Disney World

So what does every athlete say after doing something for the 1st time when asked "what are you going to do next?" why of course, "Go to Disneyworld" and that's exactly what me and my family did. The day after my triathlon we headed to Indy for a park and fly to Orlando on Monday morning. Grandma drove over with us and we met up with Mimo to get ready for our trip. Monday morning couldn't come early enough and soon after waking we were on our flight to Orlando.

We took the Magical Express bus to our hotel the Yacht Club. The hotel was amazing and we were all greeted by Woody the Captain as we entered which the kids loved. We headed out right away to the Animal Kingdom. The kids loved the African Safari ride which we got to see an rare anteater, turtles and many other animals. After visiting some of the animals, we got to meet some of our favorite characters Pooh, Tigger, Piglet and Eeyore. We stayed late at the park with Uncle Alec, Mimo and Daddy enjoying the Expedition Everest roller coaster which rocked!

The next day we started off early by hitting the pinnacle of the Disneyworld, the Magic Kingdom. JD was a little hesitant to ride any rides but after finally convincing him to ride the Buzz Lightyear ride he started to enjoy it, especially after Stitch was waiting to see him after his first ride. Paige was a trooper and rode every ride that she was able to. I think Grandma and Mimo enjoyed seeing the kids faces more than Jeanne and I did. It was so hot outside we decided to go back to the hotel and enjoy the amazing sandbottom swimming pool that also had a lazy river and water slides. We had been so busy that day that we decided to stay close to the hotel and went to the Boardwalk area for dinner at ESPN where Uncle Alec won a trivia contest and the kids got a baseball and football beach ball. After dinner, everyone except Alec and I went back to the hotel while he and I went to Jellyrolls, a dueling piano bar. We had a great time there coming up with some off the wall requests for the entertainers to play.

Wednesday started off with Breafast at Chef Mickeys in the Contemporary Resort. The buffett was great and the kids got to meet all of the stars of the show like Mickey, Minnie, Goofy, Pluto and Donald. After breakfast we headed to Epcot for some fun. The Nemo ride was great and we ran into Chip from Chip & Dale but most of the rest of the park was a bust for young kids so we called it a day again and went back to our hotel and enjoyed the pool again and some ice cream in the afternoon.

Thursday we went back to the Magic Kingdom and enjoyed the early morning hours for resort guests where Paige decided to morph into a kitty and JD tried to turn into his new favorite character Stitch before the park opened. We met up with Jeanne's family from Florida to hang out with them for the morning where we went to Mickey and Minnies house to meet the cute couple again. After enjoying some "It's a small world" again for the 3rd time, we all headed back to our hotel again so Danielle could enjoy playing in the sand with Paige while JD challenged Daddy to a mean game of PingPong. While Danielle went down for her nap, Mimo, Mommy, Paige and JD went to the kid's sandcastle club to enjoy some pottery painting before heading back to the Magic Kingdom again to enjoy some more rides (Pirates of the Carribean - JD's favorite/Thunder Mountain Roller Coaster - Paige's favorite) and enjoy the nighttime parade and fireworks from Main Street.

Friday was all about the Hollywood Studios where we got there early and enjoy the Little Mermaid and Disney's Playhouse shows and even got to meet our favorite stars from Toy Story including Buzz Lightyear and Woody before it started to pour down rain on us. Back at the hotel, everyone was getting tired and just wanted to go out for dinner except Paige and Daddy. We headed back to Hollywood Studios to enjoy our fastpasses for the new Toy Story ride which was very cool and then enjoyed the Hollywood Hotel House of Terror which ended up being Paige's favorite ride of the week.

Saturday ended our vacation and we loaded up in the Magic Express bus back to the airport to fly back to Indy. It was a great vacaction but we are all exhausted and still recovering. Time to start planning our next family vacation....