The weather held out for us today and we were able to get to Animal Kingdom by 1.

Jake seemed like he wanted to stop at every booth and store to buy something and it was kind of tough to get him to look at any animals until we saw his first “giant creepy lizard” (Iguana).

I got super excited cause we stopped in Africa and saw this huge tank of African and Jack Dempsey cichlids. Very cool to see what they look like fully grown and in a huge tank. Then we saw this huge hippo in the water and Grandma was so excited. It was her first hippo sighting of the day. The thing was huge and Jake wanted once cause he said it was soooo cute.

We the grabbed and fast pass and headed over to the safari. I’ve been to Animal Kingdom a few times but never managed to get on this because it’s always been too much of a wait. Gotta love Fast pass.

One of the highlights of the day was seeing the Gorillas. We’ve seen them in a few parks but it’s just amazing seeing them up close and their so close to humans in their mannerisms.

We wrapped up the day after 6+ hours going to the Rain Forrest Cafe. It was much bigger than the one we usually go to in Burlington MA. Dino nuggets for Jake today. We drove home exhausted and releived that we got in at least one park this week.

Jake had the camera today so all pictures are his doing not mine.

As soon as we parked in the garage at universal, it started to rain so we had to run under our umbrellas to NBA Live restaurant. Jake had his typical chicken nuggets and I had a tasty Kahuna burger.

We watched the Terminator movie and I thought it was a bit too intense for Jake cause it was a very loud Sony digital theater and the robots were loud. We all thought it was a great movie. As we left the movies we were just barely dry again and had to go outside in a down pour again. We ran to the car and wouldn’t you know it again, it stopped as soon as we pulled out of Universal. We didn’t stay long there but good times. I love their theater too.

Tonight Jake and I wanted to see what the pool was like after dark and it was pretty fun. It wasn’t raining and all the Moms were out there with their mixed drinks and loud stories to each other and most of them cheered Jake on in the pool to just about anything he did. Wow someone needs to get out and away from kids.

Jake loves performing for a crowd.

As Jake and I pull up to Downtown Disney and Quest the rain stops and out comes the sun. Wouldn’t you know it. So we make the best of it and go into Quest. What an awesome place for a kid (and me too). It’s 5 floors of virtual games, arcades and fun stuff for kids. You pay one fee at the door and everything inside is free. No tokens or quarters. After a few hours of Jake and I playing every cool game we can get out fingers on we decided to go outside and see the rest of downtown disney. A bunch of shops and resturants but not much else to do for us. Jake found a lizard and that was his entertainment for the next 30 minutes.

We got back from Disney Quest and Jake quickly said he wanted to goto the pool. Do ya?

For the next 2 hours I sat by the pool and relaxed while Jake swam. Weeee how fun it is to watch a kid yell, “Daddy watch this” for a few hours. Beside teaching Jake how to duck dive and touch the bottom of the pool the other fun part of the night was watching all the Moms come down out of there condos without their kids and drinks in hand to sit around the pool and listen to music. Like shooting fish in a barrell for a single guy so Jake and I got outta there before it got silly.

In bed by 12.

Grandma said the sky was blue so we headed to the pool and we were the only crazy people there other than a few people dipping there feet in. I think once they saw me in there there was a whole bunch of coming in but it started raining again and all those people were disappointed. I played some games with some of the other kids by the pool and won a prize cause I was the best bubble blower.

We then went to Fuddruckers and had lunch before doing some food shopping for the week. I don’t like hamburgers but I did have some chicken nuggets. I quickly didn’t finish my lunch and wanted to play arcade games.

We went to the movies about 6pm and watched the movie Angels and Demons and I fell asleep after only 10 minutes of the movie. I woke up with 2 mins left and Daddy said it was crazy to spend $10 for me to sleep.

As it rained most of the day my Dad and I got tired of staying indoors all the time so we went for a walk after getting back from the movies. We saw some cool stuff like Ducks and Cranes, frogs jumping around the wet ground and big snails crawling around the ground. Daddy said I didn’t step on one but there was some icky stuff on my new shoe. Ewww

Oh yea and Daddy said there was a Tornado warning last night in our area. We looked for a tornado in the Orlando area but didn’t find one. Boooorrrrring.

The plane goes really fast on the ground and that puts it into the air. You can watch TV and movies on the plane. I watched cartoon network the whole time and my Dad watched sports and listened to some boring music. We flew for a few hours and the it started to rain in Florida. We landed the plane and got off and I asked the plance pilot where he was going next. He said they were flying to Brazil.

I don’t know where that is but I don’t think they have swimming pools of Mickey Mouse so I’m staying in Orlando.

When we got to our condo, I got into the bath and had a bubble bath. Then I went to bed dreaming of seeing Mickey Mouse this week.

I don’t know how it happened but it did. Jakob’s dad was not the happiest person in the world when he got a call at work telling him about our new pet. But a whole year has gone by and Brody-O McMurphy (started off as just Brody but someone… Jake added to it).

When we tell people that we have a ferret we all kinds of different reactions. “Ewww, don’t they stink” or “Why?” or “Aren’t those like rats?”. We figured we would tell you a few things about our ferret.

• His coat has a slight musky smell – (which I don’t find offensive). If you clean the cage the way you are supposed to then his bedding doesn’t smell and therefor you won’t have a ferret smell in the room.
• Our ferret is litter trained – There is a litter pan in his cage which he uses (most of the time, sometimes he misses but gets the general area right). We very, very, very rarely have an accident outside of the cage. Our ferret knows that he has to use the litter pan before we will open his cage so it is just part of the routine now.
• He comes when he is called – I’m serious. If he is somewhere in the living room that I can’t see I start calling him (not by Brody-o… I just say ferret) and sure enough he’ll poke his head out from wherever he was and head on over to me
• He loves Jakob – he and Jakob play chase, hide and seek, and play with his ball. This ferret loves his boy. So much so that when Jakob goes into the bathroom with the door shut the ferret just lays down in front of the door waiting for him to come out.

Our ferret fits right in with our family. He has the perfect disposition for dealing with Jake… meaning Jake does whatever he likes to the ferret like carrying him around in a bag or sticking him under his shirt and the ferret never has a bad reaction to it.

Jakob loves his ferret and the ferret loves his boy.

Jake and I played outside today waiting for his dad to come home so Jake could finally find out what his surprise was. He waited as patiently as a 5 year old can wait all day long. He was getting pretty antsy around the time that we were supposed to leave for his surprise.

We went to The Rainforest Cafe and when we walked in Jake was very, very surprised to see that all of his aunts and uncles and both sets of grandparents were there for HIS BIRTHDAY. He was so excited.

We all ate dinner and then they brought out the birthday desert. It was something called the volcano. One person carries it out with candles in it and then 5 or 6 more waiters were following behind screaming VOLCANOOOOO! Jake got so excited. He had a smile from ear to ear.

All in all it was a really fun time. Jake seemed to have a blast and he got some really great gifts. I still can’t believe that it has been five years already…then again, I can’t remember what my life was like before he came along either. Before I know it he’s going to be a big boy.