Disney Travelogue #6 (Epcot)

We spent our last day at Epcot… Love.

My cutie nephews…

Cousin love:

We spent some time in Innoventions, which is kind of a hands-on science museum. We spent most of our time there in the Recycling challenge (not that our family is ever so environmentally conscious – although we try. We were drawn there by the giant garbage truck, irresistible to our boys.)

This was a video game where you sorted the recycling you’d gathered…

 

Which you gathered using this giant (and heavy) recycling truck/cart (which is the draw of the entire exhibit, I’m sure.)

One of our favorite things @ Epcot is the Seas exhibit, featuring the Finding Nemo ride…

And Turtle Talk with Crush, an interactive and hilarious show where Crush from Finding Nemo talks to the audience (And teaches them to “Turtle Talk.” Including saying “DUDE!” a lot. Awesome.) I had to carry Tobin out of the room crying, “No! I want to talk to Cwush some more!!”

They have wonderful aquariums, which Khymberly’s boys LOVED.

In the afternoon we headed over to the World Showcase (my favorite). It was super crowded – the only crowds we encountered. It was Friday late afternoon by that time, and the Epcot Food and Wine festival was going on. In addition to the regular country showcases, there were booths from many other countries where you could sample cuisine from all over the world.

And we ran into our friends Todd & Mikki and their family! I love this picture – it looks like the Meyers and the Sandins in China!

 

We finished the day with another Grand Gatherings meal – this one was my favorite. It was in the Odyssey Center, and rather than just one restaurant, they had food from all over the world showcase. Delish.

 

Afterwards, they had a kids program…

And dance party with Minnie and Goofy!!

(Tobin started the dance party with Minnie Mouse, and after 2 songs holding her hands, I went and told him he needed to let some other kids have a turn dancing with Minnie. His feelings were so hurt - “I want Minnie!!”)

Then they walked us over to a special roped off seating section – for dessert and front row seats for the fireworks. Epcot’s fireworks are amazing, my absolute favorite of any I’ve ever seen. We were so close I had to shield my eyes from the fire, it was so bright.

After the fireworks, the castmembers who had led us to our dessert location with lightsticks let the boys play with their light sticks. :)

And then we went home and CRASHED.

Tobin is cuddling with the stuffed Figment (from the World of Imagination ride) Nana got him. He picked that out as his “one toy he wanted more than any other.” After buying Figment, we were in our hotel gift shop, and he wanted  a stuffed Eeyore. I considered it, but he got distracted and put the Eeyore down, so I thought we were in the clear.

On the bus back to the airport, Langston had a bigger stuffed Eeyore – and I could hear from the seat behind us that Tobin thought Langston had something of his. As we were getting off the bus (Khymberly’s family stayed on, they left from another terminal), Tobin completely melted down, thinking that Langston had HIS Eeyore. He kept saying, “No, you bought me an Eeyore! That’s MY Eeyore!” Oops.

Lucky for me, as we were checking in for our flight, my mom made a quick swing by the store in the airport and picked up an Eeyore. Tobin ADORES it, and has slept with it every night since then. I guess Nana knows best. :)

Disney Travelogue #5 (Free time)

When we went to Disney World 4 years ago, we were there for Thanksgiving (2006). We ate Thanksgiving Dinner at the restaurant in Germany (in the World Showcase at Epcot), and they had a dance floor & an Oopa-loompa band. The kids had such a great time running around like crazy and dancing.  As we watched them enjoy the freedom, we wondered if, even though we were having a wonderful time, the kids couldn’t use a little more free/down time.

(Our only free time 4 years ago…Look how shrimpy Luke & Alyssa were!)

So this time, we planned a free day in the middle of our time at Disney. I would totally do this again. It was hard (with all the different options – particularly the water parks, which we didn’t visit) to keep it a mostly free day, but we managed to. We slept in, then went to breakfast at our hotel already wearing our swimsuits and headed to the pool.

(Incidentally… I checked my phone that morning, and it was the first below freezing day in Lincoln. I was ridiculously happy to be in Florida, headed to the pool.)

After several hours in the pool, we got cleaned up and headed to Downtown Disney – Matt & Luke went to Disney Quest (3 stories of video gaming and virtual reality games), while Mom, Tobin and I had a great lunch and went shopping.

For dinner, mom had made reservations for us to attend a “Grand Gatherings” meal at Animal Kingdom. If you have a group of 8 or more, there are some special perks available – one of them is choosing one (or more…we ended up going to 2) of the Grand Gatherings meals at each of the parks. The Animal Kingdom Grand Gathering includes special seating for the Safari (at the end of the day, when many animals are out), then dinner at the Tuska Restaurant.

The kids loved the Safari (although Luke was not impressed by the fakey “poachers” emergency, including an animatronic baby elephant rescued from the poachers. Of course when we asked Tobin what his favorite animal was of the ones we saw? The baby elephant.)

The meal was excellent, and included African musicians (and a conga line for the kids) and a surprise visit from Timon and Rafiki from The Lion King.

 

In the advertisement, they said there would be animals in the courtyard of the restaurant during dinner – one of the selling points of this meal for my mom. It turned out to be a lizard and a tarantula.

But the kids were impressed. :)

And I learned that Tarantulas aren’t poisonous. Actually no animal is poisonous, since poison is something you ingest – spiders are venomous. But Tarantulas aren’t venomous – no one ever, in the history of time, has died from a tarantula (according to the lady holding the spider, that is.) Another mom standing with us asked, “How did they get such a bad reputation then?” (I was wondering the same thing.) The guide’s answer? “It’s a big hairy spider.” Oh. I get it. :)

Disney Travelogue #4 (back @ the Magic Kingdom)

Wednesday morning, we headed back to the Magic Kingdom for the morning. We climbed the Swiss Family Robinson Treehouse (one of Luke’s favorite attractions)

Rode on Aladdin’s magic carpets…

And then, after sailing with the Pirates of the Caribbean (twice), Tobin & I met up with my mom, sister and Alyssa – who had spent the morning getting princessed up at the “Bibbidi Bobbidy Boutique”. (Matt & Luke headed out for a couple of hours on their own – riding Space Mountain 10 more times, I’m sure.)

We headed to Cinderella’s Castle for the princess lunch @ Cinderella’s Royal Table. There, we ran into our good friends Holly & Kate Nolley, Kate had made a trip to the Boutique herself!  Tobin was VERY happy to see her. :)

The princess lunch was really on the agenda for Alyssa, but it was SO much fun, and our little boys love the ladies.

 

   

Tobin says that Sleeping Beauty is his favorite, “Because she’s PINK,” but he sure seemed to like Ariel:

She told him to call her on her “shell-phone.” Adorbs.

After lunch, we met back up with Matt & Luke and headed to Animal Kingdom for the afternoon. The adults all wanted to ride Everest (which was AWESOME, but we didn’t get any pictures.) We planned to ride the Kali River Rapids, then head to the Lion King and Finding Nemo shows before the park closed (Animal Kingdom closes at 5 every day). But the kids had such a good time on the Kali River (and we all got SOAKED), and there was no wait, so we just rode that over and over until it was time to leave.

(We couldn’t get Luke’s Cpt. Jack eye makeup completely off. He was horrified. :D)

Here are the afters – can you see how wet we are?

Buckets of water. Buckets. Luke and Alyssa made it through 2 rides without getting very wet – and they were the main ones wanting a soaking. But at the very end of our second ride, they got DRENCHED. The little boys thought it was hilarious.

That evening, the Dads (and Michael and Lesli) took the big kids back to the hotel to swim and play in the arcade. Mom, Khymberly and I headed back to the Magic Kingdom to do Fantasyland with Logan, Tobin and Langston. We thought we could totally handle that on our own – three adults, three kids. They had a GREAT time – riding Dumbo, Peter Pan, Snow White, It’s a Small World, and my favorite – the 3D Mickey’s PhilharMagic show. Then we watched the fireworks from right behind the castle, which is underneath the fireworks – they were coming from every side.  Amazing. What we didn’t count on was how difficult it would be to get three boys (only one of whom is mobile on his own – Langston is 20 months, and Logan needs a hand going up and down stairs) and three strollers on and off the buses. Especially at the end of the night, when all 3 boys fell asleep. Yikes. Note to self: It’s nice to have an extra person or two to help with the strollers. Unfortunately, we didn’t get even one picture of that evening, since we each had a child to corral.

I was so tired walking back to the hotel I had a hard time walking in a straight line – which reminded me of the Disney trip I took over Spring Break in college with my dear friends Dionna and Jessica. My favorite memory of that trip is on the last day, walking through Epcot with our Mickey Mouse ears on, too exhausted from all the fun to even stick together as we walked. :)

Disney Travelogue #3 (Mickey’s Not-So-Scary-Halloween party

Tuesday night, we had tickets for the Halloween party at the Magic Kingdom. We all dressed as pirates (well…the kids and the women dressed as pirates. Our men respectfully declined costumes. And Tobin ripped his Captain Jack wig off before we even made it to the bus. Logan was pulling things off as we rode. So we were mostly pirates. :D)

Here are 3 of our boy pirates (Tobin minus his Captain Jack wig, Luke with his makeup job – done by yours truly – which he thought made him look more like a girl than a pirate. Oops.)

 

Luke and Alyssa… I asked, “Why aren’t you smiling?” Alyssa: “Pirates are supposed to look mean!”

So then I asked for happy pirates, and this is what I got:

All the girl pirates:

Waiting for the Parade:

Captain Barbosa made a special stop to recruit from our pirate crew!

 

And the castle at night: Beautiful.