I dream of Africa (and Disney!)

Good morning!:)

Hello hello ! Hope everyone had a wonderful New Years. A wonderful and SAFE New Years. We went out to supper with the kids, pretty early. Came home. I read some. Matthew and Sarah went to bed around 9:30–Matthew was less than thrilled about that. I did some house work, loaded the dishwasher …. missed Dick Clark and the ball drop on the east coast. Paul and I went into our room and watched what was going on in Chicago. I was surprised to see that only 1 station (ABC 7) was the only station that was covering Chicago New Years Eve. Jamie was playing one of his X-Box games in the family room. When it was about 2 minutes until New Years, I told Jamie to come count down. 3-2-1 Happy New Year! Went outside to see about 3 minutes of fireworks and then it was off to bed. Paul and I weren’t even sure we were going to make it to midnight we were so sleepy. Man, it’s tough getting old. So that’s how we rang in our New Years. Woohoo huh? It was a huge change from what we were doing last year at that same time:) We were in Disney World at the Grand Floridian:) It was amazing! You stepped out onto the balcony and there it was, Cinderella’s Castle:) It couldn’t have been a more perfect room/view. And the fireworks were just … wow. We could see Wishes from our room, but the New Year’s Eve fireworks were just… they blew us away. They actually practiced them for 2 or 3 nights prior to NYE. So we saw this enormous display almost nightly:) It was like they were doing them just for us on our balcony:) We love Disney. Next time we go though, we will stay at the Port of Orleans again. It’s Jamie’s favorite place. The grounds are gorgeous. A bit spread out compared to what you get at the Grand Floridian, but absolutely gorgeous. You can hear the crickets and tree frogs every night. He loved all the birds, lizards, salamanders etc. We stayed there a couple of years ago (March 2007) when we had a Grand Gathering with Paul’s family (England), my family (Louisiana) and then Aunt Kathy went with us as well:) If you have a party of 8 or more, you can do Grand Gathering things and I do highly suggest them. All sorts of special things you get to do. I think my favorite was the Sunset Safari. We all met up at Animal Kingdom and then they took us on a safari. Afterwards, we were taken to Tusker House where a wonderful African lady taught us “Jambo” and told us stories. Then she invited us in and we had a lovely sit down meal of African inspired dishes. Chip and Dale came to meet us and the kids had pictures with them. There were African musicians that came and played. They got the kids involved as well. And to round out the night, some handlers brought in a snake and some other small reptiles for the kids to pet and hear about. It was definitely Magical:) In the Animal Kingdom though, Africa is my favorite spot. And this will be one of my favorite memories, always:)

Have I talked everyone into a Disney trip yet?:) I’ll leave yall with a couple of recipes from Tusker House in Disney:) I’m off to do laundry and take down our Christmas tree and decorations:) Back to the real world I guess:) Yall have a wonderful day:)

take care,

~kat:)

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Green Beans with Carrots

Jollof Rice

Couscous

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