I will ignore the cooking and cleaning for a bit to do a bit-o-blogging about the trip. First things first: getting there.
We left on the morning of May 3rd. I have to admit that flying on an airplane wasn't nearly as exciting this time around because we had just done it two weeks before. Fortunately, the kids were happy to learn that there were no layovers and the flight would last less than two hours. This was good, because Cole was crazy-go-nuts, saying wild and crazy things in *Coleish and having zero patience when it came to waiting in line.
*Coleish is what we have taken to calling all of the crazy things Cole says. For example, his most recent insult is calling you a "Head Butt". No one has corrected him because this is way funnier. Plus, he's also taken to head butting people when he's being obnoxious, so it kinda fits. He also reads and hears a lot but doesn't quite understand it and so uses a lot of words out of context. When he's mad at me he likes to yell "That wasn't part of the deal!" and storming off. When he's really mad at Josh or Spencer he likes to yell "You're really IMPRESSIVE!!!" It's all pretty hilarious.
Anywho, the flight? Uneventful. Which is what you want when it comes to airline travel, amiright? Well done, Southwest.
So we land in Orlando and then have to hike across to the opposite end of the airport to get to our Disney Magical Express transportation. Fortunately, part of the service is them delivering your luggage directly to the resort so we didn't have to deal with that. We had to wait in line for a good 20 minutes, which Cole did NOT like, but once we were on one of those big buses all was right with the world.
We were lucky enough to be the first stop: Old Key West Resort. First thing we checked in and got our MagicBands. MagicBands are AWESOME. Seriously, the best thing ever.
They're RFID bands that pretty much do everything: open your resort door, hold your FastPass+ reservations, let you into the theme parks, keep track of where your kids are, allow you to use PhotoPass, and even act as your credit card (you have to punch in a code, so no worries about losing it). Seriously - no more worrying about dragging around keys and credit cards and tickets and stuff! And they're cool. All the cool kids were wearing them!
I wanted to take a picture of them in their holder, but the kids were way too anxious. But here's a picture I stole from the interwebs - just imagine our names underneath instead. Disney does an awesome job making everything - even their MagicBands presentation - look so great.
Then we hiked on down to our resort suite. (We were far too impatient to wait for the shuttle - plus we had been sitting down most of the day.)
We stayed in a 2 bedroom suite, and it was great. We really could have used another bedroom (kudos to Grandpa and Grandma for sleeping on the couch bed and for Tess sleeping on some cushions in our closet), so it was small, but still really nice. Of course, not nice enough for me to think of taking any pictures... growl... but that's what Google images is for, right?
All of the buildings looked pretty much the same. We were on the second floor on the right.
It had this great little kitchen and living area. I ordered groceries so we could make breakfast each morning, but ordered way too much food. I don't know what I was thinking. I'm still kicking myself over that.
It was pretty well stocked, although there were only 6 of everything and 9 of us!
The boys and uncle Kyle shared a room like this.
I couldn't find a picture of the master bedroom that I liked, but here's what part of the master bathroom looked like. There was a second part with a toilet and large shower, with an entrance from this room and off of the laundry room. Yep, laundry room. It came in sooooo handy!
We dumped our backpacks and decided to go find some snacks. Our building was right next to a smaller pool and a snack shack. The kids were in heaven when they got their own refillable Disney Resort cups and got to choose from a pretty great menu of snacks!
I should mention here that we were on the Disney Dining plan, which allotted one Quick Meal (think fast food), one Table Dining Meal (think nice dinner), and one snack (all sorts of stuff) for each person each day. It was great for many reasons, the main one being that you didn't really have to worry about feeding your family. You just used your MagicBand and BAM! Food.
After we refueled with things like Mickey Mouse shaped rice crispy treats, Mickey chocolate covered ice creams, strawberries, brownies, and nachos, we decided to head down to Downtown Disney. Downtown Disney is considered a Disney Park, but it doesn't require tickets. Basically, it's just a glorified outdoor mall. We had fun window shopping and looking at all the crazy Disney stuff you can buy.
My kids don't usually like shopping, but they liked it here! (Just look how happy Spencer is!)
Eventually Grandpa ElRay and Grandma Susie met us and we headed out to our first dinner of the week at Raglan Road. It was very loud and very crowded. But there was entertainment: lots of Irish dancing and singing.
The kids even got to get in on some of the action.
The food was really good, too. Lance and I decided to split at 28oz steak. (You read that right - although there was a pretty big bone, so it was more like a 20oz steak. And Lance ate the majority of it and I ate the majority of the veggies that came with it. This is why we're married.)
The only bad thing I can say is that it was SLOOOOOOWWW. Our server was great, but I think he was partly to blame. We were there for over 2 hours. This amazing chocolate mousse dessert helped alleviate some of my irritation. (With the Disney dining plan you get a dessert with each meal. Yowza!)
We eventually made it back to the resort, where uncle Kyle was waiting for us. The kids were all super excited, but they were also super tired because it was way past their bedtime. (This would become the norm for the week.) We finally got everyone - including the adults - into bed.
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