From the beginning of our Disney trip to the day we came home, there were continual new adventures for the girls.  Of course, Ava isn’t going to remember any of it, but Kate will.

It was their first plane ride, and neither Kate nor Ava was scared.  They both wanted a seat by the window so they could look out.  Kate even picked out her house!  Watching their looks of awe as they watched the clouds and watched us getting farther and farther away from earth was  my adventure.

The little family right in front of us when we were in line to board the plane had a little girl the same age as Ava: two.  She was petite, and Ava is tall for her age, so Ava thought she was a baby and absolutely loved her.  So when it was time to board the plane, Ava thought she would just walk on in with them because she and the other little girl (can’t remember her name, of course) were having a great time together.  There were a hundred questions as we were boarding.  I had hoped they would get to see the cockpit since it was a 6:00 a.m. flight, but the plane was packed!  I couldn’t believe it!  Did everybody have the same idea that I did?  An early flight would mean less people?

They are all buckled in and ready to fly!

Sometimes we took the bus to the parks and sometimes we took a boat.  A couple of times we had to take a taxi to our destination (Curque du Soleil and 1900 Park Fare) because we were running short of time.  Thank goodness we only had to take the taxi twice because even though everything was close, it took awhile to get there:  stop lights, traffic.  So a short trip to Downtown Disney was about $20.  And perhaps that’s not expensive.  Since I never take cabs anywhere because I live in this little rural area, that could be a very conservative amount for a taxi trip.  But ten bucks sounded like a good price to me!

Our home away from home was the Wilderness Lodge.  It had a great pool that Kate loved and a baby pool that Ava loved.  There was a slide that Kate went down (after purchasing Nemo floaties) at least 200 times during the week.  She looked so big walking up the ramp to that pool and coming down all by herself.   And, of course, she made little friends all week at the pool.  She’s very social.  Ava made some, too, at the baby pool.  She loves those little people!

Ava had some favorite things to do while we were gone as did Kate.  She loved to ask when we were going home (she loves to be home) and she loved taking big bubble baths.  So we tried to indulge her as much as possible.

Every day the maid would leave some kind of little wash cloth animal ( dog, lion, penguin) and one day left Kate’s sunglasses on Marie, the cat.  The girls loved their little surprises as well as anything else on the trip.

“There was a little girl who had a little curl right in the middle of her forehead…”  If you know the poem, Ava fits it perfectly:  “When she was good, she was very, very good.  But when she was bad, she was horrid.”  And oh my, when that girl got tired, watch out.  She cries and holds her breath; she’s beyond reason.  On one such day when she was throwing one of those I’m-so-tired-I’m-nuts fits, the maid was just coming in and was a witness to the scene.  From that day on, she started leaving the pet surprises.

Poor little Ava got really sick on Saturday afternoon, throwing up all over the place, and was sick all night.  She would get chilled, so I put my long-sleeved tee on her that looked like a nightgown.  Since we left early Sunday morning, getting to the airport a good hour ahead of our flight, the girls had time to find a few more “characters” for yet another photo op.

It’s a take!  The movie is shot and the war is won.  We are home.  Ava is happy.