Me in Place

Marketing? What marketing?

One of the favorite discussions on vacation was who what where questions about roller coasters. Our oldest, who is ten, was determined to go on all of them and looked forward to it greatly. The 8yo did her best to be brave and go along with it as well…and the 6yo? Well, for all his bravery, coasters were still a little overwhelming.

Expedition Everest is located at Animal Kingdom and is a great ride. You speed along -and then notice um…the tracks end in a twisted mess! Aah! What will happen? Turns out a Yeti has destroyed the tracks…the ride stops and you hear the roar of the Yeti and then speed backwards. Very cool. Miss 10yo went on twice – once with Dad and once with me. (One of my favorite things about Disney is the creativity that goes into everything, including rides. Practically every ride has a storyline to go along with it. A+!)

Rock ‘n Roller Coaster is located at Hollywood Studios and was my personal favorite. The ride begins with you in a room looking at a recording studio where the members of Aerosmith have just finished up a session. Their manager tells them they have to leave now to hurry over to a concert venue on the other side of LA. Steve Tyler says he doesn’t want to leave all the fans there, so he asks the manager to get backstages passes for all those in the room. You then proceed on to the actual ride – which are coaster cars shaped like stretch limos. You fly through loops at 60 mph – all in the dark while Aerosmith songs play in the speakers in your limo. Neon signs depicting locations in LA flash by…until finally you arrive at the venue. Smoothest coaster ever, and great storyline. A++

And here’s my favorite picture of the whole vacay. Three little kids trying to be oh so brave on Thunder Mountain (located in the Magic Kingdom). Love their faces!

First of all, going the last week of August/beginning of September means hot hot hot weather. I’m not kidding, everyday they would say “92 degrees, feels like 99″. One night I looked at the weather and it said “77 degrees, feels like 99!” I’m not joking. I don’t know how I – with my deep aversion to hot weather – made it. But we did. We just accepted the layer of sweat, gave up the attempt to be at all cute and put together and drank lots of water. Also, it meant the crowds were pretty low and we hardly had to wait in line. Which made the following doable for us:

One of the main things kids like to do at Disney Parks is get the autographs of the characters. This seems rather inane to me, as I once dated a guy who dressed up as Prince Charming at the Magic Kingdom, and  – just trust me on this one-he was no Prince Charming. So it’s fake. Yes, fake. You’ll also have to buy the autograph books and the big pen and stand in line.

But, cynicism aside, the kids like it and, if you plan it right, the lines aren’t too long.

Here’s the kids talking to the Princess and the Prince from “The Princess & the Frog.” They’re discussing Chicago deep dish pizza.

The one we stood in line the longest for was the fairies. It was an hour long. An hour. In line. However, lest you get all uppity and declare you’d never stand in line for an hour to meet fairies, it “felt like 99!” outside and the line was in an air conditioned building.

Turned out it was Terrence, Tinkerbell and Vidia waiting for us. They let in one family at a time. Talked to the kids and had mannerisms straight from the movie…which was actually cool (since our kids are totally into these movies right now).

Here Tinkerbell and Terrence are discussing silly bandz with the kids.Which Tinkerbell had never heard of. Imagine that.

Vidia:

And, Buzz Lightyear over in Tomorrowland:

TIPS: I have a couple mom friends who are possibly going to visit Disney soon. So I’ll add a few tips for them.

*If you know your kids will like doing this character autograph thing, make sure to plan ahead and buy notebooks or autograph books at home and take them with you. You’ll save money.
*If you don’t mind spending the money, Disney autograph books are available at most stores in the park. Buy the big ol’ autograph pen there – it is easier for the characters to sign with.
*Times for the characters and locations are given on the paper you get when you enter the park.
*I’m sorry if you have to stand in line longer than 15 minutes. It stinks. But it’s for the children!!

Our trip to Florida included a stay at the Caribe Royale – a hotel about two miles from the entrance to Disney. There are pros and cons to staying offsite…which I’ll go through briefly in a minute.

The hotel we stayed at was nice – had restaurants on site;  the suite we stayed in had a living room and then a bedroom, a small fridge and microwave; a pool with a cool waterslide and due to the time of year, it wasn’t crowded – and we were set! Oh, did I mention it was $220 cheaper per NIGHT than staying on site at Disney? Yep.

A poolside parrot! (Who freaked everyone out everytime he squawked!)

And on the weekend nights they showed a kid’s movie poolside with free popcorn. One of the highlights of the trip for the kids.

Although it was a large conference hotel – it wasn’t too packed and we didn’t have trouble with noise, other than the very first night when some very very loud people had a little party going on down below our window. Other than that, it was fine.

Pros on staying off site:

-We had a rental car and could get around easily.
-Because we had a car, we could eat at other than Disney restaurants. Translation: Cheaper food.
-When you have a spouse who can handle only so much of the Magic, it’s better to give him (or her!) a break from having to be around it 24/7.

Cons to staying off site:

-I will give it to Disney, their on-site places are super nice and super Magical. We stayed at one years ago due to the generosity of a friend.There are on-site restaurants, fabulous pools (the one we stayed at had real sand as the bottom of the pool), on-site groceries and drugstore, so you could get everything you needed. But not many Disney resorts have room for more than four people to a room (bummer), so when you have a family of five or more, you have to get a two bedroom suite – mucho $$$. (There is one resort that you can fit five into one room, I believe it’s the All Star Music Resort. )
-When staying on-site, transportation is well-run and available. You also get one hour extra time at a park each day.
-The Magic is non-stop!

Guess where we were for a week? The magical world of Disney! I can’t say Mr MIP and I are the Disney fans – parks and crowds are not our fave, but we wanted to take all three of the kids when they were at a great age for the parks (and hopefully so they’d remember some of it!).We had a great time – HOT HOT HOT…read: there was no point in trying to look “cute” with a layer of sweat constantly on you! BUT the good part was that the parks were not crowded at all and we had little to no waits, even on the major attractions! I’ll be giving short overviews for you because I know Disney is a popular place to bring kids. Another thing coming up soon on Me In Place is a special guest blogger who will be talking about Things You Didn’t Know About Ireland!

Mr MIP didn’t stop there…he went ahead and conquered another 14er. This one is named Quandary Peak and the climb went well (i.e. he made it down alive).

Before we get back to what I’ve been up to, let’s focus our attention on he who shall be called Mr MIP. He has always been into mountain books, mountain maps, mountain movies, etc., etc.

But lately he got the actual climbing bug. And this summer he was able to spend a few days in Colorado climbing two 14ers, as they’re known. (14ers are mountains over 14,000 feet above sea level.).

Here are some pictures from the first climb – Mt Elbert. Mt Elbert is the second highest mountain on the continental US (Mt Whitney is the highest). Although it is the second highest, it is rated a Class 1 because the incline is gradual. All of the above information should be checked for facts before using it in your mountain report for school, because I’m too lazy to look it up and I’m asking Mr MIP for this info while he’s watching one of his favorite shows, Burn Notice.

Little pika on the trail…can you see him hiding?

Mr MIP took along the small buddy of our eldest…Even Swifter summitted!

Father-in-law put in a heater in their pool this summer. You might want to be nicer to me ‘cuz yeah, pretty much best pool ever now. And you don’t have to swim with 150,003 other people’s kids.

But there’s only so much pool awesomeness a girl can take before she must demand a Blog Adventure!

So we piled in the car and drove to a diner I’ve wanted to try.

Food was A-
Gross Floor under our table was F
So – overall, a C experience! If you’re ever in the Portage area, give it a try. Maybe they’ve cleaned the floor by now.

All in all, a perfect blog adventure.

And…two more checked off the 30 Things to Do in Chicagoland list.

The first was eating pizza at Gino’s East. I had never been – a strange anomaly in my life – but always wanted to go, especially after that one Amazing Race finale where the final task was to order and eat a pan pizza and then race to the finish line. Mr MIP and I ordered a small sausage, black olive and mushroom pan pizza and patiently waited the 45 minutes you always wait while waiting for the waiter to bring your waitful Chicago deep dish pizza.

Oh, yum. Crust is a little more like Lou Malnati’s and the sauce wasn’t quite as good as Giordano’s, in my opinion. But the quiet little booth with the graffiti left by hundreds of other diners, made the experience a great one. Definitely recommended!

Blurry, but I wanted you to see the graffiti covered walls:

And the other thing we accomplished from The List was to visit the Lincoln Park Conservatory. Free and beautiful – it’s definitely a place to check out. Not very large, but filled with beautiful plants and a fern room and orchid room (my fave) and tons of 1st graders, it’s located just north of the (also free!) Lincoln Park Zoo.

Oh, I love orchids. Don’t you?

On the 30 Things to Do in Chicagoland, it includes getting your picture taken by five different statues in located in Lincoln Park. Lincoln Park is the largest public park in Chicago and includes a free zoo, a free conservatory and is just plain beautiful!

There are lots of statues around the park, but only five were listed to get your picture by – so we ended up wandering a LOT around this park, looking for random author statues and asking the oldest zoo volunteers I could find where the statue of Eugene Field was. (The older ones know things. Don’t ever forget that.)

Here ya go -

Grant (did you know Grant and Lincoln are the only two who have a statue both in Lincoln and Grant Parks in Chicago? Makes sense, I guess.)

Shakespeare

Hans Christian Andersen

Eugene Field

Lincoln Himself

Standing by statues isn’t really my idea of fun, but it was fun to check off another thing on the list, and the walk itself around the park was beautiful. Take some time to visit Lincoln Park. You can take a long, nice walk. Visit the free zoo. Visit the free conservatory and have a picnic. Very nearby is the Chicago Historical Museum – which I haven’t visited, but have heard is great.