Fabulous Florida

Yesterday was a long travel day for us.  I think we were on the road from 8-3.  We were very anxious to arrive in the Sunshine State and leave the rain and clouds behind.  We checked into Disney's Fort Wilderness and we were in our fabulous pool by 4.  The kids had just enough time to splash and play before the rain started to fall again.  Dave grilled steaks and the 6 of us had a very nice dinner as a family our first night in Florida.

It is worth mentioning that Magnolia has finally learned to swim on this trip.  I believe she is disadvantaged by her tiny size and it has been a challenge for her to get it.  Well, now that she has she is so fun to watch in the water.  This campsite has a good water slide and she can go on it all by herself and clear the slide at the bottom without any help.  I am very proud of her and she is quite proud of herself.

This morning we were to Universal Studios by 9am.  The main priority for the day was to give Adelaide and Alastair a chance to ride the Harry Potter ride.  I have no idea what it was like because Magnolia and Dagny are too short to ride it so we were doing our own thing but all reports were great and they loved everything about the whole HP section of the park. 

Dave spent a day at Cedar Point begging Addie to ride coasters with him and a day at Hershey Park doing the same with no luck.  As it turns out she just needed to be bribed with a chocolate frog.  She rode the coaster, got the chocolate, and now she loves roller coasters.  It was a fun, crowded, and hot day at Universal.

For dinner we were able to meet up with my cousin, Lance Sergio, and also Jody, Dylan and Hayden Anthony.  Lance is the youngest of my Brazilian first cousins and it was really great to catch up with him.  He and his wife Diana have lived here in Orlando for 13 years.  He is my only Brazilian cousin that lives here in the U.S. but I am hoping we find more of them coming to the States soon.  A very fun branch of my family tree.

The Anthony's are some of our favorite friends.  Jody and I have been friends since 7th grade and her kids are good friends with mine now too.  They are 9 and 7 and we see them a couple of times a year.  We invited them to stay in the motor home with us for the next 2 nights so we are up to 9 bodies sleeping here tonight and bedtime was shockingly easy.  I expected to have to use my mean mommy voice at least once or twice to get giggling kids to settle down but I did not.  They fell asleep in a snap.  Clearly they are worn out.  :)

Tomorrow we head to the Magic Kingdom so we can experience the "real" Disney World.  I am excited to spend more time with the Anthony's and hopefully keep the kids awake long enough for the parade and fireworks tomorrow night. 

Nightie night.

Jll