Magic

Hello again,

I am happy to be back and blog. The vacation was a blast and I would be happy to repeat everything that Stephanie posted. Just kidding. I will actually just give you my opinion of the best part. I think the funnest part was Universal Studios Orlando Islands of Adventure. It was fun to go on the rides. Dad even lost some pounds to go on the Harry Potter ride. I would say my favorite ride was the Hulk Coaster. You can see what it is if you search. Also the Hollywood Rip Ride RockIt. It was fun. Mom didn't like it though because her hair got messed up. All in all I am back home and ready for the boring times. I have unpacked. Please disregard other posts about me not being unpacked. I also have gotten a magic trick and it is amazing to astonish people with amazing things. I may post a video later of me doing my trick.

P.S. I would like to celebrate my second post and Stephanie going to college. She will no longer need her bed which means it is up for grabs.

Home Again

Yep...we are once again home! We left shortly after nine, stopped once for lunch and gas and then again at the new Hardee's in Burlington for supper (nobody felt like making supper when we got home). Nothing extraordinarily exciting happened, though we did take a few pictures from the road! In the end, I believe either Mom or Billy won the license plate game (found the most state license plates) with Jesse, Travis, Justin, and Jonathan close behind. We listened to two whole stories on CD and Jesse claimed to be hungry every twelve minutes.

We stopped to eat at Hardee's and got home at 6:45...so I suppose if we try to be technical, the vacation lasted precisely 10 days and one hour! Now we are in the process of unpacking our many belongings. Actually, no. Dad and Billy are looking at the mail, Johnny is reading the paper, Travis and Jesse are playing with their Hardee's toys, Justin is downstairs playing or something, I am blogging, and Mom is unpacking.

So...here we are, home at last! What a week it has been! And now, some photos from today's drive...

I think this is supposed to show that we are in Kentucky since we missed the welcome sign.

St. Louis Gateway Arch

Busch Stadium, home of the St. Louis Cardinals

We passed the church in Taylor, MO

Travis and his bubble gum (ewwww....)

Funny smile from Jesse

Funny smile from Jonathan

Back in Iowa (a great place to be)!!

...And back in Mediapolis! It's great to be home!

Departing Tennessee

Next time I post we will likely be home! Unless I find internet access on the road somewhere...

We are planning to leave in about 10-15 minutes from our hotel, be on the road for about nine hours, and get home at around supper time! I can't believe we are almost home and vacation is almost over. We had a lot of fun spending time together and seeing all kinds of things! I will try to post when we get home safely.

P.S. If you revisit the post from Saturday (On the Road Again...), I just added some photos from Chuck E. Cheese's!

Atlanta and beyond

Sunday, July 29

Today we woke up and went to church in Atlanta. The congregation there was very small, and the building was small as well! There were a lot of friendly people there to meet and we felt very welcome!

Atlanta Apostolic Christian Church

After church we changed and got on the road, driving four hours to Nashville, Tennessee to our Holiday Inn Express. For supper we went to a place called Cori's Doghouse-it has 38 different kinds of hotdogs! We were stuffed by the time we finished (not because we ate all 38 hotdogs). We came back, swam, and then went to bed...ready for one last long day on the road!

Entering Tennessee!

A snapshot of the Smokey Mountains? The view was great!

Our dining place!

Random Pictures

Johnny & Me at Toon Lagoon

Billy at Toon Lagoon

Jesse found Scooby Doo's Mystery Machine!

Dad, Jesse, and some unknown characters.

Dad, Jesse, Dora the Explorer and Boots!

Picture taken on my voyage to space at the Kennedy Space Center!

On the Road Again...

Yes, we are on the road again...on our way to home! Sometime around 9:30 we left, made one stop for gas, got stuck in traffic for 20 minutes, and arrived at our hotel in Atlanta at five. We unpacked and then went swimming before leaving to eat with some of our relation at Chuck E. Cheese's here in Atlanta. It was great to meet Chase and his wife and daughter, and everyone had a good time playing games and winning (a few) tickets!

Here are some photos from the road...

I got a picture to remember all the red lights this town had! Dad really loved them! ;) The lights were always red...and then they didn't allow right turns on red very often either.

The Publix grocery store where we went for groceries.

We passed some orange orchards!

Entering Georgia (leaving Florida)

And some photos from Chuck E. Cheese's... :)

Jonathan is intent on winning his balloon-popping game!

Chuck E. Cheese himself!

Jesse and Me...NOT winning much.

Travis and Billy try to win the jackpot!

Travis redeeming his tickets

Chase, Amanda, and Sydney

Ready to Head Home

We all woke up early this morning to clean and get packed up for the drive home! We are slightly behind schedule right now because the towels went into the wash a little late. Other than that, everything is in the process of being packed up and we are saying our farewells to the house!

Travis is tired after a long, busy week! (But still smiling!)

Johnny is too busy to look as the camera as he finishes his last-minute packing.

Sad to be leaving!

Billy, Justin, and Dad do the only thing they can do without making a mess...watching TV.

Our packed up disaster...once again it's all going to fit into the van! And this is only a portion of it.

...and behind every clean and packed up mess is a busy mother!

And then there are me and Jesse, all ready to go!

We should be home by Monday evening...we will be taking our time on the way back!

Adventure Island (Water Park!)

This was our day for the water park, and the weather was just perfect for it! The park, called Adventure Island, was near Tampa and right next to Busch Gardens. There were several water slides, a few play areas for children, a wave pool, and a lazy river. We found ourselves a picnic table in the shade to claim for the day, and everyone enjoyed all of the park! For lunch, we ate sandwiches, carrots, and cookies that Mom had packed. It was great to be able to stay cool from the sun, and it didn't rain at all! In fact, I realized it hasn't rained for three days now! Everyone had fun and got wet...I can't think of much else to say about our day. At the end, we dried off and got dressed before the hour-long ride home. We arrived around 10:30 and got home at 8:45.

Jesse rests after a busy day in front of one of the slides. He spent much of his day on the water playground and in the wave pool!

We ordered pizza for supper and are getting packed up to leave tomorrow morning. Our goal is to depart by nine!

Universal Studios: Florida (Thursday, July 26)

Thursday, July 26

Our second day at Universal Studios was spent in the Florida park, separate from the Islands of Adventure we were at on Tuesday. The day was very enjoyable and I believe everyone had a good time! We started on the Despicable Me ride, and waited in line for an hour before getting to the front and having to wait another 15 while they experienced technical difficulties. At least by that time we were sitting in the air conditioning! The ride was really fun though!

Universal Studios Florida rides in the background!

We continued on rides and other things the rest of the day. This park had a lot more movies and other entertainment than the Islands of Adventure. There were several 3-D and 4-D movies and shows to see. The boys also enjoyed playing in Curious George Goes to Town where they got wet and played in the ball factory.

Jesse enjoyed the Curious George place!

The other boys came to have fun too! (Justin)

For lunch, we ate meat, cheese, crackers, and cookies that we had packed and brought with us. We waited until we got home to have pulled pork sandwiches for supper.

At the end of the day at Universal, there was a water show-a waterfall with a movie playing on it! The show was celebrating Universal's 100th anniversary, and it was really neat to see, especially all lit up at night. There were fireworks too. After that, we went to a magic shop and watched some tricks, and the boys bought some. We went to the gift shop and got t-shirts before heading home at closing time. Once again, we were all very exhausted when we got home after such an exciting day! :)

(Jesse met some famous people so I will try to share those pictures later!)

Outta Control!! Magic Show & Dinner

Immediately from the Kennedy Space Center, we went to the Outta Control Magic & Comedy Dinner Show in Orlando at Wonderworks. Here we ate salad, unlimited pizza & pop, and dessert...along with a magic and comedy show. It was very entertaining and funny, so I think they did a good job! And the pizza was delicious! The boys liked the unlimited aspect of it. After the show, we stopped at the gift shop where there were magic tricks among several other souvenirs and candy. Everyone has their own money from working this summer and is spending it as they wish. The boys bought some magic tricks to bring home with them! Jesse and I just bought tubes of flavored sugar. :)

Magic Show (The man in the white plaid shirt is the comedian/magician)

All of us in front of Wonder Works after the show.

If you look closely, you can see that the entire building is upside down: lamp posts, palm trees,  pillars, and all!

After the show, we came home and have just been hanging around and swimming tonight. Looks like another big day is planned for tomorrow, so we should probably get rested up! Good night!

Kennedy Space Center

Today we drove over to the Atlantic coast of Florida to visit the Kennedy Space Center on an island off the mainland. This is where NASA has several buildings, and perhaps best known, the launchpads for the spaceships the U.S. sends into outer space. We started at the visitors center.

The first thing we did was the Space Shuttle Launch Simulator. Here, we went into a simulator, sat inside a space shuttle, and blasted into space. It felt and looked very real, but it fortunately wasn't! The simulator was really neat.

We then began our bus tour around the space center. We made two stops; the second was a museum with several theaters, a sample from the moon, artifacts, and a big rocket in the middle. 

Our Tour Bus

Billy and Me and the Saturn V Rocket

Travis holding up the rocket!

We saw some fires in the distance...didn't know what they were, but it was quite a sight! There were even fire helicopters on the scene!

Shortly after we arrived, the electricity went off in the building and we ended up getting back on the bus and going back. We did have time to see quite a lot, though.

On the drive back to the visitors complex, we saw some alligators and a bald eagle's nest in the trees. The nest was very large! They said it was the size of a king-size bed!

Back at the complex, we watched two IMAX 3-D films, went through a museum-like center, visited the rocket garden, and made a stop at the gift shop before leaving. We all learned a lot from this day, and it all was a wonderful experience!

Jesse's all ready for the IMAX movie!

Universal Studios: Islands of Adventure (Tuesday)

Tuesday, July 24, 2012

Today we went to Universal Studios-Islands of Adventure! It is a theme park with several rides and other things to see, do, and eat! We opened the gates at 9am and closed them again at 10pm. It was fun for us all, I believe...though Jesse had difficulty enjoying some of the scarier rides and instead went to Seuss Landing where the rides were a bit more welcoming!

Our first ride of the day: the moving walkways!

The day started out at Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey, which I think was the newest ride. Even though it was the first ride we did, it was still a 60 minute wait. By the time we were out of there, it had turned to 90, so we were glad we got there when we did! That ride was pretty impressive. From there we did a roller coaster that made Dad sick and caused him to start being Jesse's guide in Mom's place. We also did a walk-through "tour" of an enchanted building (something a Harry Potter fan may know about).

The Wizarding World of Harry Potter

We got very good at waiting in line today!

Jesse gets ready for a ride!

Us and the Hogwarts Express Conductor from Harry Potter

Waiting...resting...and a little more waiting...

After Harry Potter, we made our way to Jurassic Park, where the dinosaurs were roaming. Before getting started, we ate the sandwiches Mom had packed for lunch. After enjoying that ride and getting pretty wet, we went to another place and did two more really wet rides. We were completely soaked and spent the rest of the afternoon drying off! Then we did the 3-D Spiderman ride. (At this point, Mom and Jesse were gone to Seuss Landing again.) The wait was 90 minutes long, but I thought it was almost worth the wait! It was a really neat ride!

Eating Lunch in Jurassic Park

Finally, we did the Incredible Hulk roller coaster, which I thought was the most thrilling of them all. Although I liked Spiderman better, this one had a much shorter wait so it was more rewarding! As we were waiting in line, it started to rain and it rained for about 15 minutes. They shut down the ride for that time, but we were glad for a dry place from the rain! 

You can see the Hulk ride on the far right side of this picture, along with some other attractions. This was the last picture taken before the camera stopped working for the day. We were all pretty wet here!

Then we went on to a stunt show, and this was really neat to see! It was like a play, but the actors did a lot of stunts. And pyrotechnics were even used!

After this, we went back to our favorite rides until closing time-riding Spiderman, Jurassic Park, a few others, and even the Incredible Hulk two more times until we got sick! Then we went to the gift shop before heading out. We were all VERY tired at the end of the day! I'm not sure about the rest of them, but I could hardly function when we got home. Somehow Mom and Dad still had the energy to grill and make up hamburgers before we all went to bed. (Hence, the reason I hadn't the opportunity to write about our day yesterday!)