Disney is for Big Kids too/Time to Leave the "Happiest Place on Earth"

Since it was our last night in Orlando, Lattie, Michael and I went back to Magic Kingdom after the kids got ready for bed. The guys wanted to ride Space Mountain and the Seven Dwarfs Mine Train and those were incredibly long lines to stand in when the kids couldn't ride those rides.

Our first stop was to see what Fast Passes might be available. If we had been smart, we would have stopped and done this as we were leaving that afternoon. There wasn't a lot to choose from but we got a fast pass for Pirates of the Caribbean and Jungle Cruise. From there we headed to Space Mountain. It says it was an 80 minute wait, but that was something we wanted to do before leaving so we waited it out. As we got into line, two girls pushed past us and said that they were joining the rest of their group. (There's a point to this . . .hang on for it!) We stood and talked in line for a long time, but it was nice to just catch up and talk without having to focus on what little ones were doing. As we got near the front of the line, a cast member came by and said she was looking for a group of 3 to go to the front of the line. Well, wouldn't you know that we got to go to the front of the line . . .right in front of those girls that cut in line earlier. I think that was Michael's favorite part of the trip!! :) 

After that, we walked over to see about riding the Seven Dwarfs Mine Train. It was broken down and they were going to close it for the night, so I guess that one will have to wait until  our next trip to Disney. Maybe it won't be so new then. .. we'll see! We went over and rode Big Thunder Mountain Railroad. We got ready to ride and had to wait a round because a child had thrown up on the ride just as we were supposed to get on. ;)

We rode Pirates next and it was fine. I'm glad we didn't take the kids because I just don't think they would have been very entertained.

Then we rode Jungle Cruise. I'm so glad we didn't wait in line with the kids to do this. It was such a waste of time. Especially after going to Animal Kingdom and actually seeing most of these animals live. But at least we can say we did it!

After that, we decided to try the Dole Whip. Everything I had read about this says that it is a must-have at Disney. Well, I have to tell you, that I could have done without! I should have asked to walk back to Gaston's Tavern and get a giant cinnamon roll, but oh well . . .I think Lattie enjoyed his though!

 Pictures before we left 

We decided that we had ridden about all we could so we headed back home to get a little sleep before leaving the next day. We got up and got the cars loaded and checked out and headed for breakfast at Cracker Barrel. These two guys enjoyed the rockers and the checkers on the way out.

We drove and watched movies, getting stuck in some bad traffic due to a wreck. It took us about an hour longer than it should have to get to Jacksonville where stopped for lunch at an Olive Garden. The boys enjoyed eating their "noonles" - so cute!

After lunch, there was a mall across the street so we went to walk around and stretch our legs. We thought we might be able to see the Easter Bunny, but he was taking too long to get there so we just got back in the car. We drove/watched movies again until dinner time when we finally hit Savannah. The kids were really getting restless at this point, so we decided to stop for the evening. I pricelined our hotel again and we ended up at the same place. We did try this place called "B & D Burgers" and it was really good. They had some delicious fried pickles, which I love. Of course, it turns out that everyone in our family loves them too. . . so I didn't get to eat as many as I would have liked. :)

It's hard to see, but they had these Crocodiles on the back of the booths which the boys loved. It's hard to see it in the sun, but I included this picture because of Charlie's sweet little face.

After dinner, it was time to crash in the hotel . . .  

We got up the next morning and drove all the way home. It was such a wonderful trip and I'm so glad that we did it. Sure, it was expensive and it will be a long time before we can do something like that again, but we made some wonderful memories. The kids are still talking about what we did two weeks later!! I am so grateful that my parents and brother were able to come with us too. Not only did it help having extra hands, but I love that we got to share all of these experiences with them. Our trip also made me excited for all the fun times that our family will continue to have. Some of my greatest memories/experiences in my life were on trips that my family made as I was a child. My parents did such an amazing job of making sure we saw a great deal of this wonderful country we live in as well as experienced many different types of culture, history, art, and great food. But as wonderful as those experiences were, the best part was the time spent with family. We can still laugh over different inside jokes from many years ago!! I can't wait to do the same for my children.

Magic Kingdom Part 2

You can't do everything at the Magic Kingdom in one day, so Wednesday was our second day to go play. (Actually, you could probably spend 3 or 4 days at the Magic Kingdom before you could actually do it ALL, but two days was sufficient for our group.)

Riding the monorail to Disney!!

We started our day early again . . . it really was the best plan for our family. Once we got into the park, we took another picture in front of the castle  - this time with EVERYONE. :)

We got one with Grammy and Poppa and the kids too. :)

The photographer asked if Lucy wanted to take a special picture and had her hold her hands out. When we got our pictures from Disney, look who was sitting in her hands!!

This pictures amazed Lucy!! She was so excited about this little bit of Disney magic. :)

We talked about riding the train from Main Street to Fantasy Land, but once we found out that it didn't start up until 9 AM, we decided to just walk ourselves. Since we didn't get to do Enchanted Tales with Belle on Monday, we headed there first to avoid the long lines. It was great because we got to walk right in and do it immediately - no fast pass needed! (Made me super excited because we got to do it without waiting AND we ended up with a fast pass to see Elsa and Anna!!! Double win!!)

When you begin the "experience" (it's not really a ride), you walk into Belle's cottage and then into Maurice's workshop. The magic mirror transforms into a door (cool special effects!) and you enter into the castle and meet the wardrobe. She assigns parts for everyone that wants one and a few to people who don't! ;) Uncle Lattie and Poppa went and hid at the back of the group, close to the door but they ended up being chosen to play the suits of armor. Lucy got to be a dancing plate, Alex was the footstool, and Charlie was an enchanted portrait. The boys weren't too thrilled with their characters (especially Charlie!), but I think it's because they wanted to go ride a ride rather than sit and listen to Belle. But they were cooperative enough so that Lucy could enjoy what she wanted this time. 

Everyone acts out the story and if you had a special part, they tell you where to move and what to say with Belle. At the end, they take photos of everyone.

Lucy and Belle

Uncle Lattie, the knight

Poppa, the knight

Lattie kept joking about meeting up with Belle later that evening ;) 

We got a picture with the boys . . . they could have cared less though! :)

After Belle, Lucy said that she wanted to meet Ariel. The sign said it was a 20 minute wait and we knew there was no way the boys were going to wait in line when they were ready to ride a ride. So Poppa, Uncle Lattie and Daddy took the boys to drive the cars in the Tomorrow Land Speedway and Grammy, Lucy and I waited in line. The line took us more like 40 minutes and Lucy was ready to leave a couple of times where we were waiting. But we finally made it to see Ariel and it was definitely worth it. I think these pictures are some of the cutest ones we have of Lucy with a princess! :)

So while we were waiting in line, the boys got to drive the cars twice! :)

Getting ready to ride

It almost looks like Uncle Lattie is riding by himself, but if you look closely, you can see a little head of brown hair. :)

Poppa and Alex getting ready to ride

Uncle Lattie said that Charlie has a ways to go before becoming a good driver. At least he's got a few more years to practice. It will probably help when he is tall enough to see over the steering wheel. :)

Lattie and Charlie driving:

After the cars, the guys went to go see the Monsters Inc Laugh Floor show. While they were in the show, we finished up with our visit with Ariel and rather than sit and wait, Lucy wanted to ride the People Mover again. :)

Our first Fast Pass for the Day was the Buzz Lightyear ride, but we had about 10 minutes to kill before it was our turn to ride. And who happened to show up for photos right at that time? Why, Buzz Lightyear himself!!!! We had two excited little boys . . . Lucy liked him too. :)

Charlie had a high five for Buzz

So did Alex

The kids loved the way that Buzz stamped all of their autograph books super quick. :) He made quite a show!!

After hugs for Buzz, we headed over to the Buzz Lightyear Space Ranger's Spin. Everyone seemed to enjoy shooting their laser guns. The boys would say, "Pew Pew!" as they fired. Alex rode with Uncle Lattie and I and his favorite part was making the car spin round and round. But he managed a pretty decent score anyway (with a little help) :)

They took pictures on the ride as well.

After our fun with Buzz, we headed back into Fantasy Land because our next Fast Pass was at Peter Pan's Flight. We had a little time to kill, so we went to Poppa's all-time favorite ride, "It's a Small World." :) I don't think you can go to Disney World without riding this ride at least once! The line moved quickly and once we got in our boat, I was amazed how mesmerized the kids were! Charlie sat so still during the ride!!! He was very excited when we got to the children in Africa and there were "ra ras" (Giraffes) eating leaves from the trees. Alex enjoyed it and it wasn't until about the last two rooms we rode through that he started getting a little restless. (The ride is 11 minutes long after all. . . that's a long time for a 2 year old to sit still!) But he soon discovered that if he sat on my lap, he could reach down and touch the water.  

We still had about a 10 minute window before Peter Pan so we decided to ride the Carousel again. This time, Poppa rode with us. :)

We rode Peter Pan and everyone enjoyed sailing in their flying boats as well as seeing all the "Pee-pites" (pirates) and the "croc-croc" (Crocodile). We had rented the movie to watch in the car, but hadn't seen it yet, so I don't know that the boys (or Lucy for that matter) really got a lot out of the ride since they didn't know the story. But they do like Jake and the Neverland Pirates so they at least knew who Captain Hook was. I enjoyed the ride though . . . since it is exactly the same as it was when I rode it as a child. :) I am glad we had a Fast Pass for this ride though because the standby line was always at least an hour or more. I never did understand that since it should keep moving on through. As much as I enjoy that ride, I definitely wouldn't have waited an hour or more!

After that ride, Lucy, Grammy and Poppa headed to the Be Our Guest Restaurant. When we were planning the trip, Lucy had said that was the one place she wanted to eat. So in our planning, I tried to make all of her wishes come true. After all, it may be a while until we get back to Disney. . . and when you're at Disney, you should be able to have your dreams come true! (Within reason!!) Since the restaurant is still so new, you have to have a reservation even for their quick service lunch. I wasn't able to get a reservation for eight but I could do one for three. 

I asked Lucy to describe her experience for me. . . here's what she says:

   " When we walked in, we waited in line and there were knight saying stuff and I couldn't tell which side was talking. It was a lot of things. Then we went up to the lady that was behind the computer and she gave us a magic rose since we didn't have a magic band. We went into a room to order our food. Then we walked into the ballroom. We waited for our food. Then someone came to our table with our food. They had a cool way to hold the food. And then we ate. I had Maurice's Macaroni. I also had peach applesauce and to drink, I had apple juice. It was yummy; I liked the whole grain macaroni and the peach applesauce. Grammy had the carved turkey sandwich. I can't remember what Poppa had. For dessert, I had the triple chocolate cupcake. Poppa and Grammy split their dessert but I can't remember what it's called. I brought Mommy and Daddy the Master Cupcake with Lumiere's 'grey stuff.' I liked the Be Our Guest restaurant. It was my favorite place to eat because it had yummy food and I like how it was decorated."

 

Mommy and Daddy enjoyed eating our cupcake. :) While they were eating there, the rest of us went to Liberty Square and ate at the Columbia Harbour House. The boys enjoyed eating their food in big boy chairs as opposed to high chairs and everyone ate very well. I had another frozen lemonade . . . oh, how I love those! After we were done, we started walking around and walked past where Tiana was scheduled to arrive at 1:00. Alex and Charlie have quite the obsession with Tiana. Lucy has a little Tiana doll that they play with and even though we've never seen the movie, they still love her. It was around 12:30 so we just decided to go ahead and wait in line since we would be in the shade. Lucy joined us when she had finished her lunch and then Tiana came!!

                                                   

Look at that grin!

                                                   

Everyone got autographs!

                                    

                                    

We all sat down and told Tiana about our day while she signed autographs.

                                    

                                                    

The boys picked up leaves off the ground to add to the leaves on Tiana's dress. 

Someday Alex will be very embarrassed by his hand placement while posing with his favorite princess. ;)

Hugs for Tiana - you can see the leaves the boys gave her on her dress.

The boys loved giving Tiana hugs. 

After they gave hugs, they even went back for kisses. You can tell they really loved Tiana because they didn't do that for any of the other princesses! :)

Our final fast pass for the day was the Haunted Mansion. I wasn't sure about this ride because I didn't want it to be too scary for Lucy. We watched the ride on YouTube and she was excited about it. She especially liked at the beginning where the portraits move and you can see the guy in his underwear. :) She was also a fan of the ghost sitting in your car at the end of the ride. It was really dark inside the ride. . . darker even then I would have thought so it was hard to see! The boys didn't seem to care one way or the other. . . just as long as the car kept moving!

 It was really hot outside by this time, so standing in line was not easy. .. but it didn't take too long to get to ride The Magic Carpets of Aladdin.

Charlie is in the carpet with them. . . it is not just two bros handing out, riding magic carpets together.

Alex and Lucy rode with me. They took turns making the carpet go up and down and were really excited when the camel spit on us with water!!

It was about that time of day where we had experienced all the fun we could. Michael and I took the boys to go pick out a souvenir from our trip and Grammy and Poppa took Lucy. The boys had decided after seeing the toys in Tomorrow Land that they wanted a Buzz Lightyear. I asked them about other toys and every time, the response was the same - "BUZZ!!" 

Grammy and Poppa brought Lucy back with a princess Rapunzel hat. . . . the pointy kind with the flowing fabric from behind. . . the same kind of princess hat that I wanted as a child. Don't worry - Lucy told me I could borrow hers. ;)

Before we left, we went to ride the people mover one more time. :)

 The monorail wasn't working so we rode the ferry boat back to the parking lot. 

 It was about 4:00 by the time we got loaded up in the car and ready to leave. We didn't go to a parade or fireworks or any other shows. There were many rides we didn't ride, but none that the kids had asked for. I'm sure that we could have spent another day just at the Magic Kingdom and still found plenty to do. But as you can see, we had a very full and fun trip. What a great age this was to take our kids to Disney!! (Of course, is there really a bad age to go to Disney???) Everyone had fun and even though we had few little tantrums along the way, it always got resolved and everyone had a great time.

Up Next: Disney is for big kids too and time to leave the "Happiest Place on Earth"