Disney World - Day 3

With the grandparents in town, on Tuesday we headed to Magic Kingdom.  I was beyond excited to take Emma to the Magic Kingdom.  I imagined staying the whole day in the warm sunshine and see all the enchanting things there were to see.  Of course, you know how best laid plans go.

Note:  Please excuse the binky in virtually all the pictures in this post. Emma is typically not allowed to have her binky outside of her bed or in very special situations, but Disney, while magical, can be stressful so we bent a few rules.  This day was especially stressful so the binky was in full effect.

Emma getting ready for Magic Kindom in the Mickey ears Grandma bought her the night before.

Emma seemed a little off that morning.  She hardly ate anything, was in a zone and at one point asked to go back to bed, which I don't think has ever happened before.  I figured she'd perk up once we got in the car.   She perked up for awhile, but was soon in tears again.  She cried on the monorail taking us from the parking lot to the park.  She finally calmed down once we got in view of the park, but still wasn't her usual perky self.  We had tears off and on all day. To add to it, the sunshine and warm weather I had imagined were nowhere to be found.  It was cold and gloomy and none of us were prepared. This was not how I envisioned our trip!

We marched onward and soon found some things to keep the little one happy.   Our first real stop was in Mickey's Toon Town Fair.  I wanted to be sure to get there because Emma loves Mickey and it was built for her age group.  But, the main reason was that the last time I was in Disney it was just being built so I didn't get to go and it was going to be closing forever at the end of that week! It was 'now or never'!

Look Minnie and Emma are the same size!

Minnie's house in Mickey's Toon Town Fair

Just realxing in Minnie's chair

I thought this was in important message pinned to Minnie's bulletin board.

After leaving Mickey and Minnie's houses, we found a few friends.  Emma had to wait in line to see them, something I don't remember being the case when I was a kid.  Didn't the characters used to just walk around the park?  Well either way, she was delighted to meet Tigger and Pooh! Notice the wardrobe change.  Mommy was feeling bad for dressing Emma for warmer weather than we were given so Grandma Helen and I went in search of something a little warmer. We all felt a little better, except that her ears went so well with her shorts!

After Tigger and Pooh, we headed over to 'It's a Small World'.  You can't go to Disney without riding eventhough, truthfully, it's one of the least exciting rides, which could explain the 90 year olds operating it.  It has recently been redone and the children are vibrant and beautiful!  The wait was only 5 minutes and it was warm inside so we were all in favor of it! Emma just looked at the picture as I was posting and said, 'Oh! It's A Small World! Can we ride it again?'  I couldn't believe she rememberd what it was called! Glad to know it made an impression on her!

Grandpa Don, Grandpa Barry, Emma and Daddy waiting to ride It's A Small World

I love the visuals in this ride.  This was my favorite room.

After Small World, we had more tears, a leaky diaper, a failed attempt at eating lunch (thanks to tears from Emma) and what we thought was a stolen stroller.  We found it and realized it had been moved since must have left in an undesirable place.   We decided to keep moving and hit a few more favorites before calling it a day.

Emma and Grandpa getting ready to climb up into the Swiss Family Robinson's tree house.

Another (rare) picture of Mommy and Emma

We also headed over to Pirates of the Caribbean, not sure how Emma would do since it's dark and fairly scary.  She loved it and rode happily, unafraid for the whole ride!

Finally as we were all getting tired, the sun came out.  What a bummer!  We couldn't walk another step though. At least we got a pretty picture of the castle on the way out.

Emma fell asleep in her stroller which I'm pretty sure she's never done other than when she was a baby still in her infant seat.  Emma sleeps in two places and two places only - her bed and her carseat. We realized she must have been cranky because she was so tired.  She slept all the way out of the park, on the ferry across the water back to the parking lot, and I think all the way to the car!

We got our sleepy girl back to the hotel, tried to feed her (not interested) and put her down for a nap.  If I remember correctly, she slept for 4 hours.  I was getting a little worried at this point because it was so unlike Emma.  I thought she might be getting sick, or worse, the thought that soemthing was wrong with her shunt!  Emma is never sick and rarely so tired that she wants to sleep all day.  She's a good napper, but this much sleeping was excessive.

Luckily, she woke up in a wonderful mood, which is more than I can say for myself. We went to dinner in the hotel and she finally ate a few bites of macaroni.  After dinner, we went up to the lobby for the parade of African music the have every night.  It was awesome!  Emma got to try out some instruments in the gift shop first.

Emma LOVES drums! She is a drummer at heart and I won't be surprised
 if she grows up to be the coolest girl drummer ever!

Then she got a little drum to carry in the parade.  We all walked around the lobby chanting 'Si ya ya, Africa'.  I'm sure that's not really how you spell it, but I don't know what the real spelling is.  It means 'We're going to Africa.

At the end of the parade, the parade leaders did some more drumming for us.  Emma parked herself in the middle of the circle drumming and dancing her little heart out.  When one of the women abandoned her drum to dance, Emma went right over and started drumming to the music of the other drum!

Emma participated in the parade the next two nights as well.  It was a great end to a day that started out not so great!