Magic Kingdom & Disney Studios

Our first morning at Walt Disney World began bright and early. This year I was motivated to get to the parks nice and early each morning since that first hour of the day is when you can get the most done. However, I was quickly reminded that it is a pain to get to the Magic Kingdom when you're not staying at a monorail resort. If you're driving you have to park your car, take a tram and then got on the boat or the monorail. Not such a big deal unless you have two strollers that you're trying to manage as well. We ended up walking from the parking lot to the Transportation and Ticket Center. For all of you who may wonder - this is a bad idea - take the tram. Anyway, when we finally got to the park we let Ethan pick what he wanted to ride first and he chose Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin. This turned out to be an excellent choice because as we entered the ride we won Dream Fastpasses for the day. The funny thing about that is that Ethan chose the same ride in Disneyland two years ago and we won Dream Fastpasses then too. It wasn't crowded at all, but we did use a few of the fastpasses.

Everyone but Tanner loved the Buzz Lightyear ride. He proved once again not to be very adventurous on this trip. However, as we exited the ride Stitch was waiting outside and Tanner was thrilled about that. He loved the characters and was always excited whenever he saw them.


After greeting Stitch we headed over to the Tomorrowland Speedway. The boys love this ride, and it always has a long line, so we were happy to hit it early. I rode with Tanner and Ethan rode with Brian.

Next Ethan got his first chance to ride Space Mountain since this year he met the 44" height requirement. He was super excited. My mom and I rode with him first while Brian took Tanner for another spin on the Tomorrowland Speedway and my dad stayed with the baby. Ethan loved, loved, loved Space Mountain. During the ride he was either giggling or screaming the entire time. I couldn't help but laugh as I listened to him. He was instantly hooked. After our ride he got my dad to ride and then he went to find Brian to get him to ride as well. Tanner and Brian had found a talking garbage can which Brian liked, but Tanner did not.

While Ethan rode Space Mountain for the third time, Tanner found his favorite treat. . . the ice cream carts. He ended up developing quite an eye for the ice cream on this trip. The only trouble was that he couldn't eat the ice cream before it started to melt.

We finally pulled Ethan away from Space Mountain and headed for Fantasyland. We stopped at the Tea Cups and Tanner wanted a ride and Grandma was happy to take him. Ethan didn't want to ride this one, and this turned out to be a pattern during the trip. Whatever Tanner wanted to ride, Ethan didn't. Whatever Ethan wanted to ride Tanner wasn't interested in.

We rode Winnie The Pooh and Peter Pan and saw the 3-D film "Mickey's Philharmagic." Ethan pretended to be uninterested in this show because he wanted to do something more adventurous, but after the movie started he put on his glasses and reached for the 3-D objects during the show. Before we knew it is was time to stop for lunch at the Columbia Harbour House. This is a basic fish, chicken and chips type of place, but our meal total still came to $50.53! Yikes!

After lunch my mom took Tanner and Bradon to meet Donald Duck and ride the Jungle Cruise while Ethan, my dad, Brian and I headed for Splash Mountain and Big Thunder Mountain Railroad. We weren't going to use our Fastpasses at Splash Mountain, but there was about a 10 minute wait so we decided to use them. At Big Thunder we decided to use our Fastpass, but there wasn't a wait at all. When we got off the ride Ethan wanted to ride again but suddenly there was a line and our Fastpasses were gone. Oh well.

We met my mom and the boys back in Adventureland and Tanner and Brian rode the Magic Carpets. We decided we needed to head back to the resort for a little break before dinner.

On the way out of the park we stopped to get a Dole Whip Float for a snack (these are yummy and refreshing), and we spotted Timon so we had to stop for pictures.

After a quick swim at the resort we headed out again for our 4:00 p.m. dinner reservation at the Hollywood Brown Derby at the Hollywood Studios. We had booked the Fantasmic Package which gives you seating in the far right section of the amphitheater, the advantage being that you don't have to get to Fantasmic as early to get a seat.

We had always wanted to try the Brown Derby, but it's an expensive restaurant and even on the dining plan it costs 2 table service credits. However, you do get an appetizer with your dinner as well, so it's a pretty good deal. All of us really enjoyed our meals here and wished we'd saved more room for the really yummy desserts. I even took some pictures!

Grapefruit Cake

Pistachio Cheesecake and the boys got Worms in Dirt For some reason I didn't get a picture of my dad's super chocolate dessert. It looked yummy, but it was too rich for him. My mom and I loved the grapefruit cake. Dinner here came to about $145 with tip. I would go back to this restaurant since it was really good. One funny thing that we quickly noticed on the trip was that whenever the food was served the boys had to go to the bathroom. I know that I personally made three trips to the bathroom at this restaurant with Ethan and Tanner and I think Brian made a trip as well. They always had excellent timing!

After dinner we took the Backlot Tour (which Tanner hated because of the scary flood and fire), and then Ethan rode Star Tours before it was time to head to Fantasmic! I took the boys to the bathroom twice before the show started here. I was beginning to think that I would become well acquainted with all of the bathrooms in Walt Disney World. I was a little disappointed to see that they've changed Fantasmic a bit. There's a heavy emphasis on Pocahontas now, and since that's never been a favorite of mine I found the change to be a negative one. Tanner had his ears covered through most of the performance and the wind was blowing so we would occasionally get water blown on us. I tried to keep poor Bradon covered as best I could, but he did get hit with water a couple of times. Amazingly the noise didn't seem to bother him too much. He's such a good baby. I thought Tanner would dislike the show, but he actually really liked it.

Back at the resort later that night we got a couple of cute pictures of Tanner and Bradon together.

Total number of steps logged today: 17,250