OFADE Part 5: Epcot and The End!

We spent a whole day on Friday and a Half day on Saturday at Epcot!

Sierra was most excited about going to Epcot. Paul and I were equally excited to see her there. Sierra has a special love of world cultures and customs. She loves trying new things, seeing new things, and experiencing new things. I think at the beginning of our week/adventure she was just excited to see all the different countries and eat cool food, but then as the week progressed I think she became more excited because she could experience all of this "new" stuff with both feet firmly planted on the ground. :) A HUGE selling feature for her!

Logan also found much to enjoy at Epcot..like all the water features..... and Paul found that at Epcot all your golf shots look really impressive. ( He came up with this shot and is very proud at how it turned out!)......

We had all decided before we even walked into Epcot that we wanted to try and "eat our way around the world showcase." We didn't eat in China or Mexico because there wasn't anything new to eat there, Canada only had trail mix, and we ran out of time in Norway. Other than that we did sample something in every country.

We ate a lemon tart and a cream filled pastry in France.

We had Shrimp Tempura, Udon Noodles and Kaki Gori (shaved ice with sweet flavoring, a.k.a. a snow cone like thing) in Japan

Traditional Baklava in Morocco...

A Bratwurst, and the most amazing pretzel I have ever had in a theme park in Germany...

a funnel cake in Americaand the best fish and chips in the United Kingdom.

Sierra's favorite ride in all of Disney World was at Epcot. Test Track was a HUGE hit with her and she rode it twice,the only ride we can say that about for Sierra. We also enjoyed the Nemo Ride, and Talking with Crush was "sweet." We also rode Living with the Land, and Journey into Imagination with Figment, Gran Fiesta Tour w/the Three Caballeros, and Maelstrom in Norway. Sierra and I went and saw "The American Adventure" while Paul and Logan rode the "Friendship" boat. The other BIG hit with the kids was the Kim Possible "ride."It's not a ride as much as it was running around a country trying to stop a diabolical plot to take over the world. It was a lot of fun and the kids really enjoyed it, and it was also a great way to get to see the individual countries. Because of that, we did it about 5 times!

Logan was really great at Epcot. Honestly he would have been perfectly happy to sit and watch this all day........

the train in Germany. Is anyone surprised, really!?!

The kids also enjoyed going to each of the countries and collecting items for their "kidcot" masks.
This is another favorite souvenir and again, FREE!!!

Sierra's Favorite thing about Epcot was "all the different countries and Test Track."
Logan's favorite thing about Epcot was watching the trains, and riding the boat.

My favorite part of Epcot was watching the Drummers, and the Candy Maker in Japan, doing Kim Possible with the kids, and watching Sierra fall in love with so many countries in one day.

Paul's favorite part of Epcot was Japan, riding in the "friendship" boat with Logan jut to ride on a boat, and eating Fish N'Chips down by the water with the family.

Well, there you go it's finally over. Our trip in 5 installments.

We had a great time. It was magical. It was fun. It was perfect. We created memories, and moments that I hope Paul and I and the kids will remember for always.

Thanks Disney..until next time....

OFADE: Part 4 Hollywood Studios

We spent all day Thursday and a half day Saturday at Hollywood Studios.

Hollywood Studios is one of our favorite parks! We loved it because we had a plan so our day went by smoothly, but we also had TONS of fun/ happy surprises happen! It was a GREAT couple of days! Here are the highlights!

While on the back lot tour we ran into the chicken coop from the Hannah Montana Movie. Sierra was pretty stoked, but I don't think she would admit it. She's now "too cool" for Hannah Montana. That made me remember the following comment Sierra made; "Mom, how cool would it be if all of a sudden Selena Gomez walked up to us and said, "Hi Sierra! I am here to be your guide to Disney World. That would TOTALLY ROCK!" This comment made me smile, and giggle to myself. I replied by telling her that if Selena Gomez popped out while we were at DW to be our guide, then this truly was the MOST MAGICAL PLACE on Earth. :)

We also stopped and posed with 3 of the 5 Power Rangers. I loved how they would show the kids how to pose and then pose with them. The blue ranger was my favorite. He was really into it! This was also our "ode to Nathan," my brother, who is serving a mission in Paraguay! He may be 19 but he is still a HUGE Power Rangers fan! We miss you Nate!

In Hollywood Studios we met a TON of characters!

Mickey, Minnie, Pluto, Goofy, Mulan, Belle...

Chip and Dale, Jafar, Lotso from Toy Story 3......

Lightning McQueen and Mater....Handy Manny.....

and Mike W. and Sully!

There were more but posting all of the pictures would be ridiculous.

We met most of the characters at the Magic of Disney Animation. We hid out there while it was down poring and it turned into a character smorgasbord while we were hiding out there. We also got to learn how to draw Minnie and Tigger from Disney Animators! If you are ever there, do this! It was awesome and because we asked nicely we got to take the animators signed drawing of Minnie home with us! Not many people know this, and it's FREE!!

We also learned what Disney Character we were most like. Paul and Logan were most like Cogsworth the clock from Beauty and the Beast, Sierra was most like Tinkerbell, and I was most like Nala from The Lion King!

It was one of our favorite stops!

Another one of the unique things about "studios" is the number of great shows you can see there. We enjoyed a number of them....

Playhouse Disney, Muppet's 3-D, Indiana Jones, High School Musical 3, Beauty and the Beast...

and our personal favorite...Lights! Motor! Action! A stunt car driving show. Logan was BEYOND excited with all the Lights, screeching tires, action, water, falling, shooting, and FIRE!!

Saturday was STAR WARS Weekend! I was worried it was going to be CRAZY!! It was Crazy, but not CRAZY, and actually turned out to be really cool! We were greeted to the park by these guys....

(look on the top of the building)

and we watched the Star Wars Motorcade that featured that weekends celebrates including, Jeremy Bulloch ( Boba Fett from episodes 5 and 6), Ashley Eckstein ( voice of Ahoska in Star Wars: The Clone Wars), Ray Park ( Darth Maul), Billy Dee Williams ( Lando Calrissian), and Dave Filoni ( supervising director of Clone Wars), and a few other people. To cap our Star Wars experience off Paul, Sierra and Logan joined forces with the Dark Side.

We also rode some amazing rides, like Toy Story Mania, Tower of Terror, and Rockin' Roller Coaster!

Here are our personal favorites from Hollywood Studios:

Logan really liked Toy Story Mania, meeting Mater and McQueen, Playhouse Disney, Lights! Motors! Action!, eating and "playing" games at Pizza Planet, and playing on the Honey I Shrunk the Kids! playground.

Sierra "Hated Tower of Terror, but I liked Light! Motor! Action!, Toy Story Mania, and Drawing with the animator."

Randi: " I really loved all the surprises we enjoyed at Hollywood. I was surprised at how much I enjoyed drawing with the animator, Little Mermaid, and the Star Wars Motorcade. I loved Lights! Motors!, and I really loved riding Toy Story with my kids! Oh! and I of course LOVED Tower of Terror...can we go back tomorrow?"

Paul " Tower of Terror is the best ride in the whole wide world, in the whole park. I liked animation, Lights! Motors!, running in the rain ( although we did that everywhere), and being the high scorer 2x in Toy Story Mania!"

Ostler Family Adventure Disney Edition: Part 3

I have been having a hard time posting about this part of our adventure because we spent so much time in the Magic Kingdom!

We all had so many favorites, and we took so many pictures, it's been very hard to narrow it all down!

We spent all day Wednesday in the Magic Kingdom, as many nights as we could sneak in, and a half day on Sunday! This truly is the most "Magical Place on Earth!"

One of the things that we had discovered from our previous day at the Animal Kingdom was pin trading. Sierra fell in love with it, and she especially loved trading pins at Magic Kingdom. Pin trading was her souvenir but you would have thought it was all of ours the way we were all looking at/for pins to trade!

The first big hit of Magic Kingdom was the monorail. Logan LOVED it!

LOVED might even be an understatement.

He was a little obsessed.

But in the cutest most excited way!

Here Logan and Paul are on the Tomorrow Land Speedway! A family favorite. Sierra and I rode it together and then went pin hunting while Logan and Paul rode it again! We were lucky enough to get back just in time to capture this shot. Pure Joy! We all loved this ride so much that we rode it again on Sunday!

Another Logan favorite: Dumbo!

He rode this ride every chance he got, and that would be 4!

Subsequently, any ride like this ride he also liked. Aladdin's Flying Carpets, Astro Orbiter, and Triceratops Spin in Animal Kingdom.... all BIG hits with this kid!

The other big hit with Logan was Goofy's Barnstormer. He rode it 5 times and if we could have he would have ridden 5 more times!

Sierra and I also liked the Barnstormer. It was a lot of fun!

On Wednesday we were also able to eat lunch at the Crystal Palace with Winnie the Pooh and gang! The food was great and the kids enjoyed meeting all the characters.

Oh! Paul met his favorite too!

Paul has THE BEST Eeyore voice ever!

Here was a funny moment caught on film. We decided to ride the teacups as a family. Both kids had ridden the ride earlier in the day, in separate teacups, but we wanted to ride all together.

Here is how it went down:

Logan wanted to spin the tea cup by himself...Sierra gets a little agitated.

We tell Logan to share, he says "no!"

Logan loses his turn. Sierra gets a turn...this makes Logan very sad/angry.

Yup! This is going exactly as planned..........

Paul decided it would be best to lighten the mood......

by pretending to throw up.

We were all amused. It made for a memorable tea cup ride!

Sierra's favorite things to do while at the Magic Kingdom were to get autographs from the characters and pin trade. She also LOVED It's a Small World, Peter Pan ( where we got stuck for 5 minutes) Splash Mountain...she admitted to liking it a week later......,Tomorrow Land Speedway, Tomorrow land Transit Authority and Smoked Turkey Legs.

Paul's Favorites were watching the fireworks in Fantasyland under the castle, and making new memories with the kids on rides like Barnstormer and The Tomorrow Land Speedway.

My favorite part of the Magic Kingdom was seeing my kids and my family have such an amazing time. It made me so happy to see smiles on everyones faces as they did each new activity.

Thanks Magic Kingdom for the Most Magical Days! We can't wait to come back again!

Disney Trip Part 2: Animal Kingdom

The first park that we visited at Disney World was the Animal Kingdom.

We went to the Animal Kingdom for a full day on Tuesday and a half-day on Sunday.The first ride we rode on was the Kilimanjaro Safari Ride. This is the ride where you see "Wild Animals in the wild." At one point we got stuck for a few minutes because a herd of White Rhino were crossing the road. They were so close to the truck that we were able to see the little baby white Rhino that was just a few months old. She was adorable.

We saw many other animals on the safari ride; lions, crocodiles, elephants, zebras, etc. Because we rode early in the day the animals were more active then when Paul and I rode it by ourselves a year ago. That made it a really great ride. The kids liked it, and Logan was thrilled when we helped "rescue" the baby elephant from the "poachers."

We also rode Kali River Rapids. Another great ride. We were a little worried about Logan, as it was the biggest ride that he could ride in his height category, but he did great and wanted to do it again. Unfortunately we couldn't as Paul, Sierra, and I ended up soaked! And I mean SOAKED!! We were all standing in the bathroom after the ride trying to ring off the water, and dry off under the hand dryers. We were dripping water all over the bathroom floor. It was quite funny!

Another Highlight of The Animal Kingdom for us was visiting Rafiki's Planet Watch. The train ride over is beautiful. Logan's loves of planes translates nicely to trains, cars, buses,etc. so he was naturally a fan! It was also a great place to catch a breeze and a snack! While at the Planet Watch we did a nature scavenger hunt, we met Rafiki, Pochantas, and Jiminy Cricket. We also saw this amazing lama. I fell in love with this animal, such personality:

Can you see his/her teeth. PRICELESS!! I mean honestly!

While at The Animal Kingdom we also saw the Finding Nemo Musical, The Festival of the Lion King, It's Tough to Be A Bug in 3-D and The Flights of Wonder Bird show! Nemo and Lion King were BIG hits with the kids. Logan loved the bubbles at Finding Nemo, and Sierra loved the flying lady at Lion King! It's Tough to be a Bug was a little intense for the kiddlets. Before we went in though I captured this photo, I just couldn't believe how cute the family looked in their 3-D glasses! Flights of Wonder was also awesome, especially when an Owl hit Sierra in the head while demonstrating his silent flight!

Our Family Favorites from Animal Kingdom:

Sierra said that her favorite part of Animal Kingdom was: "The Kilimanjaro Safari ride and Khali River Rapids."

Logan said that his favorite part of Animal Kingdom was: "The river ride where we got wet, and the Train ride"

My favorite part was: "The River Rapid Ride and the Bird show were Sierra got hit in the head by an owl. I mean come on, that's pretty priceless!"

Paul's favorite part was: "The Safari Ride the Rapid Ride and the Bird Show. But the one I will remember the most is the Rapid Ride where we all got soaked!"

Ostler Family Adventure: Disney Edition Part 1

We just got back from our very first Family vacation, an exciting trip to Disney World. It was everything we wanted it to be and more. We truly enjoyed spending the week together. We created many memories, and as with any truly successful family vacation, a few inside jokes as well.

I have decided to post the vacation into sections. It makes the blogging ( journal-ing) of the events a little easier.

So first up: Gettin' There!

We left last Monday. Sierra and Logan were SUPER excited to be getting on a plane. Sierra was excited to have her very own T.V. for the flight (we flew jetblue) and Logan just loves, loves, loves planes. We were a little concerned about how he would do given that the last few times he's been on a plane he did not like the seat belt part. I guess being older really did help us out - this time he did AMAZING! He sat by the Window, and proceeded to be the great friend he is:

What!?! You thought we would leave Willy at home! Oh, No! Willy received first class treatment. He got some of the best views from the plane, and he even traveled into the Disney Parks with us. You can imagine Logan's great surprise and excitement when we arrived in Orlando and ran into the Sea World store in the airport. Willy and Logan's first offical stop in Orlando! :)

On a more serious note, about half way through our flight the pilot came on and told us that if we looked out the right hand side of the aircraft we would be able to see the BP Oil Spill that is currently swallowing the Gulf of Mexico. These are pictures of a small section of the oil spill that we could see out our window. It's just the tip of the spill, and with that thought in mind, it makes it even that more HORRIFYING when seen in person. Having grown up around the Gulf of Mexico I can't tell you how sad this is. So many things are at jeopardy of being lost and destroyed. Wildlife, beaches, fish, shrimp, wetlands, etc. I was angry/sad/and bitter all at once.

We could see boats down below as we flew over. Tiny speaks in a sea of oil. Also, as a side note while we were in Orlando, the news was reporting that some beaches in Florida were starting to see oil slicks come on shore. Truly, one of the worst disasters I have ever seen.

And now a lighter note:

As we were gathering our luggage to get a taxi, I realized that I had forgotten my PURSE ON THE PLANE. In my meek defense it was a new, smaller purse. I was not used to carrying such a tiny thing. Luckily, Paul was able to get a gate pass and retrieve it for me. Unluckily, it took an extra 30 minutes to do it. We were doing so well on time too! Here is a picture of the kiddos begrudgingly waiting for Paul to come back with my purse.

They are SO ASHAMED!!!

Seriously one of the stupidest moments of my life.

So, there are the ups and downs of the first leg of our journey.

I will post pics and stories about Animal Kingdom tomorrow!