My parents came to pick up Harper the night before for her week long stay with both sets of Grandparents. I was SO apprehensive about leaving her, and was very relieved when Harper happily went with my parents - laughing, waving and giving me the thumbs up out the window as they drove away.
Friday morning we were up very early and off to the airport.
We were all so excited! Jon and I hadn't been to Disney since we were children. I have been making these plans and saving for this trip for a long time! Olivia tracked our progress the entire way to the airport by using the GPS on my phone.
After arriving in Orlando and traveling via Disney bus to our hotel, it was very quickly apparent that Disney knows how to make sure you have a perfect experience. I have to admit that I was a little apprehensive about staying at a "value" resort. I had heard some negative things - small rooms, lots of waiting for the bus, etc". I was so pleased that as soon as we got off the bus, we were greeted by Disney employees blowing bubbles, giving Olivia a hula hoop, giving me a flower, putting buttons on us and ushering us to the check- in desk. Our room (yes it was small, but just right for the 3 of us) was ready early, extremely clean, and a very short walk to both the pool and the bus stop. We never even had to wait more than 5 minutes to catch a bus from our hotel to any of the parks. Our hotel (Pop Century) had its own bus, so we never had to make multiple stops either!
Our first night there we checked out the hotel, tried to rest (Olivia was NOT having it) and hopped on a bus to go have dinner with the princesses in Epcot. Olivia was thrilled to be meeting Disney characters right away. ( She still calls them Disney correctors ) The next 6 days were jam packed full with getting up early, hitting a park, one sit down meal a day, afternoon naps and pool time and finishing our evenings catching various fireworks shows or parades.
Rather than rewrite every single day of our trip, here are the bullet points in no particular order, just how I remember them.
Disney Magical Memories
- Olivia loved our hotel's flower shaped pool. She participated in the hotel staff lead games and dance parties. The lifeguards loved her dance moves and knew her by name before our stay was over.
- Olivia would call out LOUDLY to any characters she saw in the parades or street shows- waving wildly the whole time, believing 100% that they were looking right at her and waving back. Half the time, the characters actually DID hear her (she's that loud) and would come over and hug her or kiss her.
- After the Beauty and the Beast stage show Olivia was chosen to go up and receive the red rose from Belle and wave to the crowd. (only one girl is chosen) Her luck blows my mind :) She must have had pixie dust sprinkled on her that day.
- Olivia's favorite two rides were Star Tours in Hollywood Studios and Big Thunder Mountain Railroad in MK.
- I wore a poncho on the raging rapids ride......i embraced my nerdiness- but i was the only one with dry undies afterwards! luckily no cameras were allowed on the water rides- but you'll have to imagine how I rocked that poncho.
- Olivia was just a touch shy of the 44 inch height minimum to ride Space Mountain, and Mount Everest so we packed her some platform flip flops and she put them on right before the rides. She got on without a problem! Yay!! She was so brave and got right on - but after twice on Everest and once on Space Mountain she said "uh uh- no way - I am not going on those rides again- no way- no how" Now she'll only talk about how they didn't bother her at all. I guess technically you only have to ride once to earn bragging rights.
- While walking thru MK we spotted Anastasia (one of the step sisters) Olivia ran up to her and they held hands and walked together (alone) past several attractions. Anastasia said she had to go find Drizzella (sp) and kept telling Olivia she was her new best friend. She put Olivia in the front of the line for autographs and both step sisters kept shouting "bye Olivia bye Olivia" while we walked off. (pixie dust!)
8. We went to MK for only a few hours on our very last day- before catching the bus back to the airport. We let Olivia dictate what she wanted to do - we ended up riding Big Thunder Mountain 4 (maybe 5?) times in a row, getting one last Little Mermaid ride and meeting Rapunzel from Tangled. The perfect end to a perfect vacation.
9. Olivia was the Rebel Spy on the Star Tours ride.
10. Watching Jon tear up as Olivia defeated Darth Vader during Jedi Training Academy.
11. It was always SO hard to make ourselves leave the park and go back to our room for a nap, but we were always so glad we did. Olivia doesn't nap at home anymore, but Disney wears you out and she napped every day of our trip, but would then be able to stay up until 10 or 11 each night.
12. Eating lots of ice cream!!
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| dance party with Stitch |
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| pool time on Mother's Day |
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| her special seat after being picked to get the rose |
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| receiving the rose from the Prince and Belle |
We had an amazing trip!! There were too many happy memories to write them all down, but I am officially hooked on Disney. I won't be wearing Mickey Mouse outfits anytime soon- but I will be having sweet dreams of princess parties, light saber duals where the good guy always wins, and TWO little girls wearing their mouse ears. I am now counting the days until Harper turns five and we can go on this magical trip again. I'm sure that at any age you take your kids to Disney it is so fun, but I truly think that for us, this was the perfect time. She had the stamina to walk a lot, wait a lot, and stay up late - but was still young enough to truly BELIEVE in all of the magic. perfection. xoxo
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| view from our balcony - how can this not make you smile? |
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| our room was on the third floor right past the first giant bowling pin |
