Seaworld Trip!

After our fun sleepover on Friday night, we woke up bright and early, as in 6:15. This was not a planned wake up time, I think the kids were so excited that they couldn't take it any longer and woke up. So after breakfast and one crazy morning we all piled in the car and headed south to meet Brittney and Jeff for Seaworld. We finally made it and headed to seaworld. I had been told by a friend at work, that it would be worth the extra money to get preferred parking,which means we would park right up near the entrance. So we did and boy were we glad when it came time to leave the park. Instead of hiking a few miles, we walked a short distance and got in the car. NICE!! Once we parked the car we made the short walk up to the ticket line and that is when it got a little testy for all of us. When we approached the ticket line at 11:15am it was insane! The line was so long. It felt like a bunch of cattle being herded through the shoots for their shots! You add heat to that and you got yourself a unpleasant situation. The kids did extremely well while we waited in line. They past the time by doing this:

After many trips in and out of line to get water at the water fountain and the kids making numerous faces at each other, we finally made it through the gates! Once, our tickets were bought, we had to bring them to another line(thank goodness this one was shorter) to get them scanned and have our backpack prodded through we finally made it all the way inside and this is the first thing that we saw: At night it changed all different colors and looked so pretty.

We decided that since we waited in line during lunch time that we needed to eat first and then we would go to the splash pad to cool off before hitting the shows. We found a really good deal, you pay one price per person and you get unlimited drinks and food at the participating restaurants through out the park. That was the best purchase that we made the whole day. Being that it was over 100 degrees we made up for it in drinks and more. It was great to just show your wrist band and grab a couple of waters and a snack. Being that each drink started at 3 bucks a pop and Joshua's kid's meal was 8.00(that is not a typo) we felt good about the choice that we had made with buying the Dine All Day passes. After we filled our tummy's we headed to the splash pad, which happened to be right next to the restaurant that we ate at. This splash pad is Sesame Street themed, so everywhere you turned, you saw big bird or cookie monster and most importantly ELMO! Joshua was very content with saying hi and waving to the characters from behind a fence, but when asked if he wanted his picture taken with them, he would shake his head and say,"NO!NO!" They had a little stage that the characters would sing and dance on and you could watch them. We didn't even get a chance to get near it, Joshua was having a mini meltdown, but Maddie and Aubrey weren't to keen on it either once the performance started.

Here is Joshua saying Hi from a far.

This is Bay of Play. It was a combination of a Splash Pad and kid's amusement park! It actually reminded me of the fair. It just opened in the Spring of this year, so it was brand new! The pictures below kind of help you see what it was like. You will have to excuse Joshua in the first picture; he was still in meltdown mode.

They had a huge older kids area, but then they had this toddler area that was shaded and fenced with lounge chairs and a changing room. It was nice and the kids loved playing in these fountains.
We did play in both areas!

After we cooled off in the splash area we headed to our first show! One World, which was the Shamu show. We waited in a huge line to get into this show, but it was amazing. Joshua wasn't to into this show, but I think it had to with the fact that it was around his nap time and he was tired. I heard on the way out afterwards that they had to turn people away because it was full.

The Feldmans' enjoying the show!

This is truly amazing!

This is a mother and her baby! The baby was born not to long ago and was learning the tricks! So cute! They both jumped out of the water together, but I missed it on my camera. Darn! It was really cool!

The Madls' enjoying the show!

Check out this splash! Incredible! There is an area called the splash zone, basically if you sit there you are going to get drench! It would have been nice, but we decided the kids wouldn't think so, so we went up a few rows where it was safe. I remember sitting in the splash zone as a kid and loving it! You really do get drenched.

Leaving the Shamu show. This stroller came in mighty handy! Maddie and Joshua took turns riding in the back and the adults took turns pushing!

Snacking on some popcorn! We were able to find some shade, YAY!

It just wouldn't be complete with out ice cream and since we were at seaworld, it was a Shamu ice cream! It was funny because everything had shamu on it and even the pretzels were shamu shaped! lol This ice cream melted faster than he could it eat! Poor kid, I think he got 3 bites!

In between shows we would run through the splash pad to stay cool and re-apply sunscreen. It was great the way they had the splash pad built right in the center of the park. You really couldn't go to another show without passing by the splash pad, so we took advantage of it. Our next show we went and saw was the Sea lion show! It basically made fun of the other shows and rides! It was really funny and the kids really got into this show!

They were pretending to be on one of the Roller Coasters in the park: The Steel eel.

Taking a picture with "Elmo"

The next show we went to was called, Azul. This was like seaworld meets Cirque de soilel. Brittney and I thought this was the better show. We didn't want it to end! ha! The kids got into this show as well. There were dolphins, acrobats, parrots and much more. This show was truly amazing!

Simply amazing! They were jumping off of high jumps, the catwalk, the sides! It was crazy all the things they were doing and timed it perfectly!

Later in the evening after the Azul show, we went back to the Bay of Play for the kids to run around. I honestly have no idea where they were pulling their energy from(possibly from us, the parents) but this was around 7:30pm and they were still going.

This was the souvenir that Joshua picked from the gift shop on the way out! SHAMU! He loves his shamu. It took him no time to choose it. I was kind of surprised because he really wasn't into the shamu show and we had just seen the penguins before the gift shop and he was saying he wanted a penguin. KIDS!?

Maddie chose Shamu as well. They wanted their picture taken in front of this Shamu statue with them holding their Shamus! Maddie said later that she wanted to be a seaworld trainer when she grew up. So cute! The kids did absolutely amazing! I still can't believe it! None of them took a nap and they played so hard. Yet, they were still all smiles at the end of the night when we were leaving!

So after 3 shows, several trips to the splash pad, walking over 3 plus miles and having the time of his life, it took him about 5 mins before he was sound asleep and he didn't wake up (even when we transitioned him from the car to his bed) until 7:40 the next morning. Then he took a 3 hour nap that same day. I will admit that I took a 3 hour nap as well!

There were some pictures not posted because I took so many that I only posted what highlighted the main points. We also went and saw the penquins, but they had already turned the lights out, so you really couldn't see them and my flash didn't work so the pics just came out dark and blurry. Dan and Jeff rode the "Steel eel" roller coaster and loved every minute of it. We got to the park about 11:30 and we walked out of the park at 9:50 that night(they close at 10) We managed to make it all day without anyone getting sunburned, with minimal melt downs and everyone leaving with smiles on their faces and hopefully a lot of memories!!