Spring Break 2015

Ah I had made such good progress catching up my blog last fall, but it's been a few months again and now I'm in danger of the time lapping my posts by a year!  So, I'll be making another push to catch up!  LAST spring break we went to Baba and Grandpa's house again.  It was a very fun, busy trip.  Our annual pass to Universal was still valid, and Grandpa had started working at Disney World, so we got to help him take advantage of some of his new employee perks!  Also, Joe went a few days before us and our trips overlapped for the first time ever.  We also took in a Spring Training game and had dinner with the Gorondy Family!  

A well timed perk for us was the Disney Employee Spring Fling that we got to attend with Dad.  It was held at Mickey's Retreat, which is an awesome park facility just for employees.  For the event they offered face painting for free for the kids, carnival games which only cost fifty cents per ticket, inflatables, food trucks, and they had an easter egg hunt!

Tyler's turned out so cute and went with his sweatshirt, he actually had employees asking to take photos with him!

check out the bottom right photo closely, made skills by Timmy for making the shot, and by me for getting this picture!

Also special for the event, some favorite characters showed up!

The canoes and paddle boats are always at Mickey's Retreat, and only cost a few bucks to rent.  Neither Timmy or Tyler had ever done anything like this before, and both really enjoyed it!

One last character sighting!

The next day we took in a Nat's Spring Training Game.  Baba and the Gorondy's came to the game too, but I guess we were pictured out from the day before!

I'm finding this a little hard to believe myself, but according to the dates our phones put on our pictures, we made our way over to Universal after the game!  We caught the tail end of a parade, and rode the Woody Woodpecker Rollercoaster over and over again, mostly all by ourselves!  Both boys absolutely loved it, and Timmy even asked to ride in the seat alone!

The next day we were right back at Universal and Tim got Timmy to ride Do-Right Falls, and Timmy loved it!  Thanks to rider swap he got to do it a few times.  Tyler was waiting so patiently in the rider swap room, that a universal employee noticed and asked how tall he was.  When I told them, they said, "That's tall enough for Spider Man.  When you go there, tell them that Ashley at the Falls says Tyler doesn't have to wait in line because he was so patient here."!  Unfortunately Spider Man was closed during this trip, but we told them the next day and we didn't have to wait in line, all thanks to Tyler!

The next day we were back at Universal again.  Tyler was tall enough for both Spider Man and Transformers this trip, which he had been dying to ride for a full year.  I rode both of them with Tyler, with my arm wrapped behind him and back across his chest.  I thought his little heart was going to beat right out of his chest, but after the rides he said he liked them.  I think he especially liked Transformers, as he talked about helping Optimus Prime, and about Bumble Bee saving us, for a while after the ride was over.

Tyler was also tall enough for the Simpsons ride, and I was shocked that we talked Timmy back onto it too since he was pretty traumatized the first time he rode it.  Timmy still dislikes it, I think Tyler liked the ride okay, but they are both afraid of their Krusty the Clown stuffed animals that they had won on a previous trip now!  This trip was also our first for riding the Minions in the moving cars instead of on the stationary bench.  It's so fun!

The next day we took it a little bit easier, with pool time and coloring Easter Eggs.  That evening we met up with The Gorondy's for dinner.  I didn't get good pictures, but you can see they are fond of Parker!

Before heading to dinner, the boys posed with Grandpa as he was getting ready to head to work!  At the time, he was a deckhand on the Ferry at Magic Kingdom!

The next day Dad took us all to Epcot on free employee passes!  Dad had met another Deck Hand who is retired from Chevrolet, who offered to meet us at Test Track, let us check out the Chevrolet Lounge, and get us fast passes for the ride!  It was neat to get this behind the scenes peek!  We also completed the Easter Egg hunt around the Country portion of Epcot, and met Princess Aurora for the first time.  It was a full day!

Test Track Chevrolet Lounge and Meeting Spaces, great view!

On our last full day, Mom and Dad treated us to an awesome meal at the Animal Kingdom Lodge.  While we waited for our table, we got to go out on the "plains" and watch Zebras, Giraffes, and other African animals roaming around!  We could see a lot of them through the window once we were at our table too, especially the bird, who hung out by the window almost the whole time!  The food was SO good too!

After lunch we went over to the Wilderness Lodge to complete a scavenger hunt for Hidden Mickey's!  The boys got pretty good at following the clues and we found them all!

When we woke up on Easter morning we checked out our baskets to see what the Easter Bunny had brought.  Then it was time to head home!