Outside the Crystal Palace waiting to be called for our table!
Now we did this same breakfast with Ben and Abbey when Ben was 4 and Abbey was almost 2. Ben loved it and Abbey screamed whenever a character came close to our table, so we were interested to see what would happen this time. Paul took matters into his own hands and immediately gave Eyore a big hug!
So did Ben.
Abbey hesitated, but didn't scream.
And she finally walked over to be in the picture, although she didn't hug him. Juliette, however, moved close to me and wouldn't go be in the picture. She didn't scream though.
Pooh Bear enveloped Ben in a big bear hug!
With some prodding, Abbey would touch Pooh, but that was about it. I would say that was good progress!
After breakfast we ran (literally) over to the Meet and Greet for Anna and Elsa to get in line. The park had just opened for the general public (but had been opened to the resort guests for an hour). The line to meet them was 260 minutes. That's right - we even asked to be sure if that could possibly be correct, but yes, the line to meet them was almost 4.5 hours!!! So we told the girls that unfortunately they would not meet them this time because waiting that long would be crazy. So instead we went to the Merry Go Round.
Selfie! With Abbey photo bombing us in the back - ha!
Then we headed over to Huck Finn's island, which we had never been on before, but this time Ben had read the book and wanted to go. It was fun to walk around and explore the island for a bit.
Back from the island, we had to put Ben in time out...
Just kidding, the kids were good, but we had to snap some pictures.
We found it strange that they did not have stools for the kids to stand on, but no problem when Daddy is around!
Next we went on the new Ariel ride, which Juliette was just in awe of - you can kind of tell from this picture how much she loved it!
And we got to meet Ariel!!!
Juliette went right to her, but Abbey was still a little shy. Ariel was awesome in talking to her though. My favorite line was, "What's wrong? Have you never met a fish before?"
Ben went along with it well, but the girls, especially Juliette, really loved it!
Then it was off to meet up with our good friends who were at Disney for the week!
Madgie had been talking to Juliette about the tea cup ride so all morning she kept asking to go on it!
This is Paul's least favorite ride because it makes him feel like this...
Then we went to the new experience of stories with Belle. She acted out a scene and had different kids be part of it to help her. They had a part for every kid that wanted to participate...but of course, none of our kids would do it! But this is our friend Danny being Chip the tea cup!
After the play all the kids got to go meet Belle and Juliette immediately wanted to do that! She even walked up in line by herself to go do it (Abbey wouldn't go with her).
Then it was off to some 3D action with these crazy kids!
And of course, It's A Small World!
All the kids. It was really fun meeting up with them for a good part of the day.
Our family. This was the best picture we could get - kids were really tired at this point and getting cranky.
So we fixed that with a quick stop for ice cream!
After that they were back to being silly and happy again, so we got some cute shots in front of the castle.
Love this one!
Then we were off again to get in a few more rides before heading home.
Like driving the cars! Ben was just a tad too short to drive by himself, which he was disappointed about, but he did well driving with Daddy and Juliette while Abbey and I went together.
Then it was time to head back. We left the park just before 9 - just before the parade started. If we were staying around Disney we would have stayed for the parade, but seeing as how we still had to drive 2.5 hours back to Jacksonville, we figured we better get going. It was a great day. Thank you Madgie and Patch for keeping Matthew for us!
