June - Sunny day... thinkin' the clouds a-way

After a pocket-gouging lunch fit for a dumpster we headed over to catch our first show of the day, Elmo Rocks, and indeed, he did.
And just like that... the veil of uncertainty as to why they weren't speaking at breakfast was suddenly lifted as they belted out a montage of classic rock songs.
See, mommy knows EVERYTHING! They WERE saving their voices for the concert!
(*phew* dodged THAT bullet!)

Gangsta Cookie




Not long into the show, this little person in the neighborhood started to fade... He's such a trooper though. When he gets tired he doesn't cry, fuss or meltdown... he just turns to mush.

Meanwhile Adrienne scoped out the theater for a bit - I asked her if she wanted to go down to the front - nope. Then came the ticker-tape explosion. She stood up, pushed me aside & headed right up front. No questions asked.
From that point on she was front & center.

At the end of the show Greg brought Nick down to say hi to Elmo & thank him for making us such a great breakfast.
(while dancing around with ants in their pants while on line to get in the park that morning we told them we had to wait patiently because Elmo was actually cooking the breakfast for us....)
We headed over to Ernie's Water Works which Adrienne LLOOVVEEDD. I didn't get to snag any pictures since Nick was done after getting pelted in the face by a spitting fountain upon taking about 2 steps into the play area.

Instead, we headed over to the 'beach' where we relaxed for a while and then we put the painfully over-priced lunch tableware to extremely good use. Sand toys!

Serving up a cup of coffee and an apple juice. Yum!
At this point we were about 45 minutes from the start of the parade. The sky looked ominous, the kids were beyond weary & we were skeptical but we sucked up some good ol' ice cream to burn through the lull and stuck it out for a little longer....
The air may have been sweet but someone forgot to sweep the clouds away. Less than 10 minutes before the start of the parade the drizzle started BUT.... the show must go on - especially when one considers the army of toddlers threatening to revolt if they don't!
"Adrienne! Let daddy hold you!"
"NO!"
*sigh*

In one of the 3000 reviews / blogs / tips / tricks I read before going someone said to sit where 'blue meets black' which we did... and it was AWESOME! All the main characters stopped right in front of us to do their singing & dancing!

"I SEE HIM! I SEE HIM!"
"WHO!?!?"

The Count! Talk about a perfect entrance.... check out those clouds behind him!
Finally! She's lookin' alive.....

....and she's SO happy because she just spotted for the FIRST time all day.....

Abby Cadabby!!

More excitement because it's the first time we're seeing......

Super Grover!

The last freakishly gleeful dancer passed us by and we wasted NO time in heading to our home-away-from-home. We were literally mere feet away from the waiting area (blissfully COVERED) when the skies OPENED.
Damp, dog-tired & dazed.... we did it. Soup to nuts we had the quintessential Sesame Place experience: breakfast with the characters, water rides, ride-rides, food, shows, sunshine and rain.
Time to......

.... get locked out of our hotel room! Ehhh, no worries! Adrienne took the helm of the camera while Greg went to schmooze his old collegiate flame down at the front desk (sorry babe! you KNEW I couldn't leave that one alone!!) to give us a new key.
Would you like one lump? or 2?
Playing hide & seek with the monsters in our hotel room.

Old habits die hard.

Background: We're in the car, heading home from Boston at Christmas. Love in an Elevator came on the radio. Nick instantly started singing the chorus since they spent most of their holiday playing in.... an elevator.
Lightbulb: Make a CD of rock songs about things they could wrap their head around.... Yellow Submarine, Walking on the Moon, Cheeseburger in Paradise!! So we've been singing about heaven on earth with an onion slice for a few months now and when we saw this restaurant (yes, yes, I KNOW it's a chain) we HAD to go.
Maybe it was delrium from the day (week? month? life?), but I bought into this restaurant like the kids bought Sesame Place. I mean C'MON!! My garnish is a fish.... with SUNGLASSES no less!

Day 2 started with one of their FAVORITE things from day 1... the van ride over to the park.
"Who's ready to go!?!" "MEEEE!"

**awww**


We hit the ride-rides first..... "Mommy.... are YOU driving?!"

"I see daddy!"
(Greg & Adrienne were in a different teacup)

OK, to be fair, I stole this off someone else's blog. It didn't occur to me to take a picture because it was SO FREAKING COLD! Oh my HEAVEN. I swear... I think they iced the water. It was just not right. Not right at all.
Count's Castle.... it was Ernie's Water Works x 1000. And every 3 minutes or so the bucket on top would tip over and splash everyone below it.
And the girl who HATED (repeat: H-A-T-E-D) Big Bird's Lazy River absolutely LOVED this freezing cold house of horrors.
We were finally able to pry her away from Count's Castle and caught one more show, Abby Cadabby's Treasure Hunt.

Cookie Monster came over to us TWICE and tickled the kids. I thought Nick was going to have a stroke... he was SO excited.

Time to head home. Who's more exhausted?
The one with the sleeping pout?
.... or the one catching flies?

Not ready to rubber stamp the vacation just yet, we went to Klein's for dinner.
"What!?! These people AGAIN!? Didn't we just spend TWO days with Elmo!?!? Enough's enough mom! Give me some Darth Vader!"

When life gives you lemons, make lemonade.
But as far as this getaway goes.... it was all about the sugar.

June - Open Sesame

As one iconic talking bird once said, "And away we go...."
to Sesame Place!!!!!

We wasted no time after checking in..... straight to the pool which we had to OURSELVES the whole time!!
At the end of last summer we went to Logan's Christening and the kids got to use these muscles, as opposed to the cheapy version I had them using. I was SHOCKED at how great they did so I wasted no time in ordering them up the night we got home and tucked them away for this season.
(T - tell your SIL I owe her big time for telling me about these!!!!)

Adrienne went down to the bottom step, pushed off & started doggie-paddling like nobody's business!! WHAT?!? How the.... what the... WHEN the....?!! Last year she wouldn't even CONSIDER going into the water without being glued to someone!! Suddenly after a winter season, not touching the water even once she suddenly knows how to and WANTS to swim solo!?!?

Nick... the funny thing was that he can swim perfectly - when he's not trying. He would spot Adrienne doing something fun on the other side of the pool and swim right over to her - never thinking twice about it - perfect form, paddling & kicking. But the minute he TRIES to swim.... he's about as boyant as the Titanic.


But hey, why swim when you can get thrown through the air like a dolphin at Sea World!?!




I wish the stills came out better.....
Their first night EVER..... sharing a room together.
Bright and early Tuesday morning.....
Come and play, Everything's A-OK, Friendly neighbors there, That's where we meet
Can you tell me how to get, How to get to Sesame Street

C'MON!!!! The MINTUE we walk in we get to high-5 OSCAR!?!? How awesome is that!??!

We started off the day at Breakfast with Elmo.
Well THAT couldn't have been more amazing!!! Up close and personal with Big Bird, Ernie, Bert, (or Ernie-Bert, 1 word, as they're each called in our house), Zoe and of course Elmo! The characters were milling about the room, getting pawed at / tugged at / attacked by sticky-sleepy-runny-nosted toddlers running amuck thanks to bleary-eyed, half-awake parents (ok, that sounds funny and all, but the truth is ALL the kids were wonderful and the parents were just as on top of things - actually that was the case the whole time at SP) and then after breakfast they came around visiting EACH table. Kudos to the folks who do this - they were WONDERFUL and gave out millions of hugs, kisses and high-5s - they took time with each kid and were SO patient and wonderful. Nick bought it, hook, line & sinker but Adrienne was a little skeptical... "Why can't they TALK?!" I explained they had to save their voice because of all the singing they were going to do in the shows later that afternoon. She was doubtful, but didn't ask anything more... I could see the wheels turning though....

Just have to give a quick nod to Napoleon before I wrap up our FANTASTIC Breakfast with Elmo....
Give me some of your tots.
Bellies full... time to hit the rides. OK, since that might not be such a good idea 3.2 seconds after devouring a plateful of grease, we'll start with the simpler adventures... the climbing, the slides and 'the tickles'.
C'mon guys! Just like Mr. Salmon's sprinkler!!
Nope. Adrienne scoots around it.
But we got Nick through it!

OK, so now we're wet and we've digested for about 6.4 seconds... let's start things off small... with THIS whopper!
They were SO excited. After the first turn their opinion changed.
Nick: "Mommy.... I'm all donnnnne!"
Adrinne: "I want to get off."
Of course we told them they were SOL (the G-version: SO-outta-luck). The next day Nick ASKED to go on it again. Which we did. And he said the same thing. Goofy. Oh wait, wrong park.....

Over to the splash pool - a field of water about 5" deep.
Nick thoroughly enjoyed the water jets... proving that he is most definitely..... Greek!

Not surprisingly Adrienne LOVED the never-ending splash pool - her kind of non-threatening aquatic thrill.

Next up, Big Bird's LAZY RIVER.
Wish this wasn't blurry... Nick and I started off together while Greg & Adrienne followed a minute later...
Who doesn't love the lazy river ride!? What's NOT to love about the lazy river ride!?

Hmm. One guess who HAAAA-TTEED it.
She whimpered her way through the whole thing.

I would pretend to 'lose' Nick...
"Get my toe, Mommy!"

For a girl who treats water adventures with as much enthusiasm as the Wicked Witch of the West she cannot get enough of high-flying DRY rides. I lost count on how many times we went on this...
Look at those little legs all the way up there!!

They wanted to climb to the tippy-top of the gargantuan rope-net-structure via the stairs and INSISTED they would go down the rope tunnels. As we hauled our tushes up there I said to Greg, "$10 says we end up carrying them back down." But before the drama ensued with the rope climbing I said, "Hey guys! Let me take your picture with the park in the background!" So they grabbed each other & gave a BIG hug! doh! Of course they thought THEY should be looking AT the park.... too cute!
OK, one more try....

After 1 level of ropes, both in tears, it was time for a snack.
C'mon... Elmo pretzels!?!? Totally love it....
(I'm a sucker... I know......)

A little down time in the padded cell.

So I kept telling them WONDERFUL stories about the ball pit.... which no longer exists. doh!
Instead they have Ernie's Bed - a big ol' moon walk.
I guess the Elmo pretzel didn't quite cut it in the refueling department because Nick took about 2 bounces, declared at the top of his lungs, "He's not sharin' with me!" and wanted out. ('He' being Ernie? a kid in the bounce? we have no idea....)

On the other hand, Adrienne was LOVING it!
On the way to lunch we snagged a quick ride on the Merry Go Round (as you can see behind Nick, those were about as crowed as the lines got - we either walked right on everything or had to wait 1 turn - it was awesome!)
And a stop at Mr. Hooper's Store to contemplate the mechanical workings of a cash register...
Ohhh... we got it! You POUND on it!