Chilling out in Clermont

With Disney on the cards for the following day, I insisted on a laid back day in Clermont to get myself motivated for a day of the Rat.
Living only 20 mins from Magic Kingdom means I get lots of visitors from the UK, and, therefore, I've been multiple times to soak up that 'Disney Magic'..what I do know is that it is exhausting, especially as we dont avail ourselves of the mobility chairs provided for people who like to see the parks on wheels.


Anyway, back to our relaxing day in Clermont....

First stop a spot of lunch then off to the park with Izzy and Anne...as with all 4 year olds, simple swings and slides hold a bewildering facination. I suppose as you get older you forget how exciting the park can be when you are that small, but what was equally amazing was that my 39 year old friend seemed as absorbed!

'come on, I see swings!'

After a marathon swing pushing session (still not sure how come I was the pusher!) Anne and Izzy went over to the slides. It was funny to watch Anne nearly de-capitating herself as she wen't down the childrens slide.

Ok I was officially bored, hot and covered in playground sand...let go back and swim in the pool...oh not you Anne, you've got a bad hand...Izzy, let's go back and swim in the pool. Although the slides were exciting, I think the best bit of Izzy's holiday was swimming in the pool everyday.

I'll drive past the lakes on the way back so you can see how gorgeous it is here...it's tough for all the people who live lakeside with their boats and jet skis, my heart bleeds for them....

Home, and Izzy was changed in about 2 seconds flat...Anne came out to read outside and I told Izzy I'd come in when the hot tub was warmed up (sneekily I'd put the jets on, but not the heater...thought I'd gain myself some time to read in the sun..mean aren't I?)

Me reading my book whilst Izzy waits for the hot tub to heat up (cough)

Anne chilling out in the sun

All that remained was to crack open a bottle of wine and watch the sun go down..everyone early to bed, tomorrow we slog around Magic Kingdom, hurrah!

Sunset behind my house

Halloween Bootie...

You may have read my blog about Izzy and I's pumpkin carving exploits..I've never done one before and what I didn't really know is that living in Florida I should have refrigerated before the big night. Come candle lighting time I was hit with a swarm of tiny flies, to which I sprayed some fly killer, which ended up in a scorched pumpkin as candle consumed what was left of fly spray. Note to self..fly spray is an accelerant...DOH!!


1. Ok house decorated... check

You can see Gary in the window wondering what was going on ( you can also see my rotting pumpkin!)

2. We had Izzy a scary outfit...hmmm...is a princess scary....check!

Izzy dressed in her 'scary' outfit standing in front of the candy...speaking of which

3. Bowls of candy to hand out to the little monsters...check

$50 dollars well spent at Walmart (heh I'm not proud, candy is cheaper there!) Izzy helped me bag the first 20 bags, trouble is I did one hundred, so I was candied out by the time I'd finished bagging! (Next year I'm just not going to bother....bagging that is...I'm not a misery!!)

Izzy, you are supposed to be bagging not eating!

4. Costume for Anne....hmmmm...Anne what is that you are wearing?

What do you mean?

I've got a black top on, it will have to do!!

I suppose you could pass as a scary monster, you'll do, try not to scare any little children!

5. Bag for candy....check. In fact we had two, one for Izzy and one for me to carry for her so she could dump her bootie! Clever that 4 year old!

6. Practicing saying trick or treat .....check...and scary Halloween faces....

Izzy practicing her scary face...

OK LETS GO...

I've never been trick or treating before, so this was a first for all of us. We left hubbie at home (sorry chick, he had 80 kids around before we got back) and we started off around our neighbourhood.

Well even in this recession nearly every house had their porch light lit and I'm sure there was more decorations up than last year!

 

Izzy and my foot trick and treating...at this point my arm is falling off from carrying candy...and yes I had flip flops on...it was 80F outside!

 

Sorry Iz, they aren't real!

We had a great time and Izzy will never forget her first proper Halloween...I'm sure Anne is planning just to come back next year so she can collect candy for all the village children for Christmas! We got back after about an hour, bags full of goodies, Gary going mental on the back porch because the door bell kept going and hubbie looking a little worn out from the multiple times he'd had to get up to answer the door in our absence...I took over the chore when we got back, Anne got the beers and Izzy conned us into letting her have 5 pieces of candy..like I said, clever for a 4 year old!...

I had a great time, slightly tainted by finding out today on Anne's blog that Izzy took all the candy home with her....so clever and sneaky..takes after her mother!

Pumpkin carving...Halloween fast approaches..

The English rarely understand how besotted Americans are with Halloween. Trick and treating is huge here and if you say trick you probably won't get egg'd as in the UK! I have already bought Iss her princess dress for Saturday and today it was time to carve pumpkins... this blog is really for my friend John who is a pumpkin carving virgin...John...if Issie can manage it I'm sure you can!

1. Buy a pumpkin with a nice side to carve a face into and cut it's head off

2. Scoop out it's guts and discard, leave about an inch thick on it's face side!

3. Draw a face on the best side of your pumpkin and then use a sharp pairing knife to stab it to death, joining up your stab marks. You don't have to be Picasso, the light will shine thorugh as long as you can make some holes!

4. Put a candle inside and it's head back on and you have a carved pumpkin!

Issie and I had great fun today. She was ace and worked hard at gutting her pumpkin and then giving it a scary face

Even Gary wanted in on the act after eating some of Issie's dropped pumpkin seeds...

Within an hour we had two super cute Pumpkins ready to be lit Saturday night. Issie was very proud of herself, she gutted it on her own and drawn the face, I just helped her with the cutting.

Warning though, Pumpkin gutting will exhaust your child...don't do on Halloween itself as they will sleep through it!