Disney Vacation - Day 3

Today was Father's Day! Before we left Texas, the boys and I had gone to the store and bought Van some Father's Day cards, and Evan had painted him a picture. I sneaked these into my suitcase before we left, so he was pleasantly surprised to wake up that morning and be given all those goodies. :)

So off we headed to Epcot. Van, the boys, and I left a little before Trisha and her family did. Our first stop, of course, was Spaceship Earth. How can you walk into Epcot and see that ginormous globe thing and not want to go in it? This was a pretty neat ride. I wasn't sure how Aaron would handle it because a lot of it was in the dark, but he sat beside me on the ride, and we talked about things the whole time....and he loved it! This ride kinda takes you through a "journey through time" of sorts, showing you how far we have come as a civilization. Pretty neat. The boys enjoyed the last part, where they take your picture and put you on the screen as a computer character. When the ride was over, it let us out into a neat room full of virtual games and things like that. Evan played a virtual driving game, Van and Evan put their faces and characters up on the big globe, and then the boys played some kind of energy game that looked like a giant television screen on the floor.

By this time, Trisha and her family had caught up with us, so our next stop was an indoor Character Spot to meet some more characters. Ahhhh....air conditioning! :) We met Mickey, Pluto, Minnie, Donald, and Goofy. We had fun taking pictures with these characters, and of course Aaron was loving every second of it!

Our next attraction was The Seas with Nemo & Friends. We boarded a "Clamobile" and rode through a cute little ride featuring real aquariums and of course, our friends from Finding Nemo. We then toured the aquariums outside of the ride and even saw dolphins and manatees! We got in line for Turtle Talk with Crush...had to wait quite a while, but the kids got to watch sharks and stingrays in an aquarium in front of us the whole time, so they were plenty entertained. Turtle Talk was adorable! I think the parents liked this just as much as the kids. LOL Crush talked to the kids in the audience and put on a cute little show.

Next, we headed to the Sunshine Seasons cafeteria to eat. My goodness, this place was super busy and chaotic! The food wasn't great either. This is really the only place we ate while on vacation that I didn't care for. Van and I got some kind of Chinese food dish, and it was not very good. It was just shoulder-to-shoulder people here, and trying to hold 4 food trays and keep up with your kids in a crowd like that is NOT fun. Anyway, we managed to find a place to sit and eat our meal...but we weren't able to sit with Trisha and the kids because there were no tables big enough for all of us.

We rode some cheesy ride next..something like "Journey into the Imagination with Figment"...something like that. Not that great, but the boys had fun playing in the imagination room afterward.

The World Showcase was next! First up was Mexico. We rode the Gran Fiesta Tour Starring The Three Caballeros, which was a little boat ride around an indoor area. Again, kinda cheesy, but it was air conditioned. The heat on this day was just unbearable! I think the heat index was around 110°. HOTTTT! Next was Norway...not much to do here, but really neat theming and design. China was next. Beautiful! This is where Aaron purchased his beloved blue monkey marionette. The boy is obsessed with puppets lately, so when he saw all of the marionettes hanging on a rack by a street vendor, he just about jumped up out of his stroller! He had some Disney Dollars we had given the boys in their stockings last Christmas, and this is what he picked out to use those on. It was a great purchase...he never went anywhere without it after that!

Germany and Italy were next....nothing to do here, but again, very cool design. Van has been to both Germany and Italy, and he said the design was spot-on. By this time, it was so stinkin' hot that Trisha and her family decided to head back to the hotel to go swimming. Van, the boys, and I stayed, not wanting to go wait in line for the bus and deal with all of that in the heat, so we headed to the American section of World Showcase. It was indoors, there would be a 30-minute movie coming up, and it was super cold inside...so we decided to go to that and hope that Aaron would fall asleep and get his nap during the movie. Thankfully, Aaron did indeed fall asleep. However, we couldn't take our stroller in the building, so we had to carry him out and lay him on a bench in the main atrium. We sat here for quite a while while Aaron napped, but he was comfy and getting rest, and there were acapella singers in the same room as us, so it was neat just getting to sit there and listen/watch while we all took a break.

We headed to Japan when we knew it was around the time for Aaron to be waking up because we wanted to see "Miyuki", who was the lady who did Japanese candy art. This was so cool! She'd pick kids from the crowd and ask them what their favorite animal was, and then she'd make that animal out of sugar and give it to them. Evan was lucky enough to be chosen, and she made him a blue monkey. It was so neat the way she just formed this thing out of sugar! Amazing. Morocco and France were next. Morocco didn't have anything to do or watch, so we watched some movie on a 360° screen in France just to cool off again. I'm telling you...the heat was ATROCIOUS! The United Kingdom and Canada were next, but honestly, I don't even remember seeing these places because I was totally in the mindset of finding somewhere indoor again to get out of the heat.

So, we headed to a big gift store and let the boys look around and play a bit. Then, we went to some cafe and sat down to have something cool to drink. We then headed to something we had passed by on our way to see the characters earlier in the day, which was Innoventions. I'm so glad we decided to do this! The boys got to go to little "stations" to play and discover. The first one was where the computer took their pictures doing different poses in front of a green screen and then put them into their very own video game. It was hilarious! Aaron was laughing so loudly that all the Cast Members had to come check out his video game and see what was making him laugh. They got a good laugh at it too. LOL! Then, we went to a station where the boys got these little Velcro frogs and got to dress them up in whatever way they wanted. Next was The Great Piggy Bank Adventure. This was soooooo cute! Watching Aaron carry around that fat little piggy bank was just too cute! The boys loved this game, and what's really neat is that at the end of the game, it emails you a similar version at home. So, the boys have been able to play this game here at home too. It teaches the value of a dollar and how to save, invest, etc. Really neat!

Van got to test drive a Segway after that, while I took the boys to learn about Fire Safety at another station.

Trisha and her family came back sometime after this, and it was time for supper at The Garden Grill. Here, we met Farmer Mickey, Chip and Dale, and Pluto. Everything we ate was organic, some of it grown there on Disney property, so that was neat. Good food, too. The restaurant rotates very slowly so that you can see the whole place before you leave. Lots of character time here. Dale made out with Brooklyn and made her face turn 10 shades of red. LOL! The kids got to have "worms in dirt" for dessert, which was chocolate pudding, oreos, and gummy worms...but that thought that was really cool. Good food and a nice, fun supper! :)

Fireworks were next! The Illuminations show was AWESOME! We had a great view right in front of Showcase Plaza. It was a bit loud, and my kids didn't care for the loud pops and booms, but it was a breathtaking show set to a musical score. Simply beautiful. I had given the kids some glowsticks to play with before the show, so they held onto those and had fun playing with them during the dark. We headed back to the resort after this and crashed!

Please CLICK HERE to see Epcot photos! Remember, there are 2 pages, so be sure and look at page 2 as well!

Thanks for reading. :)