Five on Friday: February 16

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It's FINALLY Friday! I'm excited for the weekend. While we don't have any big plans, this springlike weather has got me wanting to clean out closets, clean windows, and do all the other projects that I put off until this time of year :)

__one__ We got back from Disney World last Friday, and you can read about our time at Magic Kingdom, Animal Kingdom, and Hollywood Studios. February was a great time to visit, with small(er) crowds and fantastic weather. We passed on Epcot this trip, but we had such a great time I'm already dreaming of what we would plan to do next time we go!
                                  
However, the next vacation is definitely going to be somewhere tropical. With unlimited adult beverages.

__two__ The trip to Orlando was my girls first time flying, and I was glad we were able to test it out on a 1.5 hour flight. However, they did super amazing, and I was so proud of both of them for how they acted on the plane. Their Amazon Fire tablets helped a ton, but they were genuinely pretty interested in looking out the window and amazed by the fact they were in the air.

__three__ We had Caroline's birthday party a few weekends ago at Bounce U, and it was really an amazing party. Not only did the kids have a great time, but I literally didn't have to do anything except bring goody bags for the kids. For the goody bags, I put lots of candy, fruit snacks, some Doc McStuffins bubbles, and these Wiki Stix (which are a really awesome activity for kids!).

This was our first birthday party outside of our home, and I'm never going back! No cleanup, no stress - it's really the way to go.


__four__ Emery wouldn't fall asleep last weekend, so I snuggled with her so she would take a nap. I soak up these moments, because I know one day my girls won't want to snuggle me anymore.

__five__

Disney 2018: Hollywood Studios

Our last and final day at Disney World was spent in Hollywood Studios. This turned out to be my favorite day!

When we arrived, we stopped at Sweet Spells first and all got treats. Emmie and Caroline picked cookies, and I picked the giant carrot cake cookie sandwich. It was seriously as large as my head and really yummy. After we had a nice sugar high, we headed to our first fast pass, Disney Jr. Live on Stage. They had everyone sit on the floor under the stage, and it ended up being reallllly hard to see the characters. The best part was that after we left, we were basically first in line to meet Doc McStuffins, which the girls LOVED!

After meeting Doc, we headed to our next fast pass, which was Frozen Ever After singalong. It was cute and the girls sang along to their favorite Frozen songs, but a fast pass was completely unnecessary. After lots of girly things, we headed to Toy Story Mania which was my favorite ride all trip! We luckily had a fast pass, because the stand-by line was 2 hours long!

We were pretty hungry at this point, so we stopped at ate a quick lunch and then happened upon Sofia the First. The girls were happy to meet another Disney Jr. character they love.

Daniel needed some "boy time" at this point, so the girls and I went to watch Ariel's Voyage of the Little Mermaid while Daniel went and checked out Star Wars stuff. Ariel was cute, but Caroline told me she was disappointed because she thought it would be a ride! HA!

After Ariel, we found Daniel with some Storm Troopers, and Caroline was picked to stand up there with them and go through "basic training". It took just a few minutes, but Caroline got the biggest kick out of it.

We were exhausted at this point in our trip, so we headed back to the resort and rested before dinner. We had reservations at O'hana, but didn't want to fight the Magic Kingdom crowd so late in the day, so we cancelled and went to Disney Springs to eat. It was a great decision! We ate at Raglan Rd. which is an Irish Pub. The food was fantastic, and the girls got to learn Irish dancing while we ate.

Our flight was early the next morning, so we called it and night and went back and packed and got ready for our travel day. We had such a great time at Disney and Caroline is already asking when we can go back!

Disney 2018: Magic Kingdom

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We choose to spend our 2nd and 3rd days at the Magic Kingdom since there is just so much to see. In all honesty, we barely saw half the park in the 2 days we spent there.

We boarded the bus bright and early Wednesday morning to make it in time for our dining reservations for breakfast at Cinderella's Royal Table. We underestimated how busy the bus line would be, and showed up out of breath and 30 minutes late for our reservation. Luckily, they still honored it and the girls were able to meet all of their favorite princesses. This meal was by far my favorite of the trip. I ordered the shrimp and grits and it rivaled some of my favorite restaurants here in Nashville. Side note: Cinderella's Royal Table is two table service credits per person, so we chose to pay out of pocket. However, it's highly worth the character interactions and food.

 

Rapunzel Dress//Tiara

Next, we had rode the carousel right outside the castle, and then headed for our fast passes to meet Rapunzel and Tiana. This might have been my favorite character interaction, as these two princesses spent ALOT of time with my girls and were very patient with them.

 

Next Daddy rode Seven Dwarves Mine Train by himself as Caroline decided it was too scary for her. I'm glad she did, because I don't think she would have done well on it. After he was done, we did our last morning fast pass with Enchanted Tales with Belle. I didn't get any pictures, but the girls basically got to help re-enact the story of Belle and the Beast with Belle. It was pretty cute and the girls enjoyed it.

We headed back to the resort to eat lunch, swim, and take a quick nap, and then we headed back to MK for our dining reservations at Crystal Palace. We were supposed to get to meet four characters from Winnie the Pooh, but only Tigger and Eeyore ended up making it to our table. The food was also TERRIBLE, and we all agreed we would not come back on a return trip.

 

Mickey Mouse T-Shirt

I had reserved another fast pass for Tinkerbell after dinner, so we did a quick stop by and Caroline got her picture with her. Emmie was pretty done for the day at that point and declined.

 

Our second day at MK was much more lowkey. We all rode Dumbo, which has a nice play area for the kids while you wait when we first arrived.

 After Dumbo, we had a fast pass to meet Ariel in her grotto. This was another cute character interaction that the girls enjoyed.

We had quick service reservations to eat lunch at Be Our Guest, which is Belle's castle. It was cute and the food was pretty good for quick service. The girls shared a shrimp dish that had a good scampi flavor. I chose the pot roast and Daniel ordered the french dip sandwich.

After lunch, we used our last fast pass to ride Under the Sea - which is a Little Mermaid themed ride that was pretty cute and nice and slow for the girls. After, we all needed a snack, and made our way to Aloha Isle for more dole whips (those things are sooooo addictive!).

At this point, we were all ready for a nap, so we headed back to the room. After sleeping for a bit, we got ready for dinner at Chef Mickey's, which is in the Contemporary Resort. It is the best buffet style food we had our whole trip, and the character interaction was great for the girls who really enjoyed meeting Minnie Mouse for the first time all trip!

We were about wiped at this point in our trip, but we had one day left at Hollywood Studios. More about that park tomorrow!

Disney 2018: Animal Kingdom

We just got back from our Disney trip, and I am ready to share it with all of you before I forget all the details! Overall, the weather was gorgeous and the kids were (generally) good, so we had a great time. I will say, however, that next time the kids will either (1) be able to walk the whole time without being pushed in a stroller, or (2) we will stay at a resort on the monorail system. The buses got a little brutal towards the end.

The first day (Tuesday) we left our house at 4 a.m. for the airport, and departed on a 5:30 a.m. flight to Orlando. The kids actually did GREAT their first time flying, and I squeezed in a middle seat between them and tried to nap while they said "Mommy" a million times and poked me over and over.

We landed approx. 8:15 a.m. Orlando time, and hopped on the Magical Express, which is Disney's free transportation to the resort. It was pretty seamless, and the best part is you don't have to pickup your bags at the baggage claim - they magically appear in your room hours later. When we got to our resort, Art of Animation, we quickly checked in and then immediately boarded a bus for Animal Kingdom as our room wasn't ready yet.

We were starving when we arrived, and stopped at the Yak and Yeti counter service restaurant. I ordered the beef teriyaki bowl, which was marginal at best, and Daniel got a burger. Caroline & Emmie split a kids burger. We had the dining plan, which next time I would probably pass on as it was really too much food for our family. After grabbing a quick bite, we went through the stand-by line for It's Tough to Be a Bug. It was a super cute show, but a little too scary for my littles.

We then headed over to our first fastpass, which was the Na'vi River Journey. It was a nice, slow ride for the kids and had lots of bright colors, but I definitely wouldn't have waited in the stand-by line for 1.5 hours to ride it. After we got off, the kids were already ready for a snack, so we headed to grab some ice cream for Emmie and a dole whip for me and Caroline.

Next up was Dinoland, where Caroline got her face painted like a kitty and kept her looking at herself in mirrors the remainder of the day.

Our next fast pass was Festival of the Lion King, which was a very interactive live show that the entire family enjoyed. I even caught Emmie bopping her head to the beat and clapping for the dancers.

We squeezed in one more fast pass before dinner, even though we were all exhausted at this point (no naps for anyone in the family) and rode Kiliminjaro Safaris. The kids didn't like it as much as I thought they would, but they did occasionally laugh and scream when they saw new animals.

We finished up with dinner at Tusker House. The reason I picked Tusker House was for the character interaction, which didn't disappoint. The kids got to meet Donald, Daisy, Mickey, and Goofy, all wearing their safari clothes. The food, however, was a huge disappointment, as everything had an underlying curry/African flavor that none of us really enjoyed.

After dinner, we boarded the bus back to the resort and passed out in bed around 7:00. We had reservations the next morning at Cinderella's Royal Table and I didn't want us to oversleep!