We had a wonderful week-long visit to Florida for Thanksgiving. It was a fantastic break that felt like more than a week (in a good way). We managed to fit in visits to two sets of grandparents - Granddad Scott and Sujata in Gainesville, and Papa Duane and Nana Karen in DeLand. We also took the kids to two parks at Disney World. The visit started off with a stay at Granddad's house in Gainesville.
Granddad's house is a comfortable place to stay. The kids enjoyed dancing inside and playing ball with Granddad outside.
We all love kitties, so of course we enjoyed playing with Granddad's cats.
One of our Gainesville traditions is to visit the Butterfly Exhibit at the museum. There were also some fun structures outside.
Some of these photos, including this one, were taken by Brielle.
Brielle hoped that a butterfly would land on her finger. 
Just as Uncle Kevin did with Cousins Sylvia and Tavio, we took the kids to the house I grew up in in Gainesville.
We also visited a fun new playground in Gainesville.
At Sujata's house, the kids and I enjoyed using her artist tools to create some nice drawings.
And we went to our favorite restaurant, 706, TWICE!
Granddad and I enjoyed our tradition of playing a cribbage tournament whenever we get together. He was the reigning champion after our last visit, but this time I won back the crown (despite Brielle openly rooting for Granddad!)
Before our visit to Disney's Magic Kingdom, we stayed at a hotel near the park. Brielle was really looking forward to going to a hotel with a pool (even more than actually visiting Disney World). We stayed at a hotel with a heated indoor-outdoor pool that had a really cool waterfall dividing it in half. We had a wonderful time swimming together.
Brielle is getting really confident with her swimming and can now swim for long periods of time under the water. Ronan is also wild about swimming and kept diving under the water to swim to Mommy or Daddy.
The next morning, we headed out to Disney's Magic Kingdom. As far as I can remember, we've always taken to monorail into the park. But this time we decided to take the ferry.
Our first stop was a visit to Ariel the mermaid, since Brielle still loves mermaids. She was so cute - she was gracious about the visit, but she noted that she knows that it wasn't the real Ariel because Ariel isn't real. Don't grow up too quickly, Brielle.
Next, we stayed at Papa and Nana's house in DeLand.
Here we got to enjoy Thanksgiving, as well as our first Christmas celebration.
We also enjoyed walking around the neighborhood, because the weather was amazing and we're always interested in seeing houses for sale. We don't currently have plans to move there, but it was kind of fun to fantasize about having a relaxed lifestyle in their neighborhood.
I told Brielle and Ronan about Kevin and my excitement about moving to Florida and seeing our first lizard. They also enjoyed seeing the little lizards running around Papa and Nana's yard (you can see a small one in the photo below).
Disney is only about an hour from DeLand, so we decided to take a second trip there with Papa coming with us.
This time we went to Animal Kingdom, which none of us has ever visited
before. the centerpiece of the park was a huge, colorful tree with a
trunk made up of animal carvings. It was quite impressive. 
We enjoyed seeing the birds, including a show where hawks and a bald eagle flew over the crowd. Brielle said that she's never seen a macaw in person, so she was really excited to meet one.
Animal Kingdom also had fun rides.
Because Papa came with us, he was able to watch the kids while Kraig and I enjoyed a roller coaster ride.
Like Epcot, the park was divided into different continents. The scenery was authentic and beautiful for each area.
Ronan took this photo, and I think it's pretty cool.
One of the highlights of Animal Kingdom was taking a safari ride to see amazing animals, including some extremely rare animals that we've never seen before.
We had an amazing visit. Thank you Granddad, Sujata, Papa, and Nana!
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