Boys' Birthday Trip: Day 4, Sea World

Update: Y'all have got to be better about telling me about typos, misspellings and omission of large sections of a sentence. Seriously. I fixed it, so all is well again, but considering yourself warned. 

Second update: My boy S at the hair salon made me look real good today. I dread washing my hair and then it being at my mercy again. 

I made it out of the house with much less drama today. And I even walked out with a cup of coffee. Double score. AND, I am getting my hair cut today, so its gonna be a good day, today is.

What was also a good day was the day we went here.

50% of our household loves marine mammals. And 25% seems to like them, and I don't know about Keith. Through our local friendly AAA office we got buy one day, get one day free tickets to the marine mammal world, which made us very happy. We saved this park for our last two days and luckily had great weather. A bit cold at times, but overall very good.

Sea World is a big park and can become confusing. Lucky for us our boys are really good at reading maps. Our first stop was the dolphin theatre, which you can see Grady located on the map.

On our way there we got distracted by flamingoes. Flamingoes that are actually the pink/orange color you expect, not like the pale ones at our zoos. Yes, I know its based on what they're fed, but how different is the food at Sea World from the Atlanta Zoo?

We were almost to the dolphin area when we spied the touch pool, and it was nearly deserted, so we went to touch. Cole LOVED this. See how the ray is saying hello? Well, this one particular ray (and yes, i could tell it was the same one, it had a scar) kept swimming by and then popped its head right up and out of the water. Cole squealed and giggled. And when I told him that meant the ray was saying hi, he giggled more. And then he started waving at the ray and saying hi.

He was a little unsure about the touching part, but I wasn't.

They were really not happy to leave the touch pool, but we promised cooler things awaited us. So off to find a seat in the dolphin theatre.

You've heard me complain about the National Aquarium's dolphin show here, and I dont want to sound like a broken record, but can we all not just enjoy hearing about the dolphins from the trainer? Must we be subjected to some form on crazy storyline and extra theatrics and excessively loud music?

We tried to block the storyline, and enjoyed the dolphins. Thankfully, at one point one of the dolphins did not cooperate, (Perhaps shared my distain for the excessive dramatics?) so the trainer came out and did a little oldschool talking to the audience about the dolphins. That, I loved.

And of course I loved the jumps.

But oh boy, here we go with the dramatic shite. Grady did love this. Wook, da ladies! See the parrot lady swinging?

And there were more parrot people. See the lady in blue on the walkway? She was Grady's favorite. When she left the area and the dolphins came back Grady kept asking "where the ladies at?". So, take a look at the blue lady below. Probably somewhat embarrasing to wear all those feathers. But you know would be more embarrasing? Being one of the three guys dressed in the very festive birdlike costumes behind her on the walkway.

For a few minutes those dudes stood there and we had no idea why. Until...

I'll concede the diving was cool. The flying ladies? Not so sure about that. And I would have liked the divers more if it were a water-based cirque de soleil show, but it wasn't. It was a dolphin show. Show me dolphins and tell me about them, dammit.

Another cool thing was the parrot guy. While the lady parrot was floating above the pool, real trained birds fly through the amphitheatre and landed on this dude, who just so happened to stand near out seats.

And then that show was done and we went to the sea lion show. Cute, but I'll spare you my critique. I did miss part of the show due to someone's unfortunately potty accident. It's hard to focus on holding peepeee when you have so much going on, you know?

The boys are getting really good at getting their way. They wanted to play the penguin game, so instead of asking repeatedly or throwing a fit, they just stood quietly and gazed longingly at the penguins.

Naturally I told Keith that they HAD to play it, give them each three dollars! you pick a penguin out of the water, and look at the colored sticker under that penguin. The color of the sticker dictates whether your price is a small, medium or large stuffed penguin.

Grady picked.

Cole picked. And wouldn't you know, both of them got the small penguin. Amazing, the coincidence.

I jest. We all know there's probably only one penguin marked for a medium or large stuffed animal.

Then, to our favorite part of the park. Or second favorite. The kiddie rides. This one was fun. Goes up in the air and spins.

Then another ride that was like a boat that swooshed back and forth and side to side. We liked that a lot.

And then, the killer whale show. The cheesiness factor of this show was lower, but again, one of the animals did not want to cooperate. I liked this because the animal trainer came out and talked to us, and that was cool. We listened intently.

And then the show resumed and we saw some neat trained behaviors.

But, because of the pause in the show earlier, Grady was over it. He was more excited about playing with my face/lips/double chin (yikes!) than watching the show.

I really should have put some lipstick on.

And here, friends, was the hands-down winner of the day. While Keith ogled some college football player he recognized, the boys played in the fountain. For a long, long time. So, let's recap.

Touch ray? Eh.
See dolphins leap? Eh.
Watch ladies dressed as birds fly? Eh.
Kiddie rides with no waiting lines? Eh.
Killer whales? Eh.

Fountain with frigid water? WOW. Amazing! Thank you mom and dad for driving us 8 hours to play in this fountain. This is really cool.

Who knew the water would be so fun? When it was time to leave to go take naps, we were not, I repeat, not happy. But we sure did nap well.

Boys' Birthday Trip: Day 3, More of the Magic

So, it's just been one of those weeks, ya know? The weekend did not bring the rest we needed after vacation, and this old lady's back is killing her. For reals.

Scoliosis+MetalRodsInBack+HeavyBabies=MeComplainALot. But last night I tried to rally and do something fun (boys bday invites) 'cause you know, it was time to snap out of it and get on with being productive. And my good mood lasted until about 5:50am this morning when I scurried out of our house with my gym bag and purse and work books, bag, stuff. This is the normal morning routine, I get out of the house in my workout clothes while the boys and Keith sleep. I go to the gym, then to work. Along the way, I plan mentally plan my day. The run-through of my mental checklist came to a screeching halt when I reached for my cardoor and realized that I forgot my keys.

Picture it, it's cold, its dark and I distincly remember locking the door on my way out, you know, so no boogieman could go into the house to get my boys. So there I stood, stupified for a minute, staring at car, then staring at house.

Staring at car, staring at house.

I walked back to the front door, to see if I maybe didn't really lock the door, but alas, it was locked. Now what to do? I did not want to wake the boys up, but I did want to get Keith awake. Unfortunately for me that didn't happen for another hour and a half. A rather cold and blustery hour and a half, I should say.

So anyways, no workout this morning, we'll aim for lunchtime, if I can get away from work at lunch.

But, am determined to not let this morning's misstep ruin my mojo, so let's get on with sharing the vacation pics. This day we went back to Magic Kingdom, this time with old friends. Marsha and Carlos, and their two little boys, lived here and we loved hanging out with them. They moved back home a few years ago, sadly, but we've always taken any opportunity to catch up with them. And since we were going to be within an hour's drive of their house, we called them to see if we could all catch up. The answer, thankfully, was a resounding yes. They too have two little boys, and we all agreed to meet in Magic Kingdom.

Which brings me to my first picture, an attempt for all of us, minus Keith to get a picture. You can see how well this went. This is the best of a series of 10 pictures, and at least Carlos has Devon somewhat facing the camera. And Jordan is looking, too, but Marsha and I are trying to get our two orange jacketed kids to cooperate. Wasn't happening.

One learns quickly to just abort and move on. And on to Devon's favorite ride, this guy.
Cole told me right away that he was NOT going on this ride. Eeees scawy, Momma, bemember? So we played in the garden area for a while. Grady played for a while, too, but he and Dada went on the ride and enjoyed it.

The park was already more crowded, but it was actually better than the day before. The best part of Disney to me was seeing how well the park was planned for crowds. Lines you anticipate would take forever moved quickly and  distractions were everywhere for kids. And the more people were around you playing with stuff, the more obvious the little clever parts of the park became.

Like these groundhogs that popped up when you jumped on a certain spot on the ground. We missed this completely the day before, but a little girl with the cutest pigtails showed the boys how to do this, and they loved it.

After Pinnie the Pooh, Carlos and Devon went on another ride that we thought would be scary, and the rest of us went back to It's a Small World for a dose of mindless happy. Like. A lot.

I forgot to mention that Marsha's sister, Kristy, was there with her little one. A very serious Ms. Vivienne.

We got a blurry family shot on the boat taking us through this happy place.

In our next stop, we struck little boy gold. You recognize this guy, right? We were worried about this being scawy, but we gave it a shot. And I'm so glad we did.

But not without a little drama. Right after we walked past buzz on our way to the ride, Cole started his "no, no, no..." protest. He did not want to ride. But we ignored it, and the four of us climbed into a space craft thing.

The genious of this ride is that you aren't just a passive passenger. You can shoot back, and the person in the middle can make the car spin from side to side, or even in circles. Once Grady figured that out, he was in heaven.

And Cole was mesmerized.

This is what he was staring at.

During the ride, I really couldn't decide if the boys were mesmerized or if they were scared. There's a thin line between the two, really. So when it was our turn to get off the ride and both boys threw massive fits because they liked the ride so much , I knew the answer. Mesmerized.

Next, the PeopleMover. Nice, mellow, and longer than I thought. Also longer than I thought was the dark tunnel the people mover takes you through. Overall, we liked it.

Somewhere in there was lunch, snack, more playing and walking and rides. And then, three of the five passed out.

But not this one. While his brother napped, he plotted, successfully, to get jelly beans.

More magic carpet ride. 

Our view from the ride. Look, way below is Carlos (striped shirt) and the rest of the group.

And our final ride of the day, some type of jungle ride, on a boat. We fast-passed it, and were onboard in no time.  

Cole was a little nervous here and started chewing nails immediately.

And there's no need to be scared this ride, the animals are fake!

And this is not an animal, but water is pretty.

Oh wait. I was wrong. That was not the last ride. We did this again.

In front of us were Jordan and his dad Carlos.

And behind us was Grady, on his trusty horse Elvis.

Elvis got a thorough inspection.

My memory is really starting to fail me. That ride was also not the last ride. I may have blocked this last stop of ours, it was not so pleasant. You would think we'd learn from our last 3D experience in Animal Kingdom, but not so much. 

We donned the glasses.

And the show started. This one. I don't have much to say about it, except I was tired, and Cole has crying NO and crying and not happy, and being crammed in a theatre that was unusually hot with hundreds of other people was not fun, and there was no way out until the end of the show. How and why make a music show scary?

Eggh. So our plans for the day was to go grab some dinner together, but a quick assessment of the kids' moods ix-nayed those plans. And that's the beauty of hanging out with other poeple and their kids, we all know its important to play it by ear.

So the kids all played with Devon and Jordan's new toys while Marsha, Kristy and Keith rode Space Mountain. I know, I'm such a giving wife, I let him do the run ride. Truthfully I was tired and afraid there would be strobe lights, but let's all pretend I was selfless.

Once last post about Sea World tomorrow, then back to regular programming.