Post Vacation Blues ...

One nice thing about homeschooling is that we've been able to finish school early and take our summer vacations before the big crowds come out. I've always loved that, especially when going to places like Yellowstone, which can get super crowded mid-summer. So, here I am now, suffering from Post Vacation Blues. It's not hard to see why if you look at this stupid picture of me. Floating down a lazy river in Disney's Blizzard Beach isn't exactly stressful. Of course, it might be next month when the crowds really start pouring in. However, I'm already itching to do something else and get out of the house again. Money is tight, as always, but we are planning a 2-night camping trip this weekend at a local lake. It's about an hour from where we live, if that. Rick and I drove out there yesterday to check out the campground. They recently added electric sites, which is good for us because Rick has to sleep with a CPAP machine. Not many places around here offer full or partial hook-ups. So anyway, we're expecting rain for the rest of the week and then Saturday and Sunday are supposed to be nice. I'm hoping we can get our kayaks out on the lake for the first time this year. How about you? Do you have any summer vacations planned? And also, are you like me and get the Vacation Blues after you take a trip?

Slide Show of WDW

We're back!

UGH! I've been trying to get on Blogger all day. Looks like it was a problem with my cookies. I tell you, the only good cookies are the ones you can eat. Computer cookies are nothing but trouble. Chocolate cookies are so much better.

We got home from Disney World on Wednesday afternoon. Our flights home were much nicer than the flight getting there. The one from Salt Lake City to Orlando was just awful. We had to land during a really nasty storm. Even the flight attendant mentioned it being an E-ticket ride. I figured if she said something like that, it had to be bad. When we asked the pilot to rate it from 1 to 10, he gave it a 6 or 7. Eeek! Fortunately, the flight home was much nicer and we were able to travel up and around all of the storms up north.

Sadly, Neil was sick on our last day in Florida. He made it back to Epcot, but didn't last too long. On his way out of the park he was able to get his picture taken with Marie from The Aristocats. He loves white cats, so that made him happy. Nathan and I spent the day wandering around World Showcase. The day after we got home, Nathan got sick. I'm just glad they got sick when they did and not right in the middle of the trip. That would have been miserable for them. So anyway, the past few days they've been trying to get over whatever it is they have. I'm hoping to not catch it myself.

We had 10-day park hopper passes and it's amazing that even with that amount of time we weren't able to see and do everything we wanted. It was just crazy. We had a lot of restaurant reservations, so I guess that added to the time situation, along with some dinner shows. I would have liked to have spent more time at the waterparks. Blizzard Beach and Typhoon Lagoon were both a lot of fun. I was surprised how much I liked them, especially since I'm not a big public pool fan. Both days we had dinner shows though, so we had to rush out early. Maybe we can spend more time at them if we ever get back there.

The weather our first week was perfect. It was in the low 80s with very little humidity. I was really surprised by that because I was expecting it to be hot and miserable. It was really nice. The second week things heated up and it was in the mid 90s at times with a lot more humidity. Even so, I don't think it was as bad as it could be. We really lucked out, especially that first week.

Rick and the boys had been to WDW once before, but it was my first trip. I grew up going to Disneyland all the time, so I wasn't overly excited about going to WDW at first. I started looking forward to it more and more as it got closer. I'm really glad we went and so blessed to have in-laws who were willing to help us get there. I'm not sure if we'll ever be able to afford to get back, but I hope so. There's still so much I'd love to see and do, not to mention do a few things again. I'm hoping to make a slideshow of some of our pictures, so hopefully I can get that up on my blog sometime soon.

What a character!

Disney's Flora

Star Wars Weekend 2011

Today is the first day of Star Wars Weekend. Not only was it packed with people, but today was the first real hot & humid day we've had since getting here. Even so, I still don't think the weather is as bad as it can get. We missed the big procession of characters by a few minutes and Rick was pretty sure he saw George Lucas. I don't know for sure if he was there or not, but Anthony Daniels (C3PO) was in the park. The guy pictured above played Boba Fett when he was younger. In order to meet some of the characters you had to have a FastPass, which people got at 4am. The fans camped out in the parking lot all night long. And here I thought I was a crazy STAR WARS fan. There are some true diehards here. FastPass for the new Star Tours ride sold out immediately, but we were able to ride it the other day on a test run. We totally lucked out because today the line was hours long. And the other day both boys got to do the Jedi training too, which I'm sure was impossible to get into today. Anyway, it's been a hot and crazy day!

Disney Wildlife

Of all the things to take pictures of at Walt Disney World, here I am taking photographs of birds and bunnies. I saw my very first cardinal the other day. I'm sure most of you have those birds at home, but they're not common for my part of Montana. It's fun seeing all these tropical birds flying around here, especially in the theme parks. I'm used to seeing pigeons and seagulls in Disneyland, but here it's snowy egrets and white ibis -- very different! I hope I can do a longer blog tomorrow. It's late and I'm just totally wiped out.

Disney's Animal Kingdom