A Visit to the Sunshine State

Morgan and I had so much fun when she visited, that she invited me to stay with her for the weekend in early May when Caleb was out of the country. YES. 

At the time we began planning this, we had no idea that Carson and I would be moving to Florida this summer, but that made the trip MORE exciting because as we spent time together, we kept planning more time together for when we move. We will live three hours away... score.

I flew in at midnight on Saturday morning and we stayed in a hotel in Orlando that night. 

A little waffle and apple juice at the hotel was the perfect way to start our day...

Because we were headed to DISNEY WORLD! I hadn't been since I was 12 or 13, so I remembered some things, but at the time thought I was "too cool" for the whole thing, so now that we don't care what people think of us, Morgan and I had fun!

Fun in the rain that is. It was pouring when we arrived and drizzling all day.

We wore some snazzy ponchos that Morgan had wisely saved from a previous trip to Disney.

Plus side of the rain? Short lines! We got right on Space Mountain and then headed over to ride the teacups. There were three people ahead of us in line and I made Morgan take a picture to prove it.

The Dumbo ride! No line, but it was very wet!

It's a small world after all. This song will forever be in my head...

Gaston's Tavern in Fantasyland.

We rode about six rides in the first hour, due to the short lines. On one ride, we started to get off, and the employees said "Want to go again?" we didn't, but others on the ride did.

We had someone take this and realized immediately afterward that we were standing right next to a trash can.

Thunder Mountain Railroad

Swiss Family Robinson treehouse. One of my favorite movies as a kid.

We wanted (okay, I wanted) to get a picture with a character, but we didn't want to wait in a line to do so, so here's Peter Pan and Wendy as we passed by.

Being the super economical people that we've turned into, we brought along turkey sandwiches and chips. We bought drinks at a Disney restaurant and feasted on turkey sandwiches. The only downside was that Morgan smelled strongly of turkey all day long from carrying these.

Making our next plans...

Stroller parking was no joke

Resting on the Peoplemover. We tentatively took off the ponchos at this point and didn't have to go back to them. Yaaaaay!

Our final scores on the Buzz Lightyear ride

After being tempted by them all day, Morgan bought a giant turkey leg. It was too much food and we couldn't finish it.

We got on the Riverboat to ride around while we finished off the turkey as best we could.

At some point in the day, it stopped raining. The crowds reappeared, and we had to wait 20 WHOLE minutes in a line! What is the world coming to? (that's sarcasm)

As we were about to leave, we (I) realized that we hadn't gotten the picture with a character that we (I) wanted, so we waited in a little line to meet Mickey. He made us do card tricks. Most of all, we were curious about how he speaks and moves his mouth in that costume... or perhaps it wasn't a costume and we DID meet Mickey Mouse!?

Since we'd done all the rides we wanted to early in the day, and since there wasn't anything left to do, we headed back home to Ocala at around 6. We discovered that the average person walks 10-12 miles around the Magic Kingdom in a day, and so we made a more modest guess that we walked 8. Needless to say, after a late night and long day of walking in the rain, we were ready to get home. 

I met Marlin, who had fleas for some reason, and he was kind enough to snuggle and let the fleas bite us too, so that was a blast. We mostly sat on the couch and watched House Hunters, since we're exciting people. Morgan and Sydney fell asleep.

On Sunday, we went to church and then to my uncle and aunt's house for lunch. We came home and worked on a craft that I'll share soon (it's Disney related and similar to our last project together). We watched more House Hunters and on the commercials we watched the Food Network. 

On Monday, we went to the beach! We'd thought about doing the beach on Saturday and since it rained, we're glad we dodged that bullet. We went to Ormond Beach on the east coast. 

The hose for the air at the gas station had a hole, so I tried holding it together while Morgan pumped. Spoiler alert: it didn't work and we got our money back and went to another gas station.

On the way, we stopped to take pictures with this giant metal chicken. 

Cousins!

We moved our little camp back really far because the first place we had it got completely soaked. Whoops. 

After the beach, we picked Marlin up and then Morgan ran into WalMart to get supplies for ice cream that we forgot to make.

And since it was Cinco de Mayo, we were going to go to a Mexican restaurant, but they were all crowded, so we went to a steakhouse instead, but got fruity drinks anyway. 

We finished off Monday night by going to a movie with Sydney and Aunt Pam, then came home and snuggled with Marlin, who clearly missed us. 

On Tuesday, I went to IKEA for the first time! I could have bought a million things, but I purchased a piece of artwork (that Morgan is keeping until I move to Florida) and a hotdog, since it was cheap. 

After IKEA, it was airport time :( :( 

I expected to get through security with no problem, but I waited in line forever and finally got picked to be in an expedited line where they swab your hands for explosives and then just let you go without taking off your shoes or scanning your bags. Well, they swabbed my hands and they tested positive for whatever reason. I obviously spent time at IKEA that morning, not assembling weapons, but I was still nervous because everyone else was zipping through. I got sent to a little room and patted down and they went through all my things and swabbed those for explosives too... 45 minutes later, I was sprinting to my flight, since by that point it was after the boarding time. I made it and had an otherwise uneventful trip. (the guy I asked said that sometimes lotions will have something in them that set off the sensitive machines, but that they didn't know exactly what it was)

Carson picked me up that night and we went to Steak and Shake. He started a new summer job the day before and was already tan. Here he's showing off his dipping sauces because he said "surprise me" to the waitress when she asked what he wanted and she brought options. 

Now I'm really excited for more beach time and Mickey Mouse time in Florida! Can't believe we're moving in just a few weeks!!!