Disney Vacation - Day 1

The night before we left, we headed out to Rockwall to stay with my in-laws since we had to be up and at em by 6 am to catch our flight.  Our plan worked beautifully and we arrived at the airport with way too much luggage and plenty of time to spare.  Which is a good thing because, apparently, a young, attractive, red-headed mother of two screams "terrorist".  Or at least that's what I tell myself when I try to reason why I was pulled aside and patted down by the most unfriendly TSA employee.

"Which one is our plane, Mom?"

While waiting for our plane to come in, Carter & Olivia were exposed to the joys of overpriced chocolate milk in the terminal and sideways glances from other travelers secretly (or not-so-secretly) hoping that your family is not on their flight.  Turns out those fears were unfounded because our children behaved beautifully on each flight.

Checking out the safety manual like any good traveler should...

Chillin'.  "What's the big deal here?"

The excitement of taking off combined with being clueless of what was to come kept our children entertained for all of about 5 minutes.  Then we resorted to our bag of tricks which included Starburst, various snacks and activities and soft fuzzy blankets for a little extra security, and....

... iPads.  Turns out when you throw some headphones on a child and plaster Barney in front of them, they hardly remember that they're thousands of miles above ground.

Thanks to Mr. Wright Amendment, our flight had to touch down in New Orleans, but the stop allowed the young uns to get unstrapped and stretch their legs a bit.

And pose for the camera, of course.  Both the kids knocked out a bit on the last leg of the flight, so all-in-all, it was a pretty peaceful trip and turns out I was worried for nothing.

It was raining when we touched down in Orlando (which I learned later is a very normal event for Florida), so that made the baggage claim wait a little longer, left us with soaking wet clothes, and made our trip to the rental car a little more interesting.

Side note about the rental car: my father-in-law specifically requested a seven passenger vehicle.  With four adults and two children in carseats, you need all the room you can get, right?  Seven passenger vehicle used to mean, large, family bohemith vehicle with room for a small army.  But these days, it apparently means that the back seat can touch the rear window and the driver & passenger can ride with their knees touching the dashboard.   Which leaves no room for? Luggage.  I so wish I would have taken a picture of all the suitcases sitting outside the car and Nick & Dave rearranging it all at least 10 times trying to figure out a way to get to the condo without leaving someone at the airport.  But at the time, I was just trying to keep my kids calm and gently remind the two that we still had to fit me and a double stroller in the already packed vehicle.  It all worked out in the end, of course, but it is a fun memory that I never want to forget.

Once we finally arrived at the condo and sorted out the cancelled reservation situation, we were left with a lovely two bedroom, two bath place to call home for the next week.  It had plenty of room for all of us and even had an in-suite washer/dryer combo which came in handy, for sure.

We relaxed a little bit throughout the afternoon and then went to dinner at the Wolfgang Puck Cafe in Downtown Disney.

(picture from the Disney website)

The food was delicious, and this was the view from our table:

After dinner, we headed back to the condo to rest up for the following day.

Of course the kids were all out of sorts with their schedule being thrown completely out the window, but after a while we were able to get them settled down and asleep.

Next up? Day 2 - Magic Kingdom!