Disney World

We had a REALLY great trip. We left early Sunday morning (the 21st). We spent the day swimming at our resort and at downtown disney shopping and eating. Monday we went to Magic Kingdom. Tuesday we went to Epcot. Wednesday we went to Animal Kingdom. Thursday we went to Hollywood Studios, and Friday we went to another resort for breakfast, downtown Disney again, back to our resort to play on the playground and an early dinner and then flew out that night. We touched down at DFW about 8:30 pm.

A few things:

1. Crocs are awesome!! As ugly as they are my feet NEVER hurt. Even after 14 hours in the park my feet felt great. They were worth every penny even if I never wear them again!
2. 95% of everyone that works at Disney is extremely sweet especially to the kids. I think it would be awesome if the whole world treated kids like they mattered as much as they do at Disney.
3. The magical express is awesome. They picked us up at the airport and took us to our hotel. Two hours later, they knock on our door and deliver our bags. Every day they have busses that come by every 15 minutes or less for each of the 4 parks, 2 waterparks, and downtown Disney. We never had to rent a car, pay for parking, worry about finding a parking space, or waste energy on walking from the parking lot to the park. Oh, and the last day we checked in our luggage at the hotel during check out and when it was time to go to the airport all we had to do was go through security and sure enough there it was on the belt at DFW. I was in awe!!!
4. The dining plan rocks!! We are family that does not go out to eat very often. The kids and I go to ChickFilet once a week with friends and as a family we go to the Donut Shop, Sonic, or have pizza two or three times a month and then go out nicer: Chilis, Cheddars, ect. once a month and we share meals. So for the dining plan.....we paid about $85.00 a day ahead of time and got 20 Table Service Meals, 20 Counter Service Meals, and 20 Snacks. The counter and table service meals included a drink, entree, and dessert. The only thing we had to pay was tip for the table service meals. We felt like we were SOOOOO splurging. We would split two counter meals at breakfast (for instance that would be two big egg, ham and cheese crossiants, 2 giant cinnamon rolls and 2 big milks), split two counter meals at lunch ( for instance 2 good size personal pizzas, 2 giant cookies, and 2 drinks) and then we'd have a big dinner. Most of our table service meals were buffet - all you can eat. When you added it up we would have spent way over $85 if we had eaten that much NOT on the dining plan. We ended up with a ton of snack credits on the last day because we were just never hungry between meals - we were always afraid that we would ruin the next meal if we ate a snack and then after a buffet dinner there was no way we could stuff in a snack!! Even with all the walking in the parks, I gained 2 lbs on this trip! On the last day we went to a bakery/candy store and used up all our snacks credits to bring goodies home in our suitcases.
5. Animal Kingdom and Epcot were our favorite parks
6. Magic Kingdom was fun and did make you feel like you were in some type of "magical" place but it rained the last 6 of the 13 hours we were in the park. It puts a little damper on your day when you are walking around in a plastic poncho sticking to you and wet pants from where you've sat on the wet curb waiting out the never ending rain storm!!!
7.Hollywood Studios is a good place to end on. There is not as much to do and there are a lot of shows so you do a lot of sitting and watching. It was good for us because we did it on our last day so we were all a little tired and Hope and I had colds that we had gotten the day before. Oh, and our favorite things was at this park. Its a new ride Toy Story Mania. Its the one thing that I REALLY wanted to do again, but the line was 70 minutes!!
8. Fastpass is genius! All the popular rides have fastpass. You go to the ride, put in your cards (everyone has their own card) and it gives you a time to come back and ride with a minimal wait. You can get one every two hours. So you go get your fast pass, then go do a bunch of rides that don't have long waits and then at the appointed time come back and get on the popular ride in like 5 minutes - when the wait time in the regular line could be over an hour. We worked it pretty good and never waited any more than 20 minutes for any ride. Every ride told you how long the wait was. It always over-estimated. That was VERY helpful for someone like me - that likes to have everything scheduled and planned ahead of time! I loved it!
9. I think the best part was just being able to focus on having fun with my kids. I didn't have to worry about dishes, laundry, straightening, cleaning, or school work. It was just about having fun and being together. I REALLY needed that and I'm sure it was good for the kids too.
10. When it was time to leave Blake and I realized how blessed we were that although our vacation was awesome that coming home was awesome too. We love our life. Blake enjoys his job. I enjoy homeschooling the kids and taking care of our home. Everyday that we are together is fun. We are very blessed.

Am I sad or happy?

Something big happened tonight.....Hope said a word with a "R" correctly for the first time. We took the kids to the park tonight and I was sitting on a bench watching Hope ride her bike. At one point she sailed past me crazy fast and when she stopped I asked, "Was that scary?" And she said, "Vewy ScaRy!" I said, "WHAT?!" And she said, "Vewy ScaRy." I said, "Say 'scary' and she said, "scaRy." On the way home, Blake and I got her to say several "R" words and she said her R correctly about 50% of the time. I'm glad to know that she won't be a big kid one day that still can't say their R's. But I am sad that in several months I will probably never hear all those cute "r" words anymore. My three favorites that I LOVE to hear her say: Yes sir, Burger, and Cinderella's Slippers. SO CUTE!! I WILL NOT get baby fever, I WILL NOT get baby fever, I WILL NOT get baby fever!!!