Disney World 2012--Day Six (Downtown Disney/Magic Kingdom)

Since we covered so much ground at the Magic Kingdom on Monday, we decided to spend Friday morning checking out Downtown Disney.

We walked around and visited the various stores.

We went to look at the T-Rex restaurant.

 Such a cool interior!

 Ava had a blast digging for dinosaur fossils.

 This was a huge, animatronic T-Rex.

We grabbed some breakfast pastries over at Babycakes.

And we had to go to the Lego Store since Kevin was a Lego fanatic when he was a kid.  The selection of Legos nowadays is much larger than he had to choose from 25 years ago!  There were amazing Lego displays all around the store and in the water.  The detail was insane.

 Posing with Lego Woody

 and Lego Buzz

 Ava raced Lego cars with the other kids and picked out one of the new, girly Lego Friends kits to buy with her birthday money.

Our last stop at Downtown Disney was the world's largest Disney Store, the World of Disney.

Wow, one could spend hours in here!  Ava spend quite a while shopping around and spending the rest of her birthday money.  She ended up with a Mickey Mouse necklace, a ring, a Beauty and the Beast figurine set, and some really fancy Minnie Mouse ears.  Mom got some really nice books about Disney, Kevin got a hat, and I scored a super soft throw with Cinderella Castle on it.

The view over one of the sets of doors at the exit--such beautiful princesses!

We caught the bus and made our way over to the Magic Kingdom.  We grabbed a great lunch of fish and chicken at Columbia Harbour House and then had a few hours before Ava's appointment at Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique so we decided to go meet some more characters.  First up were Aladdin and Jasmine.

They were really sweet and Aladdin charmed Ava right away with his hugs and sense of humor.

Next, we went over to Tinkerbell's Magical Nook (isn't it pretty?!)

to meet Tink and her friend, Vidia.  Vidia was full of attitude and Ava didn't quite know what to make of her at first.

Tinkerbell saw Ava and ran over to pull her away from Vidia.

She saw Ava's birthday button and wished her a "Happy Arrival Day!"  When she asked Ava how old she was and Ava replied that she was five, we got the reaction from Tink that we had gotten the whole week.  Tink said, "Oh, wow--5!  You're a whole handful!"

 Pictures like this one just make me happy.

When we said good-bye to the fairies, we went outside and ran into Peter Pan.  He saw Ava's birthday button and said, "Noooo, you have to stop growing up!!"

We took a relaxing ride on the elevated PeopleMover and enjoyed our view of Tomorrowland.  Then it was time for Ava's appointment at BBB.  We walked over to Cinderella Castle and checked in at the Boutique so that Ava could get ready for her dinner with Cinderella and Prince Charming.

The fairy godmothers-in-training went to work getting a Royal Dressing Chamber ready for Ava to put on her gown.  Ava met her Fairy Godmother, Amber, and picked out the hairstyle and tiara that she wanted.

After hair, it was time for nails.  Ava chose a beautiful silvery blue.

Then she chose her make-up.

Ava prepared to be sprinkled with fairy dust

and Fairy Godmother Amber said those three magical words.  Bibbidi Bobbidi Boo!!!

And it was time for the big reveal!

Her headband to match her dress was the finishing touch.

Mom and I oohed and aahed.  Kevin waited outside so he could be surprised.

Her daddy thought she looked beautiful

and said he wanted to take her to ride Prince Charming's Royal Carousel.

Ava took a picture with the plans for the new Fantasyland.

Our last stop in the Magic Kingdom before dinner was the classic "It's a Small World" ride.

We hopped on the monorail and zipped over to the Grand Floridian to have dinner at 1900 Park Fare.  We really enjoyed the meals we had at the different resorts because we were able to look around and check them out.

The Royal Photographer took our family picture before we went in for dinner.  Kevin and I are just slightly underdressed compared to Ava. :)

As soon as we sat down, we were approached by Prince Charming.

Kevin told me after the fact that I had put my hand in front of the flash.  Oh, well.  

Then Cinderella came over to visit with us.

She had to leave to go waltz with Prince Charming.

Lady Tremaine started to walk our way and Ava wigged out.  She kept saying, "She's the evil stepmother!  I don't want to have anything to do with her!"  We convinced her that Lady Tremaine was not going to be mean to her so she relented.  Lady Tremaine lectured her about what she did for us to earn the right to wear such a beautiful dress and how she always needed to mind her parents.  :)

Anastasia and Drizella, the evil stepsisters, also paid us a visit and they were full of themselves!  They wanted me to keep taking pictures of them because they said they were so beautiful!  Then they would fight with each other.

Ava had had strangers stopping to tell her all evening that she looked beautiful so at this point she was a little full of herself too.  After dinner, she decided she wanted to do a photoshoot in the lobby of the Grand Floridian.  Of course, I obliged.  So she posed.  And she posed.  And she posed some more.

When we got back to our room at the resort, she decided we needed more pictures.  She directed me as to what she would like me to capture (close-ups, twirling, etc.)

After our photo session, we decided to go down to the arcade even though it was about 11:30.  We shut the arcade down a little after midnight.  

We went back to our room and got packed up since it was our last night at Disney World.  :(

Next up, Day 7 of our trip.

Disney World 2012--Day Five (Epcot)

***I feel like I have to preface these pictures by saying that Ava did not approve of the shoes that she had to wear with her new hot pink/zebra Minnie Mouse dress.  She was not happy at all that morning when she realized that the only ones I had packed for her were her tennis shoes.  She kept telling me that they looked horrible with her dress and just ruined her whole look.  I explained to her that I only packed her tennis shoes because I knew she would be doing a lot of walking but this did not appease her.  I know one day she will read this and this subject will come up again when she looks at the pictures.  I can just hear my little fashionista now, "MO-OM!  I cannot believe that you put those pictures of me on here for everyone to see when I was wearing those awful shoes with my very pretty dress!"  So Ava, I apologize again but I still think you looked adorable!***
Thursday morning, we arrived at Epcot early and had enough time to visit the Character Spot before our breakfast reservation.

Autographs, thumbs up, and hugs and kisses from Mickey Mouse himself!

Hugs and high fives from Minnie Mouse

More love from Pluto, Donald, and Goofy

The Epcot International Garden & Flower Festival started while we were there and it was beautiful.  We really enjoyed looking at all the displays.

We made our way over to Norway for the princess breakfast at Akershus.

We were greeted in the entry by Ava's favorite princess, Belle!!!

We were seated and had just enough time to visit the pastry buffet when they made the announcement that it was time for the Princess Processional!  Ava was in Cinderella's group

and she walked proudly around the banquet hall with the other little princesses.

After the processional, we enjoyed a delicious breakfast.  I had read Akershus was all about the princess experience and that the food was nothing to write home about, but our family has to disagree.  The food was yummy and we actually had them bring us a second platter to split amongst the four of us.  Soon after, the princesses started coming over to visit with Ava.  The first one to stop by was Sleeping Beauty herself, Princess Aurora!  She gave Ava her autograph,

posed for pictures,

and took time to have the sweetest talk with Ava.  Here she is telling her that she can be anything she wants to be and to always make wishes because they can come true.  Talk about an emotional scene for me to watch!  It was really sweet of Aurora to take the time to share those special words with Ava and she really spoke them with a lot of conviction.  

We were also visited by Cinderella 

Snow White

and Ariel.  Ariel did a great job of staying completely in character.

Ava also got another birthday cupcake (for breakfast!) and got to blow out her candle.  She also received a birthday card signed by all the princesses that she got to meet that morning!

After breakfast, we walked over to ride The Seas with Nemo and Friends and then we went to Turtle Talk with Crush.  Ava got to sit up front with all the other kids and interact with Crush.  It was really cute.  After the show ended, we went to check out the aquarium.  We had seen one side of the aquarium when we ate at Coral Reef on our first night in WDW so it was neat to see the rest.  We really loved watching the dolphins and they kept swimming right by the glass in front of us.  It was so cool to see one that closely.  Mom and I couldn't tear ourselves away from the dolphins and sea turtles but Kevin and Ava had walked off to explore.  I wish now that we had walked with them because the coolest thing happened to Ava when she and Kevin were on the other side of the aquarium.  They found a quiet spot to watch the sharks were no one else was and at that moment two scuba divers dove into the tank right in front of them.  They came over to the window to wave "hi" to Kevin and Ava and noticed Ava's birthday button.  They swam to the bottom of the tank and picked up handfuls of gravel and came back to the window and threw the gravel into the air like confetti.  They took their regulators and filled the water with bubbles and mouthed "happy birthday!" to Ava.  How cool is that!  I hate that I missed it and had to just hear Kevin and Ava describing it.  When we finally tore ourselves away from the aquarium, Ava discovered Bruce and had to take her picture with him.

After The Seas, we walked over to The Land so that Kevin, Ava, and mom could ride Soarin'.  They loved it and told me all about the ride.  We decided to tour the World Showcase and visit all the countries before going to ride Test Track.  We were strolling along and spotted Alice in Wonderland as we walked into England.  I leaned down to peek into the stroller to ask Ava if she would like to go meet Alice and realized that Ava was sound asleep.  So we ended up missing opportunities to meet Mary Poppins and Beast as well but Ava obviously needed her rest.  Mom, Kevin, and I just enjoyed strolling along and enjoying the sights in the different countries.  Ava woke up in time to ride Test Track and then we decided to go back to our room to relax and swim before going back to Epcot for dinner and Illuminations.  Later that evening, we hopped the bus back to Epcot and went back to The Land to eat dinner at Sunshine Seasons.  After we ate we scouted out a spot around the Lagoon for Illuminations.  We just sat right down on the concrete in front of the railing and made ourselves comfortable.  As we were waiting for the show to start, Ava and Kevin amused themselves by playing with these light saber things.  It was the first thing that Ava had asked us to buy her all week.  I can't believe we went 5 days without her asking for something!  

Illuminations was good but not my favorite show by a long shot.  It was not something that I will feel like I have to make a point to see each time we go to WDW.  Our day at Epcot ended up being our most relaxing day of the week so far and it was nice to kind of recharge.  We only had one more full day at the parks and it was nice to rest up for it!  Up next, spending our last day at WDW back where it all began--Magic Kingdom!!!!