mickeysaver
<font color=blue>WINNER of the world's worst limer
- Joined
- Jun 2, 2002
Gabby and I took Layna, who is 14 months now, to the Magic Kingdom yesterday and oh what a day we had. We went with the intention of just getting around the park with her, meeting a few characters, and basically getting her used to her stroller, which she has never ridden in. We went well prepared with extra clothes, baby snacks, extra fluids, a couple of familiar and well loved toys, and a light, but very warm blanket. There was never a time when we said, "Oh man, I wish we had brought whatever." We got up at 5:20 am to let our dogs have a few minutes to go outside because we knew it was going to be a super long day. We had the stuff ready to load into the truck the night before, so we did that. I woke up the baby, changed the diaper, and loaded her sleepy little self into her car seat, and off we went. The baby slept most of the way there. We grabbed drive through breakfast and when we got to the TTC parking lot, we had the most excellent luck of second row down on the far end for the shortest walk possible to the TTC. Gabby and I stopped at Will Call for our FL AP's. 
We stopped to change the baby out of her PJ's and into a warm outfit at the TTC. We fed her some breakfast while we waited for the Ferry boat.
Once inside the MK, the crowds were not bad in the morning at all. We got a couple of PhotoPass pictures done with the castle in the background and headed to Adventure Land. That's where we were greeted with a 10 minute wait sign for the princesses.
We knew that meeting characters was going to be really hit or miss, so only waiting 10 minutes sounded like the best possible scenerio, if it was a failure. lol For Aurora, she was ok, but really was not sure what to do. Layna has never heard much about the character, so she had very few things for us to tell her to make her familiar with who the lady in the pink dress was. Layna looked puzzled and never smiled. Cinderella, we could reminder her of a few things from the books that we have read to her to help with her. Layna was fascinated with Cinderella's gloves. So, a tiny grin at best and then we were off to meet Belle, who again, Layna doesn't really know who she is, so we told her that Belle loves books as much as she does. Layna wanted to touch her hair. But, really didn't warm up to her much either. Ok, 3 face characters down with mixed results, but that's ok, I was hoping to make sure that she was warmed up for the big one later. Down the way we went and stumbled across a 15 minute wait for Jasmine & Aladdin to appear with us being the first in line. Totally worked out well again, two characters at once and they were both characters that we had talked to Layna about in books. We showed her some of the merchandise that had Jasmine & Aladdin riding on the magic carpet, just like the last page of her favorite little book about them. She loved watching the Magic Carpet ride as we waited. Jasmine & Aladdin came out and we had them all to ourselves for a good 5 to 10 minutes. Layna did really well with both of them. Big smiles in the pictures. Totally was finding her usually hammy side when the camera started clicking. Excellent! Ok, so we decided that we would have to take her on at least one ride, so we looked and there was a 10 minute wait for the Magic Carpets. Perfect! I took pictures of her from the front seat during the ride. She was a little uncertain about what was happening, but once we circled around and started going higher, the giggles and smiles kept going. Perfect introduction to Disney rides. 
We took a potty & diaper change break and tested out a fuzzy character meet. Frontier Donald had a short line. I figured since he was short that he would be about the least of the bunch to freak her out. It worked out perfectly. She was fascinated by his bill. The pictures show her smiling at him quite a bit. It was another good character experience.
Finally, we headed over to the one thing we were most hoping would go well, which was her meeting with Princess Tiana. The line had just closed, but there was only one family waiting and Tiana and Naveen would be back in 20. We decided to wait. They went by us on their way off stage and we told Layna to look. She blew them kisses. OMG, perfect! She wanted to go see them immediately, but we told her that they would be back and we would play and wait. Several distractions and a little walking around later and it was almost magic time. Layna knows who Princess Tiana is not only because she is 3/4 African American, but because we love the character and the fact that her dreams came true through hard work rather than some stupid prince coming in and sweeping her off of her feet. Layna's room is done in a Princess & the Frog theme with beautiful soft green walls, white Nantucket style furniture, some beautiful accent pieces from the Magic Garden collection, which features a crowned frog with lots of pretty pastel colors along with bright flowers and bugs. Overall, it's just the cutest room little girls room that I have ever seen. There are lots of Princess Tiana dolls, Princess Tiana bedding, a Princess Tiana lamp, and more than a few Princess Tiana books. Needless to say, Layna knew who Princess Tiana was, afterall, she had been kissing her toys and blankets with her face on them for months.
Magic time! Tiana and Naveen said that they were glad that we waited because she was such a beautiful baby and so sweet because she was blowing them kisses. Layna toddled right up to Tiana and gave her a big hug. (melt) Layna showed Tiana and Naveen her favorite frog, Shaky, and the pictures that the PhotoPass people took were priceless. I had no intentions of buying a PhotoPass CD, but I have to now. When Layna left, she dropped Shaky, and Tiana brought it to her at her stroller. Layna wanted Tiana to pick her up, but of course she couldn't, but she was so sweet with her. I just couldn't imagine a more magical character encounter.
Layna really didn't want to be in the stroller, so for the first time ever, we let her walk through a crowded area. Gabby pushed the stroller and I rolling along on the ecv, held her little hand and lead her from Liberty Square all the way to The Plaza where we had our lunch ADR. She moved slow, which was expected, but did a great job of holding my hand. We had a great lunch, most of which Layna decided to wear, as expected, and afterwards, it was clothes changing time again, this time into something cooler. Layna was so tired, but was really fighting going to sleep. We took her through Tomorrowland where she got to see Chip & Dale and Buzz from a distance. She was cranky and we were not going to push it. We headed up to Fantasyland and Layna was starting to hit close to meltdown stage. We decided to head back and make use of the baby care center. By the time we got there, she was so close to asleep that we just decided to keep walking and let her zonk out on her own, which she did. While she was asleep, we went to the PhotoPass center and looked at all of the photos of the day. It became apparent that buying the CD was not an option, but a must do. We kept on walking around and window shopping. Layna walked around a bit more while holding my hand. The crowds got pretty busy as the day wore on, but we had to stay until 4 pm at the very least, because we had an appointment for Layna at the Barber Shop to get her first haircut. On the way there, Jim the piano player was playing outside of Casey's. Layna was totally digging on the piano music. She watched him intently and started to wiggle her fingers like she was playing the piano like he was. It was so cute. He even played a really neat version of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star that was mixed in with When You Wish Upon a Star. Really a beautiful piece and Layna loved every note, especially the one that Gabby got to play.
I had secretly hoped that Michal would be the one to do Layna's haircut. I had seen him on the Disney Blog or something where he was talking about working there for 14 years. He looked like family and I just wanted him to be the one. We were blessed to have the luck of indeed having Michal do her haircut. He was so great with her. He covered her in Mickey stickers before doing anything. She was so engrossed in the stickers that she had no clue that she was getting a haircut. Her wild little afro was tamed and she now has a perfect little coif. If it was possible to make this baby any prettier, he managed to find the magic to make it happen. Gabby and I waited our turn as walk in customers and Michal cut our hair too. I like what he did for my hair. It's close to usual, but a little different. Gabby's while hair looks much better trimmed up too. Someday soon, she wants to get it bleached blonde like Guy Fieri's, but that's a different story.
Layna picked out a Duffy the Disney Bear to have as her toy of the day. She promptly started kissing his nose, so we knew that he was the one. She took another nap after we had our dinner at Peco's Bills. We window shopped some more and just enjoyed being at the park. We changed the baby back into her super warm PJ's since the temps dropped again and she was starting to get cold arms and legs in her little kitty Marie romper. We decided to stay to see the guest photos projected onto the castle. Gabby wanted to see it. I have seen stuff on YouTube about it, so I didn't really care, but it was ok. Layna enjoyed the lights of the Main Street Electrical Parade. The place was so jammed up, that we decided just to hang out through Wishes. We both love it, but fireworks and toddlers do not always mix well, but I hoped for the best. I have loved fireworks my entire life. From 7 months of age when I was first treated to fourth of July fireworks to present, I have never seen a show where there were too many fireworks. I just really love them and I had wanted Layna to love them too, since we will be taking her to the parks for many years to come. Layna had spent most of the day out of the stroller in Gabby's arms because of the safety issue of having an additional rider on a scooter, but since I was stationary, I took Layna right before the fireworks began. Her hands were ice cold, but she had been refusing to be under the blanket, so I was not surprised. I held her in my arms holding/warming each hand in mine. She laid back on me with her head resting on my right shoulder. She didn't flinch at all. She had a sweet little smile on her face the entire time. I did oohs and aahs for the big pretty stuff and she seemed to have enjoyed them, as she voluntarily clapped at the end of the scenes. It was a sweet shared moment of Disney magic that I will never forget.
We headed home after that. The baby was out like a light before we even got off Disney property. We arrived home about 11:30pm to the pleasant surprise of no doggie accidents in any of the crates. The baby barely flinched or wiggled as I changed her diaper and tucked her into bed.
Overall, I can't remember a more magical day at WDW. It was the perfect first visit for Layna and a great first visit as AP holders for us.
We stopped to change the baby out of her PJ's and into a warm outfit at the TTC. We fed her some breakfast while we waited for the Ferry boat.Once inside the MK, the crowds were not bad in the morning at all. We got a couple of PhotoPass pictures done with the castle in the background and headed to Adventure Land. That's where we were greeted with a 10 minute wait sign for the princesses.
We knew that meeting characters was going to be really hit or miss, so only waiting 10 minutes sounded like the best possible scenerio, if it was a failure. lol For Aurora, she was ok, but really was not sure what to do. Layna has never heard much about the character, so she had very few things for us to tell her to make her familiar with who the lady in the pink dress was. Layna looked puzzled and never smiled. Cinderella, we could reminder her of a few things from the books that we have read to her to help with her. Layna was fascinated with Cinderella's gloves. So, a tiny grin at best and then we were off to meet Belle, who again, Layna doesn't really know who she is, so we told her that Belle loves books as much as she does. Layna wanted to touch her hair. But, really didn't warm up to her much either. Ok, 3 face characters down with mixed results, but that's ok, I was hoping to make sure that she was warmed up for the big one later. Down the way we went and stumbled across a 15 minute wait for Jasmine & Aladdin to appear with us being the first in line. Totally worked out well again, two characters at once and they were both characters that we had talked to Layna about in books. We showed her some of the merchandise that had Jasmine & Aladdin riding on the magic carpet, just like the last page of her favorite little book about them. She loved watching the Magic Carpet ride as we waited. Jasmine & Aladdin came out and we had them all to ourselves for a good 5 to 10 minutes. Layna did really well with both of them. Big smiles in the pictures. Totally was finding her usually hammy side when the camera started clicking. Excellent! Ok, so we decided that we would have to take her on at least one ride, so we looked and there was a 10 minute wait for the Magic Carpets. Perfect! I took pictures of her from the front seat during the ride. She was a little uncertain about what was happening, but once we circled around and started going higher, the giggles and smiles kept going. Perfect introduction to Disney rides. We took a potty & diaper change break and tested out a fuzzy character meet. Frontier Donald had a short line. I figured since he was short that he would be about the least of the bunch to freak her out. It worked out perfectly. She was fascinated by his bill. The pictures show her smiling at him quite a bit. It was another good character experience.
Finally, we headed over to the one thing we were most hoping would go well, which was her meeting with Princess Tiana. The line had just closed, but there was only one family waiting and Tiana and Naveen would be back in 20. We decided to wait. They went by us on their way off stage and we told Layna to look. She blew them kisses. OMG, perfect! She wanted to go see them immediately, but we told her that they would be back and we would play and wait. Several distractions and a little walking around later and it was almost magic time. Layna knows who Princess Tiana is not only because she is 3/4 African American, but because we love the character and the fact that her dreams came true through hard work rather than some stupid prince coming in and sweeping her off of her feet. Layna's room is done in a Princess & the Frog theme with beautiful soft green walls, white Nantucket style furniture, some beautiful accent pieces from the Magic Garden collection, which features a crowned frog with lots of pretty pastel colors along with bright flowers and bugs. Overall, it's just the cutest room little girls room that I have ever seen. There are lots of Princess Tiana dolls, Princess Tiana bedding, a Princess Tiana lamp, and more than a few Princess Tiana books. Needless to say, Layna knew who Princess Tiana was, afterall, she had been kissing her toys and blankets with her face on them for months.
Magic time! Tiana and Naveen said that they were glad that we waited because she was such a beautiful baby and so sweet because she was blowing them kisses. Layna toddled right up to Tiana and gave her a big hug. (melt) Layna showed Tiana and Naveen her favorite frog, Shaky, and the pictures that the PhotoPass people took were priceless. I had no intentions of buying a PhotoPass CD, but I have to now. When Layna left, she dropped Shaky, and Tiana brought it to her at her stroller. Layna wanted Tiana to pick her up, but of course she couldn't, but she was so sweet with her. I just couldn't imagine a more magical character encounter.
Layna really didn't want to be in the stroller, so for the first time ever, we let her walk through a crowded area. Gabby pushed the stroller and I rolling along on the ecv, held her little hand and lead her from Liberty Square all the way to The Plaza where we had our lunch ADR. She moved slow, which was expected, but did a great job of holding my hand. We had a great lunch, most of which Layna decided to wear, as expected, and afterwards, it was clothes changing time again, this time into something cooler. Layna was so tired, but was really fighting going to sleep. We took her through Tomorrowland where she got to see Chip & Dale and Buzz from a distance. She was cranky and we were not going to push it. We headed up to Fantasyland and Layna was starting to hit close to meltdown stage. We decided to head back and make use of the baby care center. By the time we got there, she was so close to asleep that we just decided to keep walking and let her zonk out on her own, which she did. While she was asleep, we went to the PhotoPass center and looked at all of the photos of the day. It became apparent that buying the CD was not an option, but a must do. We kept on walking around and window shopping. Layna walked around a bit more while holding my hand. The crowds got pretty busy as the day wore on, but we had to stay until 4 pm at the very least, because we had an appointment for Layna at the Barber Shop to get her first haircut. On the way there, Jim the piano player was playing outside of Casey's. Layna was totally digging on the piano music. She watched him intently and started to wiggle her fingers like she was playing the piano like he was. It was so cute. He even played a really neat version of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star that was mixed in with When You Wish Upon a Star. Really a beautiful piece and Layna loved every note, especially the one that Gabby got to play.
I had secretly hoped that Michal would be the one to do Layna's haircut. I had seen him on the Disney Blog or something where he was talking about working there for 14 years. He looked like family and I just wanted him to be the one. We were blessed to have the luck of indeed having Michal do her haircut. He was so great with her. He covered her in Mickey stickers before doing anything. She was so engrossed in the stickers that she had no clue that she was getting a haircut. Her wild little afro was tamed and she now has a perfect little coif. If it was possible to make this baby any prettier, he managed to find the magic to make it happen. Gabby and I waited our turn as walk in customers and Michal cut our hair too. I like what he did for my hair. It's close to usual, but a little different. Gabby's while hair looks much better trimmed up too. Someday soon, she wants to get it bleached blonde like Guy Fieri's, but that's a different story.
Layna picked out a Duffy the Disney Bear to have as her toy of the day. She promptly started kissing his nose, so we knew that he was the one. She took another nap after we had our dinner at Peco's Bills. We window shopped some more and just enjoyed being at the park. We changed the baby back into her super warm PJ's since the temps dropped again and she was starting to get cold arms and legs in her little kitty Marie romper. We decided to stay to see the guest photos projected onto the castle. Gabby wanted to see it. I have seen stuff on YouTube about it, so I didn't really care, but it was ok. Layna enjoyed the lights of the Main Street Electrical Parade. The place was so jammed up, that we decided just to hang out through Wishes. We both love it, but fireworks and toddlers do not always mix well, but I hoped for the best. I have loved fireworks my entire life. From 7 months of age when I was first treated to fourth of July fireworks to present, I have never seen a show where there were too many fireworks. I just really love them and I had wanted Layna to love them too, since we will be taking her to the parks for many years to come. Layna had spent most of the day out of the stroller in Gabby's arms because of the safety issue of having an additional rider on a scooter, but since I was stationary, I took Layna right before the fireworks began. Her hands were ice cold, but she had been refusing to be under the blanket, so I was not surprised. I held her in my arms holding/warming each hand in mine. She laid back on me with her head resting on my right shoulder. She didn't flinch at all. She had a sweet little smile on her face the entire time. I did oohs and aahs for the big pretty stuff and she seemed to have enjoyed them, as she voluntarily clapped at the end of the scenes. It was a sweet shared moment of Disney magic that I will never forget.
We headed home after that. The baby was out like a light before we even got off Disney property. We arrived home about 11:30pm to the pleasant surprise of no doggie accidents in any of the crates. The baby barely flinched or wiggled as I changed her diaper and tucked her into bed.
Overall, I can't remember a more magical day at WDW. It was the perfect first visit for Layna and a great first visit as AP holders for us.
Thanks for sharing!!
