Orlando 2014 - part 1

We r e a l l y  wanted to get away from the snow, so we took a hop, skip, and a jump to Florida last week. 

Well . . . actually, Jason had to visit Orlando from some work, and Beckham and I got to tag along and have some bonding time together.  How lucky is that?!  We have been so excited for this trip for weeks!

The night before our plane left, we stayed with Aunt Jenn and Uncle Brandon.  They are so good to us!  We had so much fun seeing our cute cousins, and it really helped to break up the traveling with our little youngster.

Beckham just loves little Blake, but we had to keep reminding him that he needed to be soft and talk nice.  Sometimes, I found it best to just tell Beckham to just plain look and admire the baby from afar.

Beckham also had fun with Jennah.  She was so nice to show him how to play with the toys.  What a sweetheart!

And, we couldn't have left Aunt Jenn's house without seeing Yogi.  I mean, really.  Mr. Beckham thinks he is pretty cool.

Our flight took off in the afternoon, and I had been worrying and stressing about it for weeks.  Literally.  Weeks.  I planned and prepared to entertain a toddler on a long plane ride, and you know what?  He did great!  We arrived in one piece late at night and smiles on our faces.  He was a champ!

The next day, we visited the temple grounds.  It is gorgeous!  I cannot emphasize it enough.  The Orlando temple is simply stunning.   I was so excited when we rounded a bend in the road and a beautiful temple appeared right in front of us up on a hill.  It just made my day.

Beckham thought it was pretty cool too.  He loved running all over the grounds in the warm sun.

We also visited the Animal Kingdom in Disney World.  This was easily the highlight of the whole trip for Beckham.  He L-O-V-E-D it!  I think it was also a hit for his Daddy as well.   These two boys were pretty happy to be there together.  (I must admit, even though I am not an animal person at all, I was very impressed by the park.  It was neat, but really what can you expect?!  It's Disney World!)

Promptly as we entered the opening gate (literally, as we walked up to the gate), Beckham decided it was time for his nap.  He got a few minutes of shut-eye on Dad's shoulder before deciding that this place was pretty neat. 

We saw so many things!  Here are some of the many fish that we saw, and we even saw an hippo in there too.  He came right up to us.  None of us had never seen one before and everyone thought that was very cool.

And, we saw some gorillas.  Beckham started squealing with excitement when we got up to the window for the gorillas, but really he was only excited to see a small bunny in the gorilla exhibit.  Funny kid.

Our absolute favorite thing that we did in Animal Kingdom was get on the Safari ride.  We saw lots of cool animals out in the open and no visible fences.  It was so different than seeing animals at a zoo because we were right up next to them.

 Beckham stood on Daddy's lap the entire way and waved his arms every time another animal appeared.

 A giraffe munching on some leave in the tree

Beckham was not in the mood to even look at the camera for a picture.  Every picture I have is of him pointing at something and looking in the other direction.

Flamingos 

 An Elephant

If you look closely there is a big lion out on the rock, and there were actually quite a few more out there.

At Animal Kingdom we saw some characters, which were completely foreign to Beckham.  We saw Winnie the Pooh, Tigger, and Russell and Doug from Up.  Beckham was a bit nervous seeing them and was worried about touching any of them.

 Dad decided to get Beckham a little souvenir at one of the shops.  Beckham thought little Simba was great and immediately showered his new stuffed animal with hugs and kisses.

 We also wondered the park and saw some fun rides and other random things.

 There are some drums outside of the Safari ride.  Beckham was pretty good at playing them.

Before leaving the park, we got some popcorn which was a huge treat for Beckham.  I had no idea that he loved that stuff so much.

It was no surprise that Beckham fell asleep in Daddy's arms on the way back to the hotel that night.  It was a fun day for a little boy.

Our hotel overlooked Downtown Disney.  Before Jason had to run off to work, we took our little family to visit and see what there was to see there.

We went to lunch at a fun T-Rex restaurant.  Beckham was trilled to see all the robotic dinos (that even roared!) and fishes.  So much so that it was difficult to get a boy to focus and eat lunch.

 We were seated under a gigantic octopus with a great view of other dinos.  The picture above is the t-rex.

 And the pretty fish were right next to us.

Oh, and Jason.  Well, he met the first burger that he was unable to finish eating (or so he recalls).

 

Beckham took a nap in his stroller after the lunch, and Jason and I took a walk and window shopped at all the fun places in Downtown Disney.

Beckham had a good little nap and Jason and I had a good little time together in Downtown Disney.