Walt Disney World 2012

In November, Isabella, my mom, Amanda and I went on a Disney girls trip.  We started our trip at Walt Disney World for a couple of days, then went on a 4 day cruise on the Disney Dream.  It was such a special trip, because my sister is expecting and so who knows when we will get to do something like that again.

We stayed at the Polynesian Resort in a theme park view room.  It was my first time to stay here and I had always wanted to.  It did NOT disappoint!  We could walk out on our balcony and see the castle in the morning or the fireworks in the evening.

Here are some views from our room...

I am such a nerd, but I love towel animals in the rooms.  I get so excited when I come back and there are little towel creatures waiting for me!

The first day, we got in, Isabella and I rushed over to the Magic Kingdom just to get a couple of rides in before dinner.  We went just before the New Fantasyland expansion opened, so we didn't get to see that, but we did see the new Dumbo with the kids play area and we rode the Barnstormer, which I had never ridden before.  I wasn't sure how Isabella would like a roller coaster, even though it is pretty tame, but she was just giggling the whole time!!  She LOVED it.  If she had been tall enough to ride Big Thunder, I think she would have.  Next time!

The first night we went to dinner at 1900 Park Fare at the Grand Floridian hotel.  They do a dinner with the characters from Cinderella, whom Bella was obsessed with at the time!  She wore her Cinderella outfit from Halloween.  The dinner was a buffet and the food was really good!  You just ate at your own pace and waited for the characters to come around.  The story behind the dinner is that you are at the prince and Cinderella's engagement party.  So before they start walking around they come out and dance first.
   

The first to come around was the prince.  This picture cracks me up!  Makes me a little worried for things in the future too...

Next up was Cinderella...

Next came the Stepmother.  Bella kept saying all night "I think the Stepmother is really nice, just not to Cinderella".  I think she was just trying to psych herself up to not be scared.  I think she was still a little intimidated...

The Stepsisters were hilarious.  Bells had her little dolls with her and they threw a fit over dolls that looked like them.

The next morning we went to Epcot.  I was so hoping Isabella would get to ride Soarin', but she is just a little too short, so I figured we would just see how lenient the cast member working the ride was.  I think luck was with us because she was being super strict, but somehow mistook Bella for a girl she had already measured and waved us through.  We were like 'walk fast'!!  So she totally got to ride it!  It is so fun to experience things for the first time with her.  She is a lot like me in that she gets SO excited about things, and I love it.

We had a quick breakfast at Sunshine Seasons, which is my favorite counter service meal in the whole of WDW.

Bella has been in to this pose where she puts her hands under her chin, so we have lots of pictures like this.

Mom and Isabella in front of the ball at Epcot!

We went back over to the Magic Kinddom later, because Amanda was meeting us there that day.  One of Isabella's favorite rides was the Magic Carpets of Aladdin.  There is a camel that spits on you and I got soaked because I didn't know it was coming.  She thought that was about the funniest thing ever and kept trying to steer us to the camel's level every time.

Towards the end of the day, she was pooped!

That night she got to see the Main Street Electric Parade while eating a Casey's Corner hot dog.  A great way to end the night!  Next up was the cruise...

Jude's Six Month Shoot

In October we did Jude's 6 month photo shoot with Sara Seeton.  We have just loved her.  Even when I think the kids didn't smile once or were totally not cooperating, she gets the perfect picture.

It was the first really cold weekend we had in 2012, and I think it was like 40 degrees outside so we were freezing.  This is a picture she took just to warm up and check the lighting, but it turned out so cute of Bella all bundled up with her Little Dog.

Even though it is Jude's photo shoot, we use the chance to all get pictures!  So here are a few of all of us.

This one is funny to me.  Jude is like 'give me back my hat!'

Sibling love...

My little pumpkin...

Ok, this one is seriously my favorite.  He was doing ok until we put him in the wagon, then he was just DONE...

With mom and dad...

I can't believe that was 6 months and we are about to do our 1 year session!  Where did the year go?  I swear he was JUST born.

Adventures by Disney

During our stay we got to experience two different Adventures by Disney tours.  These are land tours just like tour companies have all over the world, only they are run by Disney.  The first one was their Behind the Magic tour, where we got to go in Walt's Apartment above Main Street, the other was a tour from our hotel to Hollywood to see Grauman's Chinese theater, the Kodak Theater (now called Dolby) and other sites around LA.  These are our tour guides Michael and....yeah I can't remember the other guy's name, but they were so fun and why ABD is a great choice if you ever want to tour another country, or somewhere in the US!

The Harry Potter clans hand prints in front of Grauman's.

We also went to the Walt Disney Studios, and got to go to the archives.  I saw this Mousercise record that I totally had as a kid.  I could still sing the song 'Come on everybody and Mousercise, let the music move you 'til you're carried away....'

Also at the Walt Disney Studios they had Disney legend hand prints.  I am a HUGE Elton John fan so I took a pic...

The dwarves hold up the roof...

All over Disney Parks you see hidden mickeys.  Here we found a hidden Gus Gus!

They have actually since discontinued the tour of LA, but they still do the Behind the Magic.  If you are ever at Disneyland and want a little extra magic, I would recommend it highly!

Disneyland Hotel Rooms

For an entire day we toured something like 12 hotels.  We were exhausted by the end, but learned so much good stuff!  Again, my pictures were rushed and taken with an iPhone, so I promise the rooms aren't actually blurry. =)

First was the Paradise Pier hotel, which is one of the three hotels on Disneyland property.  This is the 'cheapest' option if you want to stay on property, but will still cost you a pretty penny.  The rooms are cute, beach themed rooms.  Here is a picture of the double room.

This is a view from one of the rooms with the theme park view. 

This is one of the pool side rooms that has a patio.  Only a few rooms at this hotel have a patio or balcony of any kind and these are them. 

Those rooms look out at this pool.

Next up was the Disneyland hotel.  This was the first hotel at Disneyland, and has recently been completely redone.  This is the double room and if you can't tell, the big headboard over the beads lights up with a fireworks show.

Look carefully at whose hand is holding the light fixture.

This is a king room with the same headboard, but this one isn't on.

The Disneyland hotel has the monorail pool, with two slides.  You can only use this pool if you are staying at this hotel and it is a huge draw for a lot of people.

The other great thing about the Disneyland hotel is Trader Sams.  This is a really cool tiki bar.  They have a few drinks that if you order them, things happen in the bar.  Like one makes some stuff on the shelves dance, and another makes the bar feel like you are going through a monsoon with thunder and lightning.  Seriously a must see if you go.

Since we were on the west coast, we decided to make a quick day trip out to Hawaii and check out the rooms at Aulani on Oahu.

Ok, not really.  They have fake rooms set up here for people thinking about buying in to Disney's Vacation Club, which is basically their time share.  So we got to see what the rooms at Aulani look like and now I am even more dying to go!

The duvet with hidden mickeys...

The breakfast nook...

The kitchen...

Now obviously not every room at Aulani has the big suites, but this at least gives an idea what the rooms and decor look like.

The other resort on Disneyland property is the Grand Californian.  That is the hotel we were staying in so we didn't tour it and I didn't take any pictures!  Sorry.  If you have ever stayed at Wilderness Lodge at Disney World, the theming is very similar.

I won't bore you with pictures of every 2, 3 and 4 star hotel we saw, but I do like a few of them so I will just show a couple. This is the Fairfield Inn across from Disneyland.  They are the only ones we saw who had some Disney themed rooms.

Cars Theme...

Club 33

During our tour of Disneyland, we got to do some pretty cool behind the scenes stuff that normally no one would get to see.  One of them was have breakfast at Club 33.  This is a very elite club at Disneyland that you wait on a list for years to join and it costs a fortune once your number comes up.  This is where Walt used to eat and hob nob, so it was pretty exciting when we found out we were going up!

Here are a few pictures inside...

These are the toilets.  They were so funny we all took pictures...

A picture of Walt eating in Club 33...

The super fancy elevator...