Disney World 2007

I have wondered the last few days what it was that I was smoking the day I thought it would be a good idea to fly across the country with a two year old and a teether. I'm still not really sure but now that our whirlwind trip is over, the stanky laundry is all done, and suitcases are put back in their proper places where I have decided they will stay for another five years, I finally have time to write about our "vacation".

It started out with a phone call from United at about 4pm the night before we left. The agent on the phone wanted us to switch to the 830am flight the next morning instead of the 11am flight we were scheduled to fly. Take a wild guess at how much fun it is to get four kids plus yourself ready at 5:30am which is why we booked the 11:00am flight to begin with. I guess they were oversold so she upped the anti and offered us a $500 voucher if we would switch along with implying that because we were traveling on Frequent Flyer miles, more than likely, we would get bumped if we showed up. Before committing, she told us that she would be able to sit us together which was our biggest concern with a two year old and all. Needless to say, in reality, we were scattered on the very much full plane. Luckily, a nice old grandpa switched with us so that we could be closer together. I'm glad we didn't have to use our "We're putting our two year old holding our lap baby in that seat next to you unless you want to switch" threat. At the airport, I enjoyed seeing the faces of the waiting passengers as they gawked at us. I imagined them thinking something like, "That is one HUGE family! Those poor parents have their hands full!" or rather more likely, "I REALLY hope I'm not the one sitting next to them on the plane."

The earlier morning flight that was supposed to get us in sooner actually got us in about thirty minutes after our original flight did thanks to delays in DC from some "Security Breach".

I enjoyed the varying FAA rules and regulations which changed based on the airport and day we traveled. We learned that a child booster seat isn't an FAA regulation seat when flying from Phoenix to Washington DC but is acceptable if flying from Orlando to Denver. I'm still trying to understand how it is that a seat that is acceptable for use in a car is not acceptable for use on a plane. Because odds are, the seat will probably save a child while in a car going 60 miles per hour but if a plane is going down, unless the seat is lined in titanium and surrounded by silicone gel and an airbag which deploys just prior to hitting the ground, whether a seat is FAA regulated or not, seriously, a rapid descent from 30,000 feet, it's really not going to matter.

And speaking of descents....we learned after the first leg that my two oldest inherited their dad's "throw up on the descent" gene. I can honestly admit that there was never a dull moment.

We spent our first day at the Magic Kingdom. On the road between our condo and the park, I was thinking to myself that the street needed something......I don't know what.......maybe a big building with a huge wizard head poking out on top. I'm guessing a parent or two in order to save a buck has actually taken their child to this building under the guise that it really is Disney World. Before we headed to the park, we drove out towards Cape Canaveral and took those pictures I posted earlier from the Space Shuttle launch. That really was pretty impressive!


We had a fun first day and learned early on that the time it takes to get through the park increases exponentially based on the number of kids you have. When there are just two of you, you don't have to deal with potty breaks every two hours, nursing a baby every three hours,a screaming baby who won't nap and kids who wanted to spend hours playing in the play yards and water yards. Because of the delays we were already facing, we nixed the idea of getting in lines to get the character's autographs. Our time was precious so we just pointed them out and said, "Hey look kids! It's Chicken Little! Ok....let's go get a fastpass for Big Thunder Mountain."




There were hardly any people there. We were able to get on and off and back on rides again without any waiting. We got spoiled. It was decorated really cute for Halloween.
We made the mistake of taking Lauren on the first ride down Splash Mountain. She wouldn't go near a roller coaster ride after that. Jack on the other hand had a BLAST! It was so fun to go with him and see the grin from ear to ear and hearing him say, "WEEEEEeeeeee" as the roller coaster sped around on the track. By the way, you get over the shock of a $10.00 hamburger and $15.00 toy souvenir that I swear was in the kid's happy meals a few months ago pretty quickly. You really just kind of go numb to it after that first day and figure you'll just deal with the debt and taking out a second mortgage when you get home. It took all of about a half of a day to realize all of that gawking didn't end at the airport. Everywhere we went people stared as we walked by like we were some freaky park attraction. We had a lot of people ask us if the kids were all ours and then a lot of "Wow? Really? You're brave" thrown in now and again. Either we don't get out of Arizona much or some people clearly have never visited Utah, Idaho or Mesa, AZ. I kept thinking, "I know people with six or more kids so if you think my four is huge......" My husband replied to the United agent on the flight home who kept commenting on our family size, "It's not like we're the Brady Bunch!" So I started taking note myself of other people at the park and discovered that I didn't see a single family with more than three kids in tow. So, maybe we were a novelty after all. Which got me thinking....since Disney can make up their own rules by claiming that a nine year old is an adult, then at the very least, the park should give a group discount for families of 6 or more.

We went to Epcot the second day. We had a lunch with the Princesses. We got to meet Cinderella, Belle, Ariel, Jasmine and Sleeping Beauty. For some reason, Jack wasn't in the mood to eat so I put his $15.00 hot dog in a plastic baggie for him to eat later.

And my all time favorite picture from the whole trip is this one of Erik ogling Belle.........I couldn't get a single picture of him looking at me. He kept giving her "the look" out of the corner of his eye.

Kirk and I made a colossal error by going on the Mission:Space ride first thing after the lunch with the Princessess. See, they had two ways to experience the ride. There was the "green" line ( non spinning ) and the "orange" line ( spinning). I took Jack with me on the green line experience. He had a blast ( so to speak ). Kirk went on the orange experience and came out green which is when I realized they made a gross error in their color coding system. I thought he was just being a wimp and decided I wanted to try the orange line for myself. Let's just say that no matter how much we may have thought about how cool it would be to be an astronaut.....we would never survive the blast off into space and traveling 17,000 miles per hour. I was nauseous the rest of the day.

We also went to MGM Studios but I don't think the kids really understood the park. It was a lot of shows and thirty-somethings reliving their eighth birthdays as they watched the Star Wars Jedi show. The coolest part of MGM that day though was as we were leaving, we ran into some old friends who we haven't seen in probably ten or more years! I mean, it was so completely random that we happened to run into them. I still can't get over it! And I'm kicking myself that we didn't get our camera out and take a picture! So here's my shout-out to our friends, the Wilsons......"Hi Wilson family! It was so great to see you again!" So, it was totally worth it to go to MGM!

We also went to Animal Kingdom where the new ride Everest resides. Jack calls it the Yeti ride. He looked forward to riding it all week long. So, knowing how much fun he had on the previous roller coasters, I took him with me to ride it. It was pretty intense and after we got off, I excitedly said, "That was SO cool! Do you want to go on it again with daddy?"

He said, "No. I don't want to ride it again."

I replied, "But, who will go with daddy then?"

His response was "He can just go by himself."

We had breakfast with Mickey and other assorted Disney characters while at Animal Kingdom.

Later in the day, it poured rain so we got our ponchos out and had some teenage boy take our picture. Afterwards, he made some snotty remark saying, "It's just rain!" So I said back, "Yeah. Well we're from Arizona and our kids see rain all of five times a year. So, get over it!" Punk. Our last day was spent back at Magic Kingdom. We ended up buying the tickets for the after hours "Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party". They had fun activities for the kids like free face-painting which would have been really nice to know a few hours earlier so I wouldn't have spent $15.00 for Lauren to get hers done.









There was a Not So Scary parade and rides that were open for people to ride. They even had places where you could trick or treat. And that we did. We had so much candy that we literally had to check two extra bags on the flight home because we didn't have enough room. All of that candy almost made up for the cost of the tickets. On the bright side, I don't need to go out and buy candy to pass out on Halloween.


All in all, we had a really great trip. The kids had a lot of fun and that's the most important part of all.