We kicked off the day with Kye thanking us for totally splitting up the kids from their attempted sleepover the night prior. He was cracking me up about how thankful he was that I made them separate!
Our plans for the day were to head to Disney Springs. While our main goal for the trip was the beach, our second main set of plans was to visit The Void in order to redeem Kye’s birthday gift! The plan for the day was to chill at the condo until Spear woke up mid-nap (like 10ish) then head to Disney Springs, give Spear his 11:00 bottle there and be back to the condo in time for naps at 1:00.
We keep things short and sweet here lately with a baby on a schedule! I’m really trying to balance being my hardcore Babywise self while also having Spear be more flexible. For us, we’re comfortable having ONE nap a day on the go and so far it seems to work well for Spear too.
We had some chill time at the condo and it was SO nice just letting the kids play. The location of our condo was super close to the pool area and there was such nice grass and open space for them to run!
My wardrobe goal this trip was to have the kids wear stuff that they are almost grown out of! Majority of their outfits were things they wore to the parks last year. Def time to sell the stuff Tess wore and pack up Britt’s for when Tess is bigger!
We ended up putting Spear down for nap early so he woke earlier and it allowed us to get to Disney Springs earlier too. In fact we were there before they even opened! We headed straight to the Lego Store!
It’s totally FREE to play with all the Legos and even build cars to race. Kye LOVES this activity and even the girls were really into it this visit!
Once Ghirarfelli opened we grabbed our free samples of chocolate 🙂
Then headed over to let the kids each pick out a pin.
Our tradition has been for the kids to buy a pin every Disney visit BUT now that we’re pass holders we’re not being hardcore on that rule. If we’re going more often we don’t need to be buying a pin for each kid every visit. I do love the tradition though and love helping them choose pins that will be special memories from that specific trip!
Tessie fell in love with the Peter Pan ride this visit so this was the perfect pin for her!
Kye doesn’t tend to go with my advice of choosing a pin specific to that visit and instead is going for a Star Wars collection of pins!
We hunted for a Sword in the Stone one but they don’t make one! Instead Britt went with Merida!
Minnie and Mickey need a little touch up paint, huh?
Spear was more interested in his thumb than in checking out all the fun Disney theming 😉
My Disney girl!
For Kye’s birthday we made two reservations for him at The Void at Disney Springs. They have a Star Wars virtual reality experience that we’ve heard is AWESOME so we knew it’d make an excellent gift for Kye. We also both wanted to get to experience it ourselves so that meant he got to do it twice 😉
I also really wanted to get to experience it with him FIRST. I was bummed I didn’t get to see the kids excitement the first time they rode Flight of Passage and I didn’t want to miss out on Kye’s excitement over this experience. And let me tell you: HE WAS PUMPED.
I really didn’t have much of a clue as to what to expect regarding this experience. Like what does virtual reality even really mean, right?!?!
First of all they have a recommendation for this experience as suitable for ages 10 and up. They are NOT hardcore on this rule. BUT I understand the reason for it. The gear is BIG and HEAVY. Kye’s pretty strong and was really, really eager to get it off by the time our experience ended. Even though Britt is tall enough (I think it’s a 48 inch requirement) NO WAY could she handle lugging that equipment around and NO WAY do I want to hear her complain about it the whole time either! HA!
I do think the experience was lacking in explanation. Kye and I are both hardcore rule followers and do best with clear instructions. This didn’t have a whole lot of that and I wished they’d taken more time explaining things to us and helping us understand the gear and what we were about to experience.
They have lockers to put all of your items in (which you want to take advantage of. Then you get geared up in a helmet as well as a vest and gun. You go through a system to select your customized look for your attire and then you head into the experience.
I am prone to motion sickness but did fine with this! It’s nice knowing you can lift your visor at ANY time to see what’s really going on around you. I did this a couple times just to see what it looked like behind the scenes. It’s truly awesome to see just a warehouse area and people behind computer screens but then put back down my visor and be surrounded by Star Wars world and scenes.
It’s a full emersion experience. You ARE a character in the story. You ARE doing things, taking part, fulfilling a role as that character. It’s incredible and amazing and AWESOME.
Of course we wished it was a bit longer and had a few more elements to it but it was worth the $15 per person ticket price in my opinion! The whole thing is under an hour from walking in the door till ending the experience (assuming you have a reservation and arrive a bit early like we did).
It’s PERFECT for ANY Star Wars fan from child to adult! Zach and I enjoyed it just as much as Kye did and he LOVED it.
In-between mine and Kye’s scheduled time and Zach and Kye’s time we went to Goofy’s Candy Company for our snack fix 😉 We have a tradition of allowing the kids to each get a treat to enjoy! This time Kye and Britt had coupons from Easter to cover theirs 😉
First time at one of our favorite Disney Springs spots!
I love seeing the treats the kids choose! Britt LOVES chocolate and cookies!
Guy’s turn! They had a BLAST!
While the guys were playing we decided to walk around and check out everything. Britt wanted to go see the alligator at Rainforest Cafe and I totally forget that he acts alive 😉 It was a nice surprise!
Random stranger asking if I wanted a pic 😉 I always say yes, even if the moment isn’t right ha!
We also have the tradition of buying a Christmas ornament on each Disney trip. Obviously much like the pins, we aren’t going to buy an ornament every single time we visit. But this trip WAS SO special so I wanted to make sure we had one to remember it by! Again, no luck at sword in the stone…but we did find Merida 🙂
Britt also fell in lovvvve with a large Marie stuffed animal. She’s been taking full advantage of having an annual pass and using her pass holder discount 😉
I’m def ready for Tess to be old enough to have chores and earn her own money! For now I feel bad about her not getting something just because she doesn’t have her own income! So she’s also taking full advantage of being pre-chore life 😉
(And yesssss the sucker with the white stuffed animal was stressing me outttttt)
I loved that he was WIDE AWAKE for his awake time and able to take it all in and soak it up!
Make money, spend money 🙂
Tess did REALLY well walking around rather than riding in the stroller! We had such a fun time waiting on the boys 🙂
Spear was so impressed with the tree at Rainforest Cafe
(and YES you can walk around inside the restaurant even if you aren’t dining there!)
Raisin’ them right and teaching them to love some jewelry 😉
Piggy back rides back to the car!
And we got back before nap time…so again Spear only missed HALF of one nap on this day! The entire trip he either had all of his naps or only skipped one!
We had a super fun family morning! Disney Springs is ALWAYS a super fun place to go and it has so much of the Disney vibe without being in the actual parks. A great option when budgeting! And if you go early, it’s literally not crowded AT ALL. Even on the Saturday of Spring Break 😉
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If you had to pick one time out of the whole year to go to DisneyWorld when would that be? Nice weather and lower crowds?
hmmm that's tricky! Weather is just all over the place. Sept (post labor day) is usually pretty low crowd but HOT. Feb (aside from President's Day weekend) is low crowds but typically cold. I'd prob choose Feb over Sept. Early Dec is also wonderful!