Disney 2012 - Day 3

Saturday, February 4th was our "lazy" day.  

While everyone back home was getting snow dumped on them, 

we spent the morning swimming ...

 relaxing in hammocks on the beach (Adam's favorite part of the vacation, I think) ...

enjoying the view and sunshine ...

and playing in the in-ground sprinklers at Downtown Disney!

We spent the morning bumming around the Caribbean Beach resort, then headed to Downtown Disney for some lunch and shopping (and unexpected water play, which led to more shopping - souvenir t-shirts for the kids because I didn't want them to ride back to the resort in soaking wet clothes).  I love Downtown Disney.  Its one of my favorite parts of our Disney trips, so I was really glad that we got to spend some extra time there on this trip.  We'd already checked out several places on our first night in Orlando, but we went back to hit up 365 days of Christmas and Goofy's Candy Company.

I love all things Christmas, so the Christmas store at Downtown Disney is one of my favorite stops.  The two times we've been there I've gotten each of the kids an ornament for the tree and bought a picture frame ornament with the year on it for my souvenir.  Kind of a fun keepsake/tradition.  We spent a lot of time this trip at "Once Upon a Toy", which is a kids dream.  Alyssa loved the Potato Head station where you can design your own Mr/Mrs. Potato head with every accessory you could imagine.  There was also a design your own lightsaber station, which had Joel been a LITTLE bit older, I'm sure we probably would have come home with our very own lightsaber.

Alyssa and Joel had SO much fun running through the water at Downtown Disney.  They probably would have been happy to have done that all day, but it we had dinner reservations with "Chef Mickey" to get ready for, so back "home" we went!

We continued Joel's birthday celebration with dinner at "Chef Mickey" at the Contemporary Resort.  Mickey, Minnie, Goofy and Donald Duck all stopped by to visit while we were dining.  Joel got a special souvenir placemat to help his remember his "big day" and we also pre-ordered a special Disney-style birthday cake complete with Mickey shaped sprinkles for our special birthday boy.  (And our server created a special "birthday pirate hat" just for Joel out of a napkin ... they've got pretty creative people all around!)

Thankful Thursday - first Thursday of summer vacation edition

Today was a very, very trying day for me full of frustrations and feeling discouraged.  So in the attempt to end my day on a "good" note, I'm going to do a Thankful Thursday 5 before bed if it kills me. :P


1.  Overall, I'm thankful that it is summer vacation.  I'm not going to think about TODAY too closely, but overall its been wonderful to be lazy in the morning, to hang out, to catch up, to play, to read, to listen to music, to watch the kids play with their neighborhood friends, etc. 


2.  I'm thankful for my amazing neighbors.  


3.  I'm thankful for my honorary Olson family.  They mean the world to me.  Our Sarah is undergoing open heart surgery tomorrow to fix her "broken" heart.  She's one of the most huge-hearted people I know ~ can't imagine what she'll be like when her heart is whole!


4.  I'm thankful that we now have digital cable which supplies me with 24/7 music stations for "background noise" during the day.

5.  I'm thankful that even on bad days, I still love my kids to the moon and back ~ from the top of their heads to the tips of their toes.

And now ... to bed I go! :)  (bonus #6 and #7 ... I'm thankful for "The Office" reruns and the TiVo that supplies them before bed).