Today was the last part of McColley's Fifth Birthday Celebration!
We invited McColley's remaining best friend from school, C, to come with us to Le.goland. The two boys' level of excitement never dipped below overwhelming the entire time we were there.
We picked C up from his house at noon and the entire drive down was spent with McColley explaining about all the cool rides they HAD to go on. The plan was to hit 'At.lantis Subma.rine' first, but as we walked in, 'Heroes Wa.nted' was the first cool thing the boys saw:
I couldn't go on the ride for a couple of reasons, so while the boys waited in line, I grabbed a drink and got back in time to see them take their place:
It was a race between all the fire trucks, so when the alarm bell rang the boys had to race out to their truck:
And then 'drive' it down to the fire:
And then aim their water guns at the flames:
When they were done being heroes, we walked around the park and realized how super busy it was. Both of McColley's two MUST DO rides had over an hour long wait. Eventually we decided to bide our time and wait for people to go home. Luckily, there was a Pirate Stunt Show that everyone wanted to watch.
When the show ended we walked back through the traffic area and discovered that the line for the cars was very short. The two older boys were excited to go to traffic school:
They were even more excited to get blue cars with red trim:
And to top it all off, they got drivers licenses!
With two newly licensed drivers, it was time to eat some dinner. It was easy to tell that dinner was over when the boys couldn't sit still. Conveniently, there was a playground right next to the restaurant:
The only way the boys were going to leave the playground was if we went and did the boat ride. So, even though the line was still just shy of an hour, we agreed (it helps that the line has Dup.lo stations to help pass the time):
Brayton and I rode together while the two older boys went with B:
C was allowed to drive about 75% of the way because McColley had already done the ride but McColley did get to take the boat in and out of the docking area:
By the time we were done with the boats we only had about an hour before all the rides were going to be shut down. However, thanks to a lot of people leaving, we were able to fit in 'At.lantis Submarine', DinoTrek, and Laser Raiders along with a stop at the L.ego store for some minifigures.
Needless to say, it was a long day but it was super fun!
Or maybe we were waiting for something...
Such as the train to London! Much to Brady's consternation, McColley and I were the only ones going. There was much crying and gnashing of teeth - there were MASSIVE tears. The train takes an hour to get to London, and McColley was incredibly fascinated by the graffiti along the way.
After reaching London, we had to walk through Cove.nt Ga.rden Market to get to our destination. We decided to stop by the A.pple store first, and play around with an i.Pad. Of course, McColley didn't need any instruction on how to use the iP.ad. My understanding is there was still much crying and gnashing of teeth.
After finishing up our walk through the market and stopping for a lunch at P.ret A Mang.er, we finally reached our destination. To kick off McColley's birthday week, the two of us went to a show in London. My eldest son has now seen a show in Ra.dio Cit.y Mu.sic Hall (The Rock.ettes Chri.stmas Show) and the West End.
We went to see the Lion King at the Lyc.eum Theatre in London! (McColley partly gets a birthday week because he's going to spend the entire week in summer school) Here is McColley anxiously awaiting the start of the show. I believe Katharine still endured some crying - unfortunately, you need to be three to be let in to the Lion King.
The view from our seats - we were in row "Y," and the last row was "AA." We still had a great view!
Since we didn't really walk around the show too much in New York, I took McColley up to the stage, and he looked into the orchestra pit.
While waiting for the show to start, we tried to figure out what animals were represented in the fire curtain. Apparently Lion King is a cross between Ha.mlet and Rohr.shach.
If we felt like spending a pound, we could have rented, or "hired" for those that don't speak British, a set of binoculars. We could still see the facial expressions from our seats, so we didn't hire these bad boys out. Plus, Daddy had to make sure to have £3.50 for the ice cream during intermission.
After the show, we walked back through the market to take the Underground back to our train station. Most of the street performers had left the market, but there was the string quartet performing to a large audience that played along. They were pretty good. Once we got back to the train station (the Underground ride is so fast, there wasn't enough time for pictures - and it was CROWDED!). While waiting for our train, McColley decided to try and lean on the barrier between platforms 9 and 10. Apparently that only works on 1 September. Sorry to burst your bubble, but there is no barrier between 9 and 10 - the tracks for those platforms are adjacent to each other at Ki.ngs Cross St.ation...
Of course, we had to then hoof it through all the construction to get to our train, which wound up being on Platform 0. Hence the weird wall behind McColley.
And McColley was still fascinated by the graffiti. I think the crying had to have stopped by this time.
But McColley then decided to play around with the camera as we made our way home. Luckily, by the time we hit Stevenage (the halfway point home) he decided to stop taking a picture every fifty feet of the scenery.
All in all, McColley thought it was a great trip. He said that Lion King was GREAT and he loved it!
