Epcot, Walt Disney World, Disney, Flowers

Gather round the laptop kiddos and let me tell you about my mini vacation!

Seriously, I am going to do this old school style. Pretend you are sitting in my living room and I have a box of slides out from my last vacation. Sure it’s annoying, but about 50% of these pictures wouldn’t make sense if I didn’t explain them… so here we go!

p.s. all photos (and video) were taken on my iphone and most were edited using instagram app

Last weekend Jorge and I went to Orlando to Food Blog Forum! It’s one of my favorite food conferences and this was actually my 3rd time attending one (I also blogged about the one in October in Nashville!). This year it was organized by my girl Julie of The Little Kitchen! Thanks for throwing the best FBF yet Julie!

FBF was actually sponsored by Walt Disney World this year and we were invited to bring our family along to join in the fun! Bean was all packed up and ready to go…but I had to explain that Disney didn’t actually count him as a child.

This is me at 8 am with a real Mexican Coke. It’s an addiction, don’t judge.

We finally got to the hotel (Disney’s Polynesian Resort) and couldn’t believe all the beautiful trees they had blooming. This bright yellow tree was right outside our window!

Then we headed off to the parks in search of sugar. I can only go a few hours before I need my fix.

Later that night we hooked up with the amazing Tina from My Life As A Mrs and her husband Mike.

Our first stop in Epcot was to Mexico!

We had dinner in Mexico (in Epcot at the San Angel Inn)! The boys worked on their budding bromance and Tina and I ate our way through a giant bowl of guacamole. 🙂

After dinner we rode Soarin’ and went back to the hotel to get ready for the conference on Saturday morning.

Your Food Story: Todd and Diane of White On Rice Couple kicked off the conference with a session on food photography. They made me laugh and cry and really think about what I am saying with my photos. They are my photography idols!

PRspectives: Rachel (of KitchenAid), Jaden (of Steamy Kitchen), Arianna (of Oxo) & Thomas (for Disney) talked about working with brands. In the end the biggest takeaway… Brands want to work with you! Reach out to them!

How to Write Bigger, Better, More Badass Food Posts : Daivd Leite is a badass. He started his session by saying “I’m on stage and there’s a disco ball, I’m home.” …and it only got better from there.

He also made us swear to start using other words for delicious. I’m trying David, I’m trying!

The amazing Chefs at Disney threw a swanky lunch party in the Epcot World Showplace.

The food was delicious and so not what you would expect from a theme park….but then again, Disney isn’t a normal theme park. 😉

Saturday night Jorge and I headed over to Magic Kingdom and we caught this view as we were running inside for the fireworks.

We rode the teacups and I made Jorge spin us as fast as he could…

…which was apparently a little too fast….

 

…but don’t worry, I caught it all on video for you. 🙂

 

P.S. For all the BBT fans: You can buy Jorge’s BAZINGA shirt off amazon for 17.95.  

Sunday morning we had a delicious brunch sponsored by Whole Foods in Orlando. The food was perfect, the mimosas were exactly what I needed,  but the company was better! Above is Tina (My Life As A Mrs), Julie (Table For Two), Katie (Katie’s Cucina) & Suzanne (Koko Cooks)

After brunch we started the drive back to Jacksonville. We put the top down and took the back roads through the Ocala National Forest.

It was a gorgeous day and the drive was the perfect way to unwind from the busy, no sleep weekend!

Well…that and sleeping in on Monday morning.