Magic Kingdom
We had decided early this year that we wanted to take advantage of the amazing military deals for Disneyworld. We picked a week where the kids would only miss four days of school… (a big deal here in Georgia), researched cheap flights for my parents and got on the phone prepared with a list of reasons why they should come with us. But we didn’t need the list. They said, ‘we’re in’ after the first sentence. Dan and Sarah had already been wanting to make the trip and no one else could resist the perfect ‘Walton Disney Vacation of a Lifetime’.
We caravanned down to Orlando with Dan and Sarah and girls. Grandpa and Grandma flew from Seattle. Mike, Amy, Scott and Elisha and kids flew from Utah and Brian sent us his ‘magical best wishes’ from his mission in Arizona. We met up Sunday night and got settled in the two 2-bedroom condos right outside Disneyworld (through Armed Forces Vacation Club.) and got excited for the week.
Monday morning we got our 5 days Disney tickets and headed to the happiest place on earth… The Magic Kingdom.
First of all, traveling anywhere with the Walton family is kind of hilarious. 6 cameras and 2 video cameras documented everything we did… and although I don’t have official written releases for all of my siblings photos, I’m pretending I do. Really everyone should travel with an entourage of wanna-be photographers, a photojournalist brother, a videographer planning each magical scene in his head and a video-clip happy Dad. It’s so fun.
Our most magical memories of the day…
- Wearing the matching Mickey t-shirts Grandma and Grandpa bought for the kids
- Being so excited on the monorail we can hardly stand it
- Laughing to the funny ‘one-liners’ on our first ride of the day… Jungle Cruise… Ryan being the ‘skipper’
- Watching Luke on the Pooh Bear ride… reminded us so much of taking Ryan on that ride at the same age
- Seeing a few characters… Lilo and Stitch… Jasmine
- All the cousins on the carousel
- Watching Grandpa and Grandma hold hands throughout the park
- Watching Megan be SOOO excited to do the big roller coasters… finally BIG ENOUGH!
- Hearing Luke say ‘dere mee mou’ every time he saw a picture of Mickey.
- Watching Luke be excited to see Buzz and go on the Buzz Lightyear ride
- Taking pictures by the castle
- Going on Splash Mountain… Chris, Megan and Dan got SOAKED in the back… all captured by Mike
- Watching the ‘Celebrate’ parade at 3:00 Molly was so cute!
- Riding Thunder Mountain Railroad
- Watching incredible fireworks while in line for Dumbo
- Witnessing Sarah’s unfortunate glow in the dark bracelet explosion flinging glow in the dark liquid into her hair and eyes… not very magical but memorable none the less… complete with Dan capturing funny pictures of her trying to wash the toxic stuff out of her eyes. ouch!
- Listening to Grandpa do a traditional seal hunt with the grandkids, in the dark, in the middle of Fantasy Land while we waited for Sarah to wash toxic stuff out of her eyes.
- Running onto rides like Peter Pan, Snow White and It’s a Small World with no lines, at the very end of the night, all together
- Favorite rides of the day… unanimously ‘Thunder Railroad, Splash Mountain, and watching Luke on Pooh Bear’
And my favorite bunch of photos… captured by Mike on Splash mountain…
