Disney Vacation - The weekend in review (day 1)

Two weekends ago our good friend Rene (who we recently found out from her daughter is family) came down with her family to Disney World. Allison, Ben and I decided that meeting up with them was a great idea, so we booked a Disney World vacation too.

Rene and her family stayed at the Beach Club Villas. We aren't high rollers, so we had to search online for deals at other hotels. ; ) We found a great deal at the Dolphin, which ended up being perfect because the two hotels are walking distance from each other. But I'm getting ahead of myself here. Let's do this in order.

Friday started at Ben's survival swimming class. I talked a lot of trash leading up to the class. I was planning to jump into the pool and drop-kick the teacher like Jimmy "Superfly" Snuka if I didn't like what she was doing to Ben. That wasn't an issue. Ben was a champ. He cried a little bit, but every time she put him into the water, he kicked and spun until he was floating on his back. Good job little man! I was very proud of him. The teacher was really nice and I felt bad for ever wanting to drop kick her in the face.

Now we're off to Disney. Ben slept in the car during the 35 minute drive there. Our room was ready when we arrived, so we brought everything upstairs, unpacked and headed out to the Magic Kingdom, but not before they hit us for 2 tips. First the guys help you unload the car, then they hand you off to someone who brings the cart up to the room. I can already tell this is going to be an expensive weekend.

We took the bus to the Magic Kingdom then upgraded our "Give a day, get a day" passes to seasonal w/weekend passes. If you are looking for us, this fall & winter, check Disney World. If you really need us and we don't answer at the house or our cells, just call the main Disney World number and have us paged. Oh, also, if we don't answer at the house...don't steal our stuff. Thank you.

We called Rene and decided to meet in front of Cinderella's castle for a show. There was a cool dance party going on when we reached the end of Main Street. Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Goofy and maybe even Chip and Dale were dancing in the streets, doing a conga line and just going crazy. At one point the MC started singing "the roof, the roof, the roof is on fire.." He stopped before the next verse, but I was really tempted to be "that guy" that sings the inappropriate lyrics.


We found Rene and her family. It was good to see them. Her little girls got so big and cuter too. Rene got me a "Happy Birthday" pin. It was pretty awesome until I sweat so much that my name wiped off the pin. Here is the pin and it's replacement. Yes, I do realize I'm a big baby. Thanks Rene for getting me those pins.

The show started. It was pretty cool. Ben was confused. He just looked around at everyone. It was cool watching him trying to figure out what was going on. Eventually he started smiling and wiggling, trying to reach out to touch other people and the characters on stage.

After the show the seven of us walked around the park for a bit. When it was time for lunch Rene and her family went back to the room to make sandwiches. We spent over 20 bucks in the park. In hindsight, after getting our credit card bill, sandwiches may have been the better way to go.

Once we finished lunch, Allison took Ben on his first ride, Dumbo. I must have looked like a big dumbo running around with the camera and video camera trying to capture it. He didn't have too much of a reaction, but I think he was just too hot and tired to care.

After cooling off and a nap(for Ben), we hit the carousel. Ben LOVED the carousel. He was all smiles and screeches. After the ride ended, Allison said "I'm not getting off" I made an inappropriate but hilarious "that's what she said" joke and started testing out other horses so I could capture some good action shots on the next go around. I took video and 36 pictures. I say that's just being a dad. I was told that was definitely not regular dad activity. Either way, sorry Charlie. You're stuck with me and my overactive trigger finger.

We hit It's a Small World and Winnie the Pooh next. We were lucky. It poured both times we were on those rides. We stayed dry, but the cold rain really would have helped cool us off. We played around in the Pooh store and ate ice cream until the storm was over. Ben enjoyed both rides.

We met up with Rene and her family again and we used fast pass to go on Splash Mountain. The girls didn't want to get splashed, so I got to go on with Rene's husband and oldest daughter (4 3/4 years old.) She was excited. I can't remember everything she said, but she's a really funny girl. She comes up with some hilarious lines.

I always forget how long Splash Mountain is once you get inside the mountain. It was awesome watching her as we went down. I was partly watching her to see her reaction, but mostly watching her to make sure she was OK. I think of her as my niece. She was born exactly one week before my real niece. I worked and lunched with Rene all through her pregnancy. So I feel really close to them. (There's also a story about Rene trying to convince me to make a move on Allison that I'll tell you another time.) She loved the ride and asked to do it again. Look for us. Don't blink or you'll miss it.

We couldn't ride it again because we had to get a good spot for SpectroMagic and Wishes. We found a spot by about 8:25 for a 9:00 parade. Next time I think we should start looking for a spot by 8:00, it was a mad house. I thought we were going to get into a fight with the 2 crotchety old hags standing in front of us. Nothing went down, but there were lots of dirty looks between her party and our party.

The parade was cool but again, Ben didn't quite get what was going on. He did enjoy it towards the end, but mostly he was just looking around like "what the hecks going on? this isn't my bed. It's nighty-night time guys"

It was fun watching Rene's oldest daughter. She loved it. She said afterward "I waved to Minnie, but she didn't wave back. She signed my book earlier" I said "I'm sure she remembered you, but she had to wave to other kids who's books she didn't get to sign." She replied "yeah, that's right. she had to wave to the other kids. that's probably why." It was really cute. I think her youngest daughter fell asleep.

Another 30 minute wait and it's time for Wishes. We love Wishes. It's our favorite thing at Disney World. If you don't know what Wishes is, it's a fireworks show at the Magic Kingdom and it's worth the price of admission. I was worried that it would be too loud for Ben and he would cry, but he was fine. He actually watched a lot of the fireworks. We killed some time after Wishes ended, then decided to catch the bus back to the hotel. We all had tired kids and we were very disgusting from our day at the sauna, I mean park.

Stay tuned for the breakdown of Saturday and Sunday of our Disney World vacation. I don't think the posts will be a mega post like this, but I really didn't intend for this to be a mega post, so who knows what you'll get.