DisneyWorld!

The "fun" started on Wednesday - three days before we were going to leave. We were running errands trying to get ready to go, and Scott's truck said "Engine coolant hot." We didn't really worry about it, Scott figured the last time he got the oil changed, they forgot to refill the anti-freeze. He was planning to get the oil changed Friday before we left on our 450 mile drive to Orlando, so he took the truck in Thursday instead.

Luckily when we bought the truck we got the extended warranty, because the problem was the water pump, which needed to be replaced, and when the water pump cracked, it blew the head gasket. I am still not exactly sure what that means, I just know it's bad, and expensive! So when we found out the truck wouldn't be ready until the following Thursday (at the earliest) Scott managed to get the dealer to give us a rental car to drive to Florida so we wouldn't have to put the miles on my car. We ended up with a Jeep Patriot which we thought would be fine, except it had a little 4 cylinder engine and 10 gallon (barely) gas tank so I swear we had to stop 3 times for gas each way on the trip! Ella had fun in the "new car" though!

We finally made it to Orlando Saturday night and the drive there wasn't bad. I think we made it there in right around 8 hours. We went to Downtown Disney that night because Ella was at the point where she no longer believed that we were going to DisneyWorld, or going to see Mickey and Minnie or the Princesses! We got her some Minnie Mouse ears first thing -she picked out some adorable pink ones, and we got her name embroidered on them.

Scott and Ella at Animal Kingdom - check out the Mouse Ears...

We spent 6 days visiting 4 different parks. We had breakfast with Minnie, Goofy and Donald Duck, and lunch with the princesses ~ Belle, Sleeping Beauty, Snow White, Ariel and Cinderella.

Breakfast with Minnie!

Ella with Goofy
Lunch with Ariel!
Ella got 20 different Character Autographs, and as best I can figure, we went on over 60 different rides/attractions, and many of those we went on multiple times. Ella said her favorite ride is Dumbo. When she wore her Crocs, she just barely skimmed 40 inches, so she was able to go on a lot of the "good" rides, too - Soarin', Thunder Mountain, Splash Mountain, and Test Track.

I took well over 200 photos so I tried to narrow it down and put just a few highlights on here so I don't overwhelm anyone with 100+ photos of Ella with Disney characters, because I think I really do have that many! :)

A giraffe on the safari ride at Animal Kingdom - they were SO CLOSE!

Ella and I spinning fast on the teacups
Ella and I in the car after getting soaked in a thunderstorm!
Ella and Nemo

Scott and Ella at Sci Fi Dine In
Ella's Minnie Mouse tattoo!
It was SO HOT and SO HUMID while we were down there - at least 95 every day, but we had a great time anyway! Ella had a blast, so it was definitely worth the trip!