Thursday, October 25, 2012

Disney 2012







I was blessed to be asked to travel to Disney a few weeks ago.  We loaded up Kleck's camper and headed out to Orlando.  It was a pretty smooth trip.  Made it in 6 hours.  We played Uno, Guesstures and tried Dominoes, ( which wanted to slide around on the table).  It was nice to have a refrigerator, bathroom and a place for the kids to lay down and a big screen TV with satillite.  We got a laugh when we checked into our resort.  We stayed at the Grand Floridian Hotel.  It is so nice to be met by so many people who want to make your stay memorable.  I am always amazed.  We boarded the monorail and headed to Magic Kingdom.  We split up so the boys could ride the fun rides with their dad and we girls went off to do girl stuff!






 Off to Epcot for a character dinner with Mickey and all of his friends.  Family style dinner and delicious!  Parker is starting to warm up to the characters!  Next day we are off to MGM.  Boys off again to ride the rides with their dad.  We had a character lunch with Bob the Builder, Jake the Pirate, and many more.  Parker loved them.  We think the more realistic faces were the appeal for him.  It was another delicious buffet lunch.  After lunch Weston and Ryan and I went to see Indiana Jones special effects show and then went on to Star Wars.  Kleck, Carey, Mallory and Parker did Mickey's Club house.  We returned to hotel for some fun swimming time.




The next day we are off to Animal Kingdom for lunch in Africa.....different food, lots of fun meeting the safari theme characters.

Treated the kids to pick out something in gift shop.....Mallory picks this pink hat.....it suits her perfect!
After lunch a decision was made to go to Blizzard Beach Water Park.  The boys were determined to do the 120 ft. water slide.  A ski lift takes you to the top.  They loved it.  We girls and Parker did the kiddie section.  It had slides and fun baby water features.  Everything looks like you are in a winter wonderland.  It was a nice day....overcast so no one got sunburned.  We did the lazy river and had a fun day. 
Later that evening we were off to a princess dinner at the hotel.  Mallory was in seventh heaven.  Carey had forgotten her Cinderella dress....so we went to the gift shop there at the hotel to get her one.  She was so precious...she told her mom that she had seen other little girls all dressed up and she was the only one that was not dressed up.  She never complained, asked about her dress, etc., but she had thought about it.  She was a true princess and I will never forget how she was having her dreams come true!



Parker had a good time too!!

 
Later back at the hotel, Parker is caught in the act of robbing the hotel safe!!  The kids find the bathrobes provided by the hotel and pose for us!  A good time was had by all and many great memories to warm those cold winter days!!


Saturday, September 22, 2012

Coast to Coast 2012

Robert and I left last Thursday, September 13th to fly to LA.  We picked up Greg's car (Holly's boyfriend) at the airport.  We left LAX and drove into Santa Monica where Holly treated us to a special night at the "Hotel California"!  We had a delicious meal across the street at Chez J's.  The next morning we headed out on Ventura Highway to Ventura.  The drive up the coast was beautiful.  We checked into our hotel and spent the day relaxing by the pool and walking.  Ate a great meal at the pier restaurant!  Watched all of the surfers hitting the waves.  Beautiful sunset, the night lights on the pier and downtown Ventura.









We left Ventura and headed east to the valley area of California to see some of the agriculture.  We passed groves of lemons, oranges, avocados, almond trees and grapes and tomatoes.  We ended up at Bakersfield and could look back over the valley to see where we had been.












We now start our drive out of California and head to Utah.  We started our time in Utah in Zion National Park.  It was stunningly beautiful, magnificent, majestic......words and pictures do not describe it.





Next we headed out towards the Red Canyon and ended our day at an inn at Torrey near the Capital Reef National Park.  From there we headed towards the Arches National Park and Moab.














Robert and I named the picture above the three Wisemen.  The whole park was awesome!

Now we are headed out to cross over from Utah into Colorado.  We followed the Colorado River for a ways and ended up in Grand Junction.  The next morning we headed south and went through Montrose, Ouray and Silverton and ended up in Durango.  This leg of the trip took us into the Rocky Mountains and an entirely different look.  We hit Colorado at the right time to see the beautiful Aspen trees in their golden glory.  It was breathtaking views!






In Durango there was a wonderful steam engine.  We enjoyed spending time there at an old depot station and museum. 






From Durango we started driving towards Santa Fe and hit I-40 in Santa Rosa.  We were on our way home.  We drove through Texas and stopped at a place called Groom Texas.  There is a park called The Cross.  It is a giant cross and three different artist have made sculptures depicting the walk of Christ during his crucifixtion period.  It was an amazing thing to see and my pictures do not do justice to the works of art.  Personally when I walked up the stairs to the three crosses I could not help but feel an overwhelming sense of grief at the thought of what our Lord Jesus endured for all of us.  It felt like I was there in that time when Jesus died.  I will never forget how my heart felt at this spot in the park.  There is a website for this place at www.crossministries.net. 










As you can see we had the trip of a lifetime.  We have been to the Grand Canyon and I love Sedona, AZ, but this trip was the most beautiful one yet.  Every hill you went over, every curve in the road opened up to an ever changing breathtaking view.  If you can ever make this trip, it is worth every minute.  I would recommend flying into Las Vegas, renting a car and taking the drive through Utah and Colorado.  You will be amazed.  We live in such a beautiful country and everyone we came into contact with were so nice.  Every place we stayed was clean and very comfortable.  My pictures do not do justice to the beauty we saw.  I have close to 700 pictures that I took.  We saw farms, animals, funny whimsical places to stop, where we met some very unique people.  I hope you have enjoyed my pictures and the memories that will last me a lifetime!