Ever since we discovered the DIS, I've been reading a chapter each night to the kids from trip reports. They love it! Now that we're home, I was informed that I'd better get busy and get ours written. They want to remember EVERYTHING! One thing to mention, my DH and I have been trying to lose weight, but at Disney all bets were off. I've lost 75 lbs. this year and Kevin has lost 60. I'm amazed at how much junk we consumed in so little a time. Luckily, with all that walking, we didn't gain but a few pounds back. Everytime we wanted to cheat on our diet, we'd say, "Wait until Disney!" So here goes.
Cast:
Me - SAHM and lover of all things Disney
DH - the proad papa
Peggy - My older sister and beloved Aunt
Brenna - DD 9 - has read the Unofficial Guide from cover to cover numerous times.
Erin - DD 6 - my sweet little red head
Molly - DD 1.5 - super attached to Mommy
Our trip began on Friday. The girls had their last day of school and the marathon packing was underway. We left that night at about 8:30 PM for a night of driving. We put The Incredibles on the DVD player to get us in the Disney mood, and off we went. The kids made it through one movie and fell asleep during the second to sleep through the night. After an uneventful (although long) drive, we arrived at Disney!
We checked in the hotel and changed clothes in the bathroom (with me freaking out trying to get everyone to HURRY!) and off we went. The plan was to arrive at the Animal Kingdom for Early Entry Hour . We went straight for the Kilimanjaro Safaris as did almost every other guest entering the park. Since we were there early, the wait was only about 5 minutes. The animals were all out and about as it was still pretty cool during the morning. Wow! We took lots of really bad photos, but it was great!
After the safari, we went and got Fastpasses for Kali River Rapids as we weren't quite ready to get soaked. Then off for TriceraTop Spin and Primeval Whirl. On the way, we passed some great African drums and had a small jam festival. We also had to pose for some Tree of Life pictures!
We got to watch a few minutes of Smear, Splat & Dip, a street show of painters who do a balancing and juggling act. Very cute! Kevin and I kept teasing Brenna about going on "Primeval Hurl", a spinning roller coaster. She was pretty freaked out before it started, I think it could have been the possibility of getting covered in vomit. Thus, one of our new phrases was born, "Fake vomit - funny. Real vomit - not so funny!" As we didn't hurl, Brenna LOVED this ride. We grabbed some Fastpasses for Dinosaur and it was off to breakfast.
We had decided to try to have quite a lot of meals with Disney characters to minimize the amount of time spent trying to see the characters. Our breakfast was at Donald's Breakfastosaurus, a character meal with Donald, Mickey, Goofy and Pluto. A new fun past time was born during this first Disney meal - taking pictures of Molly freaking out. We found that Molly is not quite a fan of the characters. But with Mommy as a buffer, she would at least get within a camera frame of space for a picture. The food was quite yummy (your typical breakfast fare, but yum chocolate chip pancakes!) and our server Michelle was pretty funny. The kids had a blast!
After breakfast, we tried to use our Fastpasses for Dinosaur, but the ride had broken down. Darn! Oh well, we'll save them for another day. We were walking down the street, and we bumped into Lucky the Dinosaur. He is seriously cool!
After watching Lucky for a bit, we decided to go see a show. When I say "we", I mean me. I really wanted to see the Tarzan Rocks show as it is closing this year and we've never seen it. The kids were HOT and wanted to go to the hotel or at least do something inside. We found out that Erin is very sensitive to heat and gets wiped out very easily when it is hot. I did buy them frozen lemonade though. Brenna and Erin said it would be awful and they didn't want to see it. Tough. They finally admit that it was a fun show (now that we're home they can say that, and they are glad they got to see it before it's gone).
After the show, we decided to head back to the hotel to see if our room was ready. We were told to call after noon and see if it was ready (it wasn't ready until 3:45). We were hot and tired and Peggy's sore feet saga had begun. When we got to the exit, who should we see but Pocahontas! There were only two people in line, so the kids wanted to wait to see her. She was super!
Then the marathon car wait began. At least it was air conditioned! We did a bit of driving around, napping, nursing the baby, and movie watching (thank God for the genius who put DVD players in cars!) until our room was ready. We trudge down the sidewalks to our room, get in, and I kicked off my shoes. EWWW! Our carpet was soaking wet! It really wouldn't have been that big a deal if only they had thought to mention that the carpets had just been shampooed (now we know why we had to wait for our room). We couldn't change rooms, because we had been given the only connecting rooms available. Well, at least they were clean, although we couldn't let Molly crawl around on them. We were hoping for a nice break from the parks, but as we had reservations for dinner at 5:00 PM, we only had time for a quick shower and a change of clothes. Peggy had worn her older broken in tennis shoes that morning and her feet were killing her, so she changed into her new microfiber keds. I hoped they would be better for her. They weren't.
The change of clothes was necessary for everyone, as this dinner was the dinner show The Spirit of Aloha. We had purchased matching clothes for the luau, which forever will be known as our dork clothes. And although everyone thought I was weird for wanting matching clothes, they had to admit, the picture is great!
The reviews for the luau that I had read were pretty dismal, so we weren't really expecting much. I had made the reservations for the first night, because I figured it if was awful then we still had a great week ahead of us. If it was great, it would kick the week off right. We thought it was great! Maybe it's because we were expecting it to be bad, but the food was better than expected. The pineapple-coconut bread and the roasted chicken were yummy. We also had a salad with mango-poppy seed dressing, pineapple, ribs, Polynesian rice and steamed veggies. The kids were given a nice box of kid fare such as chicken nuggets, mini corn dog, mac and cheese and fries. They were happy. For dessert, there was a volcano dessert which turned out to be some sort of chocolate mousse which wasn't all that yummy (I was informed by the kids that this dessert was GROSS!).
After dinner, there was a fun show with a lot of dancing and music. The kids got to go to the stage and learn a little hula dance and Kevin and I got to dance a bit. The kids really liked the show. Molly loved it! She thought the hula dancers were hilarious and laughed through the whole show. She has recently developed the funniest growl when she laughs, and there she was laughing and growling loud as can be. It was a fabulous way to start our week!
After the Luau, we went back to the hotel. The kids were wiped out from a night in the car and a day at the park. After scarfing down a box of Girl Scout cookies to make up for that Luau dessert, they crashed and we weren't that far behind them. We're not used to that much walking in a day and Peggy's feet hurt. I was suffering from a sore throat that turned into canker sores down the back of my throat which my doc said were probably caused by stress and the change in my diet. Yuck and Ouch! I whined quite a bit about that for the rest of the trip. And so Day 1 came to a close. Tomorrow, on to Day 2.
For a complete set of pictures to match the tale:
Pictures from Disney
Cast:
Me - SAHM and lover of all things Disney
DH - the proad papa
Peggy - My older sister and beloved Aunt
Brenna - DD 9 - has read the Unofficial Guide from cover to cover numerous times.
Erin - DD 6 - my sweet little red head
Molly - DD 1.5 - super attached to Mommy
Our trip began on Friday. The girls had their last day of school and the marathon packing was underway. We left that night at about 8:30 PM for a night of driving. We put The Incredibles on the DVD player to get us in the Disney mood, and off we went. The kids made it through one movie and fell asleep during the second to sleep through the night. After an uneventful (although long) drive, we arrived at Disney!
We checked in the hotel and changed clothes in the bathroom (with me freaking out trying to get everyone to HURRY!) and off we went. The plan was to arrive at the Animal Kingdom for Early Entry Hour . We went straight for the Kilimanjaro Safaris as did almost every other guest entering the park. Since we were there early, the wait was only about 5 minutes. The animals were all out and about as it was still pretty cool during the morning. Wow! We took lots of really bad photos, but it was great!
After the safari, we went and got Fastpasses for Kali River Rapids as we weren't quite ready to get soaked. Then off for TriceraTop Spin and Primeval Whirl. On the way, we passed some great African drums and had a small jam festival. We also had to pose for some Tree of Life pictures!
We got to watch a few minutes of Smear, Splat & Dip, a street show of painters who do a balancing and juggling act. Very cute! Kevin and I kept teasing Brenna about going on "Primeval Hurl", a spinning roller coaster. She was pretty freaked out before it started, I think it could have been the possibility of getting covered in vomit. Thus, one of our new phrases was born, "Fake vomit - funny. Real vomit - not so funny!" As we didn't hurl, Brenna LOVED this ride. We grabbed some Fastpasses for Dinosaur and it was off to breakfast.
We had decided to try to have quite a lot of meals with Disney characters to minimize the amount of time spent trying to see the characters. Our breakfast was at Donald's Breakfastosaurus, a character meal with Donald, Mickey, Goofy and Pluto. A new fun past time was born during this first Disney meal - taking pictures of Molly freaking out. We found that Molly is not quite a fan of the characters. But with Mommy as a buffer, she would at least get within a camera frame of space for a picture. The food was quite yummy (your typical breakfast fare, but yum chocolate chip pancakes!) and our server Michelle was pretty funny. The kids had a blast!
After breakfast, we tried to use our Fastpasses for Dinosaur, but the ride had broken down. Darn! Oh well, we'll save them for another day. We were walking down the street, and we bumped into Lucky the Dinosaur. He is seriously cool!
After watching Lucky for a bit, we decided to go see a show. When I say "we", I mean me. I really wanted to see the Tarzan Rocks show as it is closing this year and we've never seen it. The kids were HOT and wanted to go to the hotel or at least do something inside. We found out that Erin is very sensitive to heat and gets wiped out very easily when it is hot. I did buy them frozen lemonade though. Brenna and Erin said it would be awful and they didn't want to see it. Tough. They finally admit that it was a fun show (now that we're home they can say that, and they are glad they got to see it before it's gone).
After the show, we decided to head back to the hotel to see if our room was ready. We were told to call after noon and see if it was ready (it wasn't ready until 3:45). We were hot and tired and Peggy's sore feet saga had begun. When we got to the exit, who should we see but Pocahontas! There were only two people in line, so the kids wanted to wait to see her. She was super!
Then the marathon car wait began. At least it was air conditioned! We did a bit of driving around, napping, nursing the baby, and movie watching (thank God for the genius who put DVD players in cars!) until our room was ready. We trudge down the sidewalks to our room, get in, and I kicked off my shoes. EWWW! Our carpet was soaking wet! It really wouldn't have been that big a deal if only they had thought to mention that the carpets had just been shampooed (now we know why we had to wait for our room). We couldn't change rooms, because we had been given the only connecting rooms available. Well, at least they were clean, although we couldn't let Molly crawl around on them. We were hoping for a nice break from the parks, but as we had reservations for dinner at 5:00 PM, we only had time for a quick shower and a change of clothes. Peggy had worn her older broken in tennis shoes that morning and her feet were killing her, so she changed into her new microfiber keds. I hoped they would be better for her. They weren't.
The change of clothes was necessary for everyone, as this dinner was the dinner show The Spirit of Aloha. We had purchased matching clothes for the luau, which forever will be known as our dork clothes. And although everyone thought I was weird for wanting matching clothes, they had to admit, the picture is great!
The reviews for the luau that I had read were pretty dismal, so we weren't really expecting much. I had made the reservations for the first night, because I figured it if was awful then we still had a great week ahead of us. If it was great, it would kick the week off right. We thought it was great! Maybe it's because we were expecting it to be bad, but the food was better than expected. The pineapple-coconut bread and the roasted chicken were yummy. We also had a salad with mango-poppy seed dressing, pineapple, ribs, Polynesian rice and steamed veggies. The kids were given a nice box of kid fare such as chicken nuggets, mini corn dog, mac and cheese and fries. They were happy. For dessert, there was a volcano dessert which turned out to be some sort of chocolate mousse which wasn't all that yummy (I was informed by the kids that this dessert was GROSS!).
After dinner, there was a fun show with a lot of dancing and music. The kids got to go to the stage and learn a little hula dance and Kevin and I got to dance a bit. The kids really liked the show. Molly loved it! She thought the hula dancers were hilarious and laughed through the whole show. She has recently developed the funniest growl when she laughs, and there she was laughing and growling loud as can be. It was a fabulous way to start our week!
After the Luau, we went back to the hotel. The kids were wiped out from a night in the car and a day at the park. After scarfing down a box of Girl Scout cookies to make up for that Luau dessert, they crashed and we weren't that far behind them. We're not used to that much walking in a day and Peggy's feet hurt. I was suffering from a sore throat that turned into canker sores down the back of my throat which my doc said were probably caused by stress and the change in my diet. Yuck and Ouch! I whined quite a bit about that for the rest of the trip. And so Day 1 came to a close. Tomorrow, on to Day 2.
For a complete set of pictures to match the tale:
Pictures from Disney
I think we'll look into renting points next time.
I really enjoyed it. Glad you have a great time. Your girls are beautiful little princess. 
I can't wait till my godson is older enough to make his first trip. I'm doing the MK tour with him 
....
