Day 3: Hollywood Studios

MGM was our favorite park as honeymooners in 2002 because of all the rides. We loved it again as parents because of all the shows and photo ops. K and E had a great day and K was able to have a great nap since we saw Beauty and the Beast and took pics with Handy Manny while he slept.
Here are our favorite photos from the day. I know there are a lot (but not as many as we'll have for Day #4). We were able to do and see so much! All due to the tips from this book which we could not have done without: The Unofficial Guide to Walt Disney World. This one had some good info too: The Official Guide to Walt Disney World.
While waiting to take pictures with Buzz and Woody, we were able to take pictures at lots of different little set-ups. Good thing too since we had to wait an hour. That was the longest that we had to wait to get a picture with any character. Most of them only had wait times of about 10 minutes. Thank goodness went to Disney on weekdays in May and not in the summer or on a weekend.

I love how Buzz has his hand on Elena's head.

The parade was fun, and we got a spot in the front row.

This is what I saw the whole week: Kids in the stroller staying hydrated and Dan consulting the map or my list of attractions that we were going to visit.
Of course a photo doesn't show it, but this Stunt Show was awesome. We were able to sit in the second row (we had really good luck with all of our shows) and the driver's were amazing.

Handy Manny and Elena. We took a bunch of photos with him, but Elena said that she liked this one best because she was the most happy in the one that we are both in. Aw. :)

I wanted to make sure that she got some kind of picture with Mulan since we missed meeting her in China. Dan is holding her up.

The required Mickey Mouse picture:

Winnie the Pooh

Kevin was so focused on the Toy Story Mania ride. He was shooting like crazy the whole time! So cute. He may not have gotten the most points (they keep track of everyone in your section), but no one had more fun.
This green army man was walking the streets posing for photos and making men do push-ups.
You don't have to have seen Honey, I Shrunk the Kids to enjoy a playground where you are the size of a bug!

In a spider's web

All excited about the Cars 2 movie. We are going to see it on June 28th for Kevin's birthday.

Day 2: An evening at Epcot

The Animal Kingdom closes early, so we headed over to Epcot afterward. Unfortunately I hadn't planned our time at Epcot because it was kind of an afterthought. I had spent a week planning every detail of what we would do at the other parks. Planning is really essential to get the most out of the experience.

Anyway, we got there too late for Elena to meet Mulan (currently one of her faves) or any of the other characters that you can only meet at Epcot: Tinkerbell, Jasmine, etc. I wasn't sure which countries had what, so we kind of wandered. Also, we had been giving the kids plenty of water, so Elena had 3 or 4 potty breaks in the 3 hours that we were there. We did do a couple of cool things. There was a Nemo ride, the different countries were beautiful, and we enjoyed...

Mexico! Loved the music, the shopping, and we went on the boat ride inside.

Kevin was so cute dancing to the music playing while we ate ice cream. He entertained us all for about 15 minutes.

The highlight of Epcot was probably getting to see Mater and McQueen. Kevin was really excited even though they were made out of bushes.

Day 2: Animal Kingdom

There's been a big delay between posts because we moved. :) We're temporarily at my parents' house until we sell ours or give up and rent it. Then we'll get a rental here and be all set for the next three years while Dan does his residency.

On with Disney:

We had skipped coming to Animal Kingdom when we came to Disney World for our honeymoon in 2002. I am so glad that we came this time. We had a great day! Here are some highlights:

The Kilimanjaro Sarafi ride was a lot of fun and we were able to see animals up close. Afterwards we took a train to the conservation center.

At the train station:

At the conservation center, Elena met Pocahontas. She was so sweet and (in case you can't tell from the picture) absolutely, unbelievably gorgeous. I wanted to tell her so, but I didn't want to creep her out. haha The vet took an xray of a spiny-tailed lizard. He was swollen/puffy. They ended up doing a little lizard enema to help him out. Elena (who wants to be a doctor when she grows up) was fascinated. We got to watch through the glass.
E and K had so much fun at this random play area. There were fountains for the kids to get wet in. At one point there were about 10 kids in bathing suits enjoying the water.
While Kevin slept in the stroller (napping is the one way that Kevin is an easy child), we walked on a nature trail and saw bats, tigers, alligators, and birds. The whole park is beautiful and thankfully shady. It must have been 100 degrees!
The Lion King show was amazing! There were acrobats, a fire dancer, stilt walkers, singers, and more. Kevin clapped and laughed most of the time. Elena was scared - especially at the beginning, but what else is new? :) The Nemo show was also really great.
There is a dinosaur section of Animal Kingdom which is fantastic. We ate a nice lunch there and then went exploring. This is all of us on one of the rides (like Dumbo with a Triceratop).

Goofy and Pluto:

The had a fossil dig with a Mastodon fossil under all of this big sand/small gravel. You can see how hot and tired they are by this point.

An archeologist themed playground to run around in:

Day 1: The Drive to Florida

Updated with a video:
We wanted to do something really fun for Dan's last (ever?) long vacation, so we decided to take a family trip. After talking to my awesome and generous brother, we chose to go to Disney World. The reason that talking with my brother helped us decide? He offered to give us 8 one-day park-hopper passes that he had. All we had to do was purchase a single one-day ticket for Elena and we were able to visit all 4 Disney World parks for 3 days! I took almost 400 photos while we were gone (and I wish I had gotten more!), so I'll be posting one day at a time.
We had a great drive, honest. Kevin is tired in the pic, not sad. They were really good. Dan and I talked and listened to part of "The 3 Musketeers" on cd while the kids watched movies, read books, slept, and played with small toys. The 10 hours weren't so bad (Dan drove the whole way there) and we even checked into the hotel early enough for the kids to play in the Splash Zone before bed.
Did I mention that our completely adequate hotel was only $50 a night? It was great. We were super close to the parks (we could see Epcot fireworks in the distance from the 5th floor walkway), we had a fridge and microwave, pools and Splash Zone, and we saved enough money on the price of the hotel that we were able to pay for parking at the parks and not stress over shuttle/bus schedules. It didn't even matter that we were all in one room because both kids fell asleep as soon as/before they laid down each night. Then we would plan the next day.
Elena really embraced getting wet on this trip. She was so excited and energetic after all day in the car. Kevin was much more restrained, and he isn't even in the video below (there is a different little boy running around in the background) because he refused to get in the water until Dan came and played with him.

Daniel's Graduation

It was an amazing weekend. We were blessed to have all our parents and my sister in town for graduation. It was wonderful to be able to celebrate Dan's accomplishments. He had 3 graduation ceremonies along with an official dinner and a luncheon (stretching things out from May 14-16), so we were able to celebrate with him over and over. :)

At our fancy dinner on Saturday night:
At the Hooding Ceremony. This was on Sunday at the chapel pictured above.

Digging in the dirt with the kids immediately after the hooding ceremony. Is he going to be a great pediatrician or what? :)
Dan with his padres:
Mi familia:
Receiving his diploma after Commencement. Commencement was outdoors (the picture on the top of the post) for all the WFU grads, and this ceremony was just for the medical school.

Wow!
I think that this is my favorite picture from the whole weekend.