Disneyworld May 2013

We were recently extremely lucky to be taken on a trip to Disneyworld, Florida. Our first foray overseas with both children. We met up with Nana Linda, Dad Rick and Aunty Kim.

The trauma of travelling aside (kids were excellent - we even had someone on the plane comment how good they were), we had a great holiday.  Disneyworld blows your mind. It's so hard to describe the scale of  the place. I think Isla fell in love at first sight. she was enthralled with our resort, Art of Amimation, right from when we stepped off the bus at about 1am, after more than 20 hours of travel.

Lachy at the Cars part of our resort

Isla and Rafiki

It took the kids several days to adjust to the time difference with Lachy waking at 3am and wanting to play AKA scream the house down. After that we enjoyed days of parks, rides, swimming, shopping in Disney stores, eating chips and hamburgers...

Isla loved meeting the characters, I was surprised by how much. I often have to remind myself she is still only three, she seems so much older in so many ways. She loved all of them from Donald to Pooh Bear and the princesses. Lachy was both in thrall of everything, yet so young he just took it in his stride. You could tell he was thinking "okay, another giant creature" and really just taking it all in.

Splash Mountain was Isla's favorite ride, she loved the fireworks each night at Magic Kingdom and appreciated the little details like underwater music in the little mermaid pool at our resort. We always thought it but the trip confirmed that she's a bit of a daredevil. Her swimming confidence is coming along in leaps and bounds and she is probably way too confident, not wanting to wear floaties but still jumping in and swimming and diving on her own. 

It was so much fun to see Islas favorite characters and princesses come to life in her eyes. I think she was the perfect age to visit, too much older and she'd be telling us that they weren't real. At the moment she is still young enough to believe in fairy tales and princesses - it's so cute to see, but realistically won't last much longer. I would love to take them back one day, there really is something magical about the place, however it will be when Lachy is 9 or so. They'll love it for completely different reasons then.

Thanks to mum and dad and Kim, Francis and I got to have a bit of time out - we did a bit of shopping (not Francis's idea of good time out but even he had to concede it was worth it for the prices).  Never enough shopping to satisfy me though! It's a measure of how tired I was that I couldn't even be bothered looking at the duty free shops in the airports. We also spent a day seeing the Everglades and Nasa which was far more impressive and interesting than i expected. It was no surprise Francis loved it.

Anyway, it was a lovely break for me not having to clean, cook and go through the daily routine - nice to swim and enjoy some sun. Not as much relaxation as per-kid holidays, but so much fun to see things through their eyes and experience it with them. It's also always nice to appreciate some of the comforts of home - you miss it when you are away, appreciate it for 5 minutes when you are back and then wish you were on holiday again. Lovely memories.