Disney World truly is amazing! I cannot believe how much fun we had! We made memories that will last a lifetime and I don't care if I am the only one that remembers them!
We left on a Wednesday morning and took off in a plane! The kids were a little anxious about their first plane ride, but that quickly went away as soon as we were in the air. Actually Maddie and Gracie were super excited about their plane ride from the beginning....It was the older two that were a little nervous. The two smallest sat next to Mommy and the oldest were with Dad.
Here we are waiting to board the plane. Yes, we are all ready to meet Mickey. All dressed in the same Mickey Mouse T-shirts!
We had a straight flight which only took two hours. We then took the Magical Express bus to our hotel. One thing about riding the Magical Express is that you don't even have to pick up your luggage at the airport, they will automatically bring it to your room. Nice touch Disney!
The Magical Express dropped us off at our Disney Resort: Port Orleans Riverside. It had a New Orleans theme. We checked in and walked to our beautiful room.
We then went for a quick dip in the pool before dinner with Mickey Mouse and friends.
After our swim we went to dinner at Chef Mickey's. To get there we needed to take a bus to the Magic Kingdom then ride the monorail to the Contemporary Resort. It took us about 50 minutes travel time. It was fun to get on the monorail.
Finally at Chef Mickey's!
We took a nice family photo, I love this pic!
Had some good food.....BBQ ribs and corn bread was yummy!
And then we met Donald, Minnie, Pluto, Goofy and Mickey!!!!
Mommy kissed Mickey!!!
Chef Mickey's was an awesome kick off to our Disney Vacation. Maddie was over the moon excited to meet all of the characters and to my surprise so was my 9 year old, Allie. Gracie didn't really want anything to do with them....she was still a little nervous. Jacob was on the neutral side of everything. But he still had a good time.
After Chef Mickey's we did a little shopping at the resort then went back to our hotel room to sleep to prepare for our early morning start at the Magic Kingdom.
We woke up bright and early at 545 am to get ready for breakfast at Cinderella's Royal Table! The girls wore their Princess dresses. Maddie dressed as Cinderella and Gracie dressed as Snow White.
We were there at "rope drop"
Right at 8 am as the Magic Kingdom opened, it started pouring down rain!!! We put on our ponchos and rushed to the Castle. Just the girls were going to have breakfast with Cinderella while the boys found something fun to do (Space Mountain). We passed a cast member in a car singing "Zippity doo dah Zippity aye , my oh my what a rainy rainy day, Not much sunshine coming your way! Zippity doo dah, zippity aye!" Forecast showed scattered thunderstorms for the whole day! I had been worried about it as I had been checking the weather for several days and I was prepared and bought ponchos before we left.
Cinderellas Royal Table
This is the moment I had been dreaming about for several months. Maddie loves loves loves Cinderella. She was so happy.
By this time, the girls were very hungry.....mostly Gracie. As they sat us they brought sweet breads and pastries to the table. Gracie had to have the whole tray of food in front of her....It was hers!
She eventually let us have some.....but only until she was able to eat a few of them herself! LOL
The princesses were announced one at a time. Sleeping Beauty - Aurora- was first to visit us.
Ariel was next....Ariel was the only princess Gracie would take a picture with...
Then Jasmine...
And lastly Snow White. Maddie and Snow White were wishing on a star in this photo. I was just trying to get Gracie to take a pic with her since she was dressed like her!
Cinderella's Royal table was a real treat. I was a little flustered because my two year old -not mentioning names- was uncooperative for most of the breakfast. But Maddie had a great time.
After breakfast was over we met up with the boys and started our touring plan. We started in Fanstasyland. The first thing we did was watch Mickey's Philharmagic. That was a pretty cool 3d short film. We then rode It's a Small World and Peter Pan's Flight. I was highly impressed with Disney's rides at this point. They are truly amazing.
We then traveled to Frontierland and conquered Splash Mountain and Big Thunder Mountain Railroad. While we waited for our Fast Pass time we toured the caves on Tow Sawyer Island.
The Magic Kingdom is so beautiful. I loved everything about this place!
Here we are going down the "mountain". Maddie, Allie, Jacob and Mom rode this one.
I highly recommend using fast pass and getting a rider switch pass so that both adults can experience the bigger rides.
We then took advantage of the break in the rain to take a few pics of us with the castle in the background. The pics weren't the best as Gracie had already fallen asleep and we were too close to the castle
I have no clue who that girl in green is...she just wouldn't get out of our pics. LOL
Our family photo
I now realize its better to take pics a little further from the castle to get a better "castle pic". Now I know for next time!
We then started our tour of Tommorowland. Everyone was getting hungry too. We got a fast pass for Space Mountain then ate at Cosmic Rays Starlight Cafe. The Cafe was a madhouse! SO busy we could hardly find a chair for over 20 mins! Probably because it started to pour down rain again.
Space Mountain was an absolute total surprise for me. I really enjoyed it! The older kids loved it. They said that was the best ride of the trip. While I rode Space Mountain with the older kids, Ervin rode the People Mover with Grace and Mad. We then rode the Buzz Light year ride and had ice cream then headed over to Adventureland.
In Adventureland we rode the Jungle Cruise, Pirates of the Carribean and Alladin's Magic Carpet. The older kids also walked through the Swiss Family Robinson Treehouse.
and then more rain started falling.....by this time we were all exhausted so we went back to the hotel for a little downtime and dinner.
We came back to the park around 8ish. We wanted to watch the Electrical Parade and Fireworks. Again as we approached the entrance, it started raining harder. The Electrical Parade was cancelled. So we headed on over to the Haunted Mansion ride. Mad and Grace did great with this ride. Again another awesome ride. I LOVED it.
We then headed over towards the castle to save a spot for Wishes the fireworks show. The fireworks were amazing....The best I have ever seen.
After Wishes, there was mass exodus......so we stayed behind to ride more rides for the next hour and catch the second Electrical Parade show. We rode Space Mountain again and the older kids rode the Tomorrowland Speedway. The small kids were so tired they fell asleep, they were knocked out tired. They missed the Electrical Parade which was also AWESOME!
I cant say enough about how much the family and I enjoyed this day. Even though it rained it was amazing. The rain may have been a blessing in disguise as it was not hot at all.
I also recommend getting the book The Unofficial Guide Walt Disney World. It has so much great info!
Keep posted for Part 2!