My family of 4's first trip to Disney- May 17-24**completed 11/10**

[firsttimer4]

So we made our way to the lion king show. There were LOTS of people standing outside and I wasn't sure we would make it in to see the show, but we did. I was pleasantly surprised by this show. It was by far the best show we saw while in Disney.











And one of my favorite pics from our trip......

Just one of those magical Disney moments.
When the show was over the kids actually asked if we could watch it again!

While DH went and got the stroller we snapped a few pics of the scenery



We had dinner reservations at rainforest café so we decided to make our way to the front of the park.
A few pics from out side of the restaurant.



And the inside from where we were sitting



After dinner we headed back to POP and decided to explore AoA. We had planned on doing this the night we arrived but never made it.

But first here are a few of our fast pass pics from Animal Kingdom

 

[nat1234]

I'm so glad your DH started to feel better and was able to go with you to Animal Kingdom. There's nothing worse than getting sick on vacation. We've been to Disney three times and it never fails someone will come down with a cold. Now I bring cold meds addition to Tylenol & gravel.

I love the picture of your DD arm around her big brother. I can total appreciate why this is one of your favourites from your vacation. Can't wait to hear more.

 

[firsttimer4]

Since we got back to the room a little early we decided to walk over and check out Art of Animation. We planned on doing this the night we arrived but didn't get around to it. On the walk over we saw a few bunnies.



CARS SECTION













NEMO




LITTLE MERMAID

 

[firsttimer4]

LION KING






I have to say we loved looking around this hotel. Disney did a great job!

On the way back we explored POP a little more









up next....
something we won't do again until our kids are teenagers

 

[dugarner]

Jumping in late, I just read the intro and watched the reveal video. You have the most precious kids EVER!! I know your mom would be thrilled to know you used the money for the trip. My mom died last summer and she loved my kids more than anything. Oh my, I bet you had some moments where you missed her something fierce.

We lived in Louisiana for ten years and I loved hearing you call your little girl Sissy---our kids' nicknames are Bubba and Sissy (that's what they call each other).

Looking forward to catching up!

 

[firsttimer4]

Jumping in late, I just read the intro and watched the reveal video. You have the most precious kids EVER!! I know your mom would be thrilled to know you used the money for the trip. My mom died last summer and she loved my kids more than anything. Oh my, I bet you had some moments where you missed her something fierce.

We lived in Louisiana for ten years and I loved hearing you call your little girl Sissy---our kids' nicknames are Bubba and Sissy (that's what they call each other).

Looking forward to catching up!

Thank you! So glad that you're joining in.

That's what they call each other too

 

[firsttimer4]

So during the planning stages of our trip I was told that chef Mickey was a must do. The only reservation I could get that fit into our schedule was at 8:30pm Thursday night. So we decided to do the water park and take a late nap then dinner.
I'm going to apologize now because I don't have any pics from the waterpark.
So we get up and head to Typhoon Lagoon. The first mistake we made was getting in the floating river first. I guess because we got in at one location and got out at another it just confused us and from that point on we just couldn't figure out where anything was. We should have walked around first and figured out where everything was. We did stumble upon the kids area. Which the kids loved!! DH and I got a work out chasing them around. There were parents that were lounging in chairs while their kids just ran around, but I needed to have my eyes on my kids at all times.
DH and DS were going to swim with the sharks but DS changed his mind at the last minute.
We found a slide that DD was tall enough to ride. We climbed all the way to the top and she decided that she didn't want to go down it. I asked if we could go down together and was told no. The guy apologized and said it was policy. I completely understood. DS ended up going down it quite a few times. He loved it!!
There was more things the kids couldn't ride than things they could. We decided to grab some lunch and after that we caught the bus back to the hotel and ended up just playing in the pool. They enjoyed that way more than walking around the water park for 3 hours!!
We decided that on future trips we would just schedule in some pool time instead of spending the extra money on water park tickets. Maybe once the kids are teens and we can let them explore on their own we'll try in again.

 

[firsttimer4]

So after some pool time and a nap we were ready for our late dinner at chef mickey's!

We got to MK and had time so we rode the monorail around once before getting off at our stop.


We didn't have to wait long to get our picture taken and to be seated.

And the characters were on their way!! As I had quickly learned with the previous character meals we did it's kind of a juggling act! We waited for a few of the characters before darting off the get our food.






DD's Minnie costume was bothering her but she kept in on until she saw Minnie!





Mickey took her dress!!



The food here was average but the character experience was great!!
I had heard that you could see the fireworks over the castle so the plan was to try and do that but on the way out there was a guy doing character drawings. so we stopped and had the kids done.

They came out sooo cute!! I don't have the finished pics with me but I will see about posting them later. I think it will be a tradition to get them done everytime we go!

 

[firsttimer4]

During the planning stages of the trip we left our last day open. We decided since our flight was a late flight we would let the kids decide which park they wanted to go back to. Well we all knew early on in the trip that it would be Magic Kingdom. Disney had announced that MK would be open for 24hrs on the 24th. So we had no idea what kind of crowds to expect. We didn't rush that morning. We packed everything up and called for help with our luggage. Which I was told they normally don't do but would send someone with a cart to help us. We weren't being lazy but with 2 kids in a stroller and 2 large suitcases, a medium one, our carryon and the park bag there was no way we were getting it all to the front on our own. Then once we got to the front there was some confusion over if our bag was over the weight limit and if we had it checked in the right place. Once we got that all sorted out we were off to MK.
It was definitely packed!! They gave us cool buttons for the 24 hr event. The goal for the day was to have DD meet the princesses. We went straight there. I can't remember exactly what the posted wait time was, but it wasn't enough to stir us away.




I love this one of Cinderella trying to get DS to give her a kiss!










The princesses were great! We didn't feel rushed at all and they interacted so well with the kids. I have a ton of pics with them.

From there of course we had to get some last pics with the castle.




We did catch the characters at the castle!!




On our first two days in MK we never really made it to tomorrowland. So we headed there.

Not the best pics on Buzz...

Lots of concentration


And one last ride on Dumbo

This time the wait was longer so the kids got to play inside. They almost didn't want to leave.

I have to admit that it was really HOT and the wait times seemed to be getting longer and longer. We really wanted to ride barnstormer again and peterpan since we hadn't had a chance to yet, but the wait times were approaching 60minutes. And since we had to leave the parks early to catch our flights we couldn't get fast passes. We decided since it was so hot and crowded to just grab a bite to eat and head back to the hotel and hang out.

We ended up getting our carryon and thank goodness I packed an extra set of clothes in there. I was soaked from sweating and was happy to be in a clean set of clothes for the flight. And I'm sure the people on the plane were also happy. We had some time to kill and some extra snack credits so we spent some time in the gift shop and then just hung out. There was some games set out front and some giant blocks that the kids enjoyed playing with while we waited on the bus to the airport. We made it to the airport with plenty of time to kill. I think we had over an hour to wait before the flight!

 

[firsttimer4]

Overall our trip was wonderful!! I didn't realize how tired I was until we got home and the next day I literally couldn't keep my eyes open. I did learn a few things.... The trip wouldn't have been a success without the help of the disboards, no matter how much you plan be prepared to be flexible, just because it's Disney doesn't mean your kids will be angels, people still get sick in Disney (even thought I was shoving vitamins down eveyones throat before we left) and you definitely can't see/do everything in one trip.

People told us that my DD was too young for Disney. Well I definitely disagree. She loved every minute of it and still talks about it. She remembers it like it was yesterday.

When we left I thought maybe this would be our one and only Disney trip. Or atleast it would be the only one for a long time. Well I was ok for a while but then the Disney fever soon set in. We have a trip booked for May 2015!!

Thanks everyone for following along and I'm sorry it took soooo long to finish this Trip report.