It’s hard to believe it was a month ago that we visited Epcot. 
It was a fantastic day and seems like just yesterday in many ways!

As we did on all our park days, we made it there in time for rope drop.

For people who do not believe it is important to get there a solid 40 minutes before the park opens, I offer you this photo.

That is what it looked like as a full 50% of the rope-drop-crowd headed straight for Soarin’.  Everyone except Scooter and I got on the ride to mark our first Disney attraction of our vacation! 
[I rode later with FastPasses.]

We cooled off three times during the day at Club Cool where we thoroughly enjoyed sampling sodas marketed around the world.

 

Mommy, Nanny, and the girls headed to Akershus Royal Banquet Hall in the Norway Pavilion for lunch with the princesses.  It was delicious and a lot of fun.  Scooter didn’t love it [she was hungry and tired] but all the other members of the party gave it two thumbs up!

JB and I joked that this is what our photo would look like if we only had one child!  [She never passes up a photo op.]

We were there for the Flower and Garden Festival.

The big deal of the day was meeting Marie the Cat from Aristocats!
She was a new character the last time we went in 2007 and we couldn’t find her.  This year we did and were rewarded with good, good hugs.

*sigh* – bliss!

Skeezix was selected to sit in a prop. chair used for an acrobat show. 

Meeting Mary Poppins.

We headed into a store buried in the United Kingdom area and were rewarded with a visit with these guys.  I love that my homeschooled [a/k/a no-one-ever-told-him-he’s-too-old] almost 9 year old still hugs characters!!!

This was a really cool find also tucked into the store in the U.K!

What are the odds???????

More Club Cool!

And dinner in Sunshine Seasons in The Land Pavilion. 
It is our favorite place to eat in Future World.

We closed out the day with Illuminations: Reflections of the Earth.  It is a wonderful fireworks show [although over-the-top with “green” messages and a big-bang-theory start…].

Our day was magnificent.  We went to bed that night late and very tired AND in disbelief that we still had 10 more days of vacation ahead of us!!

We arrived in Florida on Saturday, April 30th to sunny skies and HOT temperatures.  We spent Saturday evening swimming and got to bed early.  The 24 hour drive had left us all tuckered out.

Sunday we enjoyed the pool all morning, making our first splash just minutes after breakfast.   We had an small, early lunch and headed to Downtown Disney. 

We toured around for a bit and Mama checked out the status of years’ worth of partially used tickets.  Daddy and the boys stayed for dinner at T-Rex while Mama, Nene, and the girls headed to Orlando airport to pick up Nan.

The ladies had dinner at Sizzler before meeting up with the guys again for more pictures and playing and purchasing!  Champ went home with a new lego set and Skeezix found a new Minnie Mouse dress-up set to replace a used-to-pieces set from 2007.

It was a great way to start vacation.

We headed to bed early as Monday would mark our first full day of touring a park.

 

This is how we drove around all week. 

^{We were blessed with a fantastic vacation to Florida from April 29th – May 13th.} 

^{We drove down through the night and found the journey very pleasant.  We all agreed we’d do it again!}

^{The vacation house was nice.  Four bedrooms, three full baths [two with soaker tubs] and a living room and a family room/kitchen set-up.} 

^{Nan and Nene’s bathroom}

^{Girls’ room}

^{Boys’ and Scooter’s room}

^{Mommy and Daddy’s Room}

 

^{Mommy’s bathtub!}

^{Nene & Nanny’s room}

 

^{The pool was great.  We were disappointed that what we thought was a “hot tub” was only a “jetted spa.”  But it didn’t take away from our trip to not have the hot tub.}

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