DISNEYWORLD - Day 3, 4 & 5

Dear Abby,

We got started on Day 3 bright and early with a trip to Epcot for a Royal Banquet breakfast feast.  Now, if you recall, the night before's princess dinner was, well, unsuccessful.  After we left dinner I immediately called our lovely travel agent to go over every possibility of who could show up for this breakfast and we felt pretty good it was all nice, non-costumed headed people.  I had the cutest outfits EVER made for you - you both are a modern version of Snow White!  I LOVED it and almost had one made for me ;) We arrived in a hurry (it takes a LOT of getting used to how big the whole Disney complex is) but we had plenty of time to hang out before we were called in for breakfast. 

I have no clue what this face was about, but it sure did make me giggle.

So immediately upon arriving into the banquet hall, we got to meet Belle.  She was dressed in her finest and looked absolutely stunning.  You and Kate were both eager to say hello and take a very pretty picture with her.  

Right after meeting Belle, we were seated for breakfast and let me just tell you, what a breakfast feast it was!  I really did feel like we were at a Royal banquet and eating like a king!  They had all kinds of breakfast foods and the table and hall and everything was so neat.

You and Kate got so excited every time one of the princesses would pop into our vision and then you'd grow super shy when they'd pop over at our table, but at least not under the table shy!!  Here's Aurora and Arial...

And the beautiful Cinderella! See you didn't need to see her last night, you knew you'd see her today!

And then Snow White walked up and immediately said she loved your outfits!

Another very cool thing during the breakfast was the Princess walk where all the princesses got to walk around the hall.  I couldn't grab a picture with you AND Cinderella, but that's who you chose to walk with.  

Did I mention we enjoyed breakfast??  Oh, and did I mention that you got cupcakes every single time we sat down at a restaurant?!

I have to say, the Royal Breakfast was probably my favorite place to eat.  We felt very special and it was delicious food and there were no tears and no scary moments for you!  Our bellies were full and mouths sore from smiling and laughing so much!
After breakfast, we decided to stick around in Epcot for a bit and see what it had to offer.  I must say, it had a pretty good bit to offer! Our favorite by far was the Nemo ride, well, not even the ride part, although that was pretty cool, but afterwards we did the "Talk with Crush" and it was so neat.  AND, you were picked out of a big crowd to talk to Crush.  He asked you your name and then asked you to help everyone learn his language by saying "Totally Sweet!"  It was awesome and you did such a good job.  It was totally sweet :)

We also got to ride this hang gliding ride, and you got to ride it twice because of the whole parent trade thing (Kate was too small to ride it) and you LOVED it.  You ran off it saying "Mom, come on!  We get to fly over California!" 

After Nemo, Daddy made us ride the boringest ride ever.  While the two of us were on the flying one, he took Kate on this other one and told us we'd like it.  I think he liked it because it was air conditioned and you rode a slow boat and he could look on his phone :)  Anyway, we rode it again with him and all I can say is BORING.  Okay, you didn't think it was that, but Mom did :)  We rode a couple more rides at Epcot and then decided to grab some lunch (in the air conditioner!! - did I mention it was really hot?!) and then head back to Magic Kingdom.  We grabbed some lunch at a Chinese restaurant in the "China" area and it was delicious.  You loved using the chopsticks and particularly liked slurping your noodles through the hole in your mouth!

After lunch, we got to jump on the monorail (hooray - another ride, so you thought!) and headed back to our much loved Magic Kingdom.  By day two in Magic Kingdom, we had this place figured out and were loving every moment of it.

Daddy had promised ice cream to everyone (even though you both got cupcakes at lunch!) and he did not let us down.  It was pretty sweet timing because we walked in to MK, grabbed ice cream and watched the afternoon parade!  I forgot to mention yesterday that we watched the parade, too.  We LOVED the parades.  It gave us a chance to see all the characters (or, well, a lot) without running under tables.  And the music - oh, the music makes you want to get up and dance.  It's for sure one of my favorite things about Disney World.  But the ice cream was pretty good, too!

After ice cream, we set off to all the rides!  We conquered our top faves and some more including a couple times on the Goofy Rollercoaster and Dumbo and Mermaid and of course, It's a Small World.  

Did I mention it was hot today???

We had so much fun on Tuesday.  I feel like I really figured out the whole Fast Pass gig and jumping from ride to ride and there really were minimal wait times.  We were all smiles all day long and were completely exhausted by the time we got home.  Worth every bit of that exhaustion though!
The next morning was just like the rest, except it was our last day at the park.  So we were making the most of it!  We headed to Animal Kingdom, which meant a bus ride.  You and Kate were both thrilled about this, although the look on your face doesn't show it.  Also, Mommy utilized our time (read - we slept in a little late) and I did your hair on the bus!  That was an adventure in itself.

We made it to Animal Kingdom and went straight to the safari ride!

Now, this was super neat.  It was like we were in Africa and all the animals were just walking right beside us! 

After the safari, we walked around and saw some animals.  We weren't loving this, mainly because we go to the zoo a lot and it was a lot like the zoo.  We started to head back and noticed a line to see Mickey and Minnie Mouse.  It wasn't too long of a line, and you said you wanted to see them.  We were excited because we thought you actually would do it, so, we waited...

And waited...

Then, after like 10 minutes of what felt like 30, you out of no where said you didn't want to wait anymore and that you did not want to meet Mickey.  I have no clue why, but you were determined, so we decided to just go back to our sweet spot - Magic Kingdom!  We got to Magic Kingdom right about the time the clouds opened up, and boy did they open up!!

We were prepared though!  We grabbed some lunch with everyone else in the park and soon enough the rain was gone!  So off we went to go on a few new rides (the race track!) and of course, all our old faves!!
We spinned and spinned and spinned and spinned on the tea cups!  

We rode Dumbo again, too, like 5 more times!  And that ole snaggle tooth was just a barely hanging on! 

We did Mermaid a couple times.  You loved that one!  

And we finally bought our first souvenir!  Dumbos and Mouse ears! 

We rode and rode and rode and rode.  We were on a mission to ride everything a couple more times before we said good bye to Disney World, and I'm pretty sure we did it!  We had so much fun running from one ride to the next to the next!  We rode It's a Small World for the last time and told everyone good bye and see ya next year (ha!! yeah right!).  We rode Peter Pan and Pooh and the Carousel, all of them!  We had SOOOOO much fun that last day and to top it off, we ran over to the other part and rode the best roller coaster ever one last time!

We had dinner reservations at the park so we scooted our way there and it was a perfect location because afterwards we were set up to watch the fireworks.  We had not watched the fireworks up until this point and I think next year we'll make a point to watch them every time!  THEY WERE AWESOME!  And we were super excited to see Tinkerbelle fly through the sky!!!
Here's Mommy trying to catch a picture of you and Kate and Daddy.  It was a little crowded to say the least and catching a picture was hard.  I found this picture kind of odd.  Don't think this was the right time to be catching up on your reading...

Believe it or not, this was the best picture I could get!  Ha!! Again, we'll take what we can get.  Pictures are so overrated :)

After the firewords, we packed up the stroller and headed back to our hotel.  This night was by far the latest we had stayed up and you both were being troopers!  

Someone was a little more exhausted than the other...

We crashed when we got home, Mommy included!  It was a long day and thankfully we had lots of time tomorrow to get packed up and head home!
The next morning we slept in and relaxed a good portion of it...

Since we weren't leaving until later in the day, we decided to do one more character breakfast.  The Supercalifragilisticsexpealidocias breakfast!!!!  That's right - Mary Poppins!!!!  Mary is currently your favorite movie character, even though you say it's Ariel, Mary Poppins is what you are being for Halloween, is what you want to watch all the time, is what you sing all the time, so this breakfast was going to be awesome!!!
We hopped on our boat and headed on over...

And we were a little early, so we chilled on the fancy couches in the lobby...

Finally it was time to enter!

So, of course, Mary Poppins was there, but who else. Well, Alice from Alice in Wonderland was there!  

And so was Pooh and Tigger.  But you cannot be too surprised that you would not take a picture with Tigger and/or Pooh, right.  Thankfully you stayed above the table.  I think over the course of our days at Disney, you grew more and more acceptable of those characters with heads because I was shocked you even agreed to go to the breakfast (we asked you 200 times just to make sure!).  So proud of you.  You grew up right in front of our eyes ;)
But, of course, who cares about Pooh and Tigger when Mary Poppins is here!!  She's practically perfect in every way, you know.  

And, indeed, she was perfect!  She asked if you helped out with your little sister and you told her you were teaching her how to go potty and she said "Well that's just lovely.  Let's make sure to wash our hands every time, and possible a spoon full of sugar would help her, too?"  We  loved Mary Poppins and wanted her to join us for the rest of breakfast, but sadly, we had to tell her goodbye.  And we literally waited until she was out the door!  It was a lovely breakfast, indeed!
After breakfast (which was really an 11:00 meal) we ventured to a couple more souvenir shops and you scored new charms for your Disney charm bracelet.  Mimi had given you a beautiful silver charm bracelet that was Lizzy and/or Lynnes when they were little girls and it had Minnie Mouse and the castle and a few others on it already, so we came across a whole bunch more and you put a Ariel one on it and a few others that I can't remember now!  You were very proud of your Disney charm bracelet!

We had a few more minutes to waste at the resort while we waited for the Magical Express to pick us up so we found the arcade again!

We finally made it to the airport and just when we thought we had left all that was Disney, we stumbled upon Snow White!

It was a LONG day at the airport with delayed flights and long lines and hungry girls, but we finally made it home and were still loving each other :)
This was an incredible vacation and Mommy and Daddy did not know what we had in store for us, but I can say, after it was all said and done, Daddy was already thinking about when we could go back!  I call that a success story for sure!!
I hope you will remember this trip forever, although I can't remember anything past the age of 19, so hopefully these pictures will help jog the memory.  Just know that this trip will always hold a special place in my heart.  It was just our family, the four of us, conquering Disney and having a blast doing it! Love you sweet Disney loving girl!!!!