The first Halloween Parade!

10.27.10 was filled with firsts. Besides it being Eric's birthday (his first and last at age 34?), Emerson was in her first Halloween Parade at school. Bryce slept in his crib for the first time and managed to sleep from 10 PM till 8 AM. Emerson managed to not need a pull-up at night. Yippie! Here is to me not jinxing myself!

Epcot has a secret bar hidden in the temple in Mexico!

Really not that big of a secret, but they have some sweet "flights" and chasers. Epcot was also celebrating the World Wine, Food and Beer fest which translates into spending a crap load of cash on a bunch of random things. Costly, but cool. Emerson wasn;t that impressed with it, till I started buying her little things from the countries. Unfortunately the sword purchased in Norway was lost prior to the amazing fireworks.

A Day at the Beach...

On Saturday we went to a beach "near" Jenna and Daryl's. Beautiful! Emerson got to fly a kite, play with Prince Phillip (Arghhhhh) and build a sand castle, while Bryce discovered he had feet!

Aunt Jenna's and Uncle Daryl's!

We took the hot minivan two hours South for a few days to visit with Jenna and Daryl. Way fun! Their house is awesome and Emerson loved hanging out there.

Princess meltdown...

Disney is smart. They put their characters into controlled rooms, allow only a limited amount of people in at a time and even place photographers for you to use. This gives them control and makes you feel like you are getting some type of special treatment. It also allows only a certain amount of people to see your three year old daughter breakdown at the sight of her favorite princess, Sleeping Beauty. Emerson was so overwhelmed with the so-so imposture that she couldn't even walk up to her. We had to visit with Cindy and Belle before returning and that didn't even work. Once again... the 13 year old and Justin Beiber theory continues.

Best darn 10 bucks!

So... 10 dollars for the stinkin balloon might seem a little too much... but it is not. That thing was a life saver. We carried it around with us and tied it to the stroller. It allowed us to find one another and provided entertainment for Emerson.

Nice Costume!

We accidently stumbled across Minnie. She came out a back door as we were leaving the Muppet ride at Hollywood. For Daisy, we stood in a line in the central park areas of Main Street. As we were "next" in line, Daisy had to take a mandatory union bathroom break. (All of Disney is union. They are in the middle of working out their contract. I do believe that is one company who does not allow strikes to occur.) For Mickey we all waited in a 20 minute plus line, in a tent. They then escorted 10ish people back to a room with the door reading "Red Ribbon Room". For the sake of making the line move quickly, there was also a Blue Ribbon Room and Judge's Room that also contained a Mickey... but they attempted to keep that hush hush ;-). Emerson refused to be photographed with Mickey, but Bryce was all for it!

So random it hurts...

Way cool that we got to see all of the original Mary Poppins press items. Way hysterical that I convinced Eric to take his picture with Bill and Betty White.

Sadness and The Perfect Wedge.

I was disappointed to find out that my favorite ride, The Teacups, was closed for remodeling while we were there. Okay, I moved on. Eric, though, was slapped across the face with the fact that Star Wars was closed. We knew nothing of it being closed until we walked up to the ride. Crap. On a bright note, we went to The Prime Time Diner and spent two hours drinking beer and eating a pretty darn good meal. Emerson wasn't too happy, but we managed to enjoy the experience and the ice cold beer.

Fail!

Disney is pretty spot on when it comes to attractions and kids... but they are way off with this. They took the concept of Honey I Shrunk the Kids and put it into a playground experience for kids. Great visual and amazing creativity of space! BUT... it is so tight and the tunnels have so many optional paths that once your kid goes into something it is almost impossible to find them again. Granted the playground is enclosed, but they should really limited the amount of kids in that thing at one time. Eric and I spent the majority of time trying to find Emerson and she spent most of her time trying to find us or her way out of a tree trunk.

Christmas Lights + Disney + Creepy Music=

Emerson loved the Light Parade and the fireworks that followed. We intended on going to more parades, but this is the only one we made and it was worth it! Granted the Poppins lady didn't show up (most likely she was still overwhelmed from meeting Emerson earlier), but the rest of the floats provoked Emerson to scream at their first sight. Every single float! My favorite is how the "cast members" take masking tape and tape out lines of where you are allowed to stand. You must be within the tape! You must be within the tape till the very end of the parade! And the fun part is that some people have no personal space issues and push their way on top of you and your family and stroller! The fireworks are a little more laid back. The cool part is I asked a "cast member" about where to stand for the fireworks and he totally gave me the run down on how and when and where to go/ do/ see. Disney has the most efficient and helpful people on the planet (except for the Disney Magical Express... DON'T WASTE YOUR TIME). It would have been a perfect evening, but Bryce the baby that doesn't cry began to scream and Guy and I left the others to watch the remainder of the fireworks.

40 inches!

Emerson got lucky. She cracked the 40 inch mark prior to vacation which meant she could ride just about everything at Disney. She loved Dumbo and the Carpet Ride... to be expected. She really like the Pirate ride and insisted on going again. Luckily, there were no lines to wait in. You were able to walk in and get directly onto many of the rides. She even rode the big roller coaster, which she LOVED. In fact, after that ride, she was unhappy with the flat lined boats that carried us through It's a Small World and other rides. She saw no excitement in them. On the flip side she was none to happy about the Haunted Mansion or Snow White's Scary Adventure. Then again, Snow White's Scary Adventure was pretty 1972. Even though the majority of The Magic Kingdom was torn up because they are adding an insane amount of new stuff, it was a blast. I would seriously recommend only going to the Magic Kingdom, if you have kids under 6. The other parks are fun, but geared to a little older set and/ or they are lacking the "fun" rides. Hollywood Studios had a great ride for Toy Story which involved 3-D glasses and a shooting arcade... but that was the best outside of the Magic Kingdom. (We totally got lucky on that one too. Normal wait time was 90 minutes. We waited for less than 15.)

To be three...

and see Cindy's castle, in person and for the first time, has got to be amazing. I am 34 and I was amazed, so I can only imagine what was going on in Emerson's mind when she turned that corner and saw it at the end of Main Street. The last picture shows her as she saw it for the first time. As we walked down the street we realized that they had just started the music review on the steps to the castle. It featured all of her favorite princesses and princes and the old school Disney characters. It also had the new talking Mickey and Minnie. Yes, Disney has finally figured out how to make the mice move their mouths and speak to you. Creepy... a little. Fantastically cool... totally!

Let's go fly a kite...

Emerson loves Mary Poppins. Every night we watch at least part of the movie. She pretends to be her while tending to her dolls. Emerson LOVES Mary Poppins. So the thought of eating breakfast and having her visit seemed excellent in theory, but had some huge fault lines within it. One: Emerson did not get to eat with Mary, she simply visited for a moment. Two: Emerson did not get to go and fly a kite with Mary, as we believe she imagined in her head. Three: Pooh, Tigger and the Mad Hatter made for poor subs when the girl just wanted her Mary. Four: Whoever the chick was playing Alice needs a raise cause she came up with some of the best one liners to throw at a screaming three year old who had the most tragic of meltdowns. Five: If your preschooler really likes a character, assume that it will be like a 13 year old girl seeing Justin Beiber.... expect complete and utter emotional failure. Six: 3 month olds love Tigger and Pooh!

Two Kids, Two Planes, Three Hotels and Mickey Mouse

For all the set-up of the fear of flying with two kids under 4... it turned out to be way too easy. Yes, we brought way too much stuff. Yes, I didn't need to carryon half the stuff we did. BUT... Emerson and Bryce were so well behaved that I couldn't believe it. Both of them pretty much slept. I also want to give kudos to Eric for enrolling in a certain credit card the week before vacation, which allowed us to take all our baggage for free and get discounts on the inflight tv. AND... that brings me to the big kudos to whoever came up with inflight direct tv. Thank-you for allowing me to watch DYI, rated R movies or My Little Pony at the push of a button.
Emerson adored the hotels, and as you can see so did her dolls. Yes, that is Prince Phillip and Sleeping Beauty in the "hot tub" (that presents a whole host of questions in its self). The Contemporary is an amazing place to stay, in that it is steps from the Magic Kingdom; however, it is not very child friendly. They do have a cool splash area (as you can see in the picture) but the design of the building and rooms is a little too adult. Just imagine washing bottles in those bathroom sinks. You can only put about an inch and a half of water in those puppies and the water smells of chlorine so you then need to take bottled water and boil it in the coffee pot and sterilize everything! Totally worth it though!