day seven: the end of the adventure

On Friday morning we woke up bummed that it was time to pack up and leave the wonderful world of Disney! Lila had a rough night, and after a dose of Motrin went back to sleep and slept through all of our packing! We took our time because check out wasn't until 11, and enjoyed our last morning. After the bellman helped us get our bags to the car, he brought us back to the hotel and we grabbed a bite to eat. Lila was much better, and all three really wanted to spend our last day back at the Magic Kingdom. So, off we went!





Bennett excitedly holding his fast pass to ride Buzz Lightyear again.





Elise excited about it too! And she loved putting our tickets into the machines!





After we got a few fast passes we decided to enjoy the pretty, cool weather and take a ride on the People Mover in TommorrowLand. From here you can see alot of the area, it is a fun way to people watch and park watch...






David and the happy little ones on our last day!








The only princess that the girls had not met that they really wanted to was Rapunzel, from the newest movie Tangled. For some reason she only appears one place in Disney, in Magic Kingdom, and she does a different type of meet and greet where only about 15 kids are allowed in per time. As you can imagine the wait is ridiculous. We were extremely blessed when, as we made our way to the line (after being told we would have to wait 3 hours!!!) to see Boyd Kitchen already holding a spot in line. He was actually holding 4 slots and only needed one, and so he said our girls could go in with Mary Miller to meet Rapunzel! What a lucky break for us! And on top of cutting significantly down on our wait, the girls were thrilled to finally get to spend some time with MM.







Once they were admitted into the little courtyard they were given Rapunzel crayons and a color sheet.

As you can see, MM had had her BBB experience earlier that morning, and loved it as well!

I would have loved to know the topic of this conversation!

Sweet friends!

When Rapunzel and Flynn Ryder came out they came to the table with the kids and did a little dance with them. Lila and MM were thrilled because Rapunzel got right in between them and held their hands while they danced!

Then it was finally our turn for pictures!

And a cute group shot!

We spent the rest of the day revisiting rides that the kids loved, as well as squeezing in a few we had not had a chance to do yet (Winnie the Pooh was super cute!)....

Then we went to the Christmas Shoppe to chose a Christmas ornament as our family souvenir. David and I try to get one whenever we visit somewhere...not that we travel much, but when we have we have always bought an ornament. We have been doing this since we got married. This time, instead of me getting to pick outright I narrowed it down and then we took a family vote! :)

Lots of opinions these days!

In addition, David's parents wanted the kids to each pick something out to remember their trip by and so they had lots of fun doing that. I knew right off the bat what Bennett would pick, as for the past 3 days he had been eyeing the wall of Buzz Dolls that are in the store that you exit through from the Buzz ride. (Honestly pretty shocked that he had not had a breakdown over this. There is no way around it, you come off of the ride and are in a store with only about a million Buzz toys!) He already has probably 5 Buzz dolls, but this one talks, has a laser, and his arms and legs are able to be manipulated. He LOVES it.

At first Lila wanted Ariel dress up, but the (thankfully) changed her mind and chose a precious Ariel doll. Elise surprised David and I both by choosing to get a slinky dog (from Toy Story) and a Minnie Mouse necklace.

All three had fun making their choices and are very thankful!

As the sun started to go down the kids were still going strong and so we decided we might as well stay as long as they are happy!! Crossing a bridge the castle looked so pretty we tried to get the kids to take a picture. Guess we had exhausted them with all of our picture taking as none of them wanted any part of it- so David asked someone to take a picture of us instead!

A rare shot of just us- since we are usually the photographers!

We grabbed dinner at Pecos Bill's, and then hopped on the train and took a leisurely ride back to the gates of the Magic Kingdom. Here we got off the train and made our way down Main Street to find a spot for the Electrical parade. David had told me how neat it was from the night before, and thought if the kids were doing well we should try to stay at make it as the grand finale of our trip.

Everyone was happy so we found a spot!

The parade really is super neat, and completely different than the ones we had seen during the day. I was so glad we were able to stay.

Tinkerbell was on the first float. They turn all of the lights off in the park and the floats are all made of lights..it is super neat! All of the costumes incorporate lights as well.

Part of Cinderella's Ball....

Can't remember what this is...but it is pretty!

Peter Pan!

Not sure how we did this with the camera, but I think it looks really neat...

Everyone amazed at the sights...

The vain part of me did not want to post this, because I look like I have been hit by a bus, but E in the background cracks me up. I think she was heading towards delirium at this point!

Also, my lap or on my hip is where Lila likes to spend A LOT of time!

After the magical parade happens everyone shuffles down closer to the castle and they do an amazing light show projected onto it. Words can't even describe how amazing it is. Then the "Wishes" show, full of fireworks, kicks off with Tinkerbell flying out of the castle...

She moves pretty quickly!!

The kids (and parents) were wiped, and by the time we got back to the boat (which would take us to the hotel) Lila and Bennett were out. It was quite an ordeal trying to figure out how to carry them, the strollers, and all of our stuff to the car, as they were so asleep we couldn't even wake them! Looking back it is actually pretty hilarious, but at the time it was slightly stressful- and a really good workout! Ha!

I could go on and on about the trip....I really could. It was so special on so many levels. Not only was it our first real family trip, but it was the longest vacation David has had since our honeymoon almost 11 years ago. We had soooo much fun being together for 9 whole days, and felt so blessed that we were able to have that time and that experience as a family.

For me, it made me realize how much more I want to expose our kids to, and I hope we are able to take them on many more exciting family adventures in the future!

I will say that I was also able to focus on really being grateful for the kids closeness of age...often times this is something that completely overwhelms me as a Mom, because I feel like I can not give each of them the individual attention that they need (or that I would like to give them) because, let's face it, it would be impossible for me to achieve that. But, in Disney, the fact that they all (for the most part) are into the same things meant that we were able to spend 95% of the trip all together, rather than trying to entertain the "older" ones, and "younger" ones...It actually made the trip easier!

I loved watching David experience the "magic" with the kids for the first time. He is such a good travel partner, as he is great about coming up with a fun game plan for each day. I was so thankful that he was able to fight through the sickness (I know he felt really, really bad) in order to make sure that the kids had a blast on our vacation. I am very, very blessed.

So, our big adventure comes to an end. I know it is one we will never forget! There is only one first time to go to DisneyWorld....and it was magical!