Disney World

We had an amazing opportunity this fall to join with all of Sam's family at Walt Disney World.  The accommodations were given to GG (Grandma Grettle) by a friend, our flight was taken care of with frequent flyer miles, (thanks to Sam's travels and scoring some huge bonus points on our Delta Gold American Express accounts) and tickets to the parks were provided by GG and Grandpa.  What an amazing trip it was.

First of all, staying at the Animal Kingdom Lodge was amazing.  We stayed in a Villa (there were 2 villas for the entire family, and we had just the right amount of space.)  They were HUGE.  3 master suites - each with it's own full bath + an extra full bath.  It was 2 stories, with a large living area down stairs, including a kitchen with a large table and bar area.  Upstairs also had a good sized living space, with a pull out couch.  Our kids slept here, so Sam and I were able to have a room to ourselves.  Levi slept (well, he didn't really do too much of that, but more on that later...) in a pack'n'play in the bathroom (Yes, the bathroom was that big) which was really nice that he had his own space.

Here's Olivia hangin' in the Villa.  

 It was also so nice to stay on site - there were shuttle buses to take us to all the parks and Downtown Disney  as well as a airport shuttle to take us to and from the airport.

Our flight out was great - no delays.  We had a really tight layover - 50 minutes I believe, and we ended up having to de-ice in Pasco, so I was pretty worried that we would get stranded in Salt Lake for extra time, but by some miracle our connecting gate was adjacent to where we came in, and we had no problems making the flight.

Levi on the airplane.  He didn't sleep much, but he didn't cry too much either.

 At the airport we got right on the "Magical Express" which took us to our resort. When we arrived we could see giraffes, zebras and big horned ankole cattle out on the savannah outside our room.

Having been up since 4 AM that morning, we were all pretty exhausted, but decided to try and check out Downtown Disney.

That night the kids did a good job of going to sleep, but Levi could not settle down.  He's usually an excellent sleeper, so we were not prepared for this.  We would rock him to sleep, put him down, and then just when we'd drift off to sleep, he'd wake up screaming again.  This went on until 4 AM.  We were planning on getting to the Magic Kingdom the next day when it opened at 9 AM, but needless to say  that didn't quite happen.  We had a quick family picture in the morning with everyone that was there that day - we were only missing John, JaNae and Charlie as they had to leave Sunday.  But here's most of us:

I'm going to do a post on each park we visited, but for now, I'll leave you with this.  This is a book I put together to thank Grandpa and GG for the wonderful trip.  We really did have a spectacular time, and made wonderful memories.

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