Winter Surfing and Skydiving

Ever since we were introduced to wakesurfing, Cade is pretty much obsessed with it. He loves surfing, he watches videos on YouTube, and he even subscribes to SURF magazine.  So for his 11th birthday this year, of course surfing would be the theme.  He dreamed up this cake of a huge wave with a surfer on it.  However, I could not find a surfing figurine ANYWHERE since we live in the mountains.  So I did the next best thing and put spongebob on the beach just looking at the giant wave.

To make the giant wave, I cut a plastic solo cup into the shape I wanted, then frosted it with some thick icing and then set it in the garage since it's the temperature of a freezer out there in February.

So after much anticipation, we get to the Solomon Center to go surfing, and......... the wave maker is broken down.  What to do?!?  Cade was soooo disappointed that I almost started to cry!.  They felt very sorry for us, since we'd reserved it and then driven an hour for it, so they tried to compensate us by giving us a great deal on the indoor skydiving, and then half off the next time we come to do the surfing another day.  So when it was all said and done, we got twice the fun, and ended up skydiving that day, which was equally as thrilling.

Afterwards we found this great restaurant that serves only baked potatoes with all different toppings.  Cade was happy.  We had Grandma and Grandpa Lund with us to celebrate.

Round two of Cade's birthday celebration.  A week later we came back and were able to surf.  Cade picked it up quickly and was able to go the longest without wiping out.

We brought his good friend Logan with us and they had a blast.  One side of the FloRider was for surfing, one was for bodyboarding.

Logan and Bailey

The bodyboarding sprays a lot of water in your face!

This is a lot like snowboarding.  So fun when you're up, but soooooo painful when you fall.  And so sore the next day!

Dave is looking good.

And here's the wipeout.  Ouch!

And here's a personal shot from our photographer for the day. Avery took a picture of herself standing on the surf board.  We were so glad she was there to photograph all the action.  She took over 100 pictures during the hour!!

For the Love of Harry Potter

We're here at Universal Studios in Florida, and we can't wait to get to Harry Potter world!

This. Is. Awesome.

Woo-hoo!
If you love all things Harry Potter, this post is for you.

The screaming Mandrakes

The photos in the hall would come alive and talk to each other

The cauldron of memories

The Sorting Hat that really talks

Points earned for Gryffindor, Slytherin, Hufflepuff, and Ravenclaw

Aww, c'mon!  Poor Avery was trying so hard to be two inches taller.
 If I'd have known, I would have put her in heels that day. 
She was still able to go through the castle, but wasn't able to ride the Forbidden Journey. 
(It was forbidden to her, ha!)
There was a movie room for those who couldn't go on it where they watched, what else?
 Harry Potter.

The ride was amazing!  Coolest ride EVER. 
Wand shopping outside of the castle.

Avery wanted Hermoine's wand.

Honey Dukes the candy store,
 and Bertie Bots every flavor beans.

Of course we had to get some Butterbeer.  We also went on "the Flight of the Hippogriff", and Cade and I braved "the Dragon's Challenge", which I will never, never do again.

If you've noticed, I keep getting pictures where Cade has his hand up to his mouth.  No, he's not always eating, he is sniffing his hands to see if they're clean.  He's a bit of a germ-a-phobe and especially in public places, he checks for cleanliness and washes his hands alot.

 We left Harry Potter world to see what else there was at Universal. 
This picture is for Brooke Snow, who taught me the importance of paying attention to what's going on in the background of your pictures, and making sure that nothing is coming out of someone's head. :)

Dr. Suess ride

This is what Bailey wants to be for Halloween.

We watched a live "Fear Factor" show.  This girl was hoisted up on a cable, then had to throw some squid into a bucket while swinging back and forth on the rope.  They also put someone in a glass cage and let scorpions crawl all over their face.

Coca-Cola "refreshing station" that misted you with water.

We ended up going back to Harry Potter world by the end of the day,
because that was really the only place we wanted to be,
and we wanted to go on the Forbidden Journey ride again.
This is outside of Ollivander's wand shop.

"The Care of Magical Creatures" book that Hagrid gave to the students his first year of teaching. The book was moving and growling.  It had to be kept in a cage because it was wild and would bite you.  Draco said "How am I supposed to open this?"  And Hagrid said "You stroke its side, of course!" 

Isn't this just how you imagined the wand shop would be?
We waited in line to watch a presentation of how the wand selects it's owner,
and this lucky boy was the one who was chosen.
We noticed a sweet girl who was crying throughout the whole thing,
and later overheard her mom saying that she had gone to seven demonstrations that day,
hoping to be the one selected.
This was the last demonstration, and her last hope.
When the nice people at the wand shop realized what was going on,
they did one more demonstration, this time making sure she was the one who was selected,
and made her dream come true.

 Bailey wanted a giant chocolate frog for her souvenir.
It was delicious.
If you are a Harry Potter fan, you must, must go!

Coco Beach

Now that the boat has dropped us off on land again, we drove to the nearest beach to get our toes in the water.

Cade is still entertaining himself with his sword from the Pirate night on the boat.

After dipping more of just our toes in the water and getting completely soaked, the kids wanted to go get their swimsuits out of the car. 

They wanted to try real surfing in an ocean, and being in the spontaneous vacation mode that we were in, we drove to where we could rent some surfboards, and found Ron Jon's,  the Holy Grail of surf shops.  Open 24 hours! (Do they really get people shopping for surfing gear at 4am?)



This store is so cool!

After suiting up and getting a quick how-to lesson, they were ready to hit the waves.

It takes lots of patience and energy, because you get knocked down over and over and over.  They worked so hard at it and didn't give up.

Look how huge the board was! 

Avery was hard at work making the biggest sand castle ever.

It's a mansion with a slide and two pools

We love Coco Beach.

I love it when kids play this hard. :)

Disney Cruise Day 4

Our last day on the boat.  It was a day at sea, and mostly just the two of us!  The kids wanted to hang out in their "clubs" all day long, which was perfectly fine with us!  This is our titanic picture on the front bow of the boat, and where we ate breakfast.

This is where we spent most of the day, here at the adult pool.  We almost forgot that we brought kids with us!  I decided to attend a yoga class in the afternoon, and too bad I didn't get a picture of it, because it was the strangest yoga class I've ever been to.  It was three other GUYS, and me.  That's not weird, right?

Dinner that night was in the Animation Room with these amazing screens on every wall, where all the characters from Finding Nemo would swim from screen to screen and talk to you.

Ania from Poland and Alwayne from the Bahamas, took care of us each night at dinner.  Ania was so sweet and loving, she kissed each of us when we left and thanked US for being nice to her (after she waited on us for three days!).  After we got home from the cruise and had to fix our own boring dinners, our kids kept saying they missed Ania.  We loved her so much we couldn't stand the thought of her hanging out with another family after we left.  As we were getting off the boat and other people were boarding, we were so envious of them that their adventure was just beginning and ours was ending.