Day 1- Saturday!

Today we woke the kids up to their surprise boxes at about 3:45 am (Matt and I were up at 3). Piper didn’t handle it well- she hates waking up early and was super cranky. She then proceeded to cry, called us liars (she actually thought we were playing a mean trick on her) and dragged getting ready. By 4am though she was doing better and was excited to go! Aidan was a champ this morning, he kept repeating “I can’t believe this is happening!”. Pretty cute :)

We got picked up at 4:30 and were at the airport at 5:15. Security was awful this morning- took us 45 minutes !! It was such a pain and more than one person ahead of us were missing flights. We grabbed coffee right out of security and trekked all the way down to gate A14. We boarded our flight at 6:30 and took off on time at 7.

We had a smooth flight, and landed at 930. Got our luggage and hopped in a taxi and got to the Tropicana hotel a little after 10. Normally we stay onsite but even with reservations far out, all 3 onsite hotels were totally booked up because of the ½ marathon the next day. Luckily we got a hotel right across the street though and were only there for one night. The room was TINY though- cruise ship tiny I swear. And it was just 2 doubles (not queens) so it was a tight fit for all of us.

We checked in, then walked across the street and went right onto Pirates then wandered a bit before lunch at Hungry Bear.

Both kids really tired and cranky so we grabbed fast passes for Big Thunder and went back for a nap. Both kids crashed at about 1 or so and slept till 3, then we went to the pool till about 4. We had dinner reservations at PCH grill (at Paradise Pier hotel) at 530 so we got dressed and headed back to the parks into Downtown Disney (from here on referenced at DTD). P wandered into build a bear and found a small Merida (from Brave) dress that will fit her AG dolls. It even came with a wig and a bow and arrow! Aidan didn’t see much of anything:)  We then went into world of Disney and P used a little of her money to buy a new Disney baby (she collects them) and got Dumbo (so sweet- her first love at DL!).

We had dinner and it was really good! Matt and I both had this great pasta that was balsamic and olive oil based with sun dried tomatoes, parmesan and grilled squashes. Yum! Kids stuck with kid food. Matt and I both also ordered our favorite drink we discovered at Aulani- the ginger lemonade (made with vodka). It isn’t the same as sitting on the beach in Hawaii but oh well. Vacation is vacation:)

After that we wandered back into DL (after getting some pressed pennies- both kids seem to like it but P is way into it. It def takes planning though- With hundreds of pennies to do in the parks and one collector book only holding 50, it gets expensive . I think we spent about $50 in change on the kids to get prepped. We put all the pennies in one pill bottle and quarters in the other. Works well and we have a lot of them. We just switch them out as we need to!

We rode pirates again (NEVER a wait) then wandered over to Big Thunder to ride it but it was closed  not sure what was going on but P was bummed. We coaxed her bad mood away with more pressed pennies in Frontierland.

We went back to the hotel at this point(a trek compared to staying onsite) and kids went in the hot tub for a bit. We all got ready for bed after that and lights out- we were all asleep by 9!!