Orlando Day 5...and 6

Our last day of theme park adventures! On the little train that takes us to Epcot. If you look closely at my arm you can see the ugliest tan line known to man.Gary works for Siemens, and they are a sponsor of Epcot, and if you're an employee you can go hang out in their lounge and get drinks and chill out in the air conditioned facilities for a while! It was a nice little break from the heat!

Here's Gary posing with some troll thing after the boat ride in Norway. I think we were in England when I found Winnie the Pooh and Tigger too!

Of course, out of all the theme parks and attractions and everything, my favorite part was none other than the squirrels! And luckily I found a little fella to hand feed cashews to. I love these little guys!I really could have sat there all day!

Gary and Rick in China playing with the puppets.This bear "Duffy" was everywhere we looked! I guess Disney is trying to incorporate him in as a new character or something?

It was the flower festival while we were there so there were lots of characters shaped out of shrubbery and flowers and such.

Epcot at night right before the fireworks show. It was really cool!

The next day was Friday, and we all slept in as long as humanly possible because we were completely exhausted! It was our last day of vacation and all we wanted to do was sit by the pool, occasionally eat something, take naps and then go to dinner. It was a much needed break right before Saturday when we had to fly all day. I have to mention too that Friday night before we went to dinner, there was the CRAZIEST storm I have ever seen in my life! I have never seen rain and lightening like that before so I was a little scared for my well being. Turns out that's normal Florida weather, and it only lasted a couple hours. Thank goodness it cleared up for us to fly home the next day and we didn't have any delays. Anyway, it was a great vacation. One last hurrah for a while before the baby comes!

Orlando Day 4

Welcome to the Magic Kingdom! These are pictures of my favorite parts about the day.

Haunted Mansion is always a good time! This was one part of the park they did better in Florida than they did in California.

Thanks to Cheryl I had someone to take a picture of the best part of my day. DUMBO! A very wise person once told me that it's impossible to not be happy while riding Dumbo, and she was so right!

This was another great part of my day. Not so much the ride itself, but standing in line for it. While we were waiting to get on It's a Small World, I got an email from my brother telling me that the cancer that was found in my sister in law, had not moved anywhere, and that they got it all! Best news ever! I was so happy!Okay, so here we are looking pretty and dry for the camera. From what I remember of Splash Mountain in California, I didn't get that wet.I don't have an "after" of me and Gary, but you get the idea with Cheryl and DeeEll. Wow! Soaking wet! For anyone who plans on going on Splash Mountain in the future, take all you're pretty pictures before you get on!If I saw a character roaming around and there wasn't a big line, I would hop in with them and get a picture! Yay Goofy!

We didn't stay to watch the whole fireworks show, but we did get to see some cool animations done on the castle. It was so pretty!

It was a great day all in all! The only down side to it was the pain of our sunburns from the day before, and I had a little bout of heat stroke around lunchtime....but it all turned out well in the end!

Orlando Day 3

I really enjoyed day 3! We all slept in and then headed out to Daytona Beach for some relaxation!The water was really nice and not too cold at all. Gary jumped right in and started body surfing. I even joined in with him after a while and body surfed myself, which was a lot more fun than I expected! Of course I got so much salt water in my mouth and up my nose, but it was too good of a time to stop!Here is Gary laying out. I don't have an "after" picture of us, be we were BURNT to a crisp! That night we had to take pain killers and rub aloe vera on ourselves multiple times to sleep comfortably. Gary even went and layed on the bathroom tile in the middle of the night to cool off his skin. It was bad news!After many hours at the beach, we had dinner at "Our Deck Down Under." We were starving!This is a really dark picture of all of us, but we were all really gross anyway after spending all day in the sun and salt water. We took this picture as we came out of the restraunt. Such a pretty sight! We had such a good day, and if we hadn't gotten so toasted out there, we would have probably gone back on our last day.

As one final note: I got the ugliest tan lines known to man on this day. No pictures were taken of them, but trust me, it was ugly!!

Orlando Day 2

This first picture says a lot about our day at Islands of Adventure. This is Gary saying "I'm sorry you're sick and tired. Will you stay in this air conditioned cafe while all of us go and ride crazy rollercoasters??"I have to admit it wasn't the best day of the trip for me because there were a lot of more intense rides and rollercoasters. It's okay though because it was so hot and I wasn't feeling the best. Here they are getting ready to ride the HULK!Of course my day wasn't bad at all, there was a lot to see! We played around in Suess Landing for while which was beyond low-key!

The Cat in the Hat Ride. Not the lamest ride in Suess Landing, but pretty boring. I loved it though!

The Lorax! Definitely my favorite Suess story of all time!Welcome to Hogwarts! I was for sure looking forward to this more than any other part of Universal. When I heard they were putting in an area for Harry Potter years and years ago, I never thought that I would actually be able to visit it one day! I kept calling my sister Stacey because I knew how much she would love it! I had to buy her a chocolate frog from Honeydukes.

May I also say that butterbeer is simply delicious? You read about how great it is in the book, but you can't really imagine how good it is until you taste it! Yummy!

Here we are eating at the Three Broomsticks for lunch. I was obviously avoiding the camera because I was beyond hungry at this point and it's hard to smile when I'm hungry.

Platform 9 and 3/4. The conducter told me how lovely I was when I asked him to take a picture with me!Gary was really looking forward to Jurassic Park, but unfortunately, the ride was closed. Too bad!

All the Marvel characters were walking around. I got this picture of Cyclops lazering my baby!It was a long, hot day. Of course, so was every other day. This picture of Gary pretty much summarizes how all of us felt by the end of each day. Yawn!

Orlando Day 1

When I say Day 1, I mean the first day of adventure that didn't include an airport. Before I really get into the theme parks though I have to make mention to this family from Brazil that Gary was close with on his mission. They live in Florida now and they were so excited to see him that they got a hotel for a couple nights to hang out with us in Orlando! We had dinner the night we got there and then we all met up at the Animal Kingdom later for a few hours. Such nice, cute girls! Standing next to me is Isabella, then Isadora, and Antonia. You can't tell that Antiona is their mother because she looks so young! It was great to meet them and spend time with them, and it meant a lot to Gary.

Here is the massive tree that sits in the middle of the park. It's were the Bug's Life 3D theater is, and there are all types of animals carved into the fake wood.On our way in to see Bug's Life 3D. My favorite part of the day! Gary making gorilla faces!Silly hats in China. I'm not sure why they did a China section in the park, it's not like they had any panda bears for me!We went on a safari ride and saw all types of African animals! It was so fun! I'm just sad that I didn't get to see any lions or tigers. I love big kitties!Pluto petting me and Carlos.Rick and Gary jamming out to some street performers. Gary is such a good little dancer!After spending most of the day in the Animal Kingdom, we went over to Disney Hollywood so everyone could ride the Tower of Terror. I was the only one that couldn't go on the ride due to pregnancy, so I sat in the shade and ate ice cream and watched the squirrels running amok!It sure was a good first day. I think Animal Kingdom was my favorite part of the trip because I loved seeing all the animals!

And may I just add here that the weather was BLAZING hot the whole time! I guzzled so much water, got in the shade whenever possible, and stepped in any air conditioned gift shop when we had the chance. Whew!

Gary's Birthday!

Warning: This post could get mushy!

Happy Birthday to the best husband in the world! Have I ever mentioned how totally fantastic Gary is? He deserves every good thing he gets! I wanted to completely spoil him for his birthday, but we ended up going to Orlando for both of our birthdays instead of getting each other presents.

His sister Hali came through for us by making his birthday cake and having a little party at her house. Birthday banner included! All he really wanted from his family was contributions for a tree or two to put in our backyard. He loves trees!

I love your cute face Gary! You're the best friend I have and my life would suck without you!