A glorious forecast? Indeed. Also, a forecast full of LIES.
Our Friday at Magic Kingdom met the same fate as our first Magic Kingdom day on our last Disney trip: the forecast was way off. In reality, the weather on Friday never climbed out of the very low 50s, and was accompanied by grey skies at best and pouring rain at worst. (Care to rethink that 0% chance of precipitation, Weather.com?) It was NASTY. Cold, damp and pretty miserable. Again, the kids were appropriately bundled, but Eric and I were underdressed. You'd think I'd have learned my lesson after our last Disney trip, when the exact same thing happened, but apparently not. (Also, apparently the weather in Orlando is a total enigma and the weather people have no idea what is ever going to happen there.) Luckily I just happened to have a scarf in the car, and wore E.J. most of the time, but it was still just pretty unpleasant all day long.
But anyway. Yucky weather aside, we had a good time! Let's talk Disney fun. This will be long!
Our plan was to get going as quickly as we could in the morning, in the hopes of arriving at Magic Kingdom in time to see Mickey ride in on the train to open the park. Somehow, however, we arrived one monorail-from-the-parking-lot too late and just missed it. Bummer! But, we knew we wanted to be at the park at opening anyway, to try to take advantage of lighter crowds and knock out as much fun as we could before lines started to get long.
Let's do this!
We decided to kick things off with some princess visits, and stopped in to see Cinderella and Rapunzel. There was no line at all to visit them, although Anna and Elsa next door were already boasting a 95-minute wait. Cinderella (or, as Ellie calls her, "Princess 'Erella") was up first...
Ellie and Cinderella
...then Rapunzel. Rapunzel loved Ellie's hoodie! Actually, lots of people did. We got a lot of questions about where she got it. It was actually a gift sent from Aunt Heather from Tokyo Disney!
Just a couple of Rapunzels
Ellie requested a ride on the carousel next, so she and Eric did that while I took E.J. to a nearby shop to look for his very own pair of mouse ears.
Cuties on the carousel
Next, we had to try our hands at the Sword in the Stone...
Sadly, neither of them was destined to rule the kingdom. Shucks.
New mouse ears!
...and then we ran into the Stepmother and Stepsisters from Cinderella, as they got off the carousel. They fussed over E.J., and one of them even "decorated" him!
E.J., you have a little something on your forehead!
We continued on through Fantasyland...
Rapunzel's tower
The Beast's castle
and stopped in to meet Ariel...
Under the sea!
...before continuing on to Pete's Silly Sideshow to meet Minnie, Daisy, Donald and Goofy.
Off we go!
At Ellie's request, we started with Daisy and Minnie:
Ellie and Daisy
Chatting it up with Minnie
But, the whole time we were with the two ladies, Ellie kept asking to go meet Goofy on the other side of the building. So, as soon as we finished with the first two, we went right over to Goofy and Donald. And then Ellie did this:
#ReasonsMyKidIsCrying: we took her to see the lovable Disney characters she was dying to meet.
and completely refused to even go near them, even though she had just been bursting at the seams to meet them mere moments before. TWO YEAR OLDS.
But hey, suit yourself, kid. E.J. and I stepped in and took care of business!
Checking out Goofy
Donald is #1!
Next, Eric and Ellie rode Dumbo, which was a hit, just as it was on our last trip.
Ellie on Dumbo
I sat nearby and nursed E.J. while they rode, then he and I took some mouse-ears selfies!
I can't.
So, this is where things started to fall apart a little bit. We tried to find Gaston with no luck. We considered stopping for a cinnamon roll at his tavern but opted to come back for it (and never got around to it). Then we waited in line for the stepsisters, but that was too long and too slow so we abandoned ship. As we continued on, the rain finally started. I had E.J. in the (covered) stroller for a nap, so I told Eric to take Ellie into the (covered) line to meet Pooh and Tigger and I would keep walking E.J. around. Eric and Ellie made their way through the line, and when they were second from the front, Pooh and Tigger took a break. Only Pooh came back, so that's all they were able to meet (which would've been fine if they hadn't just seen Tigger there, and been so close!).
Playing in the rain
Ellie and Winnie the Pooh
Meanwhile, I walked E.J. over and spotted Alice in Wonderland and the Mad Hatter, so I got in line for them. I got to the very front of the line and then they took a break. I was promised that if I waited there, I would be first when they came back, and since E.J. was snoozing in the stroller, that's what I opted to do. Of course, when they tried to come back, it started pouring rain. I ducked my head under E.J.'s stroller canopy for cover (and we were under trees, which also helped), because I didn't want to lose my spot after waiting so long. Of course, the characters couldn't come back out in the rain, so we did this dance several times before we finally just gave up. That was an awful lot of standing in line in the rain for nothing!
But, onward. We decided we should get some lunch, take advantage of our FastPass for Mickey at the Town Square Theater, and wrap up our morning. We made our way back to Main Street, stopping for pictures along the way.
With my girl
Kids on Main Street
My boys
Stop it.
Family photo!
We caught a little Christmas show right in front of us...
We caught the tail end of all the Christmas festivities/decorations at the parks!
...then proceeded to Casey's Corner for some hot dogs and fries.
Yum!
On our way down to the Town Square Theater, we caught the "Move It! Shake It! Celebrate It!"street party.
We moved it. We shook it.
Then, we stopped in to see Mickey. Both kids loved him!
Ellie loved that he talked to her!
The disappointing part of that Mickey encounter was that we wanted to have a baseball signed by Mickey as E.J.'s souvenir from the trip. We hoped this was our chance, but the woman working in our Mickey room wouldn't let him sign it because it would be endorsing whatever the company name on the ball was. Bummer!
We left straight from there and went back to the hotel for naptime. And, miraculously, both kids napped - even Ellie, breaking a five-day no-nap streak!
We returned to the park in the evening for our "big ticket item," so to speak: FastPasses to meet Elsa and Anna! Those are hard to come by, my friends, and as I mentioned earlier - the wait is always far longer than we are willing to stand around with a two-year-old, and I don't care how many times on this trip said two-year-old donned an Anna dress and acted out "Do You Wanna Build A Snowman" in our hotel. That wait was not gonna happen.
But, we had FastPasses! So back to the park we went.
Disney at dusk
Ellie was appropriately dressed:
Eric and Princess Anna
And, I should take another second to share my other homemade slipcover for a baby carrier! For Magic Kingdom, I gave my Beco Gemini a little Mickey makeover. Pair that with infant mouse ears? KILLER.
He is seriously killing me.
We had some time before our date with the Princesses of Arendelle, so we decided to stake out a spot and watch the "A Frozen Holiday Wish" light show on Cinderella's castle, in which Elsa uses her magic to "ice" the castle. It was the last day for this show, so we were happy to see it!
Unfortunately, however, the show ended with a very brief burst of fireworks and Ellie FREAKED. Absolute panic and terror. Poor girl! Needless to say, we definitely scratched "stay for fireworks display" off our Magic Kingdom To-Do List and hightailed it away from the offending firework castle and off to see Elsa and Anna. The show may have scarred her for life, but the castle did look pretty!
The offending firework
Lovely!
And so, the moment was upon us! Elsa and Anna time! It should be noted that Ellie has recently been bitten HARD by the Frozen bug. She spent most of her free time in the hotel acting out various Anna scenes, and, for example, has gone to bed every night for the past week in Frozen pajamas, wearing gloves like Elsa, with her Elsa and Anna dolls beside her and her Frozen book tucked in by her pillow. It has become an obsession. So, we were pretty excited to see what she would make of a real life Anna and Elsa.
Ellie was so cute when we walked into Princess Fairytale Hall and saw the princesses! I wish I had a video of it! She even made conversation with the castmember managing the front of the line. The woman asked Ellie's name, and she answered, then launched into a roll call: "And that's E.J.! And that's Daddy, and Mama!" She also informed her that Olaf and Kristoff were missing! So cute.
Elsa was up first. I have to say, I was probably the least impressed with her of all the princesses we met. She wasn't very personable with Ellie, though Ellie didn't seem to mind!
Ellie and Elsa
Next up was Anna, and when Ellie walked up to her, Anna complimented her pretty dress. Ellie held up her skirt and very sweetly said, "This is my Anna dress." I nearly died.
"This is my Anna dress."
Ellie and Anna
When we finished with the princesses, we took advantage of the crowds congregating at the Light Parade and enjoyed a very short wait to meet Tinkerbell. She was funny—she talked Ellie's ear off (about what, I have no idea), and Ellie just stared at her blankly the whole time. Ha!
Ellie is all, "WHAT is this fairy talking about."
We learned as the trip went on that asking Ellie to say "cheese" (instead of "smile") results in a slightly less awkwardly forced toddler smile. At least this one shows teeth?
Proof that E.J. met some of these folks, too!
Ellie was asking to see Mickey again, and thanks again to that parade, the wait was only five minutes. So, we stopped back in with the Main Mouse. He was a hit with both kids yet again!
Shocking news of the day: the world's happiest baby loved Mickey.
Look at these guys!
Ellie and Mickey
Mickey was a hit!
When we left Mickey, the parade had finished and the fireworks were starting. Our efforts to escape the park before they began, thus sparing our daughter severe psychological trauma, were unsuccessful and poor Ellie was struck with terror. Eric scooped her up and made a mad dash for the monorail while she clung to him and cried. It was heartbreaking. Also, a little disappointing, because I love fireworks. I hope she outgrows this fear by the Fourth of July! Poor love.
We made it back to our hotel with one pooped Mickey and one hungry princess.
That Mickey is down for the count.
Too much dress for one chair!
We got everyone fed and in bed, and that was a wrap on Magic Kingdom day!
Up next: a little resting before the big race!
(If you'd like to see the rest of our photos from the Magic Kingdom, I've uploaded the full set here.)
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