We went to a character breakfast and ate cupcakes for breakfast.

He made new friends.

Payton got to choose which rides we would go on. On top of the list was the Buzz Lightyear ride, of course!

The kids were even asked to say the Pledge of Allegiance at Disney World’s flag ceremony. I was a little, ok really nervous they might not remember it, they are homeschooled after all and it’s not how we start our school days every morning. But they nailed it! and I breathed a HUGE sigh of relief..  Way to go guys! Dad and I were so proud!

If you will notice we have one child missing here..she was a little shy to get up in front of the crowd.

Payton wanted to have steak for dinner.

He is one cool kid.

When we had gotten back to our room, Payton had a big surprise from Mickey, Minnie, Pluto, Donald and Goofy!

Happy Birthday Payton! We love you!

Amelia with her very first Coke ever.  Priceless.

Tips,Hints and Our Experience.

So we decided again to skip the whole stroller thing. It still seemed to be more trouble than it was worth. Amelia (3) and Payton (almost 6, not 5 like I said in my previous post..ahem) did perfectly fine walking ALL day on their own. Today we even added the additional burden of their small backpacks. They needed a place to keep a small emergency snack and drink and maybe even a souvenir or two. I didn’t bother carrying a bag, I just dispersed a few things among the kids bags. I felt sorry for parents pushing around those huge strollers loaded down with tons of stuff, while they walk with their child tethered with a leash….

How much stuff can one kid need, anyway?

So my tip number 1 for Disney (or any other theme park, really) : skip the crap and skip the stroller. Carry or have your child carry a very small pack with a snack and a drink (if you don’t want to buy a drink you can refill the water at a fountain!). Like I said in my last post, Amelia just turned 3 (at the end of February) and she has walked it on her own. Brian and I have only had to pick her up a couple of times and she has only been carried a total of about 15 minutes. One of the times she was carried was because she was almost frightened to death by the “It’s Tough to Be a Bug” show. It’s NOT a good one for small children BTW… And the other time was because some girl about the same age as Amelia decided to hit, yes HIT her when Amelia said hello while we stood in line. The mother did nothing, even though she saw it.(Are you KIDDING me!?) And the little bully kept trying to push Amelia around, so I picked Amelia up to keep the other kid away from her.

I don’t think we as parents give our kids nearly enough credit for what they can do. I would have never thought in a million years that they would be able to do all that walking carrying their own stuff. But they DID!

But after all that walking..I am beat. Tomorrow is Hollywood Studios.

Planning a vacation for a family our size that is fun, relaxing and (somewhat) economical can be a challenge. We decided this year to take a more extravagant vacation than our usual and hit Disney. Our children are what I think are the perfect ages, from 3-12 years old. Also, my 3 year old has an unhealthy obsession with Cinderella that I just can’t help but indulge. But I thought as far as Disney being fairly stress free now is the time. I don’t have to worry about nursing, bottles, diaper changes..etc.. nevermind the fact that I am 7 months pregnant…..

Disney Day 1:

It is 11:43 p.m. of our first day of vacation. We just arrived back at our room about 15 minutes ago and the two youngest are completely crashed out.

I decided a few things while planning this trip.

1) I decided we would not bring the stroller. Amelia is 3 and I thought she could walk the majority of the time on her own and my husband and I could take turns giving her legs a rest by carrying her as needed. A stroller is a pain to navigate through crowds. You have to keep up with where you park it. If you bring your own, you have to fold and unfold it as you are getting on and off the bus (or other) transportation to and from the parks. If you decide to rent one, there is the extra cost. Not to mention the amount of room a stroller takes up in the car. We need that room for souvenirs!

2) Because of the size of our family, we have to stay at one of the resorts with larger accommodations which also includes a full kitchen. I thought by cooking and us eating breakfast and dinner in our room that we could save quite a bit of money and eat much healthier. I like to bring my crock pot on vacations where we will be out all day. I can put something in before we head out and like magic dinner is done when we return. Even if we are dead tired we can still have a great meal. It can also be a lot less hassle if the kids are tired and grouching. Hubby and I can still enjoy our dinner …if we are not wrangling rowdy, crying, overtired kids in a restaurant. Lets face it, we are at Disney. There is no way for the kids not to be overtired. overstimulated. and no matter how well I plan, I am pretty sure there is no way I can avoid some of the not-so-fun behavior that might come along with that. anyway….

3) Due to the larger room we also have a laundry room, meaning we could pack lighter! Meaning we had more room in our mini-van for the kids!

How that is working out for us:

1) I am still not sure how wise my decision to not bring a stroller was. Amelia (3) walked on her own all day. But she was absolutely wiped out. And a complete maniac to keep up with. She was ALL OVER the place. It was quite stressful to keep our eyes on her, making sure she was next to us at all times. The only other option is a *gasp* leash, and you will never, ever, in any circumstance see one of those horrible things on one of my kids. The things make me shudder….Back to the stroller. Even my soon-to-be-5-in-3-days son was complaining of tired legs at the end of the day. I am thinking tomorrow we will rent a double stroller and see how that works for us. A full day of walking might be just too much for the both of them.

2) I was so concerned about packing light that even though I felt like I was forgetting something -I kept pushing it to the back of my mind, once we got here, I realized I neglected to pack the crock pot. crap. The pots/pans in the room aren’t even big enough to cook enough food for our family. double crap. I will deal with this tomorrow. I can’t even think of a good solution right now.

As a side note- we found out that we should take advantage of the fact that Disney will deliver your purchases to your room for you. Payton lost his stuffed Nemo souvenir almost immediately. Plus we don’t have to lug them around the parks and keep up with them. Lesson learned.

3) Washing clothes on vacation!? What was I thinking??

So, if you have any great Disney tips for me, I am all ears! I would love to hear them.

Stay tuned for Day 2: Animal Kingdom….

We are so excited about adding a new baby to our family this summer. It seems like perfect timing as far as staying on track with our lessons without it all being too stressful. It also made me wonder how other homeschool moms do it all during the summer. Do you school year round? Do you choose just a few things to keep the kids fresh? Or do you use your summer to just have fun? What do you do when you are expecting a new baby?

Generally we homeschool year round. Instead of taking a long summer break we usually take frequent breaks during the year, it helps us prevent burn out. But since this summer we are expecting a new baby , I have been thinking that it would be good to take a little more of a break. We aren’t going to completely stop doing lessons. Every summer we do a math facts memorization and refresher course and I feel like the kids math skills would slip without it. We don’t do any other math. We just focus on facts. We do flashcards and math minutes and online games to help reinforce it all. The other thing we would like to do this summer is an intensive geography course. We use The Story of the World as our main history/ geography curriculum but the kids have shown a huge interest in learning the geography of the world. We figured summer would be a good time to pause from our regular curriculum and do this. I haven’t found anything that fits what I am looking for so I am going to develop my own (which I will be sharing on here) using books that I like and blank maps. The kids are begging to continue doing science so we are thinking about letting them do the Switched on Schoolhouse program for that. We will stop lessons a couple weeks before the baby is born and then continue them once everything has settled down. Our regular school schedule will start in early August.

I have been encouraging the kids to work extra hard to complete this year’s curriculum before the summer begins. I also needed enough time before the baby gets here to plan for next year. We have planned our spring break as an 8 day trip to Disneyland as our last “family of 7″ trip. Talk about motivation!