Keeping Up With...Family (Disney - Part 1)

It has taken me almost three weeks to start on the recap of our Florida trip.  I have no idea how many parts it will be, or how long it will take me to recap everything so bear with me.

We got up bright and early on Friday, August 29th to hit the road to Florida.  Our goal was to be on the road by 8am and we did pretty good, only about 10 minutes late leaving.  The car wasn't nearly as packed as we thought it would be, it's getting easier to travel with the boys as they are getting older.  Of course we did forget a few things, some unnecessary (laptop & tablet), some necessary (my underwear!)

Road trip selfie!

Our goal was to drive as far as we could on Friday and then stop for the night.  We were making great time and cruising along and then we hit Charlotte, NC around 5:00pm on Friday of a holiday weekend.  There was a lot of traffic.  And then the air conditioning in the car went!  It was HOT!!  We decided to stop for dinner early to cool off and let some of the traffic ease up.  Thankful for Chick Fil A and their play area!

We did pretty well and got to just outside of Georgia Friday night around 9:30pm.  We had found a hotel online and got an awesome deal.  The boys ran around and played for a while and then we all crashed for the night by 11.  We were up and on the road bright and early the next morning, planning to get to my brother's hotel pool around 2 for some family fun.

And then the puking started!  Daniel told me he wasn't feeling well and I just got a bag under him before it happened.  We thought it was from the heat, because the car without the A/C was pretty miserable.  We stopped for lunch and he kept puking.  And then Zak started.  The last 4 hours of the drive took us almost 6 hours!  Thankfully my parents got an early check in at our time share and we were able to go right there to get settled.

The boys rested and seemed to be doing OK.  We had a nice family dinner with everyone and then saw fireworks from somewhere from our balcony.  Adrian and I were able to unpack and get settled and we were feeling pretty good.  We planned to get up the next morning and hit Animal Kingdom.

But the puking continued.  And now it was all 3 boys.  We realized it wasn't just car sickness, it was a stomach bug.  We decided to shift things around and not go to Animal Kingdom on Sunday as planned.  We cancelled our day and stayed in the time share to rest and hopefully recover.  Adrian took the car to get the A/C fixed (the only positive in changing our schedule).  I stayed home and did laundry and took care of the boys.  It didn't feel like vacation at all!!

Playing in the big tub when they were feeling better

And resting when they weren't

Monday morning we got up and planned to head to the Magic Kingdom for the day.  AJ and Zak seemed OK, but Daniel was still feeling rough.  My mom, AJ, Zak and I headed out to the park while Adrian, my dad and Daniel stayed home.  We figured if they were up to it, they could meet us later.

Side story - When we got there, I got in a fight with the ticketing agent because Disney can really be a pain in the butt!  None of their systems are hooked together and they make it very hard to do what you need to do by only talking to one person.  I hear this isn't the case when you stay on property, but since we have another (super cheap!) option, we probably will never do that.  When I told the ticket agent I thought their system was "stupid" she called security on me.  Really?? Do I look that threatening??  That became a running joke for the trip, that I almost went to Mickey jail.  It's a good thing they didn't hear what I was saying when I was home trying to get my FastPasses!!

Zak loved the castle!

OK, back to the fun!  Soon after we got there and got started, Adrian said Daniel felt better after a nap so they were going to come meet up with us in a few hours.  We watched a show, did a few rides, then got on the Flying Carpets ride.  As soon as we sat down, AJ puked.  Ugh!  So my Dad came to drop off Adrian & Daniel & pick up AJ and my mom to take back to the time share.  We did a few rides and met Mickey Mouse, then Daniel said he was tired and it was close to dinner so we headed home to eat and regroup and head out to Epcot that night.  Huge thanks to my parents for helping out so we could get some fun times in with the non-sick kids!

Super fun talking Mickey in Town Square!  I loved this!

This is getting pretty long, so I'll leave off here and pick up next time with out night in Epcot.  For a quick peak at the whole trip, you can check out the pictures I posted on Facebook.