridge food was also warm....it was FRIDGE is broken.
- Went to class and got 4 out of 10 on my quiz.....so sad. Good thing I can drop one! Got home at midnight (as usual).
Wednesday = Stacy helps me out by sitting at my house while the fridge repairman comes. $300 to fix a 15 yr old fridge = time for new fridge! Lovely. I try to coordinate all this from my cell phone as I'm in meetings from 8:30-5 again (no break!)
During the day I find out one of my co-workers, Ryan has an extra fridge that is 3 years old. After some discussion this is clearly my best option. Not only will Ryan sell it to me for $100 and a meal at Tucanos, but he and Jeff (another co-worker) will deliver it from Saratoga Springs to my house in Provo. What I deal!!
Thursday = While I'm at class, I give Ryan & Jeff a key to my house and they deliver my new fridge, transfer all my food from the freezer to the new fridge, and take my old fridge to my parents house so Rocky Mountain power can take it away! What service!!! And the fridge is GREAT and much bigger than what I previously had.
I can not tell you how grateful I was for them! Seriously, I can't stop thinking about how much they helped me out this week. They even volunteered. I didn't have to beg or anything! They really taught me a lesson is helping others out without complaining! I totally owe them BIG TIME!!
Friday = I have had a consistent "lump" in my throat for the last 6 weeks or so....so I went to have a ECD to look down to my stomach to see what may be going on. Since I'm on high deductible and haven't met my deductible I had to pay for this all out of pocket ($1500). Lucky for me....they found nothing so I still have a lump in my throat and am now $1500 poorer. Where is Dr. House when you need him???
On a better note, it didn't hurt at all & I was undrugged enough to make it to the BYU football game that night after an hour nap.
Needless to say this was an expensive week when I also finished paying for my Christmas trip to Israel (at least that is something I WANT to pay for). I was almost scared to wake up each day!
Anyone have a projector or super knowledge of home theater systems they want to research projectors for me? I so need a boy to do this kind of stuff.......
Sunday, October 4, 2009
Sunday, August 30, 2009
School, Monavie Party & Vancouver
Sorry for the lack of posts lately. I am a busy, busy woman these days with school and work. Here is a little bit of what I have been up to in the past month.
I started the EMBA program and I LOVE it. My group gets along great. I am busy, but I like what I'm learning so the homework is fun and I feel like I'm progressing at something. Here is a picture of our class and me looking so very professional in my suit coat (front, right hand side).
Stacy and I also got to attend the Monavie employee part up at Park City Resort. The day included Chick-fil-a, the best cookies ever, shopping at the Outlets and then finally making it to the actual party (around 7pm). Unfortunately we arrived at the same time as the rain and they had closed the alpine slide, roller coaster, and the zip line. We waited it out through several storms and were able to go on the roller coaster 2 times. It was really, really fun!!
Here we are waiting for the roller coaster in the rain. We were about 10 people from getting on when it started raining.
Here we are actually on the coaster going up the hill. You got to control your own speed on the way down though and I had the controls!!! Thankfully Stacy didn't or we may have walked down the hill :) Sorry for the scary up close picture......just remember it had been raining :)
Vancouver
This past weekend I went to Vancouver for work. It was a quickly planned event (1 week!) but we pulled off an amazing Product Store. It was actually really, really fun and Vancouver is a beautiful city! Minus the 5:30am departure this morning the trip was great (SO SLEEPY!). Here are some pictures.
The first night we went down to Stanley park and looked at the city. This is the best picture my little camera would take. It was beautiful, great weather and we even had a seal sighting (or as some thought a really big fish ...LOL....you had to be there for that one).
The next morning I got up and had time to go for a long run back around the park. Our hotel is in the middle of the picture below. It was only about a 10 min run down to the park and it was a gorgeous morning.
Here is a picture of the park entrance before you get to the other side of the water.
I had to take a picture of this guy because he was sleeping like this when I started my run AND when I finished over an hour later. I thought perhaps he was dead, but he twitched so he was just napping.
Here is a picture of our group. We had a great time at dinner each night and laughed ALOT. Vancouver has some great food and I would definitely recommend this restaurant below ("The Keg"). It was a great steakhouse for $25 total!
I started the EMBA program and I LOVE it. My group gets along great. I am busy, but I like what I'm learning so the homework is fun and I feel like I'm progressing at something. Here is a picture of our class and me looking so very professional in my suit coat (front, right hand side).
Stacy and I also got to attend the Monavie employee part up at Park City Resort. The day included Chick-fil-a, the best cookies ever, shopping at the Outlets and then finally making it to the actual party (around 7pm). Unfortunately we arrived at the same time as the rain and they had closed the alpine slide, roller coaster, and the zip line. We waited it out through several storms and were able to go on the roller coaster 2 times. It was really, really fun!!
Here we are waiting for the roller coaster in the rain. We were about 10 people from getting on when it started raining.
Here we are actually on the coaster going up the hill. You got to control your own speed on the way down though and I had the controls!!! Thankfully Stacy didn't or we may have walked down the hill :) Sorry for the scary up close picture......just remember it had been raining :)
Vancouver
This past weekend I went to Vancouver for work. It was a quickly planned event (1 week!) but we pulled off an amazing Product Store. It was actually really, really fun and Vancouver is a beautiful city! Minus the 5:30am departure this morning the trip was great (SO SLEEPY!). Here are some pictures.
The first night we went down to Stanley park and looked at the city. This is the best picture my little camera would take. It was beautiful, great weather and we even had a seal sighting (or as some thought a really big fish ...LOL....you had to be there for that one).
The next morning I got up and had time to go for a long run back around the park. Our hotel is in the middle of the picture below. It was only about a 10 min run down to the park and it was a gorgeous morning.
Here is a picture of the park entrance before you get to the other side of the water.
I had to take a picture of this guy because he was sleeping like this when I started my run AND when I finished over an hour later. I thought perhaps he was dead, but he twitched so he was just napping.
Here is a picture of our group. We had a great time at dinner each night and laughed ALOT. Vancouver has some great food and I would definitely recommend this restaurant below ("The Keg"). It was a great steakhouse for $25 total!
Sunday, August 9, 2009
I survived!
I am officially a student once again. This past week I started the EMBA program at BYU. We had what BYU called "Residency Week" but I like to call "Adult EFY" this past week. I went to school every day from 7am - 5pm. I don't know if they have it that early to make you appreciate your job, but I now definitely appreciate my 9am start time at Monavie much more than I did a week ago. I almost can't wait to go back to work.....almost!
Highlights from the week included:
- Meeting my team that I get along with really well and should be my BFF's by the end of this year...LOL!
- Going to Camp Williams and doing really fun team building exercises that really made you get to know your team (a little too close in some cases!)
- Going to the power plant in Delta, UT. I learned all sorts of things about energy that I never knew (which wasn't hard since I pretty much knew nothing prior to this week).
- My professors and administration are seriously awesome. It was very well planned out week
- Eating WAY too much. They pretty much fed us every 2 hours.
I am actually loving school so far even though I did 10 hours of Accounting homework yesterday! I feel an overwhelming amount of gratitude that I was accepted into such a prestigious program. I will say that I was surprised by the average age of my program (37). There were so many people with many more years of experience that it was a little intimidating, but I think it will be great to learn from such smart people!
In short......I'm excited!
Highlights from the week included:
- Meeting my team that I get along with really well and should be my BFF's by the end of this year...LOL!
- Going to Camp Williams and doing really fun team building exercises that really made you get to know your team (a little too close in some cases!)
- Going to the power plant in Delta, UT. I learned all sorts of things about energy that I never knew (which wasn't hard since I pretty much knew nothing prior to this week).
- My professors and administration are seriously awesome. It was very well planned out week
- Eating WAY too much. They pretty much fed us every 2 hours.
I am actually loving school so far even though I did 10 hours of Accounting homework yesterday! I feel an overwhelming amount of gratitude that I was accepted into such a prestigious program. I will say that I was surprised by the average age of my program (37). There were so many people with many more years of experience that it was a little intimidating, but I think it will be great to learn from such smart people!
In short......I'm excited!
Sunday, August 2, 2009
We are the Champions........AGAIN!
A couple weeks ago my girls softball team (sponsored by NuSkin, with virtually no NuSkin employees on the team....LOL!) is Provo City League Champions again. We haven't lost for several years and this year we lost in the tournament (by 1 pt) so we had to beat the team that beat us twice in order to win the championship. Needless to say, we brought our A game and won both games. I love playing softball and this year was no exception.....it was TONS of fun.
Friday, July 24, 2009
Chicago!
About a week ago I went to Chicago to see Nicole and the to Peoria to see Carrie. Nicole drove down from her internship in Wisconsin to join me in Chicago for the weekend. I liked visiting Chicago, but have to say I am reminded how much I don't want to live in a big city with humidity. It makes me really appreciate Utah (climate, quality of life, no traffic, cleanliness, etc).
Our first stop was of course FOOD! We went to the world famous "Giordano's" for a Chicago Stuffed Crust Pizza. I have to say I was very, very impressed with how good this pizza was. It seriously lived up to the hype! Don't worry I was awake even though I appear asleep in the picture!
With our full belly's it was time to walk off that pizza so we spent the rest of the evening walking around downtown Chicago. We stopped at the "Bean" and the Buckingham Fountain. After all that walking we were of course hungry again so we stopped in for some cheesecake at The Cheesecake Factory. SO TASTY!
After a good night's rest we jumped on the "L" with the rest of the parentless children of Chicago (which made me so sad) and made our trek downtown (we were staying near the airport for cheapness). Luckily the weather was warm, but not too hot (mid 70's). It definitely was muggy though! My hair was forced to be curly the whole trip!
We spent most of our day on Saturday at the Navy Pier. We went for a sail on a Pirate ship which was nice to be out on the Lake, but the "windy city" was not so windy for the sale boat. I did get to help the crew pull up the sail though and I have to say it was VERY heavy and much harder than I thought it would be!
After hanging out at the Navy Pier we went to Garrett Popcorn that we heard had the best popcorn. Let's just say Nicole and I devoured a large bag of caramel popcorn in about 30 min and then we went back to buy more! It was THAT good!
Later that evening we had tickets to see the broadway play Mary Poppins. I was excited to see a happy play and figured I knew the story, but I was so surprised at how good it really was. With Aunt Mary as my aunt I have seen Mary Poppins more than the average adult, but I LOVED the play. It was with the original broadway cast and I have to say that "Bert" stole the show. He would have given Dick Van Dyke a run for his money! I was also very impressed with the set and how the "magic" of Mary Poppins still existed. Mary Poppins flew, paintings came to life and best of all Bert tap danced on the ceiling.....seriously that takes some major skill! If you have a chance to see this play it is worth seeing, plus the songs will be in your head for days and you will be cheery! I'd see it again!
Please notice how Nicole has a SCARF on in this picture :) Yes it is July!
On Sunday after church I made my way down to Peoria, Illinois to visit Carrie who moved there a little over a year ago. It was fun to see her family and her new baby girl, Audrey (6 weeks old). Although I don't have too many pictures we basically hung out, chatted, took a very long nap one day, fed Audrey (man that girl can EAT!). We also went to a local play, "Once upon a mattress" which was cute, the wildlife park, and the county fair. Carrie really has a fun neighborhood and it was just fun to be there and see her life. I MISS her! Here are some pictures of me, Carrie, Caleb and Audrey.
Our first stop was of course FOOD! We went to the world famous "Giordano's" for a Chicago Stuffed Crust Pizza. I have to say I was very, very impressed with how good this pizza was. It seriously lived up to the hype! Don't worry I was awake even though I appear asleep in the picture!
With our full belly's it was time to walk off that pizza so we spent the rest of the evening walking around downtown Chicago. We stopped at the "Bean" and the Buckingham Fountain. After all that walking we were of course hungry again so we stopped in for some cheesecake at The Cheesecake Factory. SO TASTY!
After a good night's rest we jumped on the "L" with the rest of the parentless children of Chicago (which made me so sad) and made our trek downtown (we were staying near the airport for cheapness). Luckily the weather was warm, but not too hot (mid 70's). It definitely was muggy though! My hair was forced to be curly the whole trip!
We spent most of our day on Saturday at the Navy Pier. We went for a sail on a Pirate ship which was nice to be out on the Lake, but the "windy city" was not so windy for the sale boat. I did get to help the crew pull up the sail though and I have to say it was VERY heavy and much harder than I thought it would be!
After hanging out at the Navy Pier we went to Garrett Popcorn that we heard had the best popcorn. Let's just say Nicole and I devoured a large bag of caramel popcorn in about 30 min and then we went back to buy more! It was THAT good!
Later that evening we had tickets to see the broadway play Mary Poppins. I was excited to see a happy play and figured I knew the story, but I was so surprised at how good it really was. With Aunt Mary as my aunt I have seen Mary Poppins more than the average adult, but I LOVED the play. It was with the original broadway cast and I have to say that "Bert" stole the show. He would have given Dick Van Dyke a run for his money! I was also very impressed with the set and how the "magic" of Mary Poppins still existed. Mary Poppins flew, paintings came to life and best of all Bert tap danced on the ceiling.....seriously that takes some major skill! If you have a chance to see this play it is worth seeing, plus the songs will be in your head for days and you will be cheery! I'd see it again!
Please notice how Nicole has a SCARF on in this picture :) Yes it is July!
On Sunday after church I made my way down to Peoria, Illinois to visit Carrie who moved there a little over a year ago. It was fun to see her family and her new baby girl, Audrey (6 weeks old). Although I don't have too many pictures we basically hung out, chatted, took a very long nap one day, fed Audrey (man that girl can EAT!). We also went to a local play, "Once upon a mattress" which was cute, the wildlife park, and the county fair. Carrie really has a fun neighborhood and it was just fun to be there and see her life. I MISS her! Here are some pictures of me, Carrie, Caleb and Audrey.
Sunday, July 5, 2009
4th of July!
The 4th of July is my FAVORITE holiday. This year I went up to Logan to spend the weekend with Amber, Scott, Ashley and Andrew. I had a great time! Here is a recap of what we did.
The first stop was the pool. I actually made it to the pool before I made it to the McAllister's house :) It was a warm and beautiful day. I even convinced Ashley to float on a noodle and "blow bubbles" which she did with her mouth (not her nose).
That night we went to see the Cache Valley fireworks show (yes on July 3rd). It was a beautiful evening and the rain held off which was good because Ashley was VERY concerned that it might rain and we would have to leave!
Also planned for the weekend was painting the kitchen and the front room. We decided to let Ashley start off the painting....she then took a nap so we could finish :)
For the 4th of July we went the the "Cruise In" parade where they basically shut down the Main street of Logan for a parade of cars where people drive their rebuilt cars up and down the street for 2.5 hours. I seriously laughed so hard at how popular this was. Here are some pictures.....
These are the types of cars you would see. For some reason Amber was obsessed with getting a picture of the "Back to the Future" car.
Also one reason I love going to Logan is that the McAllisters grill all the time and AWESOME food. We had shishkabobs, chicken on a can (soda can), BBQ'd pizza, Pasookies......they seriously cook so much GREAT food, but of course keep all their recipes to themselves. Amber also made me run 6 miles with her since she is training for a half marathon. Well I wish I had been training like the last 2 years because it would have made for a much more enjoyable run. I've only been casually running 3-4 miles a 1-2 times a week this year. Needless to say only one of us ran the whole time.....and it wasn't me. I guess training does help!
Anyways it was a GREAT weekend!
The first stop was the pool. I actually made it to the pool before I made it to the McAllister's house :) It was a warm and beautiful day. I even convinced Ashley to float on a noodle and "blow bubbles" which she did with her mouth (not her nose).
That night we went to see the Cache Valley fireworks show (yes on July 3rd). It was a beautiful evening and the rain held off which was good because Ashley was VERY concerned that it might rain and we would have to leave!
Also planned for the weekend was painting the kitchen and the front room. We decided to let Ashley start off the painting....she then took a nap so we could finish :)
For the 4th of July we went the the "Cruise In" parade where they basically shut down the Main street of Logan for a parade of cars where people drive their rebuilt cars up and down the street for 2.5 hours. I seriously laughed so hard at how popular this was. Here are some pictures.....
These are the types of cars you would see. For some reason Amber was obsessed with getting a picture of the "Back to the Future" car.
Also one reason I love going to Logan is that the McAllisters grill all the time and AWESOME food. We had shishkabobs, chicken on a can (soda can), BBQ'd pizza, Pasookies......they seriously cook so much GREAT food, but of course keep all their recipes to themselves. Amber also made me run 6 miles with her since she is training for a half marathon. Well I wish I had been training like the last 2 years because it would have made for a much more enjoyable run. I've only been casually running 3-4 miles a 1-2 times a week this year. Needless to say only one of us ran the whole time.....and it wasn't me. I guess training does help!
Anyways it was a GREAT weekend!
Sunday, May 3, 2009
Orlando!
Sorry it has taken me a while to post this trip. I've been trying out some new mosaics and it hasn't been the quickest process. Also this is a VERY, VERY, VERY long post so if you get bored I understand, but I will be happy when my blog book comes next year and there are pictures throughout the post to keep you occupied.
A couple of weeks ago Amber & I headed to Orlando. It was a part work, part play trip. Monavie was having one of their Regional Events down there and needed a few more cashiers so Amber got to come along. We were in charge of the Monavie product store where we sell Monavie branded apparel and sales tools to distributors attending the event. It is like a mini-convention. We helped to set up the store, work in it while it was open the next day (8-6) and then took it down. The store was very busy and time went by really fast which is great for those of you who have ever worked at these convention type events.
On Friday night one of our vendors took us all out to dinner. Not just dinner, but a super fancy nice dinner at the #1 steakhouse in America, Charley's. Amber and I thought it would be wise to split the 24 oz. steak since we are older and I'm not sure my waistline would recover from eating the whole thing. The iPhone photo doesn't do it justice, but trust me it was the BEST steak I've ever eaten. Not to mention all of the delicious side dishes and dessert we ate along with it.
Here are some pictures of the event and the steak:
After the event was over it was time to PLAY! Amber & I extended a day and decided to do a hopper pass at Disney World. Since it was spring break we were prepared for hours in line and had our schedule of all the rides we wanted to go on at each park. We were very, very surprised that most rides had less than a 20 minute wait and usually we were waiting in an air conditioned line (what an awesome idea!). I was very, very impressed with Disney World and how clean and efficient it was. It really is the happiest place on earth even for 2 adults!! Our planning worked out perfectly and we got to go on all the rides we had planned to as well as many, many others.
Here is a re-cap of each park. I have learned that the wind blown, hot sweaty amusement park look is not my best look....oh well!!
#1 - Our first stop was Hollywood Studios. Since Amber and I are getting older we had come prepared and taken motion sickness medicine to make sure our trip to Disney World was enjoyable. This medicine was not enough for Amber who puked all over me and her on the simulated ride "Star Tours." Yes, that's right....Amber puked on me. GROSS!!!! To her credit she did a good job of aiming for our legs (easy to wash) and didn't hit any other riders who were also on the ride (lucky for them!). And I was happy (and disgusted) that she kept most of it in her mouth and swallowed it (yep that is disgusting, but I would have had even more on me if she hadn't done that).
My favorite rides were 'Aerosmith's Rockin Roller Coaster' which was an awesome roller coaster that just launched you into the dark unexpectedly. I also really liked the 'Tower of Terror' which basically shot you up and down and elevator shaft as part of the Twilight Zone. We also went on the new 'Toy Story' ride that was our longest wait of the day, but a pretty fun ride in 3D. I seriously don't understand how 3D works but it was cool except that Amber beat me on the target shooting during the ride :(
Next Stop.....EPCOT
Epcot was my least favorite of all the parks from a ride perspective, but it was definitely the most beautiful of all the parks. There were flowers everywhere and they had all the Disney prince and princesses landscaped. They were made out of flowers, grass, trees, etc. Seriously way cool!
We really only went on 1 ride here (Mission to Mars) which was another simulated ride that made us a tad sick, but also I really don't understand how they made it seem like I was blasting off into space. My face was flapping in the wind and my ears were popping and it felt just like blasting off into space would. Seriously, how do they do that when I know that I haven't even left the ground?
We also ate at Epcot in the country of "China." We had glorified Panda Express, but it was tasty, we were starving and only cost $8 with a drink. Seriously I was surprised that the food was reasonably priced.
Stop #3 was the Animal Kingdom. We really liked the Animal Kingdom and went on several rides there. We got there as instructed during the Parade so everyone was watching the parade while we enjoyed the rides. A couple of our favorites were:
Dinosaur Ride - I'm not sure what it was called, but was a roller coaster that turned around like a tea cup while on a track, but also was much like the dreaded Wild Mouse at Lagoon where you feel you might fall off the track! It was fun though.
Mt Everest Ride - This roller coaster was AWESOME! It had so many unexpected twist and turns and had the whole Abominable Snowman tearing apart the track theme! You went in and out of 'Mt Everest' and at one point the track ended and you went backwards through the ride. It was pretty cool.
Safari trip - They have a safari trip where you can see the animals in their "natural" surroundings. I hate to tell you this isn't like watching animals at the zoo. We were in a jeep and the animals were just roaming around the road. No fences, nothing. No biggie that we had giraffes, rhino's, elephants, crocodiles, etc, etc just roaming free. Good thing they are "used" to people and didn't attack us cause they certainly could if they wanted to. I even contemplated if perhaps they weren't real since it seems like a huge liability, but they said they were so I believe them.
Here are some pictures of the Animal Kingdom.
Our final stop of the day was the Magic Kingdom. We got there about 6pm and spent the rest of the night there. We went on favorites such as Splash Mountain, Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, & Pirates of the Caribbean. We had so much time left while we waited for the fireworks to start that we got to go on It's a Small World, Winnie the Pooh, the Carousel, Peter Pan, etc. We did some shopping and ate. There were seriously no lines! Sadly we didn't get to do Space Mountain since it was closed for repairs.
We also had time to meet Belle, Cinderella, and Aurora. We did wait in line for 10 minutes with NO kids to meet these princesses. I felt under dressed for the occasion since all the little girls were dressed as their favorite princess and I was in shorts. We got some looks, but we were on a special mission. See Amber needed a picture of Cinderella for Ashley (yeah Amber that makes up for not taking her to Disney World...LOL!) . Anyways, I got the bright idea that we should video Cinderella saying something to Ashley. Being the smart Mom that Amber is she thought we needed to have Cinderella saying something to Ashley like "Princesses don't cry or whine" so that Amber can use it to her parenting advantage. Needless to say the video is PRICELESS and I'm sure it will be used a lot in the McAllister home.
The last day was spent swimming at the pool before we took a late afternoon flight home. Since it wasn't super sunny we actually played in the pool and had a photo shoot.
Also I got HUGE blisters on the balls of each of my feet. I think working the convention the day before (all day) and then walking all over Disney World took it's toll on my feet. They made me walk so slowly that this is how I made my way through the Orlando airport. Let me tell you this it the WAY to go. I think I may fake an injury next time!!!
And finally......A couple of pictures of our hotel room......not to shabby!!
A couple of weeks ago Amber & I headed to Orlando. It was a part work, part play trip. Monavie was having one of their Regional Events down there and needed a few more cashiers so Amber got to come along. We were in charge of the Monavie product store where we sell Monavie branded apparel and sales tools to distributors attending the event. It is like a mini-convention. We helped to set up the store, work in it while it was open the next day (8-6) and then took it down. The store was very busy and time went by really fast which is great for those of you who have ever worked at these convention type events.
On Friday night one of our vendors took us all out to dinner. Not just dinner, but a super fancy nice dinner at the #1 steakhouse in America, Charley's. Amber and I thought it would be wise to split the 24 oz. steak since we are older and I'm not sure my waistline would recover from eating the whole thing. The iPhone photo doesn't do it justice, but trust me it was the BEST steak I've ever eaten. Not to mention all of the delicious side dishes and dessert we ate along with it.
Here are some pictures of the event and the steak:
After the event was over it was time to PLAY! Amber & I extended a day and decided to do a hopper pass at Disney World. Since it was spring break we were prepared for hours in line and had our schedule of all the rides we wanted to go on at each park. We were very, very surprised that most rides had less than a 20 minute wait and usually we were waiting in an air conditioned line (what an awesome idea!). I was very, very impressed with Disney World and how clean and efficient it was. It really is the happiest place on earth even for 2 adults!! Our planning worked out perfectly and we got to go on all the rides we had planned to as well as many, many others.
Here is a re-cap of each park. I have learned that the wind blown, hot sweaty amusement park look is not my best look....oh well!!
#1 - Our first stop was Hollywood Studios. Since Amber and I are getting older we had come prepared and taken motion sickness medicine to make sure our trip to Disney World was enjoyable. This medicine was not enough for Amber who puked all over me and her on the simulated ride "Star Tours." Yes, that's right....Amber puked on me. GROSS!!!! To her credit she did a good job of aiming for our legs (easy to wash) and didn't hit any other riders who were also on the ride (lucky for them!). And I was happy (and disgusted) that she kept most of it in her mouth and swallowed it (yep that is disgusting, but I would have had even more on me if she hadn't done that).
My favorite rides were 'Aerosmith's Rockin Roller Coaster' which was an awesome roller coaster that just launched you into the dark unexpectedly. I also really liked the 'Tower of Terror' which basically shot you up and down and elevator shaft as part of the Twilight Zone. We also went on the new 'Toy Story' ride that was our longest wait of the day, but a pretty fun ride in 3D. I seriously don't understand how 3D works but it was cool except that Amber beat me on the target shooting during the ride :(
Next Stop.....EPCOT
Epcot was my least favorite of all the parks from a ride perspective, but it was definitely the most beautiful of all the parks. There were flowers everywhere and they had all the Disney prince and princesses landscaped. They were made out of flowers, grass, trees, etc. Seriously way cool!
We really only went on 1 ride here (Mission to Mars) which was another simulated ride that made us a tad sick, but also I really don't understand how they made it seem like I was blasting off into space. My face was flapping in the wind and my ears were popping and it felt just like blasting off into space would. Seriously, how do they do that when I know that I haven't even left the ground?
We also ate at Epcot in the country of "China." We had glorified Panda Express, but it was tasty, we were starving and only cost $8 with a drink. Seriously I was surprised that the food was reasonably priced.
Stop #3 was the Animal Kingdom. We really liked the Animal Kingdom and went on several rides there. We got there as instructed during the Parade so everyone was watching the parade while we enjoyed the rides. A couple of our favorites were:
Dinosaur Ride - I'm not sure what it was called, but was a roller coaster that turned around like a tea cup while on a track, but also was much like the dreaded Wild Mouse at Lagoon where you feel you might fall off the track! It was fun though.
Mt Everest Ride - This roller coaster was AWESOME! It had so many unexpected twist and turns and had the whole Abominable Snowman tearing apart the track theme! You went in and out of 'Mt Everest' and at one point the track ended and you went backwards through the ride. It was pretty cool.
Safari trip - They have a safari trip where you can see the animals in their "natural" surroundings. I hate to tell you this isn't like watching animals at the zoo. We were in a jeep and the animals were just roaming around the road. No fences, nothing. No biggie that we had giraffes, rhino's, elephants, crocodiles, etc, etc just roaming free. Good thing they are "used" to people and didn't attack us cause they certainly could if they wanted to. I even contemplated if perhaps they weren't real since it seems like a huge liability, but they said they were so I believe them.
Here are some pictures of the Animal Kingdom.
Our final stop of the day was the Magic Kingdom. We got there about 6pm and spent the rest of the night there. We went on favorites such as Splash Mountain, Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, & Pirates of the Caribbean. We had so much time left while we waited for the fireworks to start that we got to go on It's a Small World, Winnie the Pooh, the Carousel, Peter Pan, etc. We did some shopping and ate. There were seriously no lines! Sadly we didn't get to do Space Mountain since it was closed for repairs.
We also had time to meet Belle, Cinderella, and Aurora. We did wait in line for 10 minutes with NO kids to meet these princesses. I felt under dressed for the occasion since all the little girls were dressed as their favorite princess and I was in shorts. We got some looks, but we were on a special mission. See Amber needed a picture of Cinderella for Ashley (yeah Amber that makes up for not taking her to Disney World...LOL!) . Anyways, I got the bright idea that we should video Cinderella saying something to Ashley. Being the smart Mom that Amber is she thought we needed to have Cinderella saying something to Ashley like "Princesses don't cry or whine" so that Amber can use it to her parenting advantage. Needless to say the video is PRICELESS and I'm sure it will be used a lot in the McAllister home.
The last day was spent swimming at the pool before we took a late afternoon flight home. Since it wasn't super sunny we actually played in the pool and had a photo shoot.
Also I got HUGE blisters on the balls of each of my feet. I think working the convention the day before (all day) and then walking all over Disney World took it's toll on my feet. They made me walk so slowly that this is how I made my way through the Orlando airport. Let me tell you this it the WAY to go. I think I may fake an injury next time!!!
And finally......A couple of pictures of our hotel room......not to shabby!!
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