Yahoo Geocities

Chris and I started the Trankina website 3 years ago. We checked around and decided to go with Geocities because it was easy to use and fairly cheap. The only problem was that they only allowed 20 MB of storage. We burned through that fairly quickly and started using the 50 MB's that Insight gives us with our cable connection to store some of the pictures for the site. I rarely go to the Geocities page, but I stopped by to check on the site stats and found that they have raised the storage limit to 2 GB!!! Not bad for $9 per month (including our domain name). I am now moving all of our pictures back to Yahoo. I was starting to worry about running out of room and having to take down old pictures, but now we can put up as many pictures as we want!

www.trankina.us

WDW Pics!!

We put up the pictures from our trip to Sea World and WDW this morning. Go to the Trankina page and click on the trips link on the left navigation bar. The links for the trips pages are the last 3 links on the bottom of the trips page.

Trankina Family Web Page
Direct link - Trips Page

Chicago Tribune | It's a Wi-Fi kind of town

Is Fithian next? :-) Hopefully this will spread to other cities!

Chicago Tribune | It's a Wi-Fi kind of town

HD Olympics

Here is a cool blog with a behind the scenes look at NBC's Olympic broadcast center. Scroll down for some neat pics!

HD Olympics

Vacation Blues..

Boy, today I am having a hard time keeping my mind focused here at work. Now that we've been home for 5 days , I already feel like I'm back in my routine that happens day after day after day, and the midwest weather doesn't help. Cold then warm and going back to cold. It sucks! I think I need a vacation. I miss Florida, Disney World.

Coke with no ice please!!

Looks like Grandma Darr was very smart to order drinks with no ice!!!!!

Girl's Science Project May Make You Rethink That Drink Order

We're Back!

We made it home last night around 6 and are about halfway unpacked. What a great trip! The weather was beautiful the entire time and Lauren really seemed to have a great time. Her favorites were Shamu, Dumbo, the carousel, fireworks, Mary Poppins, Mickey, and feeding Birds! She also really seemed to enjoy the flight there and back. It is going to be tough to go back to work tomorrow! It is bad enough coming home, but the worst part is not being around Chris, Lauren, Dad, and Mom all day! Planning for the next trip starts now!

A little catch up from the last post...

We hopped on a boat to Epcot around 6:30 Friday night and walked through all of the countries. We missed most of the shows, but still had fun walking through the pavilions. Grammy and Pa had been giving Lauren change all trip to turn into pressed pennies and we pressed one in each country. She ended up bringing home 15 pressed pennies and 2 quarters. By the time we got to Mexico it was time to find a place for Illuminations. Chris, Lauren, and I headed off to ride the Mexico ride while Grammy and Pa held our spot. After the ride I fought the crowds to find Lauren something to eat. I stood in the longest line ever to get some chicken nuggets and fries and managed to make it back to our spot 5 minutes before the show. We thought the wind would blow the smoke from the fireworks right into us, but fortunately it changed just before the show. Once the show wrapped up we took our time heading to Mexico for a little supper. The waitress was a little bummed when we only ordered appetizer, but the burritos were $20 and none of us were very hungry. Mom and I had an excellent soup!! Lauren crashed during dinner and even stayed asleep while we put her coat on! Grammy and Pa volunteered to take her to the room and Chris and I stayed to ride Spaceship Earth and Soarin again. We really enjoyed the chance to stay in the park to midnight (thanks Grammy and Pa!!)!!

We woke up bright and early Saturday morning for the sad task of packing and surprisingly enough we were ready to go by 9!! Lauren fed the rest of the loaf of bread to the birds on the boardwalk. the sea gulls almost carried her away! We headed off to The Wilderness Lodge to check out their gift shop and let Lauren run around their fountain. After a quick bite we headed off to the airport for an uneventful trip home. All of our bags except one were off the plane in 5 minutes except for Dad's which was on e of the lasts. We stopped by the Applebee's in Brownsburg before heading home.

Pictures will be up on www.trankina.us in a few weeks!!

Magic Kingdom

Yesterday morning we woke up really early and entered Magic Kingdom at 8:10. Unfortunately we missed the opening of the park but that's ok because we saw it today. With early entry we were able to enjoy all the rides in Fantasyland: The Carousel, Dumbo, Peter Pan, Winne the Pooh , It's a Small World, which wasn't too bad since they remodeled and changed up the music, and the Mad Tea Party. She didn't like the Mickey's Philromagic show. Donald wasn't very nice. We didn't ride Snow White because Lauren has a fear of the Queen Mother and since that ride is all about poisoning the Princess and killing her we decided that wouldn't be a fun one. We did ride The Piarates of the Carribean which also wasn't a fun experience for Lauren. We ate lunch at the Habour House which was excellent. I think it's the best in Magic Kingdom.

After lunch we thought we should get back to the hotel for naps but none of us really wanted to leave so we talked Lauren into taking a nap. My idea was for her to nap and then wake up for the 3:00 parade; however, she slept throught the whole thing. It really wasn't as much fun since she was sleeping. Before the parade started we were down in the rose garden area which was a quiet zone since two children were sleeping we watched the ducks swim peacefully in the pond. Rita left the area to go to the restroom and Brad and Bill came down to sit and visit. I showed the guys the little duckling swimming around with its mama. As we were commenting on the cute little thing a hawk came swooping down into the pond and picked up the duckling for lunch. We all became emotional and sad. We were going to stop off at the City Hall to make a complaint about our experiencing emotional distress but we were too upset to talk about it.

It is now 4:05 so we headed to Chef Mickey's to get in line for dinner. Got there around 4:30. At 5:00 the gal at the counter, Claire told us that they don't take walk ups but she was very kind and let us have dinner. The people in front of us did the same thing. The people behind so probably wouldn't be very happy to know we didn't have reservations. We had a great time. We saw Mickey, Minnie, Goofy, Donald, Pluto, Chip & Dale. Lauren had a blast.

After dinner we decided to go back to MK and enjoy the rides again. We did watch the fireworks again and see Tinker Bell fly from the castle. It was just a Magical Day!

Today, we were at the park this morning at 8:30 and got to enjoy Mickey and Friends ride in on the steam engine. We stopped off at the Bakery and got lots of stuff: a huge cinnamon roll, yogurt surprise and berry yogurt for Lauren. A ride on the train to Toon Town was a hit. Lauren rode her first Barnsteamer roller coaster which was really scary. I think we will try again next time. At age 2 it may have been a little too early. They had a play area and boat for Lauren to enjoy except her father didn't want to play too much as we were on a schedule and the Princess' photo areas were going to fill up quickly. After all the glamore and sickening smiles we rode all the Fantasyland ride again. We ate lunch at ESPN Zone and then headed back to the room for a nap. Now we are headed to Epcot for the evening...

Epcot & Mary Poppins

This morning we took the boat over to Epcot. The driver of our boat was from Hoosierville and his co-driver was from Urbana, Illinois. Stein, a 1986 Graduate from Urbana High who loves Papa Del's Pizza. It was fun to be on the same boat with an Illini and a Hoosier. In Epcot we went straight to the Soaring ride which was pretty neat. The Living with the Land boat really wasn't a big hit as Lauren thought alligators were going to eat her instead of looking at the beautiful fruits and vegetables that WDW was growing in their lab. Next we went to the Living Sea to see Nemo. Bruce the Shark was eating children in the play area. Lauren was too intersted in seeing that so we only spent a little time looking at the sea creatures. Once we got in to see Bruce it wasn't so much fun. She wouldn't stick around to look through his jaws for a photo. We walked over to character connections where we met up with Mickey, Pluto, Minnie, Chip & Dale and Donald. Mickey loved our Illini clothing. We assume he was from Illinois, or is that possible? Pluto was a lot of fun. He played around with Lauren. They both got down on all fours. Minnie was Minnie. Chip & Dale were funny. Donald was a waddler. He almost waddled right over Lauren. Grammy even squatted when taking a photo. Next we saw some type of acrobat performance which really bad. Our next walk was over to United Kingdom. And guess who we saw, Mary Poppins! She remembered Lauren from yesterday and was so kind. She's just Perfect! We ate Fish & Chips and PB&J's. We are now waking up from a nap so we can go eat again.....

Downtown Disney/Epcot Fireworks

Last night we enjoyed a quick evening downtown Disney. We shopped for a short while and Lauren rode the train, again. She likes riding in the caboose. We ate a very quick bite at McDonald's. We raced back to the Boardwalk so we can watch Epcot's fireworks. It is very cool to see them from our room balcony. It was very loud and Lauren was a little frightened. Once they were finished she wanted to see them again. It was fun!

Mary Poppins. Practically Perfect In Every Way!

It was so much fun. I think mommy enjoyed it more than the rest of the group. Mary Poppins was just waiting for us in the foyer at 1900 Park Fare. She greeted us with a smile. Of course Lauren was shy at first. Then we went in to eat the most excellent breakfast buffet here at Disney. The food was great. They had everying that had lots of calories. We enjoyed visits throughout the breakfast from Winne the Pooh, Eeyore, Alice from Wonderland and The Mad Hatter. Mad Matter, not so fun. I'm sure it was because we've never read or seen that movie. Most of Lauren's breakfast conversation was "Where is Burt? Oh, he's too dirty to join us for breakfast". Once we finished breakfast that was our first question to Mary Poppins when we left, who was waiting for us again at the door. Mary Poppins explained that Burt was working to make a living and couldn't join us. Did I mention that it was a great breakfast and Mary Poppins was there? :-) After we ate we jumped on the monorail to ride through Epcot. Pa was so generous he asked if we could ride in the front and guess what, we drove the monorail. We even got wings. It was really cool. We rode through Epcot and then we decided to take the Ferry Boat back to Magic Kingdom so we can jump on another boat back to the Grand Floridian. There we picked up our vehicle and came back to the hotel. Lauren decided she wanted to go swimming so we put on our suits and sunbathed. The pool was a little chilly but fun. She found a friend named Molly who was her size and they played for quite a while. She ate a PB&J and then we came up to take a nap. This is the first time mommy hadn't taken a nap. Daddy and Lauren are snoring...oh, well maybe it's just daddy. So, this morning we covered a lot: Mary Poppins, all Disney transportation and the pool. What else can we explore...

Great couple of days

We have had a lot of fun the past two days! On Sunday Grandpa Darr came over to visit. We went to Downtown Disney ate and shopped a little. It was great to see him after several months. Lauren had been asking for him for the past few months, but then turned shy when she saw him.

Sunday I did the family thing....which involved going out to eat instead of watching the Super Bowl!! Our hotel even had a giant screen setup on the boardwalk. We made it back in time for the fourth quarter so I saw the Steelers last score. Our meals were excellent (thanks Grandma Trankina!!). The rest of the lamo's had chicken, but I ordered an awesome Ahi Tuna dinner.

Yesterday we went to Animal Kingdom in the morning and Magic Kingdom at night. Lauren really enjoyed seeing all of the animals. She loves bats, but sadly only one was out when we went through their area (it was pretty cold still). We road the safari twice and went through both forest treks. The highlight of the day for the adults was riding Everest Expedition. It's a great new ride will encourage us to go to Darcee and Tom's favorite park!!

We went back to the hotel and took a nap in the afternoon and since it was such a nice day we took Lauren down to swim...it might have been a little chilly because she turned blue (we are going to try it again today)! After a warm bath we headed to MK and watched Spectromagic from the train station and the fireworks in front of the castle. Both were great!!!

Off to the Grand Floridian for breakfast with Mary Poppins!

More Sea World Pictures

Click for bigger images

Sea World pictures

Sea World

We woke up today to a very rainy day. Fortunately it stopped raining around 9:30 just as we got to the park. The park was pretty empty until the early afternoon so we were able to easily see everything we wanted to. Lauren loved the park! I think the penguins were probably her favorite, but she also really liked Shamu. The dinner with Shamu was very cool! The food was good and we got an up close look at 2 Killer Whales performing tricks.

Another highlight was feeding dolphins. We got to the dolphin area just in time for feeding. They sold little fish that you could feed to the dolphins. They were gross, but Lauren really enjoyed seeing them up close. Chris, Mom, and I all were able to rub the dolphins heads. Lauren was getting close to touching one when another one splashed us. That ended our feeding session as Lauren decided it was safer to watch a few feet back from the rail!

Pictures to come later...

Sea World here we come!

We made it down to safe and sound! Chris ended up getting a migraine and Lauren took a 3 hour nap so we didn't do to much tonight. We went to a huge mall (Millenia Mall) that had some crazy expensive shops in it (Keystone at the Crossing x25). Since Chris was back in the room recovering it was up to me to pick Lauren's dinner...so she had a hot dog and fried rice! :-)

Lauren is polishing off some ice cream and then we are off to bed before our big day with Shamu!!

What a week!

This week has just been crazy. We found out on Tuesday that Lauren needed to have new tubes put in her ears (the appointment was supposed to take an hour...instead it took three so I missed a few more hours of work that I couldn't really afford to miss). To make up time I stayed late at work Tuesday and missed most of the Illini's big win over Wisconsin. Chris took an extra day off today for Lauren's surgery and I left at 11. The surgery went great and Lauren's ears are now fixed up for another year!

Tom, Darcee, and Rachel had planned on coming down to for the weekend to surprise Mom and Dad. We had been planning it with them for several months, but unfortunately Rachel is sick and they had to cancel today. It really puts a damper on the trip because we were so excited to see them and go to Sea World together.

We still need to finish packing and cleaning so it looks like it will be another late night! We will try to put up a post everyday with a few pictures so everyone can see what we are up to.

Hair Cuts & Such...

Ok, I feel like I'm back in birthing classes as I'm doing breathing exercises just so I don't get overly stressed. Brad and I haven't even started packing. Yikes! Tonight we have hair cuts and hopefully get to the store to buy the rest of the stuff we need for vacation..that is everything. Lauren will appreciate having stuff to snack on in the airport and on the plane. I don't think peanuts will hold her over. Oh, I just thought about the airport amenities: hot chocolate. Yummy, I can't wait to have one Friday morning. :-) May be I'll purchase a banana to go along with that to make me feel health. 2 more days. I can't wait....