Day 7- Our Last Day at Magic Kingdom

When we found out that we were going to Disney World I knew that there were 2 places I wanted to eat, the Coral Reef Cafe and Cinderellas Royal Table inside Cinderella Castle. I was able to secure reservations for the Coral Reef Cafe but not the Castle. The dining reservation cast member told me that my best bet at getting in was to call everyday we were there and see if there had been any cancellations. So we did. We called everyday and nothing. Finally on our last night there we got lucky. They'd had a cancellation for 8:30 the next morning! Yes! There was a problem however. When you make reservations at the Castle it is prepay only and we had left our Visa's in our hotel room because when you are in the park you only need your "key to the world" which pays for everything. Now normally this wouldn't be a problem because we have our Visa numbers memorized but just before we left for the trip we were notified by our bank that our information had been stolen and they issued us a new account with new cards and new numbers (that we still hadn't memorized). There was also one other small problem. We weren't at our hotel. We were standing in line for the shuttle back to the hotel though so we asked the cast member we were on the phone with if she could hang on while we took the 10 minute shuttle ride back. We wanted these reservations bad! She agreed and hung on the line. For some reason however our bus driver went a different way back to the hotel and instead of being the first stop we were the very last stop! Ugggg! After 35 minutes we were finally back at our hotel and were able to secure the reservation. Hooray! What a sweet lady for waiting on the line for that long for us.

We were up bright and early (6 am which was 4 am UT time) to make sure we were on time to our breakfast reservation. We had to get up that early to get ready but it was also our last day at Disney World so we had to get packed up, checked-out of the hotel and checked-in to the airline. It was hectic but worth it to be able to eat in the castle!

When you walk in the castle you are greeted by non other than Cinderella herself.

Sitting at our royal table.

The ceiling of the castle. Can you see the Hidden Mickeys? :)

As part of the breakfast package you get to meet the Princesses, like I said before the princesses are way more accessible than at Disneyland.

The kids had to sit on the outside of the table so the princesses could get to them more easily. Unfortunately it made taking good pictures more difficult because the window was behind them.

In between the princesses they take a break to give the girls a wand and the boys a sword and a wishing star. When they are all passed out they do a little rhyme and make the kids close their eyes and make a wish. As you can see Harris was really into the wishing part. ;)

So sweet!

This Ariel was the prettiest and sassiest ;) that we have met.

For some reason they only have peasant Belle at Disney World.

After a fabulous breakfast of deep fried cream cheese danish :) we set out to find more characters. Our first stop was to see Rapunzel and Flynn Ryder from Tangled. At this point it was only about 9:15 and the characters weren't scheduled to come out until 10. So I stood in line while Chet and the kids went in search of hot chocolate. You see, over night a cold front moved into Orlando and it was freezing! While I was standing in line freezing my butt off I checked Weather Channel and it said that the temperature was 24 degrees! So cold. So cold.

Finally we were let into the area where the characters were going to be. They had the parents line up against the wall and the kids were all around a big table set up with crayons and coloring paper. When the kids finished coloring, Rapunzel and Flynn finally came out. Liv was dying because they came out and wanted to do a dance with all the kids. She was so embarrassed! Fortunately, it didn't last very long. :)



Poor Liv! I just love watching her face she looks like she is going to die of embarrassment!

Rapunzel and Flynn

This is right next to where you stand in line to see Flynn and Rapunzel and the kids wanted to pose for the camera. You don't say no when the kids want to pose. ;)

After meeting and dancing with Flynn and Rapunzel we wanted to go find Davy Crockett Donald in Frontierland and do Big Thunder and Splash Mountain.

This was a cool character find. For some reason Donald is very hard to see. He is hardly ever out so to see him and have him be in a new costume was awesome!

After riding Jungle Cruise (which got a +3) we wandered through Frontierland and came upon our family treehouse! ;)

It was almost time to head out but there was one more character that we wanted to see. So we headed back to Main Street to meet Daisy.

Surprisingly enough this is the first time we have ever seen Daisy. You think she would be out more with the other main characters. Maybe she is just elusive like Donald.

After our final character meeting at Disney World it was time to say goodbye. We had an amazing time and look forward to our next visit!

Goodbye Disney World we will see you in 2012!

P.S. Are you ready? ;)

This was at the exit where Santa had been.

Day 6 - Animal Kingdom and Magic Kingdom

So, Day 6 was kind of a make-up day.  We didn't have a lot of plans so we decided that we wanted to try to get some daytime activity over at Animal Kingdom (there were a couple rides we missed and we wanted to see some more animals), followed by another nightly excursion to Magic Kingdom (which, as already described, was Jaime's favorite because of it's Disneyland-like feel).
When we first got into the park we met DiVine.  She was so.....weird.

Anyway...there are 2 cool rides at Animal Kingdom and we wanted to make sure we did them both this day.  First was the Dinosaur ride.  Dinosaur was very cool.  They premise is kind of Jurassic Parkish except you go back in time right before the meteor shower that destroyed all the dinosaurs.  The effects are cool and the animatronics on the dinosaurs once you go back in time are top notch.  The only problem with this is that Harris was so scared!  The ride does a very good job of making you feel like you are being chased by a dinosaur and near the end he jumps out to eat you.  This is when they snap the pic;

My job was to protect Harris (it was Little Buddy's job as well)...Jaime says she wasn't clutching her heart but was just about to check her phone (yes, she keeps it in her shirt).  Anyway, it was a great ride.

We also decided to try the Safari ride again (and we hoped that it wouldn't take a 90 minute wait this time!).  The wait was much shorter and we got some good pics;

Not a lot of narration really needed here...these are pictures of animals we saw whilst on the Safari ride.

We also made time to do cool ride #2, Expedition Everest.  No pics this time but it could be my favorite Disney ride...

We walked around, saw some animals, got some food and realized that we were FREEZING COLD!  So we decided to head back to the resort, put on everything we brought and head over to Magic Kingdom.

 On the way out we saw this on a t-shirt and bought it for Harris (as well as on a beach towel).


Not really much to report on for Magic Kingdom this night, it was pretty much more of the same.  We did Pooh Bear again and a couple other rides but our evening was really dominated by the desire to stay warm which was surprisingly hard to do.

 The kids playing in the interactive line for Winnie the Pooh.

 Cute pic on the ride...can you tell that Harris is cold?

 Of course we had to do Philharmagic again...Harris really liked it (but you can't tell from this photo)


So, funny story to close out here.  I started to notice a funny trend on the trip.  It seemed that in some pictures, Liv had seemed a bit off during my first effort to snap the photo and I would have to tell her, "No", and then retake.  The below is a good example from this night of what we began to call "two take" Liv...

 Real picture, she wasn't trying to make this face!

The retake version.

Another great day!

Day 5- Christmas at EPCOT

Christmas morning we slept in. When the kids did finally wake up there were a few presents (under my fabulous tree) from me and Chet since Santa gave them the trip to Disney World.

Yay presents!

Harris smelling his presents to see if can can sniff what it is. He picked this up from Chet who does this as well. :)

We made a total mess!

When we finished unwrapping our presents we got ready for the day and headed out to EPCOT. We spent the whole day there because we had several things that we had reservations for later in the day. We started the day by getting fast passes for Test Track. It was so busy that even tough we were there by 11 our fast passes weren't until 5:30! We had some time to kill so we decided to go over to the VIP area of Mission Space. Mission Space is a space shuttle flight simulation made by HP. Since Chet is an HP employee they have a special room reserved just for them. Well, come to find out it was closed for Christmas. How lame is that! Since it was closed they let us use the fast pass line instead of waiting 75 minutes in the regular line. I was a little worried about this ride because they close you into this tiny little simulator room and then spin you around and stuff. There is also a less intense version, which is the one we did but while we were standing in line someone said that it was like Tower of Terror and I had a mini meltdown. I was freaking a little and the cast member that let us into the simulator actually asked me if I was going to be ok. I did survive the ride but decided once was enough so we moved on to finding characters. :)

The way they do characters at EPCOT is pretty cool. They match the characters to they countries they are from. Like Mulan in China and Donald from The Three Caballeros in Mexico (we missed him unfortunately). There were others but I cant remember who was where. :)

Marie from the Aristocats in France

The Beast and Belle also in France

Liv wants to be Belle one day.

We also saw lots of princesses this trip. They are way more accessible at WDW than at DL. Sleeping Beauty was in France so we stopped to see her as well. She was so cute with Harris. Telling him what a handsome prince he was and asking him if he had slayed any dragons. His answer to the dragon slaying question was that he would find one and punch it in the face! Silly boy.

We finished with the characters in France and headed to explore the rest of the countries in the world showcase. We only made it to Morocco before we realized it was time for our dinner reservations at the Coral Reef Cafe.

Headed into the streets of Morocco

Hanging out in Morocco

 I would have loved to spend more time exploring all the rest of the countries but there is just so many things to do in each country we just didn't have time. Maybe next time. ;) After our visit to Morocco was done we took the ferry back to the other side of EPCOT where the restaurant was.

Enjoying the view while waiting for the ferry.

My adorable family on the ferry.

Our dinner reservations were at the Coral Reef Cafe. I was really excited to eat at this place because it is a restaurant with an aquarium inside. Chet made sure that our seats were right next to the tank! It was so cool!

That turtle sat there the whole time we were eating. The waiter told us that is her favorite spot in the aquarium he also told us that she is 92 years old!

After a wonderful dinner we went next door to the restaurant to The Seas with Nemo and Friends. It's a dark ride. It's really cute. You can't really compare it to the one at Disneyland because they are completely different. For Harris it was less scary. So that was a plus. :) At the end of the ride you exit into The Seas with Nemo and Friends Pavilion. It was awesome! It was a Disney themed aquarium! We spent quite a bit of time there and had a blast! (Chet and I decided that if we could somehow merge The Georgia Aquarium and Disneyland I would live there.)

They had 2 manatees that they rescued. One of them was hit by a boat propeller and the other beached herself.

 In all of the aquariums that I have been to, and there has been a lot, I hardly ever see anything that I haven't seen before. Leave it to Disney to have several fish that I have never seen!

So pretty!

So creepy! Yes that is a fish and I have so idea what kind.

The tanks were all pretty small but very beautifully done.

The Lion fish tank.

This Rock fish was doing his best at hiding in the coral reef tank.

The eels. You know I had to text Linz a picture of these guys. ;)

One more picture and then it was finally off to Test Track!

The kids being eaten by Bruce.

When it was finally our fastpass time for test track we still had to wait another 30 minutes or so in the fastpass line. It was a really fun ride! Especially when you are going on the track at 65 in an open car. It's a very different feeling from a roller coaster. I wish we could have done it again but the fastpassses were gone for the day and we couldn't wait in line because we had reserved seats for the Candlelight Processional with Edward James Olmos.


I'm not sure why but they take your picture at the end of the ride instead of during the fast part.

To close out the night we had reserved seating for the Candlelight Processional and the firework show IllumiNations. I was really excited for the Processional. The Candlelight Processional is a celebrity reading the Christmas Story with a 50 piece orchestra and a choir. It was amazing! I had tears in my eyes through the whole concert.

Edward James Olmos was intense!

Edward James Olmos and the choir and part of the orchestra

It was kind of weird to feel the spirit at Disney World but it was there. It was an amazing way to end Christmas day, thinking about the real reason of the season. I will never forget it.

After the concert it was starting to get really cold. We were debating whether or not we should stay for the fireworks or call it a night because we didn't have our jackets. It had been 78 degrees during the day so we didn't think it would get that cold. Boy were we wrong! We decided we would stay and just huddle close together to stay warm. When the fireworks finally started the wind had picked up and was blowing the smoke and ash right in our direction. I even had a giant piece of ash fall in my eye and it watered and swelled up! We stuck it out for about 10 minutes and then bailed. It wasn't that great of a show anyways. :)

IllumiNations: Reflections of Earth

Can you see all that smoke?! That's what was blowing in our faces!

Overall we really enjoyed EPCOT and had a Christmas Day that we will never forget!