Disney- Part 1

Several years ago my Mom decided that we should take a trip to Disney before my kids leave home.  Seeing as my oldest will graduate next year we thought we better get on the ball, so we started saving our pennies.  And about six months ago we got really serious about it.  The plan was to take my entire family plus my Mom, my Granny and my nephew, that's eight total for those counting along.

I have been to Disney before.....supposedly.  My parents brought me and my brother to Disney World before I started school and I remember absolutely nothing of it.  So to me, this was the trip of a lifetime and I was very excited.

We decided not to tell the kids until right before it was time to go and it was HARD to keep it a secret that long.  They thought that we were spending the week in Galveston, and honestly I think they were a little disappointed when we did tell them where we were going.

Thurs-  My nephew lives in San Antonio, so before our journey east we had to head west.   Granny, myself and Swag headed to Schulenburg that morning to drop off myself and our dog Scully at my grandfather's house.  I have a "strained" relationship with my nephew's mom so I chose not to go to her house and instead stayed with my grandfather while Granny and Swag went to pick him up.  On their way back through they stopped to pick me up and to have lunch  with my grandfather and his wife so that they could visit with their grandson.

That evening was the big reveal.  We set up a scavenger hunt for the kids that lead them to a giant Mickey balloon and this picture...

Just to clarify, the guy on the left is my nephew.  The original picture just had Mickey ears on top of his head but I have had issues with his Mom in the past in regards to his picture being posted on the internet so for the purposes of this blog any pic with him in it will be edited to not show his face.

Fri-  When Mom got off work she, Joe, and I went to pick up the rental car.
We ended up getting a Yukon, as we needed something big enough for eight passengers.  Now I don't know if you've ever seen a Yukon but while it does have seating for eight, it only has leg room for five.  The back seat literally sits ON the floor, thank goodness some of that eight was kids.  And luggage room?  Forget it!  It was crazy.

Sat- We wanted to be on the road early so we were up and at 'em by 7, which when dealing with kids (and heck, who am I kidding? ME!) was not an easy feat.  We played musical luggage trying to get it all to fit which meant we had to put some on top, thank goodness for the luggage rack!  Went by and picked up Mom and just as we were about to pull out, we hear the roar of a motorcycle pull up behind us.  My Uncle Jimmy had stopped and picked up kolaches and donuts for us and then tracked us down to share them with us.  How sweet is he?

Mom, Uncle Jimmy, and Granny

Finally, we were on the road!  Didn't take us too long to get out of Texas and then there was Louisiana.  Let me preface this by saying that I do NOT like bridges.  Mainly it's a height thing, I'm afraid of heights.  But I also don't like flat bridges that span five miles of water.  I think THAT has to do with my claustrophobia, I don't like feeling stuck.  Seems that I have quite a few neuroses at my age.  So anyway, apparently Louisiana is nothing but bridges.  You get off one bridge and oh look, another bridge. It got to be a game..."look Court, another bridge", " Is that another bridge I see?", " Here comes another bridge".  Yeah...fun.  And then we missed the exit for hwy. 12.  Come to find out if you want to go straight across LA you have to get off I-10 or else you end up taking a two hour detour through New Orleans.  Won't make that mistake again!  So two hours later than expected we ended up at our destination for the night, Biloxi, MS.  We had comped rooms at the Isle of Capri casino which worked out well.  The kids got to go swimming, Mom and Granny got to go gambling, and Joe and I were just happy to be in the air conditioning (our's has been out since Nov.).   And another positive, I believe the walk from the lobby to the elevators was enough to turn the kids off ever smoking, so much smoke!

Superdome.....dang it.

Never thought I'd be so happy to see this.

         

Swag, Me, and Mister Man

Little Miss being silly.

Sun- We had an appt. in downtown Orlando at 8 that night so we had a deadline.  We got up and on the road plenty early...or so we thought.  First there was a time change, which worked against us.  And then there was rain.  I don't mean a little rain, I mean a lot of rain, severe thunderstorm rain.  You couldn't see in front of you and you certainly couldn't do the speed limit.  So we lost a few hours there.  Let me say that Joe did 99% of the driving and he did a fabulous job.  In fact, he drove faster in the rain than I would have but on dry pavement?   Once we got into Florida he needed to sleep for a little bit so I jumped  behind the wheel and made up some time!  Now I won't say I was speeding.  Ok, I was speeding but in my defense there were people passing me when I was doing eighty so there!  And luckily Joe woke up refreshed right before another storm so he took over and drove the rest of the way.

Impressions of Florida:
If had to see one more pro-life billboard I may have lost it.
It's surprisingly hilly, thought it would be flat.
Once we got further south it actually reminded me of CA, even had vineyards.

The last few miles before the hotel seemed to stretch for eternity.  But we finally made it a little before seven.  Did I mention that we had an appointment at eight?  Yeah, so we got checked in, went to our rooms, threw our luggage down and then got back in the car that we had already been in for ten hours.

Why did we have to be downtown at eight you ask? Well, Swag's birthday of course!  Let me clarify.  Swag's birthday is in January but like most teenagers very hard to buy for.  He had expressed an interest before in sky diving but as his Mom I couldn't fathom him jumping out of a perfectly good airplane, so I got to researching.  Turns out Orlando has something called IFly. IFly is only the coolest thing EVER!  You can FLY.  INSIDE!    His appt. was for nine but you have to be there an hour early to take a class.  So we get there at eight and find out that the class is actually half an hour and starts at eight- thirty, tricky IFly, it's like you know we won't show up on time.  So we go upstairs to wait for his class.

Guys, it was AWESOME!  While we were waiting for his class to start we got to watch the group before him fly.  They actually fly inside a glass chamber that is appr. 12 feet in diameter.  The bottom is rope netting through which air is blown up from below.  You basically walk to the doorway and then fall forward.  You have to keep your chin up and your arms and legs in a pretty specific arrangement and in this position you can fly.  Now, as we learned with the class before his, if you move one arm and one leg you can spin one direction, or of course move the opposite limbs and spin the opposite direction. Bend your body a certain direction and you can fly up, bend it another and fly down.  There was a guy in the class before his who had clearly sky dived ( is that correct?  I want to say sky dove, but it doesn't sound right either way.) anyway, he had clearly flown before and his instructor was teaching him how to do different tricks.  Like flying up, stopping, and then moving forward and backward.  Or flying on his back and then spinning.  It was really, really cool.

Swag putting on his flight suit.

Finally they called us for Swag's class and he headed up. Class consisted of a video teaching you the basic position and learning the hand signals that the instructor would use  in the tunnel to get you in the correct position.  Went back down to wait for his turn in the tunnel and a thunderstorm erupted.  Now, the tunnel, classroom and waiting area are all inside but the wind for the tunnel comes from outside and if there is rain outside, well, the vacuum sucks it up too.  And if you've ever been on a motorcycle in the rain, you know that it can be quite painful to have water drops hit you in the face at 60mph.  So....we had to wait for the thunderstorm to pass.  By this time it is 9:00 pm,  we have been on the road since 7:00 am, and have not eaten since about noon.   Finally at about 9:40 Swag gets to fly.  Everyone in his class were first time flyers and I honestly have to say that Swag was the best.  On his first flight the instructor just kept him in the air and let him fly on his own.  But at the end of the second flight the instructor took him up and flew with him, spinning 30 ft. into the air and back down again several times.  And then when the class was over the instructor got in and showed off, it was amazing, especially after seeing how hard is just to stay in the air on a flat plane.  He climbed the walls like spider-man, rode the air like he was on a skateboard and spun like crazy.  Awesome!!!

Swag mid flight

Again flying!

Swag's Instructor being goofy

By the time we left it was after 10:00 and we were in search of food.  Thankfully we found a Pizza Hut that stayed open till midnight on Sunday night and pulled in.  We finally got back to the resort about midnight and went straight to bed for the early morning that was to come tomorrow.