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That song is still stuck in my head more than a week after we returned home…fortunately for me, I actually like that song! As for those of you harboring evil gleeful thoughts at me HAVING to ride It’s a Small World After All, I am very sorry to disappoint you…and very sorry that I ONLY got to ride that lovely ride three times! I was hoping for at least a nice half dozen. It has always been my favorite. Sing it with me now!

After celebrating M’s birthday, we started our week of B’s birthday surprises. It would be too crowded during her actual birthday. Besides, this way we got to celebrate both birthdays with most of the family. During this trip, we collectively took over 3000 pictures. In case you are wondering how we got B to cooperate for so many pictures, we bribed her…I promised I would create a photo book of the trip just for her. 3000+ pictures is a lot of pictures to go through…

On Day One, we started with a trip to the Brevard Zoo, a gift from Mimi and Tatie Kat. The “birthday” girl was accompanied by her baby sister as well as Mimi, Tatie Kat, Uncle Mike, Tia, Jason, and me.

She loved seeing all the animals, and THOUGHT she would like feeding the birds and giraffes, but when it came time to do so, she was less enthused. The birds were all right, until one bit her. The giraffes are so big, I think they just intimidated her. No matter, she still had a great time! Some of her favorite animals were the monkeys, particularly the tamarins. This statue here was donated by a family in memory of their daughter who died when she was two. B was fascinated by the statue, and quite sad that the little girl died so young.

She had a great time at the cheetah exhibit. The cheetahs weren’t all that interesting (hard to see and sleeping), but the exhibit also had a cheetah challenge! After Tia helped her down the first time, B was definitely up for the
challenge!

I don’t have as many pictures of the zoo trip as I do of other trips – Jason was doing most of the zoo photography. We will do a post with his fabulous pictures later. The Zoo was a great way to start our trip. And we finished the day at Downtown Disney so we could activate our tickets…would you believe that with all that Disney stuff all over the place, B still was oblivious as to where she was?? We did a VARY GOOD job not telling her anything about Disney…perhaps too good…

Day two we headed to the Magic Kingdom, including breakfast at Cinderella’s Royal Table with the Princesses! the whole day was something of a joint gift from Mimi, Tatie Kat, Jason, and me. In the morning, our group consisted of B, Poppa, Tia, Jason, & me. After M had her nap, she, Mimi, Tatie Kat, and Nana joined us. Before we left the house, we told her we were going to have breakfast with Cinderella. She looked a little confused…”the REAL Cinderella”? She was very happy, but you could tell she didn’t quite understand. We got to the park before it opened so we could watch the opening show. She saw all the characters (including several princesses and Mickey), but she still didn’t quite get it. We even told her we were at Disney. The “aha!” moment was when she rounded the curve inside the park and saw Cinderella’s castle.

THEN she understood. She was pretty excited. As you can see, she wore her “twirly” dress and princess boots to show Cinderella. As soon as she met Cinderella, however, she wanted to put on her Belle dress…which she wore the rest of the day, despite the heat!

So many princesses!!

B’s current favorite (most of the time…it really does change a lot)

After breakfast, we met up with Poppa & Tia to ride some rides and meet some more characters, including some of my favorite from the Hundred Acre Wood.

We rode lots of rides, including Winnie the Pooh, the Carousel, racecars, Little Mermaid, and the Teacups (YAY for roundy-rounds!) before stopping for lunch. While we were eating, Mimi, Tatie Kat, and Nana arrived with M, fresh from her nap and tricked out in her new Disney clothes!

We immediately headed off to do more rides – Pirates of the Caribbean (probably B’s least fav), the Magic Carpets, It’s a Small World (one of her favs, and def M’s fav), the Belle attraction, and Dumbo to name a few. We grabbed one last quick ride on It’s a Small World before heading back towards the front to watch the fireworks. The girls were pretty tired, but they were troopers! We opened the park and we closed the park. At the end of the day, we had one very tired, but VERY happy princess.

Day Three involved a trip to Animal Kingdom from Tia. Everyone tagged along for this day, even M. B had a great time looking at all of the animals (including a safari ride), watching the Nemo show, riding the triceratops ride, and pestering us with questions about the roller coaster we rode that she did not (was it scary? was it fun? did you like it? why was there a monster? why was it dark? were you scared? was the monster white? why?….I think her favorite part, however, was getting her face painted and the activities in Camp Minnie-Mickey. First, the face painting. She was one distraught little girl because the children’s section of the park contains a roller-coaster she really, REALLY wanted to ride. Unfortunately, she was too short (the height requirement was 4’…in the children’s section…sigh). After shedding her tears, Mimi offered to get her face painted. Bingo! You can’t cry when your face is painted…it will get all messed up! She did such a great job sitting still as she was made into “Sleeping Beauty” and it turned out great!

Win-win (even though we all agreed that it was a ridiculous height requirement (looked like a very tame roller coaster)! In case you are wondering what is around her neck – that is her princess pin lanyard. Each day she got a new pin to add to her lanyard (except for Day One) representative of some favorite thing from that day.

At Camp Minnie-Mickey she got to meet all the characters, even the elusive Pocahontas, with little to no wait AND guitar Dan came out and sang her a song he made up just for her! She danced with Tia while he sang her that song, and then she danced some more as he went around and made up more songs for more visitors. She LOVED it! And we even got some great group pictures.

And thus ended day three! Seems like a good place to stop for now. I will post more about the rest of our trip another time.