DisneyWorld - Magic Kingdom

Our third day was spent at Magic Kingdom.  This was definitely the girls' favorite park.  We dressed them up like princesses before we left because we knew we would be visiting a few.

We visited all of our favorite rides: the teacups, the carousel, and It's a Small World.

We went backstage to meet Mickey Mouse.  While we were waiting, I saw some signs for the Three Little Pigs and I thought they were so cute.

Because we were first in line to meet Mickey, he came out to get Lily and Claire.

 It was fun to see Mickey's dressing room.  I was playing with one of Mickey's hats and the cast member told me that it was magic.  If I put money in there, it would disappear.  I had a good laugh.

We stopped for a break at the Main Street Bakery.  The ice cream sandwich and cinnamon roll were huge!  I think this is the reason I gained 6 pounds this week.

Cast members would give the girls stickers a lot.  What kid doesn't love stickers?  Can you find all 6 of Claire's stickers?

We rode our favorite rides again.  Peter Pan and Winnie the Pooh were the biggest hits with the girls.

During the parade the balloon guy told us about "Sorcerer's of the Magic Kingdom", an interactive trading-card game they were beta testing while we were there.  They gave us a stack of cards with different magic spells on them (like Winnie the Pooh's bees and Pinocchio's sawdust) that we could use on our mission to defeat Hades.  Our mission took us to Frontierland to help Pocahontas.  Hidden throughout Frontierland were screens that would recognize our "key card" and then give us another video clue to follow to help Pocahontas. We'd check on our map and find the next location (like a treasure hunt).  It was really fun.  We got some more cards on a different day, but we didn't have time to do another mission.

After this, we rode the Liberty Belle Riverboat at sunset.  It was very relaxing.

Because we'd finished our touring plan for the day and still had some extra time we went to Tomorrowland and rode Buzz Lightyear and a few other rides.  Here's our little alien.

DisneyWorld - Animal Kingdom

Animal Kingdom is my favorite Disney theme park.  I just love the lush, tropical setting.  I love seeing the animals.  I love Asia and Africa and how I feel transported to those places.  And I love Expedition Everest (an awesome roller coaster that runs into the Yeti)...a lot.

Here I am waiting for the bus at our hotel, anxiously awaiting our adventure.  Notice it is sunny, and warm.  This was the complete opposite of the weather we left behind in Washington!

Lily and Claire loved playing the drums at Animal Kingdom.  I think they have a percussionist streak from Jeff.  Here's a video of Claire singing Jungle Bells while she drums.

We saw DiVine, which was something we had missed on our last trip to Disney World.  She is a street performer that has very good camouflage and looks like a moving plant.

As we were heading to the Asia jungle trail a cast member noticed my "Happy Anniversary" button (Yay! 7 years!).  He told me that I had a phone call.  I went over and answered the phone and Mickey and Minnie were on the line to wish me a happy anniversary and sing me a song.  It was a really fun surprise!

We saw lots of animals including some flying foxes (huge bats) and cool birds.

We enjoyed the parade and then went home.  Claire slept through the parade.  We really enjoy the cars for each of the characters; they are packed to go camping.  Minnie Mouse has a mountain of luggage and perched on top is a bubble bath...absolutely essential.

Goofy's car is towing his smoking grill.  So funny!

After Animal Kingdom, we went to Downtown Disney for dinner.  On our way, we passed the lego store and they had some amazing creations. This is the seven dwarves.

We ate at the Wolfgang Puck restaurant.  Yum!  And then we went into a toy store to play with Mr. Potato Head. 

Then, some of the cast members at the store pulled Lily and Claire aside and started a tea party.  The girls loved it.  Afterwards, they each got to pick out a pin.  Lily got Minnie Mouse and Claire picked Tinkerbell.

Meeting the Princesses

I didn't realize, until our trip was over, that Lily and Claire met every Disney Princess.  Every single one.  I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing.  They sure are cute together.  Claire gets so dreamy-eyed whenever she meets a character.

We started with Rapunzel, because we heard she has the longest line.

Then we visited Tiana (well, I snuck away to ride the Haunted Mansion).

Then Cinderella, Belle, and Aurora.  Claire loves Aurora and was super chatty with her.  She made up all kinds of stories.

The next day in Magic Kingdom we met Aladdin and Jasmine.  It was funny to watch them ride the Magic Carpets ride before they came over.  They kept getting hit by the camel spit!

My favorite character interaction to watch was Ariel and Prince Eric.  Here's Claire's dreamy eyes for Ariel.

Here's Ariel's dreamy eyes for Prince Eric (so funny!)

Then we asked Prince Eric where Max was (Max is his dog's name).  He went off on a story about Max and his whereabouts.  Afterwards, he told Lily he needed to whisper a secret in her ear.  He pulled her in close and gave her a big kiss on the cheek!  Lily was so surprised.  Eric's tricky like that.

Well, Claire was a little jealous that Lily got kissed so she had Prince Eric give her a kiss too.

Then, in Animal Kingdom, we met Pocahontas.  The girls, especially Claire, were fascinated with the fringe across her chest on her dress.  I felt bad that my kids were inappropriately touching Pocahontas, but I'm sure they weren't the first.

At EPCOT we met Mulan.  She was very concerned about the locations of Mushu and Crickee and wanted Lily and Claire's help finding them. 

On our last day, we met Snow White.  She was very into her character and did a great job.  She completed our collection!

I think its more one of my life dreams (to meet all the princesses) than my kids, but that's OK. What an accomplishment! 

3-D Glasses

Apparently we thought it was really funny to take pictures of each other in 3-D glasses this trip....we have a lot of these pictures.  Here's a peek into the collection

DisneyWorld - Evening at Epcot

Its a long flight from Seattle to Orlando...about as long as it is to fly to Hawaii.  The kids were really good on the plane though.  We left early, early in the morning and arrived at EPCOT at 6pm or so.  We rode Finding Nemo, watched Turtle Talk with Crush, ate dinner and then went to meet some very famous people.

Afterwards, we found a sweet spot to watch the evening fireworks show (which is spectacular).  We spent a few minutes after the fireworks were over exploring the UK Pavillion.  It seemed so real at night with no one around.

Then we headed home to try and get our kids to bed so they could adjust to the 3-hour time difference.  It was a magical first day!

Snowpocalypse 2012

Seattle was hammered by a bad snow and ice storm this winter.  Usually snow doesn't really phase me, but here it doesn't happen very often, so they are totally unequipped to handle it.  Add to that the fact that we live on a really steep hill with millions of trees and we had a small disaster.  Our road was closed and our power went out....power outages in the winter stink!  We tried to keep warm by running our gas fireplaces, but we were just hanging on to 60 degrees.  After one night roughing it, we went to stay with the Millerburg family.  They still had power and only live a mile away.

The next night, the Maner family came to stay with the Millerburgs too.  Then things turned into a party!  We stayed up late playing games, ate yummy food, and had a regular stay-cation.

The men all worked from "home" in Spencer's office.

The kids all played together and thought it was the best thing ever.  We even planned little relay races for them.

The snow and ice stopped early enough for us to still make our flight to Disneyworld and our power even came back on before we had to leave.

It reminded me of the last time we went to Disneyworld....the airport was closed in Houston because we'd just suffered a hurricane.  Our trip was delayed 1 day, but our power came on right before we got home from our trip.  Coincidence?  I'll let you decide!