Today? Magic Kingdom.
We arrived early, the kids fueled by donuts and the adults by sticky buns (which omigosh if you’re ever at Disney just dive into one of those and don’t come up for air). We got to see the opening ceremony and charged into the park. This was a good plan, as we hopped onto three or four rides with no waiting. Shep, who up until this point has been on stimulus overload, was actually enjoying himself and asking to do more.
After a while we split up, R&D taking Neko to the bigger kid rides, while Shep and I settled in for another round of Winnie the Pooh and the teacups.
I have to say, however, my favorite ride is Small World. It’s ticky-tacky nostalgia, but the kids, even the babies, ride through with slack-jaw awe and never know where to focus their eyes next. Plus I can’t get enough of the weird retro illustration style.
Later on we bought pretzels bigger than the kids’ heads and Neko ate THE WHOLE THING. Clearly the donut wasn’t enough, so we had to top it off with more nutritionally void carbohydrates. Shep ate all the salt off of his pretzel, and every now and then would kindly offer me a piece or two (of the salt, that is), saying “It’s really good!”
We actually managed to get the kids in bed by 9:30pm, only to have them awoken by the fireworks. Neko came screaming through the room, rounding us all up. So we all sat and watched the fireworks, which up until now had really scared Shep. “I’m not afraid of them now!” he declared. I can’t think of a better way to end the day.