Mrs. Charlotte had such a great time when we went to Disney last September that she’s been non-stop talking about it ever since. Every year we go on a big family trip together, typically over Labor Day weekend. This year several of us thought we’d be on an Aflac trip over Labor Day (long story short…some rules to qualify changed during the contest period so now none of us are going haha) so we decided to take the Parker family vacation during a weekend over the summer instead of Labor Day. Mr Rusty actually brought up the idea of taking all of us to DISNEY WORLD. What?!?!?! Trust me, I was shocked to hear him suggest that!!!
We got to planning and I used my account on the Touring Plans site (feel free to contact me if you want to use it!) to figure out what would be the least crowded weekend over the summer to go to Disney. We based our trip around that. We all went down to Orlando Friday evening (June 22nd) and stayed at a great place for a large family…Mystic Dunes (thanks to Robyn for the tip!). Saturday morning we had booked our Chef Mickey reservation for 7 am. It was the only time available for a LARGE party (13 of us!) and really it couldn’t have worked out better. Every year the guys go on a golf outing so they just planned their tee time for after our Chef Mickey breakfast! Kye remembered eating “with Mickey” from last time he went and he couldn’t wait to show his cousins the ropes 🙂
I promise Kye isn’t super short…he just happens to have MEGA tall cousins!
I found their coordinating shirts from Target 🙂
Our crew FILLED the elevator
When we originally discussed going to Disney as a family Zach and I decided not to bring Brittlynn along. It doesn’t make sense, in our opinion, to take a little baby to Disney. We knew it’d be SUPER hot and that’s just not safe for her. Also she’s on a schedule. If we were to skip all three of her naps for a day it’d be a nightmare. It wouldn’t even be fun for her! She’s toooo young to enjoy Disney so it’d just be a hassle for the rest of us and we’d rather her stay happily behind than risk taking away from everyone’s fun to have her with us. Mr. Rusty did NOT like that we weren’t going to bring her on a family vacation. We ended up coming up with the idea for Mema, Mrs. Charlotte’s mom, to come with us and she could keep Brittlynn while we went to the park. Sounded good to me! I was PUMPED that she would get to meet Mickey Mouse and the gang and that she’d be able to enjoy the trip with the family and that we wouldn’t have to worry about her at the actual theme park. It was the perfect solution!
Cuddling with Daddy
Cousin love!
They look a lot alike right here to me!
Attempt at a picture of all the cousins…
and an attempt at a brother sister shot
Super excited for Brittlynn’s first Disney experience!
The morning couldn’t have started off better. All the kids were excited and happy and even Brittlynn was perfectly content even though she was still waiting to eat her morning bottle! We got a group shot when going into the restaurant and it was AWESOME. Both of these turned out perfect. Which does NOT happen when you’re trying to get a picture of a large group of people…especially with small kids. We need to frame one of these for sure!
He’s been looking forward to those Mickey Mouse waffles!
Finally getting to eat
I know I’ve mentioned before that Zach and I think Chef Mickey’s is a great deal. Yes, it’s SUPER expensive ($30 per person for adults…) but you get to take your time and visit with the characters. No waiting in line to meet them! Plus the food is AWESOME. All you can eat breakfast buffet, can’t beat that 🙂
I did not appreciate our server bringing over juice boxes then, in front of the kids, ask “can they have these?” I mean could I really say no?!?!
We couldn’t have asked for better seats. We were right across from the food and right where all the characters came to first. It was PERFECT. Colt and Payton had never met any characters before so they were excited, but Kye was equally as pumped. He has met them before but he couldn’t wait to meet them all again!!!
I love how you can’t even see Kye!
Payton wasn’t too sure about all of it
I wanted to make sure that we made it a big deal for Brittlynn too 🙂
We had a LOT of people to take pics with each character, so glad they were patient with us 😉
Newlyweds!
We traded off feeding Brittlynn so the other one of us could eat between character meetings
Payton was hardcore about showing every character her Minnie Mouse shirt 🙂
Mickey time
The Fleming Family
Attempts at a pic of our family…the pictures of Kye from this trip crack me up. I guess he’s at the age where he makes funny faces when taking pictures?!?! And Brittlynn loved the characters so much she wanted to just keep touching them!
Really Kye?
The best we were gonna get…def not going in a frame 😉
Did you know that the characters will not hold babies?!?! I tried to get them to hold her and they all said no…must be a liability rule or something. It would be awful for Mickey to drop your baby huh?
Jolee and Trey were also first timers to Disney!
G-Mama and Big Papa
Casey and Jordan
Saying bye to Mickey
Donald’s turn!
Love this one of the three big kids 🙂
One of my favorite moments of the morning was seeing Britt with Donald…it was precious
SO cute!
This is one of those pictures where I totally laugh out loud…what in the WORLD are these faces?!?! I have no clue what was going on here haha
We played a lot of pass-the-baby
June 25th is Mr. Rusty’s birthday. I mean could the guy be a better sport about things?!?! He thought of the idea for all of us to go to Disney World then he paid for all of our lodging and Magic Kingdom tickets and he was cool with it all taking place over his birthday weekend. He’s the man! Casey’s birthday usually falls on Labor Day weekend which is when we normally take the Parker family trip. So every year it’s all about Casey and her bday…I think Mr. Rusty enjoyed this year it being all about him 😉 Everyone sang a big “Happy Birthday!” to him!
Spinning those napkins up high!
Our waitress, getting into the birthday song
Even Mickey joined in for Mr Rusty!
He loved it 🙂
Having to literally pry the juice box from his mouth for a picture with me
Minnie!
The boys
She was quite the flirt with them
Kye is ALL about giving up some kisses…
Brittlynn meeting Minnie Mouse
I adore this 🙂
She wanted to chew on Minnie’s nose
Watch out Mickey…Trey might be stealin’ your girl!
Hanging out waiting on Pluto!
Colt, Brad, Jolee, Courtney
Payton, Casey, and Jordan
Trey, Brittlynn, Mr Rusty, Mrs Charlotte, Zach
And one with me in it too 🙂
Breaking it down Pluto style!
I think this trip Pluto was the favorite. He was SO great how he got down low with the kids. I loved that!
Kye is hilarious
He was ALL about a Brittlynn pic, I love that she could get down with him!
All the grand babies!!!
Try #2…Kye is still in dance mode 😉
Brittlynn loves the boys holding her 🙂
Kye is ALL about Aunt Courtney!
When we decided to bring Brittlynn along for the trip we didn’t have much time…it was only a couple weeks prior to us going! I rushed on Etsy right away to get Brittlynn an outfit to wear for meeting the characters. I’m ALL about dressing for a theme (have you noticed?!?!). I found this shop and cannot get over how perfect her onesie turned out. It wasn’t too expensive ($15) and no joke it arrived in my mail only 2 days after I ordered it. Um AWESOME!!! I had bought the skirt from Zulily awhile back and was glad to finally get some use out of it. I thought her whole outfit turned out pretty cute and she still kinda matched her brother and cousins 🙂
I wasn’t sure how Brittlynn would do at the breakfast. Typically she isn’t a big fan of crowds…Zach’s fam can be LOUD and they are ALL about the babies so it can be overwhelming for her. She often cries when we’re all together, bless her heart. On top of just our crew being loud…Chef Mickey’s is LOUD. It’s a ton of kids hyped up about meeting their favorite characters…of course it’s loud! I was shocked that she didn’t cry ONCE the entire morning. I’m not even exaggerating when I say this…other than the car ride there and back home…Brittlynn only semi-fussed ONE TIME the ENTIRE trip. I think it was some Disney Magic because she was so sweet and so precious and so adorable and I was so glad we brought her 🙂 Everyone else was glad too as they all got to spend quality time with her and Mema LOVED getting to watch her when we went to Magic Kingdom! It couldn’t have gone better and I’m so thankful Mr Rusty pushed for her to come, the trip wouldn’t have been the same without our sweet baby girl!
When our waitress found out that the guys all work for Aflac she chased down Donald so they could get a picture with the original duck 😉
Timing was flawless. We took our time and finished up around 8:45. Britt naps at 9 so we didn’t even miss much of her nap! The kids all had a BLAST and the trip couldn’t have started off any better 🙂
From there the guys left to go golfing and us ladies took the kids back to the condo…more to come from our wonderful Disney weekend!
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So I teared up reading this post. OMG I have issues. Of course I loved it. The outfits were amazing and it looks like everyone had a great time 🙂
I love all of the pictures of the kiddos with the characters!! You could totally tell how excited they were! So awesome!!!
LOVE this post and all the pics!! Made me feel like I was on vacay, too – haha.
1. The kids' outfits are too cute!2. We stayed at Mystic Dunes when we went to Orlando for a few Braves Spring Training games…really nice!3. Casey should be a model, I mean seriously!4. How generous is Rusty?! Hope he had a great birthday!