Our first Mommy and Daddy ONLY Vacation

 

 Hubby and I traveled to Florida last week for a Youth Ministry Conference. NCYM is the National Conference on Youth Ministry and host around 200 Church of Christ Youth Ministers and their families for a week of worship, learning and fellowship. We spent almost an entire week in Daytona Beach, and even though the weather was not what we had hoped for, we still had an amazing time. 

We have a few Youth Minister friends from Georgia who came as well. We hadn't seen any of them since we moved so it was great to catch up. I was the only wife of our group of friends that came, but I had a blast being "one-of-the-guys" for the week while I hung out with them. The worship at this place was awesome. Something I needed so much, you just really don't get that feeling outside of camp or something, so it was great to get it this weekend. The lessons we good, we learned some new teaching tricks, and some helpful apps to make teaching teens better. Also we met some very inspiring men, who have given their life in dedication to pursue God's purpose. It was great to hear their struggles, and the way they used them in their journey to find God. Overall I would say this Conference was much needed, and we are hopefully going to go again next year. 

 

This was our first trip alone post-baby. Little Man was left in the hands of his 3 grandmothers that live in town. Fortunately he got to sleep in his own bed every night, and didn't seem to mind being passed around. I am so thankful that we have family here that can help us out, and give us some much needed time alone.

Little Man and his "Poppy"-my dad

I anticipated being an emotional wreck the entire week, and actually apologized in advance to Hubby. But it turns out that we were so busy that I could keep my mind off of the sadness most of the time. I was able to Facetime Little Man every night before he went to bed, I loved seeing that sweet little face light up when he heard my voice. He was very confused and kept looking around trying to find me, or he would see my face on the screen and try to grab it to give me a kiss. About mid-week I started getting sad when I saw other wives with their babies. But I reminded myself, that they weren't able to participate in the conference as  much as I was because of the babies, and that I should use this time to soak up as much info as I could while I was there. 

One of the afternoons we had some free time so we walked up and down the boardwalk and found this cute arcade. January is not very busy in Florida so we had the entire arcade to ourselves. It was a fun way to spend $10 and we would try to beat the other's score. In the end we ended up with a bunch of tickets and got some super cheesy prizes.

 You can see here our ticket load

On our last day in town we decided to drive the 90 mins to Orlando and check out the Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal Island of Adventures. Last year we went to Disney, but didn't get a chance to check out the Harry Potter stuff. So we decided to splurge and go. FYI tickets to this thing are EXPENSIVE, it was over $90/person, but we had a great time and really enjoyed ourselves. 

 

The design of the entire place is amazing, except for the other hundreds of people milling around, you really feel like you have been placed inside the movie. We got to try our first Butterbeer which is basically Carmel flavored ginger ale with a butterscotch foam on top. I really liked it but one glass was enough, it was VERY sweet. (You can purchase a souvenir glass like mine and get refills of soda for only a $1, or you can just purchase the butterbeer alone like Hubby did)

 The best part by far is Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey which is located inside Hogwarts. As you are standing in line, you get a tour of the inside of Hogwarts. Complete with Dumbledore's office, the talking paintings, the herbology building and more. It even snows inside when Harry, Ron and Hermione cast a spell on the room. The ride itself is awesome, but warning, it will cause motion sickness and may be scary to younger kids. Things such as dragons, spiders and dementors get within a few feet of your head.

 Another favorite part of the park-Dr Seuss Land. I know we were shocked too how great it was. I think even if you don't have kids this part of the park is awesome. It really looks like the books too. We road the train all through town and went on the Cat and the Hat ride. There is a carousel and One Fish Two Fish ride similar to the flying dumbos at Disney, we however didn't ride those since we were a tad too big.

 There is a restaurant in Dr Seuss land that even sells Green Eggs and Ham. It looks completely disgusting, but if your curious, there you go.

 We had such an amazing trip, but we were so glad to rush home to see our baby. He was in great hands while we were gone and just want to say thank you to my parents, my mother-in-law and grandmother-in-law for taking care of our little guy while we were gone.