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5:55 am. Sunrise on the lake. Thanks Char! #nofilter (Taken with...

Sun, 27 May 2012 05:59:54 -0400

5:55 am. Sunrise on the lake. Thanks Char! #nofilter (Taken with instagram)

Hammock time (Taken with instagram)

Sat, 26 May 2012 18:16:42 -0400

Hammock time (Taken with instagram)

Turned down his nap. Then the nap got him (Taken with Instagram...

Sat, 26 May 2012 17:11:13 -0400

Turned down his nap. Then the nap got him (Taken with Instagram at High Rock Lake)

2nd set of Disney Pics

Fri, 25 May 2012 12:09:02 -0400

Bath time! (Taken with instagram)

Mon, 21 May 2012 20:40:54 -0400

Bath time! (Taken with instagram)

Disney Pics

Mon, 21 May 2012 10:06:15 -0400

At this point we’ve posted a lot of photos from our Disney trip. But we of course have many many more than what we’ve posted. Here’s a set of about 80 that you can view via slide show (you should be able to view full screen)

Easy like a Sunday morning (Taken with instagram)

Sun, 20 May 2012 07:36:42 -0400

Easy like a Sunday morning (Taken with instagram)

Love May weekends at Bocci (Taken with instagram)

Sat, 19 May 2012 20:31:31 -0400

Love May weekends at Bocci (Taken with instagram)

iPad learning - thanks for the tips folks (Taken with instagram)

Thu, 17 May 2012 19:12:58 -0400

iPad learning - thanks for the tips folks (Taken with instagram)

Family fun

Tue, 15 May 2012 10:57:00 -0400

We had one of the spontaneous moments of fun last night after dinner at Moe’s. A family relay race around the fountain.

It’s the little things in life. And this is one of them.

So fun.

Happy Mother’s Day (Taken with instagram)

Sun, 13 May 2012 22:39:35 -0400

Happy Mother’s Day (Taken with instagram)

Disney Recap, Part II: Magic Kingdom

Fri, 11 May 2012 16:35:00 -0400

We knew that the highlight of the theme park portion of our trip was going to be Magic Kingdom. With kids aged 7, (almost) 5, 2.5 and then the babies, there was an obvious draw to the characters, attractions and entire Magic Kingdom experience. We ended up spending almost 2 full days at Magic Kingdom and an additional night, during which we took in the night-time Electrical Parade.

For the Magic Kingdom Recap I thought I’d run through a list of awards:

Best Ride - Overall: The best known rides at MK are probably Space Mountain and Thunder Mountain for the roller coaster crowd and rides like Small World, Dumbo and Pirates of the Caribbean for younger audience. We found that the ride which had the most overall attraction for the broadest audience was the Buzz Lightyear/Toy Story ride.

On the ride, you slowly work your way through a space-themed maze a la Small World or Pirates but you have a variety of targets during the journey and use your laser shooter to try and score points. Each time you ride you can shoot different targets and try to get a higher score. It was a ton of fun for kids and adults too! Props to Jason for high score!

Best Ride: Kids

The runaway winner for best ride for the older kids was the Goofy rollercoaster - aka the “Goofini” or Barnstormer. It’s just the right mix of an actual roller coaster and one or two turns to make it fun with being small enough to allow the kids to really enjoy it. Jacob and Jensen LOVED it. We had Miller ride it…he wasn’t totally enthused but imagine he will be a bigger fan in a few years!

Most Hilarious Moment: Miller on the Carousel

As a little more than 2 year old, Miller was a little young for a lot of the rides at the park but we tried our best to help him face his fears and learn that the rides could be fun. He wasn’t really a fan of the rides which went up in the air (the aforementioned rollercoaster and the Dumbo ride) and had a little trepidation in the shows when the lights would go all the way out. All of this is understandable - he’s only 2 and all in all he was fantastic in willing to try things out. At one point we passed by the carousel and he made a mention of wanting to ride the “horsey”.

Or so we thought.

We got on for the next session and Miller suddenly decided that riding the carousel was akin to getting a root canal without anesthetic. Or at least that’s what his combination of screams and protests suggested. Surely it would pass once we got going? Well, the screams died down but Miller really didn’t want to keep going but by that point it was too late. So we tried every method we could think of to get his mind off the ride, settling on getting him to wave to the crowds in line as we went round and round. Because if there’s one thing Miller loves to do it’s wave in his uniquely friendly way to anyone and everyone. What resulted was an absolutely hilarious 30 seconds or so of juxtaposition - tears of “why are you making me do this” combined with a wave to the crowds that was positively Presidential. Alas, we survived. And the next day when we walked past the carousel Miller announced, “I rode that horsey”. Yes you did, Mill, yes you did.

Most valuable accessory: tie between the Baby Bjorn and strollers

We were amazed at how well the babies did in the park. Both Charlotte and Janie Grace were real troopers, sleeping on the fly on all kinds of different schedules. The Baby Bjorns proved to be key as they allowed us to keep babies happy while also maintaining flexibility and speed getting around the park.

I would have given top accessory to the Bjorn in a landslide had it not been for the multi-kid functionality of the strollers. By the end of day 2 in the park all of us had tired legs and feet and even Jacob was begging for a little stroller time. We were adequately prepared with lots o’ wheels so we were able to keep zipping around. If only we had brought strollers for the adults!

Best photo background: Cinderella’s Castle

Man, what a classic and cool background for a pic.

makes you wanna just grab the one you love and give her a smooch!

Best Character Run-In: Woody and Jessie

One of the coolest parts of Magic Kingdom is when you get the chance to meet, face-to-face, the various Disney characters. We ran into a few and by far the best was Woody and Jessie from Toy Story. The kids waited about 10 minutes for their chance to get a few pictures and autographs. But the wait was totally worth it when the characters spent quite literally 3-4 minutes interacting with the kids and putting smiles on their faces. It wasn’t just a “take your picture and move along” moment. Rather, they genuinely tried to interact with each kid that came through, which was fantastic.

Best “Show” Experience: The Daytime Parade

During one of the days we were at the park there was a parade around 3pm. (Quick Tip: you can find out which day the parade is at many of the information booths. However, we found the Disney Mobile Magic iPhone app to be a great resource for maps, times, wait times, and other park info). Tracy was able to grab some front row spots for us (thanks, in part, to parking our strollers right along the parade route). We really enjoyed the music, dancing and floats and a number of the characters ended up coming super close to us during the parade.

We also saw the nighttime Disney Electrical Parade one night. While it was good, my personal opinion was that the daytime parade was a much better overall show. One tip if you do go to the night parade - we were told to sit right by the main entrance. You get to see the whole parade but then have an easier exit, which we found to be true.

Coolest cross-generational photo: The Cars

Tracy’s family has some great pictures from 20+ years ago when they went to Disney as a family, including many on the racetrack. Below is a pic of Donna and Tracy circa 1986 or so

And now, Donna (now GiGi), with Tracy’s son

And, that, my friends is why they say Disney is magical. The ability to generate cross-generational memories for the ages. Pretty cool.

How about one more picture from way back. Jennifer and Tracy with Minnie Mouse

Taken with instagram

Sun, 06 May 2012 15:48:23 -0400

Taken with instagram

Disney Recap, Part I

Sat, 05 May 2012 23:37:00 -0400

Well, we’ve been back from Disney for a week and we’ve yet to provide any sort of recap save for a bunch of pictures that were live-blogged while in Florida. Never fear - in return for the little delay in posts, I thought it would make sense to do a series of posts (couple? few? who knows) to talk all about what we did. The trip certainly deserves a few posts because

a) it was awesome

b) we did a ton

c) lots of other people may end up going to Disney and want to know what we did and how it was.

So hopefully I can recap in a way which does justice to A, B & C above

To begin, let’s talk about the travel - we had a group of 11: 6 adults, and 5 kids (ages 7, almost 5, almost 2.5, almost 1.5, and 6 months). As you can imagine, with this many kids we had a LOT of stuff that we hoped to take. So my brother in law Jason and I drove a minivan full of bags, baby gear, food, and other various & sundry items from Greensboro to Orlando. The rest of the crew flew from Greensboro to Orlando (or technically Sanford, as their flight was via super cost effective Allegiant Air (definitely worth checking the prices if you’re thinking of flying from Greensboro).

Jason and I seemed to have drawn the right lot in this arrangement - our 10 hour trek was offset by the fact that we stopped in Jacksonville to break up the trip and with no kids, we were able to burn down I-95 with little trouble. The remainder found the direct flight to be not that crazy; or at least as minimally crazy as traveling with 5 kids age 7 and under can be.

We arrived on a Sunday afternoon and got settled into our accommodations, the cabins at Disney’s Fort Wilderness Resort. Fort Wilderness is one of the Disney properties but is not set up with hotel-like lodgings. Rather, it feels more like a huge (700+ acre) camp. There are areas where you can bring your own tents and camp, areas for RVs, and lots of wood cabins, which is what we stayed in. Each cabin has a room with bunk beds and another bed, a full kitchen, and a fairly spacious living area. In the living area there is a “murphy bed” which folds up into the wall when not in use, allowing 6 to sleep comfortably in each cabin.I realized we didn’t get a good picture of the inside of our so here is a picture via WDWPionears that gives a good look - the wood panel looking wall across the room is the drop down Murphy Bed folded up.

The cabins are really great for families, but the really great part of Fort Wilderness is all the other things you get outside the cabin walls. First off, it’s so refreshing - especially when all your time in the park is spent surrounded by 100% in-your-face Disney product everywhere - to be able to wake up and step outside to the fresh air and trees you would expect from a cabin in the woods. But it’s the best of both worlds. Because you’re in a cabin and have a little bit of nature but you still get housekeeping service, fresh towels and other amenities you’d expect from a resort. And the killer part, you’re only a ten minute boat ride from the front gates of Magic Kingdom.

The ferry boats run every 10 minutes or so and we never really had to wait very long either coming or going to the Park. The boat is a fun experience, especially with the kids, and provides for a nice way to clear your mind post day inside the park, without having to deal with traffic or parking fees.

If it was just the cabin or the unique way of getting to Magic Kingdom, Fort Wilderness would be a pretty good place to stay. But the thing that really stands out is how conducive FW is to having fun on the days when you’re not using your Park Hopper pass. A couple highlights:

The Pool - there is a large pool complete with a big water slide. There’s also a separate kids area featuring small slides and lots of interesting sprinklers and wading areas for the smaller kids. Miller LOVED this smaller area and it was good to have both given the range in ages for the kids.

We realized during the trip that this was Charlotte’s first ever pool experience…she loved it!

Another highlight - once you park at your cabin, you don’t use a car within Fort Wilderness. They have buses to tote you around the premises but you can also rent golf carts. We got a golf cart for one of the days when we weren’t going to the parks and it was a blast just to drive around.

There were also tons of outdoor areas to play. I can think of half a dozen playgrounds/basketball courts and they were a big hit with the kids.

Finally, if you stay at Fort Wilderness it’s worth using one of your dinners to go to the dinner show known as the Hoop Dee Doo Revue. The food is down home cooking (friend chicken, ribs & fixins) and the entertainment is a kind of country-western, musical fun. We all enjoyed it, adults and kids alike.

So as you can see, we pretty much loved Fort Wilderness. It was the perfect place for us to stay. I’m convinced we could have had a blast just hanging out at Fort Wildnerness. Alas, we did make it to the Magic Kingdom a couple times. Some details and pictures on those experiences in Part II sometime soon.

Happy Birthday Jensen!

Wed, 02 May 2012 15:24:00 -0400

Today you are 5! We were so glad to have such a great time with you last week at Disney and to pre-celebrate a little.

You are such a sweet, smart, interesting and creative little girl who is growing up (way too fast!) into a lovely young lady. Seems like yesterday you were a little baby! Please don’t tell me that this means Charlotte will soon be 5 as well!

(Jensen at 1 week, 6 days)

Love you Jensen! Hope you have a great day!

Tracy posted this to Twitter last week but thought I’d put...

Wed, 02 May 2012 12:10:03 -0400

Tracy posted this to Twitter last week but thought I’d put it here as well…one of the highlights of the Disney trip, a character dinner at “Chef Mickey”. Things got a little rowdy at one point…

Within 2 minutes of leaving Gboro for Durham this dude was...

Sun, 29 Apr 2012 13:04:35 -0400

Within 2 minutes of leaving Gboro for Durham this dude was asleep. Literally first nap in 9 days.

Made it back from Disney. What an amazing trip! (Taken with...

Sun, 29 Apr 2012 12:58:39 -0400

Made it back from Disney. What an amazing trip! (Taken with instagram)

Poppy D and Char Char (Taken with Instagram at Hoop Dee Doo...

Wed, 25 Apr 2012 18:59:44 -0400

Poppy D and Char Char (Taken with Instagram at Hoop Dee Doo Musical Revue)

Official Mickey Speedway License (Taken with Instagram at...

Tue, 24 Apr 2012 19:01:32 -0400

Official Mickey Speedway License (Taken with Instagram at Tomorrowland Speedway)