Family of 6, 24 hours in the car, and the race to beat the blizzard - 12/18/16 trip

Yay! I'm all caught up. I just found your report and I'm loving it! Your kids are adorable! I have a DD 6 and 7 who are going on their first trip in February, they don't know. It's great to see another family with kids a similar age, who dealt with some of the things i know I'm gong to deal with. Makes me feel like i'm not alone :rotfl2:. Y'all had a very productive Epcot day. I can't wait to hear all about your MK day.

I love seeing y'alls shirts. I have a Silhouette machine and I'm making all of our shirt for our trip. I can't wait to see what other shirts you made. Keep it coming.

The silhouette machine is so fun!!!! The shirts looked professional, we got lots of comments on them. I tried to find clearance shirts at target so overall the shirts were inexpensive to make, compared to buying them on Etsy which is going to cost us 20-25$ per shirt. For 6 people in our family, we just couldn't swing that! Plus I enjoy being crafty. :)

Thanks for reading!
 
It's Magic Kingdom day!!!!

I will get a start on the day but I'm sure I won't make it very far. I took a LOT of pictures! :rolleyes1

As I mentioned before, MK opened at 7 am on Tuesday for EMH and I intended to be there by 6:30! Our plan for the day was to hit everything hard from 7-12, and then head back to our room for naps and quiet time. We didn't have any table service meals that day, so no reservations to work around, but we had fast passes for Peter Pan, Enchanted Tales with Belle, and Thunder Mountain in the evening.

We actually had another MK day scheduled for Thursday, so we don't have to get to EVERYTHING today, which takes some pressure off for sure.
So, I set my alarm for 5 am but I really had trouble sleeping because I was too excited! I love MK. :love: Plus I was worried about oversleeping so I just kept waking up and checking the time. Ugh!

We wore coordinating shirts for the day, also made by me and my friend on the silhouette. I let everyone pick the character they wanted. I couldn't bring myself to pick a favorite character, because I love them all, so I used the castle for my shirt.
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I wasn't really sure what the bus schedule was going to be like that morning, because I kept reading different things. It sounded like buses usually start running around 7 am but on EMH days they will start running an hour earlier, so my goal was to be to the bus stop by 6. Despite my previous trips to MK, I have never once seen the welcome show and I was dead set that it was going to happen this time!

The kids were definitely tired and I had to wake them all up, but they were excited and got dressed quickly. We were at the bus stop by probably 5:50! It was pitch dark out! There was one other family with all adults waiting there.

There was nothing listed on the bus schedule and we waited and waited and waited. The other family who was there was getting really upset. They even made some calls to try and figure out where the buses were. It finally showed up on the schedule that the bus would be there by 6:22. This was definitely disappointing to me, as it's a solid 30 minute bus ride from CBR to MK and I really wanted to see the welcome show!

The bus finally showed up around 6:20 or so and we got to MK around 6:45. We really had to rush through security and check-in and I think the kids were feeling our stress. My 4YO started having a huge tantrum (something to do with the stroller, but I can't remember now... like the baby had taken his side or something??) and I was trying so hard just to calm him down that I didn't really get to watch the welcome show as much as I wanted to. :sad: But it was ok!

They let us in and my 7YO, who seriously has the biggest bladder and NEVER needs to go to the bathroom, chose that moment to desperately need to use the bathroom!! Arghh!! So our first stop at MK was the BATHROOM. But really, we weren't in a huge hurry.

I honestly don't think I've ever been to MK in the morning when it's still dark out. I pulled the kids aside to take a picture of them in front of the beautiful lit up castle!

I know I've said this like 3 times already, but this is one of my favorite pictures from the trip. :)
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And one of just the castle.
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Since only Fantasy land and Tomorrowland are open during EMH, we headed over to Fantasy land. I really didn't have much planned for that first hour. I wanted to head over to Adventure land at 8 so we were just going to do a few things in the mean time. I asked the kids what they wanted to do first, and gave them a few options, and they wanted to go on It's a Small World! It's a classic. :)

Small World is definitely not a big Rope Drop attraction so we got an entire boat to ourselves! I will always love this ride!
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I snapped this picture of my big kids while hubby was getting the stroller.
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Next we headed over to the Under the Sea ride. Once again, there was zero wait! Everyone seemed to enjoy the ride!

Afterwards, my daughter wanted to go meet Ariel. The wait time was 20 minutes already, so I wasn't thrilled about using the rest of our Fantasy land hour waiting in line for it but I knew the line would be much longer later so we might as well go.

My 7YO and 4YO didn't want to meet Ariel. They decided to go on Barnstormer while we stood in line for Ariel. I kept the 2YO with me because he is very attached to Mama! He was a gigantic pain the butt during the wait, and kept wanting to run around everywhere and up and down the aisles. I guess 2YOs are not really known for their ability to wait patiently in lines. My daughter started to get pretty impatient towards the end too. We almost decided to leave because the rest of the family was done and waiting for us outside, but we stuck it out.

Finally we reached the end of the line and got to meet Ariel as a mermaid! She was one of my favorite face characters that we met. She kept talking about us "silly humans" and was really happy and personable, despite my kids with their deer in the headlights looks, lol.
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That look on my 2YO's face is classic, lol. I have no idea why he was so unhappy about the whole thing!

When we left Ariel's Grotto, we found the rest of our crew and we headed over to Adventureland.
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Our first stop was the Jungle Cruise (or the "Jingle Cruise" since it was Christmas!). It was so funny! My 7YO was cracking up at all the corny jokes.
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Then we made our way over to Pirates of the Caribbean. This is always a favorite for my kiddos and it didn't disappoint! After the ride, my 7YO was really wanting a souvenir from the pirates souvenir shop. He fell in love with a little stuffed dog, it was the one from the ride that has the little key in his mouth. We agreed to let him get it!
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He's not usually a stuffed animal kid, but he really loved this dog!

All right everyone, that's about all I can manage for tonight! It's not even 9 am at this point in our MK morning, lol. But I'll be back tomorrow to finish up Adventure land and head back to Fantasy land for lunch and our fast passes.

Thanks for joining me on our adventure!
 
I'm enjoying your report! I have 5 kids 9,7,5 and twin 12 month olds.. we are going this coming September it will be our second trip and you've given me some courage to maybe drive instead of fly... I'm only worried about the drive home honestly.. that would be exhausting. Looking forward to reading how you kept your sweet 2 year old happy and agreeable when he can't ride too..
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I'm enjoying your report! I have 5 kids 9,7,5 and twin 12 month olds.. we are going this coming September it will be our second trip and you've given me some courage to maybe drive instead of fly... I'm only worried about the drive home honestly.. that would be exhausting. Looking forward to reading how you kept your sweet 2 year old happy and agreeable when he can't ride too..
Subbing in

The way home is always harder, that's for sure! But I think they traveled just as well on the way back as on the way there. How long of a drive would it be for you?

My 2 year old did well, there were only a couple times I could tell he was sad that he couldn't ride with us, but mostly I think that was because he usually got left with dad and he is very attached to me. Sometimes we got separate fast passes for him so he didn't really feel left out. Like the one afternoon we got a fastpass for 7DMT for me and the older 3 kids, and we got a FP for Winnie the Pooh (right across from 7DMT) that he went on with my husband. Or when we did Soarin, they went on Nemo. So he still got to have fun too! But the nice thing about Disney is the majority of things are infant/young child friendly so he wasn't left out much. :)
 


The way home is always harder, that's for sure! But I think they traveled just as well on the way back as on the way there. How long of a drive would it be for you?

My 2 year old did well, there were only a couple times I could tell he was sad that he couldn't ride with us, but mostly I think that was because he usually got left with dad and he is very attached to me. Sometimes we got separate fast passes for him so he didn't really feel left out. Like the one afternoon we got a fastpass for 7DMT for me and the older 3 kids, and we got a FP for Winnie the Pooh (right across from 7DMT) that he went on with my husband. Or when we did Soarin, they went on Nemo. So he still got to have fun too! But the nice thing about Disney is the majority of things are infant/young child friendly so he wasn't left out much. :)

Mayberry we will allow for an extra stay in a hotel on the way back...
Our twins will be 18 months.. I'm a bit scared..
thanks for the encouragement! Love your post!
 
We love early morning in MK, I love your picture of the kids in front of the castle so nice. I love your shirts. Nice to hear the Ariel meet and greet was a good one since you all had to wait awhile
 
Mayberry we will allow for an extra stay in a hotel on the way back...
Our twins will be 18 months.. I'm a bit scared..
thanks for the encouragement! Love your post!

That's not a bad idea, when I was a kid we always drove to Disney and my parents often drove straight through on the way there, but got a hotel room on the way back. We considered it but really at that point just wanted to be home. I hope it goes well for you!!

We love early morning in MK, I love your picture of the kids in front of the castle so nice. I love your shirts. Nice to hear the Ariel meet and greet was a good one since you all had to wait awhile

Thank you so much! I loved early morning as well, I'm usually not an early riser so I don't usually make it by rope drop. But it was super fun!
 


Magic Kingdom part II day 1

Sorry to leave you all hanging in the middle of Adventure land!! ;) I know you're all dying to know what ride we went on after POTC! Any guesses??!

If you guessed Aladdin's Magic Carpet ride, you are the big winner!! :dumbo:

I have fond memories if this ride because it's one of the first rides we went on our first Disney trip (when I only had 2 kids, and they were 2 years old and 8 weeks old!). For whatever reason, my kids always LOVE Magic carpet!
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After Magic Carpet, we headed for the Tiki room. We were the first ones in line to wait for the next show.
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The last time we were at Disney was 3 years ago and they still had Zazu and Iago as the birds in charge of the show. I haven't seen the original version for a really long time! The kids didn't seem to excited about the show until the rainstorm picked up and the little tiki guys started playing the drums. They loved that part!

I snapped this one outside the Tiki room of the kids resting.
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Then we went over to Country Bear Jamboree. I thought they used to do a Christmas version of the show, where the moose and deer wore Christmas hats and stuff but none of that this year! The room was practically empty but the kids seemed to like the show.

At this point, it was getting late in the morning and we had fast passes for Enchanted Tales with Belle at 9:50. We made our way over to Fantasy Land.

Even with the fast pass, it felt like a long wait. Probably since it's set up more like a show, so we had to wait for a whole group of us to head in. This was my first time going to this attraction so I didn't know what to expect at all except I knew you could do pictures with Belle and there was some sort of participation. The kids were running around like crazy people but we chatted with an older couple who were there visiting with their granddaughter. They were impressed that we had driven so far! We told them the kids were good travelers, and they looked at our wild and crazy kids and gave us the funniest look. We laughed.

When we got into the first room, the cast member was asking for volunteers. He was first looking for someone to volunteer as the guards and nobody was raising their hands, so he picked my husband and another man!
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Then he picked a girl to be beast, and then he needed someone to be Maurice shivering in the beast's prison so he asked everyone to do their best shivering. My daughter nailed it so he invited her up to be Maurice!
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He had a few more people volunteer for other parts, and then he asked if anyone else wanted a part and my 4YO raised his hand (this kid is always such a mystery to me, I never would have thought he would volunteer!) so he got to be a picture frame.
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It was so cute seeing them be part of the play! It was cool that they had the cast members lead them around to help them do their part so people didn't have to feel as nervous.

At the end, they let people take pictures with Belle. My 7YO didn't want to but the rest of us did!

Not sure why my daughter is so serious?!?
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The little boys wanted a picture but insisted I go with them.
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And finally, Belle with the big strong guards. ;)
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Continued on the next post, because I'm out of room to add more pictures!
 
Magic Kingdom Part III, day 1

After Belle, it was getting close to 11 am so we decided to head over to Pinnochio's Haus for lunch.
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Most of us got flatbread pizzas and they were really tasty! Except for my 4YO who got, you guessed it, macaroni. Crazy kid! This lunch was ridiculous, every single child ended up needing to use the bathroom but none of them had to go at the same time of course. So someone kept interrupting our meal to say "I have to pee!" and me or my husband would get up and bring them out. Insert eye roll here.

I was getting so tired at that point that I almost forgot we had an 11 am fast pass for Peter Pan! Once again, thank goodness for fast passes because it was a 90 minute wait at that point!

Shockingly enough, I don't think I took any pictures of Peter Pan?!? Nope, I'm wrong. My 4YO wanted me to take a picture while we were waiting in line. Then he did a silly pose.
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After Peter Pan, it was past noon and we decided it was time to head back to the resort for a break. Everyone was still relatively happy considering how early we had woken up, but no need to push it!

On the way out, I stopped to have a photographer do our picture in front of the castle since we hadn't done one earlier that morning.
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It was a long bus ride home! I had to work pretty hard to keep my 2YO awake. I knew if he fell asleep on the bus then he wouldn't nap at the resort, and that would not be good!

We took some selfies to stay awake. I'm not usually a selfie person but ehh.
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I knew my big kids wouldn't sleep. They haven't napped for YEARS, not even in the car. My 4YO only naps in the car. So I told the big kids we were going to turn off all the lights and rest for a while, but once everyone else went to sleep they could go into the room next to the bathroom (where the sink is) and watch TV on my phone. It took a while for my 4YO to go to sleep but eventually he, my 2YO, and my husband were all out. The big kids went to watch some TV and I edited pictures on my computer! This mama was too hyped up on Disney to sleep!

By 3 pm, everyone was still sleeping pretty soundly. I hated to wake anyone up, but I wanted to be back at Disney between 4-5 so I knew we would need to get moving soon. My 2YO woke up on his own so then I woke up my other boys and got ready to go!

It was a cool day in Florida so I changed into jeans, especially knowing that I wanted to stay late for fireworks! Everyone else refused pants, but at least I could say I tried!

I'm going to be honest and say I can't really remember what we did when we arrived back at the park! I think maybe we went straight to an early dinner?? We hadn't really had snacks that afternoon, other than fruit snacks and granola bars, so we were hungry. We wanted to eat at Tomorrowland Terrace but it wasn't open until 5 and it was only 4:45 when we went to find food. So we went over to Cosmic Ray's instead. Unfortunately this maybe wasn't the best decision, because Tomorrow Land was INSANE at that time! Soooo many people, and I could feel my kids getting disregulated. Hell, I could feel myself getting disregulated too!

Once we got into Cosmic Ray's, it was pretty empty and we sat in a little corner where there were hardly any people so that was better, but my 4YO was already worked up so he got himself going into quite a whiney tantrum while we waited for the food to come. I don't remember why. I'm assuming because waiting was involved, and that word is not in his vocabulary.

Usually once the food comes, everyone chills out but everyone just kept bugging each other and whining about stuff! Seriously, it's like the break at home made things worse!

At the end of our meal, a cast member was walking around and he handed out Mickey stickers to all the kids. That was nice! The kids were really excited about that.

Then we went over to Mickey's Philharmonic!
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The kids looooooved this show. It was a favorite for most of them for the whole trip! My 2YO refused to keep his glasses on so it probably looked like a blurry mess to him, but he seemed happy enough.

Then we went to the carousel. We had kind of a strange experience where the cast member let us on the ride, but we walked around and there were NO horses open that we could find. Maybe one. There was another family looking too. So they had to put us in this little holding pen off to the side to wait until the next ride. This definitely confused my 4YO and he was not happy about having to wait longer.

It was actually really cool because during our ride, Cinderella's castle was lit by Elsa!! So we got to see the castle light up and see the fireworks from the carousel! You can see the castle behind my son here.
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That was so fun to see.

Next up was Dumbo! The wait wasn't too long, only 10 minutes. We hit a little snag on the way in because a couple of the kids really wanted to go to the play area but the rest of us just wanted to ride. The riders ended up winning out and we went on the ride.
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Of course, Dumbo is always a favorite!

Afterwards we decided to go back into Dumbo again to do the play area. Unfortunately, the line had increased so it was quite a bit longer than the last time around. The kids thought we'd be able to walk right into the play area, but they make you wait in line even if you don't want to ride. I was super crabby about it, I'm going to admit, my Disney spirit faded in that line. I just wanted to leave the line and go somewhere else. My husband was getting a bit crabby too. I feel like that line moved sooooo slowly.

But FINALLY we made it to the play area. DH and I sat on a bench and just let the kids go wild. I felt annoyed at myself for being so crabby, because it was honestly really relaxing and I'm sure the kids really needed to just go. I took some cleansing breaths and mentally moved on from my crabbiness.

After Dumbo, all the kids were thirsty. We were near Gaston's Tavern so I brought my daughter and 7YO in to go get ice water for everyone. While we were waiting in line, I saw some people get those jumbo cinnamon rolls and I was practically drooling. I ended up using snack credits to buy one (we hadn't used any snack credits that day!) and then I got a knife and cut it up into 6 pieces. It was really that big that it felt like a perfect size snack! The water and small snack seemed to make everyone happy.

Then we had to gather up kids and head over to Thunder Mountain because we had fast passes. We had kind of a weird experience there, because the plan was that I would bring the 3 big kids, and we'd do rider swap and then my husband would take a couple kids. So we brought the baby through the line with us to the fast pass and talked to the cast member who kind of snapped at us that the baby couldn't go on the ride and we had to get him out. I had never used rider swap before, but I had read that you needed to show the cast member the infant as proof or something. So I said we wanted to do rider swap, and he just kind of brushed us off and said sure that's fine, you don't need to have him here. He didn't give us any tickets or anything, so it was just weird all around.

But Thunder Mountain... oh man we had fun! It was my 4YO's first real roller coaster, and he LOVED it. All he could talk about was that he wanted to do it again!

When we met my husband, he was feeling tired and said he didn't care to go on Thunder Mountain. He was just ready to go. Our plan was for my husband to take the little boys back to the resort, and I would stay with the big kids to see the fireworks.

I forgot to mention that my husband had lost his magic band somewhere in Fantasy Land so we were going to have to stop at guest services to get a new one. We headed that direction and waited outside guest services for him to get his new band. We joked that he would have to wear the "gray band of shame" because I had heard that they just gave you a gray one if you got one in the park.

My kids were resting on the bench and I told them to look as tired as possible and I would take a picture. They are acting really well because they had been smiling up until this point! Lol.
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So my husband got his band of shame and we prepared to send off him and the little boys! Unfortunately, my two little boys are attached to mama so they both cried when they left me. :guilty: Mama was feeling guilty, that's for sure! But I knew this would be the best for everyone.

I will be back another day to finish off Magic Kingdom day 1!!

Teaser: Wishes, impromptu space travel, and "you don't love me anymore!" returns.
 
Really enjoying your TR! I would say you're handling doing Disney with 4 kids 7 and under really well! There's bound to be some drama mixed in with the happy times. Thanks for sharing your trip!
 
Really enjoying your TR! I would say you're handling doing Disney with 4 kids 7 and under really well! There's bound to be some drama mixed in with the happy times. Thanks for sharing your trip!

Thank you! We certainly did our best, it would be silly for me to pretend it was all rainbows and sunshine, lol. We all know how kids are, and even overstimulated, tired adults. Expecting perfection would be unrealistic!
 
Magic Kingdom Part 4, day 1

All right Disney friends. This is it. This is the night I finish Magic Kingdom! I wrote a lot last night because I was on a roll so tonight should be easy peasy.

After my husband left with the little boys, we decided to do some souvenir shopping. So far I had hardly looked at ANY stores because the baby is a complete nightmare in stores... running around, grabbing everything, just being insane. I figured going with my 2 oldest kids would be no problem!

Right?

Right?!?!

Well. It started out fine. Until we got to the princess room. I wish we could have skipped right through there! But alas, that didn't happen and my daughter became fixated on everything. I could already sense an argument brewing. Her souvenir budget was pretty much gone at this point, but I am a sucker and I probably would have let her get something small.

I was looking at something with my son, turned away from my daughter for literally a few seconds, and when I turned back she was gone. Gone!

I wasn't too concerned of course, just looking around, walking up and down some aisles. I figured she couldn't have gone far. My son is helping me look.

Then a few minutes go by and I'm becoming seriously concerned. She probably wandered into a different shop, but seriously what direction would she have gone? I start to panic but I try to stay calm for my son.

I'm not sure how long she was actually "lost". It probably felt WAY longer than me than it did to her. But all of a sudden, there she is, holding up a necklace and asking if she can buy it.

Relief! She's fine! I didn't lose my only daughter forever!

Then anger. What the hell was she thinking wandering away?! Didn't she know I was worried sick?!

I said "absolutely not, where did you go? I was so worried when I couldn't find you!"

And I grabbed her hand and I dragged her right out of that store!

And she's crying and clearly upset, clearly not understanding that she was "lost". So we get out into a quiet area and I explain to her how upset I was, but all she cares about is the necklace and she's reverted back to "You don't LOVE me anymore!!!!"

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My son is being surprisingly calm and trying to calm my daughter down. I was actually impressed with him (but he was probably the only one who wasn't disregulated at that moment so it makes sense). He was very helpful and got a lot further with her than I did. He even said he would give her a hug and a kiss if she would calm down (he hates touchy feely stuff, so that was huge for him!).

We all managed to reach a calm point as we're walking down main street towards the castle. Tears have stopped. My heart has stopped racing. We had moved on from our emotional meltdown and survived!

The kids were talking about smelling popcorn and I realized we were all probably hungry. People at this point were finding spots to sit for Wishes so I made a quick decision that food would solve our problems (Hello, my name is Vicky and I'm an emotional eater) and I stopped at a popcorn vendor to get popcorn for the show.

We found a seat on the grass and snuggled up to eat our popcorn.

I was really excited to see Wishes because I couldn't remember if I had ever seen it. I had seen various fireworks shows at Disney but I have zero memories of Wishes!

When the show got started, it was soooo crowded. We were all jammed up against each other. My son was fine, but my poor daughter really couldn't see anything. So I hauled that 50 pound girl up on my hip because I was determined that she was going to watch this show!

If only I could have documented her face when Tinkerbell came flying out of the castle. She truly looked like she was witnessing magic! I had decided I wasn't going to pull out my phone to take pictures but I had to take a picture of her face.

It didn't really turn out unfortunately. But I still have it!
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The show was longer than I thought it would be. She got really heavy there towards the end, lol. But I stuck it out!

And one of my favorite pictures from the show!
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After Wishes ended, the massive crowd immediately turned and started towards the exit. I was like hell no are we going that way. We were actually near the path to Tomorrow Land so I grabbed the kids' hands and I said "We're going to Space Mountain, run!"

So we dodged through the crowds and headed straight for Space Mountain. The kids were soooo excited!
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It said it was a 15 minute wait, but it ended up being a little longer than that, probably because a flood of people all had the same idea as us. About halfway through the wait, my daughter is bouncing around and I asked her if she had to go to the bathroom. She said no. A couple minutes later, bouncing intensifies. Then she confirms, yes she reeeeally has to go to the bathroom! Then my son says he reeeeally has to go to! For crying out loud you two, lol.

But they managed to hold it in, and we were off!
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They LOVED Space Mountain! My son said it was his favorite mountain!

After we got off, I scanned my magic band and then we literally started to run because they desperately needed the bathroom!

But the ramp that moves to get out? Broken! There was a crowd of people waiting to get out! Of course, we all could have just walked on that ramp without it moving, but Disney wouldn't let that happen, lol. So the potty dancing continued until they finally fixed the ramp and we made a mad dash out of Space Mountain and to the bathroom!

Don't worry, we made it. :) The whole thing was kind of funny, actually!

After the bathroom, we left Tomorrow Land and I said (reluctantly) that it was probably time to go. On the way out, we walked past the Tea Cups. My son begged for one last ride!

Well, he didn't have to beg too hard. He knows mom loves Disney World.

There was no wait so we walked right on!
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But now it really, really was time to leave. It must have been around 11 pm by then, maybe later. I hadn't checked the time all night!

On the way out, I took some pictures of the castle and the tree with my real camera.
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On the way down main street, my son said "This was the best day of my life".

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My 7YO tends to be kind of a negative kid, so hearing him say it was the best night of his life still makes me cry happy tears.

And off we went for the bus! The line for CBR was sooooo long. I told the kids we might not even get on this bus. We did, but we had the stand. I can't believe how sore my feet hurt having to stand for that whole 30 minute ride!

We arrived back at our hotel, quietly changed into pajamas, and crawled into bed. Within minutes, this was me:
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The night had started off rough, but I have nothing but positive, happy feelings overall when I look back at it.

So that was Magic Kingdom, day 1! Hope you enjoyed my detailed account, lol.

Join me next time when we get to have a resort day, breakfast at Cape May Cafe, and dinner at Boma!
 
I always try to start the day early at the parks but I don't have kids of my own. I can see how getting the kids up and ready would be a challenge!
The matching shirts look great in the photos!
 
Just got caught up! My boys are the same age as your youngest and so much is relatable! Especially when you said you had to hold the 2-year old or he'd run away! That was my whole trip. If my little guy's feet touched the ground, he was running!

Looks like a great trip so far, can't wait to hear about the rest of the trip!
 
Subbing! Really enjoying reading your TR! :D

Thanks for reading!!

I always try to start the day early at the parks but I don't have kids of my own. I can see how getting the kids up and ready would be a challenge!
The matching shirts look great in the photos!

Thanks! Yeah it's hard getting them all going so early. But it's worth it for those morning hours!

Just got caught up! My boys are the same age as your youngest and so much is relatable! Especially when you said you had to hold the 2-year old or he'd run away! That was my whole trip. If my little guy's feet touched the ground, he was running!

Looks like a great trip so far, can't wait to hear about the rest of the trip!

Oh my gosh yes. And my 2 year old wasn't thrilled with the stroller most of the time. He wanted me to hold him! So half the time I hauled him on my hip while my husband pushed the stroller. Such a crazy age! Thanks for reading!
 
Hello friends! I'm back to do a quick update of our Wednesday morning at Disney!

Wednesday Resort Day: Part I

After a late, late night at MK, we got to sleep in on Wednesday! Yay!

Except we have a toddler. Who never sleeps in. Boo.

We had an 8:55 am reservation at Cape May Cafe and we decided to drive ourselves, since it sounded like a more complicated bus ride and would take a really long time, while a car ride would be like 10 minutes.

The kids were NOT happy about getting back in the car! They still hadn't forgotten that 24 hour drive!

I've never been to Beach Club Resort before. It is such a pretty resort! I've even looked up how much the rooms are since we got home because it was so nice, lol. Very fancy! The first thing we noticed when we walked in was the gingerbread carousel. It was amazing!

My son said "Take a picture of me pretending to eat it!"
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I took a picture of the ingredients:
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There were 17 hidden Mickeys and we only found 13.

Then they called our name to go eat!

We sat at our table and immediately everybody had to go to the bathroom. Never fails! So we made some bathroom trips and then started going around to load up our plates.

Donald was the first character to come visit!
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Donald is always fun! My husband told Donald that we liked him more than Mickey, and Donald was very excited about that, lol.

Then we ate for a little longer and my 7YO took 7 more trips up to the waffle station. Because he was determined to make good use of his all you can eat benefits.

Goofy was next! Goofy is my husband's personal favorite so he wanted a picture. With his Goofy hat, of course!
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I didn't get pictures of my kids with Goofy, for some reason! He stopped by our table a second time unexpectedly and I took a picture with my 7YO and Goofy that should have been awesome but it ended up way overexposed because I had made some weird adjustment on my flash!! :( Oh well!

A little while later, Minnie stopped by!

Whoops, accidentally "posted" instead of "upload a file" so continued on the next post!!
 
Surprise! It's Minnie!
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So this picture is funny, because you can't see it but my 2YO had just taken his plate full of waffles and fruit and dumped it all over the table. So that look on Minnie's face is a look of shock, lol.
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Here you can see Minnie and I sharing a laugh over it, lol.
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The Minnie interaction was funny, because when she signed our photo mat and she saw that Donald had written "Donald Duck #1" and she was not happy! She signed right next to the #1 so it looked like it said Minnie was #1, lol. The kids still talk about how funny that was!

So that's about it for Cape May Cafe! I know it's a short update this time! Overall, we loved it and would definitely go back. The breakfast food was delicious, it was a relaxed atmosphere, and the character interactions were great. I would highly recommend it!

Next up: Resort time!
 
(I fell behind a bit, so just a few comments)

CBR is for sure a pretty resort and the pool looks really nice - nice they have the play area for the younger kids and glad the CM let your daughter stay.

Great picture of the kids by the fountain

Glad all the kids (that participated) enjoyed Soarin - it is a pretty cool ride and for kids the experience must be really exhilarating! (Adults to but I imagine kids think even less about it being a ride and what the technology behind it is and just think of it as more "real" .... or maybe it is just me overthinking it ;)

Baymax is a tougher meet - though he is very squishy when you give him hugs and of course he can do the "la la la" fit bump

Joy and Sadness was one of our favorite meets from our trip - too bad you didn't get better pictures. I took some video and one of my favorite parts is my daughter literally "jumping with Joy"

We greatly enjoy Sunshine Seasons but do get what you are saying about how the different Bays can make it stressful with multiple kids who want different things or can't decide what they want, etc.

Not sure if anyone mentioned it before but I know I upload my pictures to Photobucket and then just link to them in my TR updates so then there is no limit to the number of pictures you can use per updates since they aren't stored on The DIS servers

Glad to see things worked out with the Anna and Elsa meet and greets - it is nice how well they play their roles and act differently since they clearly have different personalities in the movie

Too bad about the meltdowns - just being in a different environment, possible tired, and definitely hot can definitely impact kids I've found.

Garden Grill is so much fun - lots of character interactions. Dealing with Character meals is definitely a challenge though to balance the characters and actually eating. At GG I've found they often come around multiple times so we try not to stress if we don't get great pictures the first time

Living with the Land is one of our favorites - we tend to ride it a few times each trip. My oldest has gotten into spotting "hidden Mickeys" and that ride has a ton of them!

It's always nice when others mention something about the kids being well behaved - I find sometimes I stress out so much about my kids acting up but to others they aren't being that bad (that I notice things more than others do) so hearing nice things every now and then is a reminder of that

Glad you enjoyed FAE - for being just an overlay of an existing ride I think they did a really good job with it. I love your ride photo! I think every other one I have seen the people look rather bored (I mean, it's a nice ride, but not thrilling) so fun to see a picture like that!

Sorry that your daughter had a rough evening - but seems like you were a great mom to her and got her in a better frame of mind before bed

Wow, great job getting up that early - definitely easier to get up early at Disney compared to the real world

Sorry the bus didn't come early. Have transportation is great but it can be frustrating at times as well.

The silhouette shirts are really cool and I do like that picture of the kids with the Castle quite a bit

Glad you enjoyed the Jingle Cruise! We love the puns and the ride is an original and just one of my favorites!

Ah, the joys of no one wanting to pee at the same time!

I love the idea of the play area at Dumbo but we have had issues with it as well with some people wanting to play and some wanting to ride. Then we had the issue with our youngest asleep in a stroller and that they wouldn't let us bring the stroller into the play area so no one got to got and the bigger kids got upset about that.

That's cool you were on the carousel when they lit the castle!

Gotta love the "I was so worried that you were lost" but the response is that you didn't get the necklace so therefore you don't love her ... gotta love kids

On the way down main street, my son said "This was the best day of my life".
... and then people wonder why we keep going back to Disney. Definitely hits you in the feels

Cape May breakfast is one we haven't done yet but looks really fun! I definitely watch too much Mickey Mouse Clubhouse as I totally heard in my head a Minnie voice saying "Oh my!" after she saw the waffles and fruit mess

Great updates!
 
A little late, but I'm joining in and OH MY GOODNESS, you have the sweetest family I have ever seen! I'm so enjoying this report so far! popcorn::
 

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