I felt so much better after my nap, even though the kids were laughing and yelling the entire time. I wasn't going to stop them from having fun, and I wasn't going to let
them stop
me from having a siesta. I had talked Lance into going to orientation at 3pm, so that's where he was (or the kids would've been a whole lot quieter). I had seen on the Village Voice for that day (the GKTW newsletter) that they would be showing a movie in the theater at 5pm, and I also knew that tonight was Nickelodeon Night. I had emailed GKTW several weeks prior to see if I could find out whether there would be a SpongeBob character there or not. I had only heard of the other characters being there, like Dora, Blue, etc., and my kids have been past all that for a while now. In my email, I mentioned that one of Clay's hopes was to meet SpongeBob, but my main reason for asking if he would be there was just in case we had something else we'd rather do that night. Well, I never got a response, so I forgot about it.
Anyway, we went to explore some more before heading to Julie's Safari Theater to watch The Bee Movie, which none of us had seen. It's amazing how much fun it is just to walk through the village! Everything seems magical. Ty and Clay were especially taken with the elephant trash can. You just hold your trash up to its trunk, and it sucks the trash in! We never had a lot of trash, so Clay just picked up leaves all week to throw away!
Madison just couldn't get enough...
I have some nutty kids.
Here is the carousel outside the Castle of Miracles. It was imported from Holland, and it's wheelchair-accessible. It's awesome!!
We had a little more time before the movie, so we decided to go back inside the castle for a few....
Clay loved this wishing well. There were pennies in the bucket, and you drop them in and hear your penny clink sometimes, and other times the well burps or makes all sorts of other hilarious sounds. Clay giggled his head off!
At orientation, Clay had been given a wishing star, and he was supposed to take it to the castle, write is name on it, and let the star fairy take it to put it on the ceiling. There are a zillion stars on the castle's ceiling belonging to past wish kids. When I first looked up and saw all those stars, I had a huge lump in my throat just thinking about all the wishes of all those sweet kids who have suffered. I wondered how many came true and how many of those kids will be able to come back for a visit some day to see their star. Here is Clay writing his name on his star and watching the star fairy take it away. We would be able to go back the next day and see it again after the fairy put it on the ceiling with the other stars...
Afterwards, we headed over to Amberville to see the awesome train station and drive the boats...
The train station was AMAZING!!! This pic does NOT do it justice at all. We could have played with that for hours...it has buttons for each little part that you can turn on and off. Clay was mesmerized (so was Lance)...
And the boats were a huge hit with everybody!! We love remote control everything in this house. Does that mean we're lazy?
And THEN our video game addict found the arcade--a FREE arcade. He was in heaven!!!
Madison made a friend and helped her learn how to play pool...
There was even a train you could ride that gave us the opportunity to see some of the miniature golf course. Clay and Shay Lynne rode in the front car and got to blow the whistle. Yeehaw!!
This was a seriously fun place, and I'm sad we didn't get to spend way more time there!! But it was almost time for the movie, and we headed over to the theatre.
It was so neat in there! Lance, especially, was pleasantly surpised. They gave us free popcorn, Icees, drinks, nachos, soft pretzels, and some tubes to fill with Pixie Stick-type sour candy in tons of different flavors. It was junk food heaven. We watched The Bee Movie, which was very cute, I might add! I guess I didn't take pics of the theater. There was even the Wardrobe from Narnia in there and I
needed my pic made beside that because I am a school librarian, for heaven's sake!!!
And then it was time for supper. We headed over to the Gingerbread House--the cutest, coolest, most awesome place ever!!
Inside, the tables are made of real peppermint candy. There is a player piano that Clay was enthralled with, and there are dolls and dolls and more dolls lining the shelves up near the ceiling. Then there is another room with tons of antique trucks and cars lining the shelves. The food is buffet-style, and everyone is SO wonderful in there. There are even volunteers in there that WILL NOT let you carry your own tray for anything. Through the week we really had to talk to the kids about not being wasteful because when they saw all that food, they wanted one or two or more of everything (they totally get that from their mom!). Well, everyone did that except for Clay. We couldn't get him to eat anything except ice cream and hot dogs all week, pretty much. He's a bean pole, and I'm always trying to fatten him up, but still--I want him to eat healthfully. I just tried to remember that this was his wish trip and not worry about it. I didn't worry about what I ate all week, either, that's for sure!
At supper, we got to meet the mayor of GKTW--Mayor Clayton. Clay and the mayor loved it that they shared the same name! And also, we met his wife, Ms. Merry. They were so sweet!
Once supper was over, we were ready for another ice cream, disgustingly enough! We sat outside and made pigs of ourselves yet again while Shay Lynne rode the carousel over and over and over (while eating her ice cream, of course)...and then we heard someone say "Hey! SpongeBob is over there by the theater!" OH. MY. GOSH. I could not believe it. I was so upset that I let the kids wear their swimsuits to dinner with just regular clothes over them and the twins didn't have their SpongeBob outfits on! DANG IT!!! We ran over in front of the theater, and sure enough, it was ole Spongie!!! I asked them how much longer he would be there because I considered going back to have the kids change, and they said only about ten minutes. I am telling you I could have thrown up that we didn't have the right clothes on!!!!! But then I remembered that we would be at Universal day after tomorrow and that SpongeBob would be there then and our hair would look a lot better. Still, Clay got to meet his beloved SpongeBob and we had our pic taken with him. I'm sorry they don't have their customs on, but that was to be remedied later (as you've already seen in my brief overview)...
Honestly, the pic and everything was so rushed that I don't know if anyone would've noticed customs at that point anyway. You know how when it's almost time for a character to leave, everyone gets all in a tizzy about how many kids there are left to see? No one was rude or anything, but still. So it was a good thing we kept the customs all fresh and ironed for Universal, I guess. We went into the theater and the kids got their faces painted and watched SpongeBob dance to his "Pineapple Under the Sea" song. It was fun. I wonder if they had SpongeBob come because of my email a few weeks ago. I don't know, but the week was definitely off to a magical start!
After SpongeBob left, we headed to the pool and learned that it was closed "due to inclement weather". *sigh* But that was OK because we really were wiped out. On our walk back to the villa (before the little choo-choo train tram picked us up and gave us a ride home) we got to meet Ole' Elmer. He was awesome!! At night, he actually snores! He reminded me of Grandmother Willow in Pocahontas, but he was much funnier. Clay giggled his head off again at Elmer's snoring. We just loved him.
Honestly, there is so much more I would love to show you in the village...and since I've almost met my limit in pics again, I think I'll just do another post with some stock photos that GKTW gave us of all that they have there. So stay tuned. I really am trying to hurry! This takes forever!! Now I understand why people take so long doing trip reports!!!
Scroll down for more pics of GKTW and Day 2 at Magic Kingdom!
. I love the tease of a trip report. The pictures are awesome. We are not going to US/IOA. We are doing another day at MK and going to Blizzard Beach, but I am second guessing myself now. Nathan looked at the web site and was not interested 
We will figure that out later. 
I can't wait to hear more. Glad that the suitcase was returned safe and sound.
Okay, maybe not ALL of them, but lots of them. Oh no! It looks like you had the same Wendy we did! Here's hoping she was in a better mood the day you saw her! Can't wait to read more!!
Again, welcome back.
But we saw the afternoon parade twice! The kids got to meet almost all their favorite characters. In fact, I can't think of anyone we didn't run into at some point that they truly wanted to see. We had an absolute blast at Disney, and I am so glad to have seen all four parks! And Universal--well, we had a completely amazing time at both Universal parks, and let's just say that our most magical moment happened there. More on that later--I don't want to ruin any surprises to be included in my upcoming trip report. I am so very, very glad we didn't decide to skip Universal Studios and Islands of Adventure! SeaWorld was something we probably could've done without, although feeding and petting the dolphins was a blast. It's just that we live in Texas and have been to the SeaWorld in San Antonio and we like ours better than Florida's. It was just so hot that day, and we had a very short time to cover a large, spread-out park. I'm glad we did it, though, as I could never tire of watching those whales and dolphins. This will shock many people, but after being on these boards for so long and reading of others' experiences, I had come to expect that Disney would be where we would be treated so well, but Universal Studios actually prevailed for us in this area. We were treated like royalty there, whereas the Disney CMs seemed to have a rather "ho-hum" attitude toward us for the most part (maybe the heat and the crowds made everyone grouchy). There were some that stood out, of course--mainly those at the character greets, but it didn't compare to the treatment we received at Universal. The important thing is that we did get to go to the front of the lines most of the time and were able to do more than we otherwise would've been able to do had it not been a wish trip. Nothing can replace Disney for their beloved characters and all those timeless stories they tell with their theming throughout the parks. Being there truly is like being in another world, and no amount of grouchiness could keep us from having a magical time. I can't wait to go back to all the parks, and I hope it's soon!
