Christmas at Disney

Well, the Miller Monkeys got a crazy notion to pack up and head to sunny Florida during Christmas break. You likely figured this out already if you read our blog and saw the beach post. (all 2 of you who read this blog) We figured it was as good a time as any to go. I had about 10 or 11 days off (thank you, God) and Yadira was able to get off for the week between Christmas and New years. We ended up driving down on Christmas night, left about 10 pm and arrived in Orlando the next day about 3. It was so funny, as we got further and further south it was really not warming up much. In fact, the next morning driving through South Carolina and Georgia it was downright icky, cool and rainy. I thought, "great, we left Ohio for this?" It was remarkable, though, right around Jacksonville the sun came out and the temp shot up into the 80's. We opened the sun roof and blared salsa and merengue music. I guess that's why they call it the sunshine state.

We were blessed with nice weather the whole time. As I stated before Yadira's brother Jesus and wife Laura went with us. The Miller's stayed at the Country Inn and Suites and they stayed with Laura's aunt who lives in Orlando. Saturday 12/27 we went to Magic Kingdom, knowing that the 25th and 26th the park reached it's max capacity. Well, the 27th wasn't far off either. It was so packed you could hardly take more than a step without bumping into someone. With how crowded it was we surprisingly were able to do a lot of rides, many of the ones we missed when we were there in 2007. We got in Magic Kingdom (so named because your money "magically" disappears from your wallet faster than Bill Clinton chasing a big mac [or an intern]) about 11 am and stayed until about 1 am. Amazingly, the kids stayed awake until then. We had a 9 pm snack of elephant ears that kept them charged up.

Even Mickey and Minnie were dressed up in Christmas garb to greet us at the entrance!

Jesus and Laura at the entrance. Note the poinsettias making up Mickey's head.

Some mean looking pirates (actually from the Caribbean, believe it or not).

One thing that I made mamma monkey promise before we went in was that we would not wait in line for hours to take pictures with characters. Guess I told her who's boss. Yeah. Note how far Nicole is placed from said chracters. She was clawing my shoulder trying to get farther away. That's not a smile on my face, that's pain.

Cinderella planted a surprise kiss on Patrick's cheek. Boy, was he surprised...

and nauseated.

Nicole tentatively approaching Belle. She did actually take pictures with live characters, just not anything in a costume.

Whoa! I'm feeling diiiiizzzzyyy! Elephant ears ready to make a repeat appearance on my lap.

Laura enjoyed taking pictures with the characters as much as the kids did.

Nicole with a pint sized pixie.

Cinderella's castle was decked out in Christmas lights.

Part of the deal to get Nicole to pose with at least some of the characters was a bribe to ride Dumbo. We kept walking by the Dumbo ride all day and the line was huge. She kept saying she wanted to ride it before we left. So the deal was, if she posed she could ride. If no pose, "No ride for you!" We finally rode it about 11 or 12 at night, one of the last things we did before leaving. Note the coating of dew on Dumbo's ears. By that time it was really cooling off (and we were in shorts, of course).



One of the only good shots of us with the castle in the background. And even this one is tilted, but I didn't feel like photoshopping it. We took about 20 shots with the castle from different angles. Just one of those odd things, someone always looking off or things out of focus.

We did get our money's worth, and squeezed every possible minute out of 'ol Mickey. Our day was even more exciting than I let on. You can ask mamma monkey for the details of her day, but I can clue you in with a few key words (migraine, nausea, vomiting, near fainting and First Aid involvement, allergic reaction, asthma attack, very swollen lip). I did not think to take a picture of her with the puffy lip. Probably God was sparing me from some great butt whuppin.