Disney World, Day Two (a.k.a. My Faith in Humanity is Restored)

So day two took us to Epcot, which will from this point forward be considered the standard upon which every other Disney theme park will be rated against.  Smartly designed for easy trekking to exhibits and rides with plenty of covered space and large atriums with food areas, this is how all the different parks should be designed. Even better is that it didn't have nearly as many people as Magic Kingdom at any time we were there.  I tried to capture a pic of Magic Kingdom tonight around 11 p.m. when we returned (for some reason; gluttons, I guess?) and the mass of humanity that still existed.  Unfortunately none of those shots was clear enough to share here. I do now have a pic to share from last night's dinner, however, with Zac and Piglet. He also got to see Winnie the Pooh, Eeyore and Tigger. Even though this isn't from today, I didn't have it when I wrote last night's post, so I am sharing here.

Dinner last night at The Crystal Palace was wonderful. Nice buffet with incredible service in a beautiful environment that is open, light and airy. We all enjoyed it quite a bit, I think, and it was a nice way to cap the day prior to the nightly fireworks show, which began literally minutes after we finished with dinner (at, yes, 10 p.m.).

The fireworks show was enjoyable and we had a light rain falling throughout, which didn't bother Katy, Zac and I even a little bit given how hot we'd been all day yesterday.


Today at Epcot, we went on what for me has been the best ride yet, Soarin'. On Soarin', you ride from the view of a hang glider above various areas of California, primarily northern but Los Angeles has a view as well. You ride over the Pacific, through vineyards and across varied scenery replete with pine scent when you hit mountains with fir trees.  The sensation of actually soaring above everything is incredibly well-done and Zac WENT OUT OF HIS MIND!!!  He LOVED this ride, literally shouting throughout "AWESOME!!!!" and laughing uncontrollably. His adrenaline rush and enthusiasm continued the entire way out of the ride for several minutes. What a thrill it was to watch him show such pure joy and emotion on such a fun ride!

Later on we had a chance to take pics with Mickey, Minnie and Goofy.  I don't have any of those because they will become part of our memories package, but will share when we get copies.  After that we went to this ride, which has a more tame version and a wilder one. We chose the tame version, which had a very short wait.  You have four people to a capsule (or rocket) and each has responsibilities throughout the mission, which is to get to Mars. Zac LOVED this one as well and just giggled gleefully and so purely that, again, Katy and I were so thankful he was having such a good time. :)

We had dinner plans after Epcot over at the Hollywood Studios park in a diner-themed restaurant. This pic here is just outside the park and yes, that's a hedge.  

Pretty cool, huh? I love my son; he's so photogenic!  I do NOT share this same gift but that's OK with me. I'm just glad he does. :)  Dinner in the park was at a diner-themed restaurant. The decor was kitschy but intriguing, with Disney-labeled televisions showing a loop of scenes from TV shows of the 50s and 60s. Each table had a TV and designs ranged a little from old diners to kitchen setups, I suspect. The menu was a bit limited and the food was just OK, but again service was outstanding and the kids had a great time.  


After dinner Katy's parents took the kids back to the hotel so they could go for a swim while Chad, Mickie, Katy and I stayed behind to hang out without children for a little while.  We had hoped to walk through the Hollywood Studios park and had a couple of options picked out to try, but it was already 9:30 by the time we were at that point and apparently that park closed at 10 tonight.  

So, we decided to head to Magic Kingdom (yes, gluttons, I know) to see what we could do there. That park is open very late, until 1 a.m. most nights and until 3 a.m. one night a week (crazy!).

This pic to the right shows two crazy people waiting in line for a bus to take us to the Magic Kingdom. We waited about 20 minutes after the bus ahead of us was so packed it couldn't take any more. This seems to have been our luck so far, to continually end up waiting at least 20 minutes for every bus we need, all the while watching multiples of every other park bus pass by.

The good thing was, we did eventually land on a bus that carried us off to the "land that causes you to lose faith in humanity" so we could find something intriguing to do.  We entered to some show being displayed on Cinderella's Castle. It was pretty impressive, really.

After that we decided to give Space Mountain a try. While I'd certainly heard of it, and was fairly sure it was created in the 70s, I didn't know much more than that. After a walk through lines that can best be described as "cattle in a stockyard", we got into our cars and headed off into the wild, very dark, yonder. The ride is almost entirely in the dark, with many jerky motions left and right combined at one point with instant runs up and down, big drops and fast, hard turns.  Is it a good coaster?  It's OK. Because you're in the dark you don't know what's going on, but SOME light, when it happened, was enough to make you wonder what was next. Devoid of light, you just accepted it as it occurred.  I don't think I'd let a small child on the ride, though, even if they meet height. It jerks you around so much side to side it'd make me nervous to let anyone but an adult on the ride.

A good day overall but WAY, WAY too late. We started later, which was smart. We stayed out later, which is just too much for us old folks. Tomorrow we are intent, at least in our family, of returning to the hotel fairly early in the evening after a much earlier supper, somehow, some way.  :)

Disney World, Day One (or How I Learned What NOT to Do)

And the day isn't even over yet...but I think it's relevant for me to write this post now since we've had our initial foray into the Magic Kingdom...literally.

 After a VERY late night for Chad & Mickie and the kids and their arrival, we set out a little later than expected this morning for the Magic Kingdom park.  Apparently, we had Fast Pass reservations within a certain timeframe (I honestly don't have a clue about any of our plans) for "It's a Small World".

The wait for the bus was hot and muggy. The bus ride was cool. The walk to our first stop inside the park was...hot and muggy. Did you know it's like a jillion degrees with a jillion-percent humidity in Orlando in late June????

It's true. Anyway, we head into the ride and instant cool, blessed air conditioning. I would've been happy just standing there but we actually had plans for the ride. I took this first pic of Katy and Zac on the ride.  I've posted a video link within this post as well of about a minute of the ride experience.  It was a lot of fun.

After this it was about 10:50 but Chad & Mickie, and perhaps the kids, hadn't had much if anything to eat so they were starving. Checking our map, we decided Main Street was the place with the most options.  We would've made it, too, except once we passed through the castle, a parade was going on.  It was pretty impressive. The dancers, the emcee, dancers on stilts, people in character. I really don't know how Mickey, Minnie and the other characters don't just drop over from heat exhaustion every day. Maybe they were cool suits or something underneath. I know I'm wearing one of those special cool towels right now as I write this, and I'm in an air-conditioned hotel room.

We eventually made it to lunch after a few minutes burning under the sun while we waited for a Disney photographer to get a group pic. I tried my best to do the pic without sunglasses but the angle of the sun to where we were standing made it impossible to do so without tearing up. So the third shot, I had them back on. We'll see what we get out of it. I'll either look like an idiot or look pretty happy, depending on the shot.  Lunch was good, I thought, if not really slow for a place that only serves hot dogs and fries. I was extremely pleased at my polish dog with caramelized onions and grainy mustard. When you put it all together with this really good bun, it was a little sweet and had great flavor. Quite a surprise AND we got to eat inside, which was lucky given limited seating.  We needed the break from the heat.

After this, Katy, Zac and I had a Fast Pass appointment at the Mad Hatter Teacup, so we needed to head off.  This is learning number two (the other was, go to Disney in the Winter), which is that if you are in a group, plan your Fast Pass plans to coincide so you don't end up on different ends of the park. As such, we ended up split from the rest of the family the remainder of our time in the park today, and that wasn't the plan.

After the teacups, we headed west, to Frontier Land, hoping to get into the Haunted Mansion, which Zac really wants to do. Unfortunately the wait was too long for standing in that hot sun, so we landed instead on a riverboat that took you on a tour of Frontier Land. I liked it. It was quieter, relatively crowd-free, and we occasionally had a slight breeze, something NEW for the day!  This pic on the right is sometime after we'd departed on the boat. I was near the back.

Our next Fast Pass was on Dumbo. To get there meant going to the opposite end of the park. After going the wrong way, we found our way to Tomorrowland, where we knew the rest of the family had been, though it turned out we'd missed them.

By this point Katy was having borderline heat exhaustion so we made it a priority to find some cold water. Using the trusty map, I found a kiosk and got she and Zac some much-needed water. After some of that, we headed into a gift shop for some a/c, then over to Dumbo. The great part of that was we went into an air conditioned tent initially and that helped us cool down.  Once it was our turn for the ride, we actually walked all the way around to find out all the elephants were taken.  This happened to another gentleman and his kids as well so they took us out and made sure we got on the next round.  When we did, I was with Zac and he couldn't wait to control the ride up and down, which you do from a switch in the front.  He had us going up and down quickly and we had a real blast!  So much fun!

We walked out of Dumbo straight into a big tent with souvenirs and snacks and drinks. We immediately got into line for some Icee-like drinks. Now those helped! Cooled us down and, to be honest, gave us all a brain sneeze.  If you've watched Uncle Si on Duck Dynasty, you understand that last sentence.  :)  By this time Katy had accessed the app on her phone that would let us try to schedule more Fast Pass activity.  It, of course, didn't work once she tried to get us into the Haunted Mansion, so we headed for Mickey's Philharmagic, a five-senses 3D movie experience. I have to tell ya, 3D doesn't work so well for me. It does when I wear contacts, but not with glasses. After some adjusting I did get to enjoy some of it the way it was intended, though we ended up in the front row and that made it hard. Zac, however, thought it was just the greatest thing and laughed and laughed.  So for us, sitting in air conditioned comfort while Zac had a great time made it even better than it was.  I thought it was really unique and I enjoyed it quite a bit.

We then headed out of the park to catch a bus back to our resort so we could cool off before we head back out later tonight for dinner reservations. Zac fell asleep on the bus but he was such a trooper today and barely complained. In fact, I'd say he complained less than I do. I don't always do well with busy crowds except at athletic events. The pic above was one I captured as we came out of the castle our last time headed for the Philharmagic show. Look at that crowd!  Now you tell me, does that look like fun? The crowd part is not. If there is a way to buy a Fast Pass where you can lay out your entire time in the park that day, one right after the other, no limits...that's the way to go.  I'm not sure that option exists, but it should if it doesn't and it'd be worth every penny.  Otherwise, you spend a lot of time in lines whether for a ride or a store or a restaurant. Don't expect anything fast, but DO plan what you do. I know I said I've stayed out of that, but we have had plans and we stuck to them today, both sides of the family.  We just didn't get to finish activities together but I'd call today a success in many ways.  




We learned a lot about what to do and what not to do and how to plan better. Tuesday Zac and I will go to the park with hats (we had to buy him one in the park today) and Katy and I will have our cold towels on to help us beat the heat or share with Zac if needed.  I'll also dress a little differently, go with my running shoes and shorts a be a little more ready for the heat.  The first full day isn't done yet, but even though it was hot and sometimes a little tense and thirsty and required a lot of patience, we've had fun so far!  Tomorrow, Epcot!

Dante Pizzeria...Wow!

www.dantepizzeria.com

Tonight Katy and I decided to experience Dante Pizzeria, which is a spot in west Omaha that serves homemade Italian using local ingredients.

I was inspired to take us there by the restaurant writer for the Omaha paper, who raved over hand-made pastas and everything else they offer.

They source everything locally, including cheese which that same writer had a chance to help make recently plus specialty meats from another local restaurant that I guess does its own charcuterie.  

I decided ahead of time I wanted the Pappardelle
Bolognese, because the sauce looked amazing and I don't know that I've ever had pappardelle.

One word...wow.  The pasta had a chew to it I found very appealing with a slight taste of wheat (whether the pasta has wheat or not, I don't know, but that's what I tasted.

The bolognese sauce was incredible. You can see from the description above the pic that it has a few meats along with herbs and wine, and the depth of flavor was really something.





Katy tried the Tagliatelle, which somehow I did not get a picture of to share with you here, but you can see from the description above that it looks pretty good as well. She thought it was very good.  I think she was a little surprised the tagliatelle noodles were only slightly larger than fettuccine in size...perhaps both of us were.  But it was very good.

We also really wanted to try their pizza, because wood-fired ovens can do some amazing things and because a co-worker of mine had told me this was the best pizza he's ever had.

To keep it simple, we went with the Margherita Pizza so we could really taste the crust and homemade sauce.

Like the other entrees, it was very, very good.  The crust was light and airy, thin enough to fold if that's what you like, and the cheese, that cheese from Branched Oak Farms north of Lincoln, was fresh, smooth and mild.  

I would have to say the pizza was cooked to perfection. The meal could have ended there, of course (and yes, we did take pizza home), but then they brought a dessert menu, which isn't listed online nor is it in what they bring you initially.  The choices were unique and hand-made...we had to try them.

So that there to the left is their S'Mores dessert.  Sorry I don't have the full description of it, but this is what they have created.

It begins with a homemade graham cracker on the bottom. The cracker is four inches or so across and more than a quarter inch thick, but not quite half an inch.  It's airy, not dense.  

Next they add a layer of chocolate. I don't know where the chocolate comes from, but it was rich and silky without being overly sweet.

They top it with a homemade marshmallow.  I'd never had one of those before.  It was really something.  They cook the whole thing in a cast iron skillet in the wood oven. I can tell you that the charring on the marshmallow reminded me very much of bonfires as a kid. Wonderful.

Katy decided to get the Butterscotch Pudding.  This pudding is very rich.  It's homemade, of course, and they call it a butterscotch Italian pudding. 

It's topped with a layer of caramel, also homemade, that is smooth and silky just like the chocolate was, and incredibly rich.

Then they top that with homemade whipped cream topped with sea salt.  Wow.  I had a bite of this and as much as I love chocolate, this was better than my dessert. 

The mix of flavors was just so unique that it was one of those food moments where you are in awe of the person who came up with the idea to put those flavors together in the first place.

Will we go back?  Most definitely.  Will it be soon?  Well, unlikely given the cost, though I don't think overall it was out of line.  Absolutely a place we'd go for a special dinner or even just to have a unique night out.  Highly recommend this place.

Zac's Pre-K "Graduation"

OK, yes, I did indeed put the word graduation in quotes. I mean, it's Pre-K, people. It's not like he's on to adult-hood or a career or anything.  Cut me a little slack, if you don't mind.  :)

Beaming With Pride!

Now, having gotten that qualifier out of the way, I KNOW Zac had a great time at his graduation and we, along with Nana and Puddin', sure enjoyed watching him as he literally beamed with pride during the processional and throughout the process. 

Miss Rochelle, Zac and Mr. Jake

I've got links to several videos I took and a few pics here.  I have to apologize for the distance I was forced to be for much of this.  

Mom, Zac, Dad :)

You can't zoom in with video on an iPhone, or at least not with the stock app that comes with it, and the lighting (I was in a darker area) created issues for photos I intended to get, as you can see from the glare in both pics and videos. To the right is the "Tooty Ta" song. Hilarious!

They did a number of cute things during the ceremony, which hopefully you can see and hear in the videos.  One neat thing was taking what the child had said they wanted to be when they grow up and having the teachers give their opinion on what they thought that child would be. 

With His Award

Another neat thing was giving each of the kids a candy bar-themed award for something unique to their personality. It showed me how much they paid attention and really cared and wanted to encourage the kids. 

His Whatchamacallit Award

I would say that, overall, Zac is well-prepared heading into Kindergarten this coming Fall and La Petite did some good things to aid in that preparation.  At times, they did challenge him,and he is always looking for that opportunity to learn.  Not sure he got that one from me, have to say.  :)

Memorial Day Pool Time

Like most families, we spent Memorial Day grilling out and enjoying time with family.  Katy remembered we had this whale pool we'd never pulled out, so we took it over to Gary and Nell's for the kids to play in.


The temps stayed in the low 80s, so the water didn't warm up much, and it was breezy, but they sure had a fun time jumping around.  You'll notice Mandy has absolutely no fear and goes at it with much more gusto than the boys.  You may also notice she's the only one wearing goggles.  This is to protect her eyes, which are still healing from her recent surgery.  I find her hilarious.


Zac really enjoyed not only the water but several hours with his cousins, who are some of his favorite people in the world.  I will say that the older they all get, fewer arguments and catastrophes seem to occur when they are together.

Zac Is Four!!!

Four years ago today, we welcomed into our lives a tiny bundle we weren't quite expecting yet.  Nine weeks early isn't what you hope for as a parent, but thanks to the amazing folks at UNMC and The Nebraska Medical Center, things went very smoothly.  


I thought I would post a few pics of those early days along with one more recent just for fun as we see what he has become.  Zac is so much of a joy, with a keen sense for humor and an ear for music that permeates most of what he does.  But four years ago, we were more worried about other things.  Here is a very small snippet from a blog post back on February 3rd, 2008:

We spent significant time in Zac's room today and tonight. Last night they put him back on the c-pap (sp?), which is essentially just a bigger breathing tube, to help make sure he's getting enough oxygen.

It's wonderful that we no longer have to worry about simple things like breathing, though obviously toddler years bring a new set of worries. I mean, he didn't lose those two front teeth by doing nothing last year!  :)

Zac, mommy and daddy love you very much.  And we know that God loves you and us very much because He decided to bring you into this world when we didn't think we could even have a baby. It was He who made sure you were ready to join us and it was He who kept you healthy and safe so you could be with us today. Happy Birthday to my favorite little boy in the whole world!

The Big 04

On Wednesday the 1st, Zac turns 4, but we decided to hold his birthday party today, rather than doing it after his birthday.  Unfortunately, one of the negatives to Zac being in daycare down in Lincoln is that it doesn't make sense to invite his school friends, but that's OK, because he loves playing with his cousins anyway!

So Chad, Mickie and the kids joined us for a few hours to celebrate and let them play together. We had a good time and a good cake. Zac is quite pleased with his presents and even has one left we held back for him to open Wednesday morning before we leave in the morning, which he doesn't know about.

The kids seemed to enjoy the cake and frozen yogurt.  Yes, frozen yogurt since at least two of us, and maybe three, have issues with lactose, so I played it safe.

I'm sharing a video of us singing Happy Birthday to Zac so everyone has a chance to enjoy it.  You'll note he leaned over on one of the candles trying to blow out the fourth one and it was a little hot. 

 

He's none the worse for wear, though, and has recovered just fine!  :)  Guess I shouldn't have spread the candles out so much.  I've also added pics from the party to the slideshow on the right.  Enjoy all!

Zac Christmas Program

Today was Zac's first Christmas program of any kind.  The program at our church is written by the same woman each year, and she writes both the musical score and the script, which I find pretty impressive.  The kids all did a great job, and some, as expected, sing a little louder than others, which adds to the fun.  :)

Zac's group of kids were asked to join in on the last two songs of the program, and I've linked those videos here as well as posted links to them on Facebook and on my YouTube account.  When it came time before church for Zac to sit with the other kids to wait for their time, he was not so excited about the prospect.

A bit later, right before it started but before he'd have to be a part of the production, I had him sit on my lap and asked him if he was scared.  Sure enough, he had the stage fright.  :)  Luckily, a little bit of bribery with promise of cookies after the service nudged him in the right direction and he performed well. Though he didn't always pay attention and didn't stand up for the ending number, he did sing and at least he didn't mill about!  :)