Florida Day 3 - Disney's Animal Kingdom

 We decided to do a day at Disney with the Knudsen's. We decided to go to Animal Kingdom because it is the least busy of the parks. Unfortunately, it was still a weekend and the National Cheer competition was going on that weekend. So we opened the park and ran straight to the Avatar ride. It was still an hour and a half wait. And the wait times only got worse. The avatar line was really well decorated so between cousins and the entertainment in the line, it went pretty quickly.

 The ride was amazing and everyone was so happy coming off of it.

Our next stop was the safari ride. We had heard that you want to go early because that is when the animals are most active. The line was about an hour and everyone was a bit disappointed that we waited an hour for a safari ride. And then the driver got upset with someone in the back that kept standing up, so about halfway through the ride he didn't stop anymore and seemed a little more rushed in his explanations. Later in the day, the safari ride only had a 5 minute wait. We totally should have waited to do it later.

After the safari, we walked through the little trail near the exit that had more animals to look at. However, our legs were already tired by this point so there were a lot of complaints from the group. The mom's tried to talk the rest of the group into going to "The Lion King" show, to give our legs a rest, but the kids all vetoed the show, and any other show we might think of taking them to that day. They were all eager to get to Everest, the only roller coaster in the park. So we headed there, hoping that if they got that ride out of their minds, then they would be more willing to try the other stuff. 

Everest was a BIG mistake. The line claimed to be 80 minutes, if I remember right. But we think it must have broken down because there was a 15 minute stretch when the line did not move AT ALL. We literally sat down in the line and didn't need to move for 15 minutes. By the time we finally got on the ride, we were so disappointed with the 2 hour wait that the ride did not seem worth it. It was cool, but not 2 hours of waiting cool.  Claire and Alyssa purposely posed in a very unimpressed way for the picture. LOL

After Everest, we headed to the last main attraction, Dinosaur. It had the shortest line of the day to that point at around 20 minutes. The ride was a little outdated and Becky later got a kick out of my and Danny's unimpressed faces in the picture compared to Alyssa's scared face.

By this point, we had done everything, without doing the shows, besides a little slow boat ride in the Avatar land. But the line was so long (75 minutes) when we got there, that most of us vetoed it. We decided to go eat instead. After dinner, we split up. Becky, Jake, Connor, Alyssa, and Claire went to the river float ride. Danny, Ashley, Tamma, Tyler, Camden, and I decided to go back to the Dinosaur ride which claimed to have a 15 minute wait on the app. By the time we got there, the line had gone up to 45 minutes so we went back to Everest instead. It was a much better experience the 2nd time through. The 60 minute line only ended up being 20 minutes. The river float group got done with their ride as we were heading back onto Everest for a second ride, so they joined up with us. We ended up riding it one more time all together and then we headed over to Avatar for the last ride of the night.

Here are some other pictures from the day.

Alyssa and Claire were twinning it.

In the line for Dinosaur

Also in the line for dinosaur

Some pictures of Ashley and Tamma.

We were exhausted by the time we got off of Avatar. The park was closed, so we headed out. We took this picture on the way out. We should have done it on the way inside because the lighting was all wrong. 

It was a fun and tiring day. The kids all had a lot of fun together. Animal Kingdom was a little less Disney-ish than other Disney parks we have been to. My biggest disappointment of the day was that it was sooo crowded. And with so little to do in the park and with kids that wouldn't go to shows, it just meant a lot of time standing in long lines and very little time actually riding rides. But at least there was a lot of bonding time while standing in line.

Florida Day 2 - Universal Studios

We got to Universal early and it is a good thing because the walk from the parking lot to the front gate was about a mile. We were in line with a bunch of others as they prepared to open the gate. We realized when we got there that we had forgotten about the early entry for resort guests. So on our Universal app, it said that the Hagrid line was already 150 minutes. We did not believe it and we raced with a bunch of others to the line. We ended up waiting for about 75 minutes, but it was well worth the wait. One of the coolest rides I have ever been on.

We were going to go to the Velocicoaster next, but we were not wanting to wait in another long line right away, so we decided to go on the Jurassic Work ride and then just continued on around the loop that the park was arranged in, hitting rides as we came to them. We didn't know anything about the King Kong ride, but the line had a lot of cool things that I'm assuming are from the movie.

There was only one ride that Camden could not go on in the park, the Incredible Hulk Roller Coaster. So I stayed with him while the others rode on the ride. They had to go through metal detectors, so Danny had to bring his phone to us after they had gotten in line. As a result, we timed the line wrong and they got off way before we expected them to be done. We rode this spinning ride and then went over to seuss land to see what we could ride there. I knew that was my plan, but I forgot to tell the others since I thought Danny would have his phone. So they were looking all over for us while we rode the carousel and went through a maze. We learned after this, to be better about communicating our plans.

We had a late lunch in this BBQ place. The food was good, but we were also pretty hungry by the time we started eating.

We brought a few of the magical Harry Potter wands along with us. We spent some time casting spells and were disappointed to find that only a few of the windows were actually functional. 

We almost walked right on to the Harry Potter ride, thanks to the single rider line.

The kids wanted to ride it again, but Danny and I chose to sit and rest instead since the ride made our adult stomach's slightly sick.

Universal loves their 3D rides. I think this was for the King Kong ride.

We finally made it on the Velocicoaster after dark. Alyssa had gotten to ride it with Ashley earlier, so she opted to sit out with our stuff so that we could all ride it. She had a lot of time to walk around the park and take pictures. 

We opted for the single rider line because the girls said it took them 30-40 minutes at about the same place it was at when we got in the line. Unfortunately, the ride broke down 3 times while we were waiting. I think it took us an hour and a half to 2 hours to get on the ride. But it was a super fun ride, so we were glad that we got to go on it. We just wish we had found a place to put the backpack so Alyssa could have ridden with us instead of being lonely waiting for us.

We finished the night off with Hagrid's motorcycle ride. The kids (and adults) were exhausted after such a long day and over 20000 steps. We got back to the house around 9:45pm and most of the Knudsen's (who had arrived around 7pm) were already asleep. We got to bed as quickly as possible since we had another early start planned for the next morning.

Florida Day 1

 For Alyssa's senior trip, she requested that we go to the Bahama's. We decided that the easiest way to get to the Bahamas would be to fly into Orlando and go on a cruise there. We chose a shorter cruise and decided to add a few days in Orlando to the trip. We left Utah on Feb. 8th around 5:30 pm. It was a direct flight, but it still got us into Orlando around midnight. 

We looked into all of the different resorts and hotels in the area, but we decided that a vacation rental was much more practical. We found one with a pool. So for our first day in Orlando, we decided to take it easy, sleep in, and enjoy the pool.

The biggest disappointment for us was that the "hot" tub ended up being a slightly warmer tub than the pool. We paid extra to have the pool heated for our stay and we expected the hot tub to be around 100 degrees for our stay. But we couldn't ever get it more than about 93 degrees. We still sat in it, but just didn't stay in it for very long.

We liked the speed limit sign behind the house. I had to point out the Harry Potter reference and the kids got it after I made the connection.

Besides the grocery store, our only outing that day was a trip to Disney Springs. We didn't know much about it besides knowing it had shops and restaurants. We expected it to be an extension of Disney with character sightings and shows, but it was really just a big outdoor shopping center with some fun themed stores and restaurants. We didn't buy anything (except Alyssa who got herself a Lulu Lemon clutch bag) but we did get a late lunch at the Rainforest Cafe. The kids especially loved the thunderstorms that rolled through a few times while we ate.

After the outing, we went back to the rental house and swam some more. We went to bed early to prepare for our early start the next day. We had planned to open the park at Universal Studios Islands of Adventure.

Some Random Things from January and Early February

Ashley is taking a world religions class at school this semester. One of the religions they learned about was Hinduism. As part of the study of Hinduism, they had a field trip to the Krishna Temple down in Spanish Fork. She got to pet llamas, see peacocks (which are apparently sacred to Hindi people), play with parrots, learn from a practicing Hindu about their beliefs, practice yoga, and eat a vegetarian meal in their buffet. She had a lot of fun on the field trip, but her favorite part was the llama, Apricot.

Tyler went on a field trip to the state capitol. They were required to wear their best clothes for the field trip, so he wore a suit. He said it was a cool building and he liked learning about the things that happen at our capitol building.

Ashley was in another school play, her second this school year. It was not a musical. It was called Trail of Hope and covered some of the stories of the pioneers who lived in Nauvoo and had to leave their homes because of persecution. Each of the students in the play had a monologue about their characters story and it was very powerful when it was all put together. She did a really good job with her part and had a lot of fun participating in the play. 

We celebrated Danny's birthday almost a week early this year. We were going to be in Florida on his birthday and he didn't want to try to fit a birthday celebration into our busy day there, so we made some no bakes, played a game or two and surprised him with a PS5. He has been having fun playing it with the boys.

I took Camden to an arcade to kill some time while Ashley and Tyler were at a play together. He played this spin the big wheel game and landed on the big prize on his first try. It was awesome. Too bad the arcade didn't have any really cool prizes.

And I think that gets us all caught up to our Florida/Bahamas trip. 

Ashley's 16th Birthday

Instead of having a big sweet 16 party like Alyssa did, Ashley chose to go somewhere fun with her closest school friends. She chose the Homestead Crater up in Midway, followed with pizza at her favorite pizza restaurant in Provo (Two Jacks). Sadly, the weather did not cooperate with us, so Danny ended up taking the kids up the canyon to the crater while I took the boys swimming. We all met up at Two Jacks afterwards.

They had fun at the crater. They only downside was that we had to reserve and buy the tickets in advance and Ashley had one friend that would not give us a committed yes to coming. Our back up plan was to have one of the boys go if she backed out last minute. But when she backed out last minute, the boys had already decided that they didn't want to go unless they both could go. And there weren't enough seats to take them both in our 4-wheel drive vehicle. So basically one of the tickets ended up not getting used.

After a delicious dinner, we went back to our house for games, presents, and dessert. They played Jackbox games and had so much fun.

Ashley's request for her treat was no bakes. They were gone before the end of the night, so they must have been good.

On Ashley's birthday, she requested to go to dinner at Longhorn Steakhouse. Danny's parents dropped off a balloon and a treat for her, but the weather was pretty bod, so they didn't stay for dinner. 

The food was good, but Alyssa was sad that she couldn't have the rolls (she is gluten free now), so we let her pick an appetizer instead.

Ashley got to sit up on the saddle and have the waiter recognize her birthday, so she thought that was fun.

Her request for a cake this year was just a chocolate cake with chocolate ganache. It was pretty good.

I think she enjoyed her birthday. She has been slow to finish driver's Ed and to practice driving, so she has not gotten her license. We don't feel the need to rush her since she wouldn't have a car to drive anyways. But we definitely want her to have a license by the time school starts in the fall.

New Year's Eve

On New Year's Eve, we went over to Gawbie and Grandpa's house to celebrate. Shannon, Kennedi, and Abbi were in town so the boys enjoyed playing with their cousins. We had yummy food and Gawbie and Shannon planned some fun activities led off with popping a balloon to find out what the activity would be. We played games, we heard a story and scored some fun light up toys. The kids tried to wear all of them at once. 

We finished the night off by watching the ball drop at 10 pm, then we headed home and killed some time until midnight so we could watch the ball drop again. It was a fun night.

Alyssa's 18th Birthday

As usual, we went to Tepanyaki for dinner on Alyssa's birthday. After such a terrible experience last year, we were determined not to have a repeat of that. So we called a week before to make a reservation, we showed up early, and we were seated within a few minutes of arriving. Dinner was good and our chef was fun. 

Instead of cake, Alyssa chose 2 gluten free desserts from Costco. French macarons and creme brulee. Both were delicious.

A few weeks before her birthday, she begged me to finally let her get highlights in her hair. I have been trying my best to convince her not to do it, since it will not be just a one time purchase, but I finally gave in for her birthday. My normal stylist couldn't get her in until mid January and she really wanted it done as soon as possible, so she found a stylist online that could get her in the following day. She was really happy with the result.

As part of her birthday gift, we also sent her to Colorado for a week to spend some time with the Knudsens. She had a lot of fun there with them, so much that we only talked to her once for about 5 minutes during the week long visit.