Day 1: 2015 Family Vacation

I apologize in advance for the amount of details, photos, and ridiculous videos I am about to inundate you with over the next two weeks. We just got back from a week-long vacation to Florida (you can read about how we decided on it here and how we planned it here) and we are still flying high from all of the fun, sand, and surf (oh, and food!) we experienced. And since this is an online journal of sorts, you are subject to a thorough recap of all things vacation. Mwahahaha. Although, if you decided to check out for the next two weeks, I won’t be offended. See you on the other side. 🙂

Okaaaaay, Day ONE. We left for Florida on Sunday, May 17th. Let’s just say, it could not have been a crazier day to try and skip town. We knew way ahead of time that the key to a successful send-off would be the preparation we did beforehand. You can read all about our “leaving the house checklist” here.

We worked really hard to have as much as possible finished at work and around the house before Sunday rolled around so that we could just jump in the car and head for the airport as soon as our Sunday morning commitments ended. Of course, Sunday was busy busy busy. Mitch had an event for work and I was responsible for an event in both worship services at our church. Having packed the night before, we went our separate directions on Sunday morning and met back at home to grab the suitcase, get into the car we were taking to the airport, and get on the road by about noon.

We reached the Philadelphia Airport at 1:15 ish, parked the car, took a shuttle to the terminal, and checked our bag. Our flight left at 2:55pm and thankfully, we made it in plenty of time to board.

I passed the time trying to learn how to operate the selfie stick we were borrowing from a friend and the GoPro we were borrowing from my brother.

Our flight was a short one- just two hours!

We landed in Orlando around 5:20pm, grabbed our suitcase (we whole-heartedly accepted the “let’s share one suitcase” challenge, especially because our airline charged $30 per checked bag!), and headed out to choose our car for the weekend.

This was way more exciting than maybe it should have been. But as 25 year olds, this was our FIRST EVER rental car! We chose a white one and I can’t tell you anything more about it. I don’t speak car. All the other ones were black and we went for the white with fabric seat coverings because black and leather don’t mix well with Florida sun. While Mitch took care of vehicle-related things, I practiced my selfie-sticking skills…

Selfie sticks are apparently not within my skill set. 🙂

From there, we headed to the hotel- we stayed at the Ramada Inn (booked through AirBnB) for the first three nights of our trip and it was great! Clean room, air conditioned… we’re not hard to please. 🙂

After dropping our stuff off, we hopped back in the car and drove across the street to Chili’s for dinner. Chili’s is a popular choice in our house and we had a gift card, so we saved a bit of cash and enjoyed a familiar favorite for our first night in Florida. Check out that alliteration!

Knowing we had a big day ahead of us (Harry Potter World!!), we took it easy and turned in early that night. All in all, a pretty relaxing day of travel! Stay tuned for Day 2 coming your way tomorrow! Brace yourself- it’ll be a day full of enchantments, owls, and Quidditch. Now you’re excited, huh? 🙂

To be continued…