William's first visit to the Beach

The kids had the whole week off of school for Thanksgiving.  On Monday we were lucky enough to hook up with some friends from PA at the worlds largest McDonald's.  I figured that since we were in "tourist Orlando" anyway, that we should do some other things in the area.  I discovered that there is a path between Fort Wilderness Lodge on Disney property, to the campground on Disney property.  The internet said that it was about a mile and then you could take the boat back.  Sounded like a good way to kill a little time.  We drove up to the lodge and the kids really wanted to go in the lodge and look around.  After looking around a bit, we walked around outside and found a beach on the lake.  You can't go in the lake, but the kids loved playing in the sand.

We also saw a geyser go off on the property.  That was pretty cool.

After the beach, playing ping pong, and getting caught in a rainstorm, we decided to go find the big gingerbread house.  I had heard that the Grand Floridian hotel on property had a huge gingerbread house.  So, we hopped on a bus, which took us around the entire campground (yes, it was the wrong bus), then took a boat to the Magic Kingdom.  Once there, we took the monorail to the hotel.  The kids couldn't get over how fancy the hotel was.

After checking out the gingerbread house and trying gingerbread (only Henry and William liked it), we headed back to the Magic Kingdom via monorail.  If it wasn't so late we could have walked, but we were tired and hungry.  Then it was back to the Lodge and home.  It was a great day.

Sponge-a-rama

Tacky, old and weird.  Yep, that's the way I like my tourist attractions.  Thankfully there are a lot of those here in FL.  One of our favorites is Tarpon Springs.  This is a town on the Gulf of Mexico that has a large Greek population.  There are many sponge divers there.  There is a street that has the sponge docks, and a lot of little shops, restaurants, and boat rides.

My family actually went to this town back in the day.  I'm pretty sure if I compared photos from that trip to pictures from last week that everything would look the same.  I love that.

This picture describes the shops perfectly.

Some more pictures of Tuesday.

Beautiful Florida

Last Friday after school the kids and I went to the community playground so they could try out their "new" tennis rackets that I got at the thrift store (3 for $4).  Here is the lovely sunset.

I missed the sun while we were in PA.  I didn't realize how much I missed the sunset's though.  Every time I see one here I just marvel.

School Thanksgiving

The Thursday before Thanksgiving I was lucky enough to go to Sadie's school Thanksgiving Feast.  William and I went and ate lunch with her and then watched a little program that all of the Kindergarten participated in.  It was so cute and I'm so glad I went.

The Friday before Thanksgiving the 2nd graders had Native American rotations.  They spent all day going to different classrooms and learning about different tribes.  I'm not sure I have ever seen Samuel so excited when he got home.  Here he is with some of his crafts that he made.  If he was awake I'd have him tell me again what they represented.  The pouch around his neck has a bear animal cracker in it because it has a bear spirit in it.

Festival of the Masters

 Once a year Downtown Disney hosts an event: "Festival of the Masters." It's an outdoor art show.  It has lots of artist booths selling things.  There was also a lot of family interactive activities.  We went after school on Friday and only had time to do a few, so we did the 2 Lego activities.  The first was helping a "Master Lego Builder" make an 8 foot tall dragon.  There was a model of the dragon and it was made out of 2x4 lego bricks.

If you look closely at the above picture of the model you will see the right foot.  In the bottom picture you will see the foot of the big dragon made out of "bricks" that volunteers made.

The kids got to make "bricks" that were then used in the big model.  The bricks they made had 10 2x4 bricks in an open rectangle.  There were 3 layers of those and then a layer of 5 2x8 and 2 1x8.

After they got done making their bricks they were inspected and then given to the Master Builder to make the dragon.

 Here is Samuel with his "Certificate of Achievement" for participating in an Official Lego Building event.

The other activity we did was to help make a Lego mosaic that is going to go on one of the Disney Cruise Ships.  Everybody got a 2"x2" tile that had colors on it.  Then you had to use 1x1 Lego's to match the colors and fill in your tile. 

 After you filled in your tile you took it to a huge Lego board and it was put in by number.

Here's how William spent the whole time.

This was a great day.  Too bad Ben was out of town and missed it.  We'll take him next time.

Henry's First Stitches

At 11:00 Wednesday  Igot a phone call from school.  Actually it was my second call from the school that day.  The first was from Samuel's teacher to inform me that Samuel had hit someone in the head twice.  Lovely.  So, when I saw caller ID from the school I just shuddered "what did he do now?"  But, no...it was worse.  Henry had fallen at school and needed stitches.  While throwing on clothes I called the pediatrician- they don't do stitches on the face.  So, off to school to get Henry and then downtown to Children's hospital.  We got right in, but things take a while, so I knew I wouldn't make it back before the other kids got done with school (it was early release day.)  Thankfully Ben was able to leave work and get them.  I guess Henry slipped on the stairs and fell down about 5 steps.

Henry got 6 stitches.  He did really well.  So did William.

Random Photos

Once again going through the pictures on my phone.  Here's one of Samuel after the pantry was packed in PA:

Sadie at a "sleepover" in her brother's room in PA:

At Idlewild in PA:

Erie Canal in Downtown Palmyra last summer:

More Idlewild (in the Storybook Forest):

Sadie having a sleepover with William in PA

Outdoor play we went to in PA last summer:

Henry in a tree SLC summer 2010

William in SLC summer 2010

Some airport summer 2010

Security at Ben's new hotel:

William's new wagon

Half a hill slid down in PA:

Sadie Mt Lebo playground

Shoofly pie in Penn Dutch restaurant Spring Break 2010

Ben in Mt Lebo

Shortly after I found out we were moving back to FL

PA snowstorm downtown Mt Lebo.  There's a car under there

When we were living in GA we were visiting teaching and my companion asked how you go grocery shopping in the snow. "Do you just push your shopping cart through piles of snow?"  This parking lot in PA reminded me of it.