Disney Recap Part 2

Going into this trip we had toyed briefly with the idea/hoped that maybe the girls could share a bed. Both of them are little bed hogs, and Hannah has never slept in a big girl bed yet. So we decided that we'd split up. Most nights, Matt slept with Brooke (to which he informed me "first she kicks ya in the N*ts and then she has her foot up your a$$!"-- to which I proceeded to laugh hysterically) and I slept with Hannah.

For some reason, Hannah felt she had to be TOUCHING me in bed. She's a little thing you know. We'd put her to bed and one of us would lay down with her until she was good and asleep (about 45 minutes). The second you got in that bed, a little arm would shoot out and she'd grip your arm/hand/nose/tummy. If you tried to scoot away a bit to disengage whatever body part, the little arm would scoot a little further. Sometimes just her little pinky was touching me, but she was touching me nonetheless. Good thing the beds were comfy and I was exhausted because I didn't get to move much--yet still slept like a rock.

So anyways--- off to the parks, huh? We spent Saturday evening settling in, grabbing dinner, and exploring the resort. Sunday morning we had a fresh start to Animal Kingdom. It just worked out on my "touring plan" that this was the park we were at for our first day, and honestly I was glad to get it out of the way. While it has some attractions that I just love (Kilimanjaro Safari, Expedition Everest, Kali River Rapids), it is just a HARD park to get through, especially (or because of?) little ones. It is a HOT park....there's shade but there are tons of trees so the breeze is pretty well blocked and the humidity is stifling.

Riding the bus to Animal Kingdom. The expressions on their face is saying "you take too many pictures" -- and it's only the first day!

We rented a stroller for the week...which Hannah refused to ride in. Brooke was thrilled to ride in it though.... which turned out to be okay because then at least she was not complaining about all the walking or her legs being tired.

We did the "Give a day, get a day" volunteer thing that Disney promoted earlier in the year. Once you volunteered you got a voucher that you could trade in for either a day at the park, or a "special fastpass." We did the fastpass thing. We used one voucher a day, at one park, and the voucher got special fastpass cards for all 6 of us to be used on six rides in the park that day. If you don't know, a fastpass basically jumps you to the front of the line. This was a Godsend for us.

We went and did the Safari, which we all enjoy. We had some pretty awesome views of the animals. Then we made our way to Expedition Everest and Matt, his dad, and I fastpassed it. Matt and Gary think it's hysterical to listen to me on roller coasters. I have this giggle/scream/whoohoo/scream thing that I do. Sometimes I think they enjoy listening to me more than the ride itself!

Safari:

While we were on Expedition Everest, grandma got the girls an ice cream. Nothing like bonding over a Mickey Bar:

(Don't blink! Hannah is in the stroller!)

We then went and grabbed lunch at Flame Tree BBQ. We found a shady, non crowded area to eat which was great. Hannah ate a bit and watched the quack quacks that were wandering around. Brooke was an eating machine (on the whole trip!). Did I mention that Hannah was pretty crabby this day? She was all out of whack from our day of travel on Saturday.

After lunch, everyone went on the Dinosaur ride except Hannah and I. Hannah's too short and that ride scared the beejezus out of me a few years ago and I refuse to go on it again. It's not a roller coaster, but I'm telling you those dinosaurs are scary. We pushed the stroller around while we waited.

Everyone was hot and tired so we decided to go back to the hotel. Orlando the first week of May has always been pretty good to us weather-wise.... this trip they were near-record breaking temps for the first several days--as in-- it was about 95 and 10000% humidity. We went thru Dinoland on our way to the park entrance and used some free midway-game vouchers we had. Brooke did whack-a-fossil or something like that. She didn't win, but she had fun.

That evening we enjoyed dinner at Kona Cafe at the Polynesian resort, then took the girls swimming afterwards. We had talked about going over to Magic Kingdom, but the girls wanted to swim. Fine by me... I think I've mentioned a time or two that I LOVED our pool.

Brooke's "Build your own Sundae" dessert at Kona Cafe:

My dessert at Kona Cafe. Matt and his parents thought I was crazy taking pics of my food, but I have my reasons! And so what if I'm crazy?

I'll leave this post as is for now.... tomorrow is our day at Magic Kingdom and there's always a lot to tell on MK days!