Memorial Day Weekend

This past weekend we celebrated Memorial Day down in Orlando, using up another of the Disney days left on the 4 day Resident passes we bought for spring break. We headed down Sunday afternoon and grabbed lunch at Friendly's on I-Drive before checking into our hotel by the convention center and then hitting one of the outlet malls for some window shopping.

Parker and Wesley both got this drink at Friendly's called the Shark Attack - it had gummy sharks in the bottom of the drink and a little cup of red dye that you could pour into the drink too. 

Up bright and early on Monday morning we grabbed breakfast in the lobby of our hotel before heading over to EPCOT. It opened at 9, so we were in line with all the other obsessed Disney folks at 8:30. The boys were happy because we got to hear the opening announcement and they got to catch some of the streamers that blast off from above the turnstiles. They opened the gates at 8:45 and by 9am we were already standing in line for Soarin'.

 

Davis isn't quite tall enough yet for Soarin' so while I took the big boys, he and Baba rode the Living with the Land boat ride. Davis was a big fan! I took him again while Baba and Parker rode Soarin', and then all five of us rode the boat one more time. On his second and third times through, Davis was pointing things out to the rest of us like a pro tour guide.

 

Up next was the Nemo ride and then the boys all went to the Turtle Talk show with Crush. Davis sat in Parker's lap and just took it all in. Parker actually raised his hand and got picked to ask Crush a question - Crush described him as the kid with the black shell (t-shirt) and the blue lid that was on backwards (hat). Parker's question was "How hard is a turtle's life?" The answer he got back was: "Not hard at all dude. We eat, sleep and swim!"

Then it was time to introduce Davis to Figment at Journey into Imagination, followed up by Captain EO (the music video with Michael Jackson).

We ate burgers and mac 'n cheese at Electric Umbrella, did a little shopping, rode Spaceship Earth and headed into Innoventions (kind of like a hands on kids science museum). Good thing too. It started pouring down rain and it turned into a hailstorm while we were inside - small little pieces, but it created lots of excitement to watch through the glass doors and windows. In one exhibit the boys played a game creating a storm relief kit for the house and in another they were testing out the strength of TV tubes.

When it quit raining we ran over to use our Fastpass for Mission Space; me and the big boys while Baba and Davis waited in the gift shop. Then we went on Ellen's Energy Adventure. Davis was sleepy and at first we thought he'd sleep through the whole 45 minute ride/show in the dark (both the big boys always napped on this ride at this age). But Davis quickly woke up and was fascinated by all the "dinosaurs" the whole way through. 

 

That finished up Future World and we headed back to World Showcase. We stopped in Norway to pick up a communicator for Agent P's Adventure (from the Phineas and Ferb TV show). We picked our mission to be in China. 

 

The boys all had fun running around in the China pavilion, saving the world by following the clues on their little flip-phone. It was neat to see the Temple of Heaven again, even if it was the scaled down model from what we experienced in Beijing last year. 

Our mission was finally over when the boys pushed a series of buttons on the phone and the little monkey in the middle of the pond came rising up out of the water. We turned in our communicator after that instead of going on another mission. 

 

Look what we found in the gift shop! Never thought we'd find a bracelet with his name on it. 

 

 

Inside the Temple of Heaven, we watched the acrobats and dancers before heading into the 360 degree theater for the China Reflections movie. It was awesome to see the Great Wall as well as the Forbidden City in the movie and remember being there.

We wandered around the World Showcase after that - skipping some countries (USA, Morocco, France), going quickly through others (Germany, Italy, Japan) before stopping to linger in England. I stocked up on tea at Twinings and we had fun in the one gift shop with all the Dr. Who merchandise (Daryl and I love that show).

We went around the lake and ended up back in Norway in time to visit the little exhibit on the movie Frozen before riding the Maelstrom ride. 

Next up was Mexico. We rode the Gran Fiesta boat ride with Donald Duck and friends before heading up to the restaurant inside for our dinner reservation. The food was delicious as always. The boys love it here. Parker especially loves that he has to order off the grownup menu now at Disney - he had shrimp in a spicy chile sauce with cheese.

We finished up the night with the fireworks show, Illuminations. And of course we brought along some of the glow in the dark kits for the boys to play around with.

It ended up being a long day, but a super good one spent together at one of our favorite places. So glad we got to introduce Davis to EPCOT finally.