Sesame Place

(This post was written on an old message board I kept prior to blogging.)

We are exhausted- Jeff and I. But T is having a BLAST. Sesame Place was great today. As I expected, it was a low crowd day- most folks had come Fri and Sat. 

There is a parade twice a day. The characters go up and down the line and shake hands with everyone- Zach was very taken with Big Bird. Teagan loved that she got to see so many of her favorite monsters and such up close. Earlier in the day, she got to hug Cookie Monster and Bert & Ernie- Daddy got in on the hug action with B&E, too. They were a hoot!

Kids went to bed easy the first night and T is had a hard time the second night- even though she is exhausted. We are watched Happy Feet and he crashed after.

Oodles of rides!! T has been on the carousel and the teacup type ride and the hot air balloon thing and the big inflated jumpy thing and lots of water stuff- she loved riding the lazy river with me. I loved most of it- except the part where we got stuck under a water thing that goes for a stretch of the river because this girl kinda pushed us into it- she pushed off us because she was "screeching" at all the water things. Because of my contacts, I couldn't see in the water so I got a smidge panicky. T was totally fine- only concerned that her ponytail got wet! She went down a slide that was boring and really slow. Looked like it should have been fast but wasn't.

The Twiddlebug slides are made to slide down when wet and they go fast and T hurt her butt at the end. 

We left after the parade yesterday- so we left around 2:30 (got there when it opened at 10). Today we stay longer. We will get there at 10, go see Elmo's World (a show) at 11, have lunch with Big Bird, ride more rides and then hit the wet stuff again! I might even get Jeff into the water this time. I did get him into his suit yesterday but we didn't find the Twiddlebug area (best for Zach) until closer to parade time.

I'm glad we brought a lot of our own food. We have a fridge and microwave but haven't used those much- I brought a lot of produce for feeding Zach. Mango, peaches, apples, avocado. That's been helpful more for T!! Breakfast here is ok. It's free so you can't complain. I think we are looking forward to getting up to Dushore- I know Mom will make big breakfasts in the morning. And we can also get the grandparents/uncles to take kids away for a few hours so we can SLEEP.

Day 2 was packed but great. We hit a couple rides then went to Elmo's World, Live. T sat in awe. She gets very quiet and observational with new things- not overcome with emotion like her Mama. So much like her dad in so many ways. Anyway- hit a couple more rides and then headed to our lunch with Big Bird and friends. I cannot say enough good things about that lunch!!!

I had read online that the character meals were worth the expense and boy was it!! We ate real food from a buffet- roasted veggies, pasta, mac n cheese, roasted turkey breast, bbq chicken breast, potato salad, caesar salad, hot dogs, and more. Dessert was soft serve ice cream, cookies, cupcakes. Fruit salad. Really good iced tea. And the cleanest, best bathrooms in the entire park are in the character dining room. Family style bathroom so we could all go in together and be available to help out. Also used it after lunch to quickly change into suits and avoid the icky more-public bathrooms! Anyway- the characters come out (Cookie, Bert & Ernie, Elmo, Zoey, Big Bird). Elmo sits in a designated photo op spot. Big Bird sits on a stool near the middle of the room. The rest go table to table and take a few minutes to visit with each and every kid. And each character does a song at some point during the meal. Kids could also move around and go see characters sometimes. And Elmo did a big cha cha dance with a conga line around the room at the end! T was thrilled because Cookie got in line right behind us. And Zach LOVED Cookie and Ernie- and each character really took a few mins to squat down and play with him and let him grab their nose or hands or whatever. T got to hug everyone many times. It was really, really great.

Then it was off for all the water adventure we could handle! We hit a few spots that we had hit the day before. Went down a "small" water tube slide- me and T. She must have had her concerned look on when we reached the bottom because the lifeguard picked her up from the float and carried her as she guided me to the steps- but T was fine.

And T rode her first roller coaster. It didn't go well but she also didn't panic. We didn't make it sound scary but made she we talked about it being super super fast and showed it to her numerous times. We have DVD and a pic from it- she and Daddy went on it and it's funny- in the pic, they look sooooo much alike!! He said she didn't like it but never cried or anything- just kept saying "it's really fast" in a semi-panicked voice.

Back to the hotel, cleaned up, hit Red Lobster for dinner. Jeff picked- said it was his vacation and he wanted RL. Okay! And it was exactly what we needed. We were all exhuasted and the service was excellent and the food was great. Z is like his mom- loves those cheddar bay biscuits. Zach also loves fish. We bought him his own meal (first time ever) and he ate about half of the broiled fish, plus about one whole biscuit and a bowl of applesauce! 

Everyone is sound asleep right now. And I will be soon, too. Tomorrow we head off to Dushore- up into the mountains. We'll see how fresh air treats Jeff... he might get lack-of-technology-itis!!

Day one

























Day Two
















Jeff had such a great opportunity to grab a bit of Zoey butt or pretend to bite her but he wouldn't do it!! And he had been talking up all the funny stuff he could do in the background of all the character pics we were taking... ha!












Teagan gave Super Grover the BIGGEST hug. This was right when we were leaving the park on our last day. She had just ridden the roller coaster- it was a Super Grover themed ride. And she didn't like it at all. So she told SG that she didn't like his roller coaster- it was too fast. And then she threw herself into this hug and she squeezed him and hugged him with all that she had left in her...