Magic Kingdom

Our favorite park was definitely the good, old classic Magic Kingdom. We spent 2 days having fun in Magic Kingdom. There were lots of rides that we repeated several times and the girls loved it. Our first day there, Monday, wasn't too busy so that was really nice. We utilized the Ridemax program to plan out our day and it worked out well for us.

Here are the girls riding the parking lot tram, anxious for their first Disney experience:

As we walked into Magic Kingdom we headed straight back to Fantasyland where was spotted Pinocchio before anyone else did. The girls were thrilled!

Dumbo ride! I believe this was our first ride and quickly became the favorite. We repeated this ride (along with other variations) several times...

We got a lot of rides in the first 2 hours we were there. The girls loved Winnie the Pooh and Peter Pan. They were not fans of Snow White (I think the Haunted Mansion was less scary to them). The carousel, of course, was a hit. We also went to a show called Philharmagic, which Rachel enjoyed and Audrey tolerated. We repeated it on Thursday though - we quickly became fans of shows during the hot afternoon hours. Audrey did have fun sporting the 3-D glasses before she knew what they were capable of:
Here's Rachel near the carousel working hard to pull out the sword:We headed over to Tomorrowland and tried out the speedway. Watch out, Rachel's got control of the race car!

A picture with Alice before we rode the teacups:

The girls' favorite ride in Tomorrowland was Buzz Lightyear. I kind of wished they had incorporated more of the characters from Toy Story, but I think Buzz is definitely one of the popular characters. As we left Tomorrowland, we grabbed a picture of the girls and I on a bridge with the castle in the background:

On our way over to Adventureland we were able to snag one of the few spots left in the shade and watch "Dream Along with Mickey". The girls enjoyed seeing the princesses.

We discovered Aladdin's Magic Carpet ride in Adventureland, which is pretty much the Dumbo ride...

We enjoyed a little ice cream break in the afternoon:
The girls and I on the Jungle Cruise:
Playing after the Jungle Cruise:

We enjoyed Pirates of the Caribbean as well. That afternoon we also watched the Country Bear Jamboree. Audrey really enjoyed this show. It was one of the few shows that she didn't ask when it was going to be over. I think she really liked the bears. We went back to Tomorrowland in the early evening. We did a few rides for the second time. We even did the somewhat dull Carousel of Progress. But hey, there was no wait and it was a cool place to sit for a good chunk of time. That evening we stayed around for the Electrial Parade. Of course we didn't get the memo about having to line up along the parade route at least an hour before the parade began. So the girls watched the parade on our shoulders and they looked awfully cute in their new Mickey Mouse ears:

We then headed back to our hotel. Audrey crashed on the way back to the hotel room. She was exhausted! Totally unresponsive, which is very uncommon for her. And of course Rachel had to pretend to be asleep as well:

Thursday we spent our second day in Magic Kingdom. I was grateful it was our second day, because it was much busier. And really the only ride we needed to go on was Splash Mountain - all the other rides were repeats. We definitely just headed back to the girls' favorites. First off was Fantasyland. Andy made a run to get fast pass tickets to Splash Mountain while the girls and I stayed in Fantasyland. We grabbed a picture with Mary Poppins:

This time we grabbed pictures of the girls on the carousel. We rode the carousel several times that day!

Our Ridemax-scheduled day got a little messed up due to Splash Mountain being closed for a few hours. But oh well, things still worked out. Rachel said Splash Mountain was fun, but she didn't have any desire to go on it again.

Our most unique adventure that day was deciding to duck into Monster's Inc. Laugh Floor. This didn't get great reviews, so we weren't planning on it. But after riding the Buzz ride again and it was the hot afternoon, we decided to enjoy sitting down in a cool place. Well, it didn't disappoint because they were scanning the crowd for a two-headed monster and Audrey was on my lap, so we were selected. We got to answer a few questions about where we were from and the girls thought it was pretty cool to see Audrey and I on the big screen. They also thought it was pretty funny that they thought the Eiffel Tower was in Houston, since they actually know what the Eiffel Tower is and where it is... :)

We did several Dumbo rides again on Thursday. Here's Dumbo, Andy, and the girls:

We hung around until about 7:00 because we had to wait for our fast pass for the Peter Pan ride, which the girls love! After that ride, we grabbed a picture in front of the castle and then headed back to the hotel. We decided to take a quick swim that evening, since we were all tired of being hot and just wanted to enjoy playing.

Andy on the Monorail ride, passed out (pretending to be asleep, of course):

We loved Magic Kingdom. The girls are still talking about rides, characters, parades, etc... Rachel keeps on saying, "When I go back when I'm 6..." Not sure we'll head back next year. Maybe when Audrey is 5 and Rachel's 8... I was a bit nervous about Audrey possibly being too young, but she really enjoyed it and did well. And if you go when they're under 3, they're free! We also enjoyed Epcot and Animal Kingdom. So, more pictures to come...