Our Orlando Trip

We have been home from our vacation for two weeks now. It was the most needed vaca in the history of my life... and I am already SO in need of another! We had such a blast in Florida with my parents, brother and sister.

We started our trip by taking the Coaster to the San Diego airport, which was a new adventure for me.

This is us waiting for the Coaster to arrive.

We flew from SD to LA and then from LA to Orlando. The flight to LA was seriously 25 minutes long. The other flight was 4.5 hours and since it was a red-eye, it was probably the 2nd worst plane ride I've ever had (1st worst was the flight to Jamaica on our honeymoon when I got super sick). Not only was it a long flight... and in the middle of the night.... but the man sitting next to me was really big, really old, and really smelly. Luke and I would eye each other as people were boarding the plane wondering Is this person going to sit by me? Oh I hope not. Or...I hope we get that girl! (Are we the only people that do that?) And as this guy got closer it became obvious that he was indeed going to be sitting by me (and practically on me)for the next 4.5 hours. I'll just say that fresh air had never felt or smelled as good as it did after that flight was over.

So our flight landed at 6am Eastern time. We got our rental car and headed to our hotel, where we spent most of the day relaxing by the gorgeous pool and exploring all the activities our hotel had to offer. That night we met up with my family at Planet Hollywood in Downtown Disney.

After dinner we walked around Downtown Disney, which was actually really cool. Our favorites were this girl who looked just like a statue and didn't move a muscle, and all the extremely talented musicians.

The next day we went to Disney World. It really wasn't any different than Disney Land, which was kind of sad. We had a ton of fun though. Our favorites were the Buzz Lightyear ride and Space Mountain. We also went to the Monsters Inc. Laugh Floor, an animated comedy show, which sounds super cheesy, but was actually hilarious, especially since Luke was "That Guy". I guess each show they pick a guy from the audience to kind of pick fun at and they chose Luke. Afterwards they gave him this special sticker. It was seriously hilarious. We were all dying.

It started storming in the late afternoon so we called it quits and went out to dinner.

The next day was LUKE'S BDAY! We went to Universal Studios that day. Sadly my camera was out of battery and I forgot to recharge it so I have no pics. This was definitely my favorite park. There were awesome rides-- the Hulk and Spiderman were among our favorites. We also got SOAKED on a few water rides. Of course.... Hogwarts was incredible. It seriously felt like we were in Hogwarts. Everything looked so legit. The rides were pretty awesome too. I so wish I had pictures of it! That night we went to BJ's and watched the BYU football game, per the Bday boy's request.

On Saturday we went to my dad's work event. It was a trucking competition where a bunch of truck drivers had to compete in some obstacle courses. The heat and humidity really caught up to us that day and we were exhausted after sitting outside for just an hour. Luke and I relaxed by the pool for the remainder of the afternoon until we went to the Hooptie- Doo Review, a dinner/ play that people from my dad's work went to.


On Sunday we went to church for an hour,


walked around the Orlando Temple grounds,

Chased little geckos,

and went on an alligator tour. This was the only alligator I saw, although the tour guide pointed out baby alligators but I never saw them. Afterwards we each took a turn holding a baby alligator. Luke passed for some reason.
Monday was our last day all together. We went to Typhoon Lagoon, a water park. There were some pretty cool rides, and the wave pool was awesome.

The fam took off that evening while Luke and I scored some sweet deals at a near by Outlet mall. We left the following morning and have been home ever since. Coming back to real life is always such a bummer... especially when it involved piles of work that need to be done. We spent the rest of the week playing catch-up. We are now back into the regular swing of things... and are anxiously awaiting another vacation, although I don't think it will be for a long while.