I'm going to have to make this really snappy if I plan to get all of these in by July.
Disclaimer #1: I don't want to harp on this, but just in case anyone is just joining us... Belle was diagnosed with Sensory Processing Disorder when she was 4 years old. We took this trip just before her 3rd birthday. It was this trip when we noticed something was 'off' with our daughter. Because of this, Belle has a hard time processing sound (everything is very loud) and she gets overwhelmed very easily. Now that she is 7 (and with therapy) she really doesn't struggle anymore. But at age 3... I didn't know if we were going to make it out of our house.
Day 2
HS was the bust of the century! From the moment we walked in Belle was overwhelmed and shut down on us. She wouldn't ride anything and screamed her way out of the Beauty and the Beast show.
Our happy moment occurred when Belle and I went to find a quite spot on the side of 'The Chinese Theater' while Gregg rode GMR. It didn't occur to me that it was where the characters came in and out. Minnie was finishing up her meet and greet and stumbled upon us. She spent about 5 minutes alone with Belle talking and hugging. I didn't ask to take pictures because I knew her set was up. Eventually a rush of tourist came running over and Minnie said farewell with a big kiss.
Akershus went well, but I will spare you all of the princess pictures because that's basically all this trip will consist of.
Day 3
Hoping for a better day, we loaded up and headed to the Magic Kingdom.
We started with Small World and she hated it. She told us she was scared of the 'maskers'. A word which is still passed around (with giggles) to this day.
The teacups and carousel were a hit.
And that was it... for the trip... she liked TWO rides.
We've called Belle 'Tinkerbelle' since birth, so we were so excited to see them meet for the first time.
We met several other characters to pass the time / feel like we were shelling out money for something.
I got the bright idea to buy her suckers to take on the rides to try and distract her from being scared.
*Disclaimer 2* So unbeknown to us at the time, Belle is totally allergic to artificial colors. Not only do they not digest, but they maximize her sensory issues. (Way to go, us!!!)
That night we had dinner at O'Hana and played on the beach for a while.
Then we headed over to Magic Kingdom and parked ourselves on the curb and hour early to get front row seats for the parade. (You can probably guess where this is headed....)
Between the lights, the loud sounds and the stinking Queen of Hearts the parade was a total disaster. Sadly, we were so deep into the crowd that we couldn't remove her from the situation. Alice (in Wonderland) was very concerned and kept waving and trying to make Belle smile.
It did draw a smile and we bought an Alice costume a few days later.
The highlight of the night, would definitely be the consequences of the red, sugar free sucker which refused to go down without a fight and came back up the same color (if not brighter) than it went down.
Disney dreams are made of this, guys....