Paige still isn't quite match ready, but she's improving all the time. Right now she does one group clinic per week and also has a standing lesson with coach Andrew at the club. Andrea took a video of her working on alternating forehands and backhands last week and Paige was looking pretty good with her technique.
After her lesson, I took her on a Daddy & Daughter date to Tropical Smoothie cafe and then got her some custard at Whits.
Connor's been a Chiefs fan forever, and although the KC games aren't aired most weeks, the last two weeks they've had some nationally televised games. On Monday night they played the Bucs and on Sunday night they played the Texans. Connor likes to go to the guest room to watch the games and always begs to stay up late and see the ends of the games.
On Monday night, Connor was supposed to go to bed at halftime, but he ended up laying in his bed tracking the game on his phone. Last night (Sunday 10-8-2017), we watched the Chiefs vs the Texans in the family room together and made him give up all his electronics before bed. The game lasted past midnight, so it was definitely too late to stay up on a school night.
Connor is thrilled the Chiefs are in first place in the entire NFL right now with a 5-0 record. I've been watching the Chiefs for a long time now and I definitely don't let my hopes get too high, but I'm also pretty impressed that they're doing so well.
Chloe watched the game with us too and Connor set her up with her stuffed animals during a commercial break.
This past weekend we went to Orlando for Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party 2017. We'd originally booked at the Four Seasons resort since they had Florida resident rates for the weekend, but at the last minute Andrea and I got to talking and decided it might be fun to stay at a Disney resort instead so we could ride the monorail to the Magic Kingdom. It was a bit more expensive, but it was a good opportunity to try out the Polynesian resort, which we've always wanted to try. We drove in on Friday and checked in after eating at Uno's.
The room was plenty big for the four of us, but it wasn't quite as nice as the Four Seasons. We missed the nice bedding and shower from the Four Seasons. The grounds and pool at the Polynesian were well kept, up to Disney standards, and we did notice that the beach area was fenced off after the unfortunate alligator attack from a couple years ago.
While we were walking around it started to rain, so we went back to the room and I finished up some work. We looked at the radar and it looked like the rain was about halfway past Orlando, so we decided that if we jumped on the monorail, we should probably arrive by the time the rain ended.
Unfortunately, the rain didn't act as we'd expected. We are used to weather systems blowing through Jacksonville, following the same path as they move through. On Friday in Orlando, the rain system stopped over us and just poured and poured for hours. There would be some moments where it looked like it might clear and then we'd start to walk, only to get caught out in the open while it poured. We rode a couple of inside rides like Buzz Lightyear and the People Mover, but as we went towards the back of the park, we gave up and just sat at a covered table near the carousel and waited. We'd done a little trick-or-treating by that time and we had some candy and snacks. We played a game where we'd guess the color of the candy in the packages as we opened them, and did a little people watching.
Eventually the rain started to die down and we ventured back out. From looking at the radar, it looked like more was on the way, so we hurried to do some of the rollercoasters while we had the chance. We rode the Snow White coaster a couple times and rode Goofy's Barnstormer at least three times. Surprisingly the rain never came! We spent the rest of the night trick-or-treating and riding a few more rides. We probably got the most candy ever this trip.
I reluctantly agreed to ride the teacup ride with the kids. I told them I'd ride it, but wouldn't help spin it. I underestimated their strength, and they got the teacup going surprisingly fast.
By the end of the night, our night-owl Connor was super tired and wanted to be pushed in the stroller. We stopped on the way out and got another pic with the decorations before going back to the hotel. It was nice to ride the monorail to our hotel, but it wasn't quite as convenient as we'd imagined since it took a while for the monorail to arrive and then we had to wait for three stops before it arrived back at the Polynesian resort.
On Saturday, we slept in and then went to Uno's for lunch. After lunch, we did a little souvenir shopping and then spent the rest of the day at the pool. It was supposed to rain, and we weren't sure how long we'd get to be outside, but surprisingly it never rained on us all day.
There were two pools and a splash ground area. We spent most of our time at the bigger pool with the slides. Connor, of course, found some kids to throw a football with, and Paige rode the slides and swam.
One of the best parts of the Polynesian resort is that they had a Pineapple Whip icecream station right near the pool. It's my favorite icecream dessert at Disney and they recently got rid of it at the Magic Kingdom. It was irresistible for me, and Paige and I ate there every day.
For dinner, we ate at one of the restaurants on property and ate some yummy Hawaiian pork nachos and pork fried rice. The kids got some kids meals, which they weren't very crazy about. After dinner we were going to roast some marshmallows, but the fire went out and then a little girl next to us got stung by a bee. It traumatized everyone and we decided to just go for a walk instead.
As the sun went down, I threw a football with Connor and Paige and all the kids in the area started to wander over and ask to play too. Everyone got a turn catching and running with the football, and it was nice to play with some other kids for a while.
After the sun set we went back to the hotel room and sang our songs and told some stories before going to bed.
On Sunday, we got up and had our Uno's on the way home. It was a fun family weekend, and we're thankful that the weather was mostly good for us. We're happy to be home and getting ready for our next week.
On Saturday, the kids went to a Karaoke party at the club. Connor was not very interested in going, and we were a little worried they wouldn't have fun. They are both really in to music, and we were hopeful that even if they didn't participate, they would enjoy themselves.
There was a fairly small turnout, only seven kids total, but in the end that was actually a nice benefit since they got more time to sing. When I showed up to pick them up, Paige was finishing up a song. I was surprised Connor wanted to sing with her, and they both sang a duet of "It's Goin' Down" from Descendants 2. I took a video, and the music was a little quiet at first so it's a little hard to hear, but I just like to watch them goofing off and singing together.
In the end, they both had a really fun time together and we're happy that they both were comfortable enough and confident enough to participate.
Connor finished a big school project this past weekend. He had a couple weeks to complete it, but we decided to go through it and get it done ahead of time. Connor and I went over the assignment and worked with him to get the appropriate information for the poster. We got some poster paper of the right size and then Connor got to work laying it all out. I can't say it went super smooth. There was a lot of information to be added, and there were some issues getting it all lined up right and adding it in. Connor wasn't too happy that we worked on it this weekend, but once we were done he was relieved and thankful we got it finished.
Paige and some of her friends went to the high school on Saturday morning to learn a dance routine with the Splashettes dancers. She knew quite a few of the girls in her age group and afterwards Abby came by our house for a while since her mom had a tennis match. We're looking forwards to her performance in a few weeks!
We've been working on the "Gym" room in the house for a while now. During Hurricane Irma, we moved some things around and before moving them back, we decided to spend some time thinking through the room and what we could do with it. It's mostly been wasted space and an eyesore and we've been wanting to get a few things for a while. It was a good opportunity to clean up and rework the area.
The treadmill's platform has been cracked and I took it apart and was able to get it out of the room with just a little help from Andrea. We'd had it 9 years through 3 moves and in Florida I hardly ever used it, so it was time to say farewell to it. The rest of the junk in the room has been distributed to some other closets, and we're thinking through the carpet and furniture for the space.
I've been wanting to get the kids their own computer for a long time and finally ordered them one. I'd built myself a computer earlier in the year, and although it was a good learning experience and I got a decent deal for the money, I didn't want to go through that again unless it was going to give us a really great value. I came across a computer build on Amazon that had pretty good specs for the money so I went with it and so far it's performed pretty well.
For future reference, the specs are: CYBERPOWERPC Gamer Ultra GUA4100A w/ AMD FX-8320 3.5GHz CPU, 16GB DDR3, NVIDIA GTX1070 8GB, 2TB HDD, 24X DVD+-RW & Win 10 Home 64-Bit
Connor hasn't been super interested yet, but Paige has been so excited to use it. She's been playing various games in Roblox and was thrilled to have a computer just for the kids. After Paige went to bed I showed Connor a few things he could do with the computer and I'm hoping that they'll enjoy it and learn with it. Andrea's ordered them a desk, but for now they're just using Paige's kitchen playset table and chairs.
