The Adventure Begins!

Brian’s family has been planning a cruise for everyone for the past year. Although the cruise doesn’t leave until today, we decided to meet up with Brian’s Aunt Judy and Uncle Terry for a couple of days in the theme parks before driving over to catch the boat. Disney has been running a special for the military all year - Brian got a free 5 day pass, and all of our 5-day passes were $99 - so coupled with rooms at “Shades of Green” - the military hotel on Disney - we’ve had a great couple of days.

First, we had to get there. We drove. Since Jax is just over the hump for potty training, he really has very little advance warning for when he has to go potty. Often, we get so little warning that I have to just pull over and let him pee behind the car. I am beginning to suspect he likes this unfettered unination... every hour or so he’d yell “MOMMY! I GOTTA GO POTTY.... I POTTY IN THE GRASS?” Usually we could find a gas station, though.

Kids and Disney are so funny. Once we made it onto the property, and while still searching for our hotel, Riley and Jackson kept an eye out for, and exclaimed excitedly every time they saw some Mickey Mouse shape. Yes, they were everywhere. It was continuous squealing from the back seat every time we saw a mouse sign/bus/building. Very soothing to the nerves after almost 8 hours in the car. Yesterday we got up early to make it to the Animal Kingdom when it opened. Animal Kingdom is really my favorite of the Disney parks. There’s lots of shade, and I like its rustic and crumbly ambiance. Once the park-opening festivities were over, we booked it straight back to the Kilamanjaro Safari ride - for two reasons 1) to beat the crowd and 2) to hopefully catch a glimpse of the animals before they retreated to cooler pastures when the day heated up. After not too long a wait (we managed to just eek in front of a large group of students from Puerto Rico) we made it onto the ride, and saw lots of gazelles and elephants and giraffes. We even saw a lion - sprawled out, lying belly up on the big rock. Oddly enough, it was the exact position that Skoshi likes to assume on the tile at home. (We learned later that the big rock is actually air conditioned to entice the lion out for viewing. OHHH - OF COURSE it’s air conditioned... it all makes sense now. ) Then we walked around the tree of life for a bit while Brian trekked of for Expedition Everest Fastpasses. This back part of the Tree is actually one of my favorite parts of the park - I love hunting for the animals hidden in the bark with the kids - my favorite is the 6 foot bunny - I can’t help but think that whoever put that there must be a theater geek (you know, the play “Harvey” with the 6 foot tall white rabbit).

After watching “It’s tough to be a bug” (which was so terrifying to Jackson that he hid his face while shrieking at the top of his lungs the entire time. This is different from his usual state of loudness in that he usually just shrieks.) we tried to head over to DinoLand. This was all as dictated by my “touring plan” which instead of printing out and placing in page protectors - like I did last time - I simply downloaded to my iphone. Unfortunately, the heavens erupted in a violent thunderstorm, so we took refuge in the “Finding Nemo” musical - which Jax also found somewhat terrifying, but Riley LOVED.

So we finally made it to the BoneYard in Dinoland - where the kids made a bee line for the dirt pit with dinosaur bones. Judy watched them while we rode Everest. Then I suppose we’d dried out sufficiently because Brian thought a dousing on Kali River Rapids would be fun. I thoughtfully declined - and volunteered to stay back with Jax who was too short to ride and needed a nap anyway. (quick thinking on my part - they all got totally drenched, while I placidly watched the trained bird tricks with a quietly sleeping Jax.) After they sloshed back my way, we took Riley on Dinosaur. It may have been a little scary for her, though. When viewing the on-ride photo afterwards, everyone is staring off to the right at whatever dino was coming at us... except me. I’m looking left to check on Riley who is curled into a little ball to hide her face. Oh well. She left the ride smiling anyway!

This entire time, Jackson is asking for one of those blue water bottles with a fan on them. For some reason, he decided that this was called a “toybin”. Not sure where he got that from, but every 5 minutes I had to deny his request for the toybin.
“MOMMY, I HAVE A TOYBIN NOW?”
“no”

“MOMMY, I HAVE A TOYBIN NOW?”
“no”

“MOMMY, I HAVE A TOYBIN NOW?”
“no”

“MOMMY, I HAVE A TOYBIN NOW?”
“no”

You get the idea.

All in all it was a good day. And since we bought the 5 day pass, we get to come back for more in a month or so. We keep thinking that maybe we’ll try another hotel. But then we look at the rates for those other hotels... and so maybe we’ll just stick with Shades of Green!