71 Toes: Disney (part 1)

You see, she must have something to carry all her paraphernalia...building blocks, puzzles, a few random markers and what used to be referred to as her "guys." Since she has matured SO much lately ;), she now mostly just carries around her "fwinsessesses" (translation: princesses).

There was a time I wondered if Lucy would ever go through the "princess stage." She was late at all her other milestones, and I thought maybe this one would never come around.

I was dead wrong.

She adores those lovely ladies more than I can say.

To her they are the cat's meow.

So we told her once she was potty-trained she could get her own set of mini figurines and maybe, just maybe we would take her to Disneyland.

And even though quite honestly I don't think she completely understood our bribe, it was out there, and really, what kind of parents would we be if we didn't follow through with it??

So, when a company trip was proposed with a destination to Disneyworld we were there, hook line and sinker.

Especially since the "company" consists of Dave, his brother and brother-in-law and their families who we adore:

C'mon, just look at those great people. We love them.

We were all so excited to finally get there...especially when we saw this:

We spent one day each at three different parks. No offense to Dave and my big kids but I have to say my very favorite day in Florida was the day the moms and younger kids split from the dads and older kids. The dads and older kids wanted scary roller coasters and the younger kids wanted the Magic Kingdom:

(so did their moms):

I must admit, I was on cloud nine this whole day because I was so excited to share it with my kids. Why are moms like that? Seriously. I think the parade was my favorite part. We sat there in the perfect slant of the sun and watched our kids soak in the whole spectacle.

It was SO fun to watch all these kids. I loved watching how Lucy is SO taken care of by not only her siblings but those great cousins too.

I loved watching Lucy whose little hands just clapped and clapped to the music and whose delighted eyes were GLUED on everything that came by. It was a little hard not to get teared up a couple times thinking about how some day maybe she won't be able to see all this stuff. It made me so incredibly grateful to be there right then, while she can soak everything in so well.

At the end of the parade all the floats stopped and the characters got off and danced with a bunch of the kids. Claire and her cousin got to dance with Donald Duck and they thought they just may have died and gone to heaven.

Enter princesses:

Should I be embarrassed to admit that I was almost more excited for Lu to meet them than Lucy was? I had grand visions of how enamored she would be and she did not disappoint me. Oh man, it was so fun to see the delight on her face, but also ALMOST better was the delight on her older sisters' faces when they saw Lu with the princesses.

My personal favorite princess?

Ariel.

You know why? Because she sure made our wait in line worth our while. First of all, she was delighted as could be when Lu showed her herself (her Ariel figurine) from the depths of her purse:

And then (much to my horror) she asked what else was in Lucy's bag. Now, I say "horror" because little did that sweet Ariel know that she was opening a can of worms. She didn't know that it takes Lu about a half hour to unload that thing, line up those princesses just so, have them "talk" to each other for a little bit, and then equally as long to load them back up again. But the stars must have been aligned for those other kids in line because Lu was miraculously able to stop after showing off just a few of her prize possessions.

You'd think that SOMEONE would have done her hair all princess-y or something if meeting princesses was on the agenda.

The other princesses were great too.

We watched the firework show:

We got drenched on Splash Mountain (I'm talking to the point of having to wring out shirts):

It was a day we sure won't forget.

On one of the other days we went to Universal Studios.

The big kids liked the "Hulk" roller coaster best.

The younger kids were pleased as punch with "Seuss Landing."

We packed like sardines into this "Harry Potter Land":

I must admit it was pretty cool...

This is Dave's sister and family (all except the one who is gone to college right now):

And here's Dave's brother and family:

And here we are:

"Where's Lucy??" you may ask.

Here she sat:

(No, she wasn't sleeping...just being obstinate.)

And this is what happened when I tried to make her be with us:

Dave was just about as thrilled as she was. Good job, other kids for staying focused on those smiles.

I'm afraid family pictures are NOT Lucy or Dave's forte.

The third day we went to Animal Kingdom:

Boy howdy do they ever know how to live it up with animals. I personally liked the bats and the little safari ride, and I couldn't believe all the details they put into the design of that place.