Magic Kingdom with a One and Three Year Old

We honestly had the best day at the Magic Kingdom today. We did lots of things but never felt rushed. We had some minimal three year old moments, but no terrible meltdowns - that in and of itself is a win. 

We started the morning with a "Welcome Call" from Goofy. We called the operator and asked to be connected with Goofy and before we knew it he was on the phone. This was a great way to start our morning. 

Since we had a car we decided to drive and park at the Contemporary. All you need is your magic band and a Picture ID.  At the Contemporary you can get on the monorail, but we decided it would be quicker to walk. It took about 10 min with the little guy walking on his own... its seriously such a quick walk, but our little guy is so so slow. haha.

We arrived and got through security in plenty of time to see the opening show (it starts at 8:40). The kids were amazed. All the characters arrive by train and that was basically the best thing ever for both my kiddos. It was also the perfect time for Jeff to meet with the Customer Service people to resolve a small issue we had with an extra ticket. He was done before the show was over. 

This is what pure amazement looks like. 

As soon as the show was over they opened the park and we headed directly to meet Mickey at Town Hall. We were probably the fourth or fifth person in line. We have been talking about meeting Mickey for quite a while, but I still wasn't sure how my three year old would handle it. (He is terrified of the Chik-Fil-A Cow.) Both my kids loved Mickey! He signed our books and then asked H to touch his own nose and then Mickey's nose. H was even game for a family picture! We never felt rushed and it was the perfect start to our Magic Kingdom day.

As we were leaving Mickey we spotted Marry Poppins heading out onto main street. H was embarrassed (this is going to be a trip theme)) and tried to hide. I got a lovely picture with her (she is my favorite). She encouraged us to just roll the stroller into the picture - so we did. haha. H tried to pull his shade down but we successfully got a picture anyway! 

We had fast passes for Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin, so we headed that way next. We hardly waited with our fast passes and hopped right on. The five of us took up two cars. Grandma and H in one and Jeff, O and I shared another. H mostly like spinning their car around, although he did end up scoring some points. I let little O aim my ray gun while I held down the trigger and we ended up being the high scorer for our little group.

The awkward scheduling part was that we now needed to get back up Main Street for Oliver's first Haircut. Jeff flagged down the double decker bus and they were happy to give us a lift. The whole way down the street they announced they were taking our little O to his first haircut. H got to wave to everyone like he was in a parade.  They even dropped us off right at the door of the Harmony Barber Shop - what a treat!

O's first haircut was so special! The whole barbershop is just so fun. They covered O in stickers, and gave a few to H for good measure as well. O spent most of the time looking at his stickers and trying to pull them off of his shoes. Meanwhile they clipped his hair so fast. He was all smiles and giggles. 

The haircut ended with his own set of Mickey Ears! It just doesn't get much cuter then that. 

Meanwhile, H was busy contemplating his pin trading. He traded with several park employees and even one random little boy. He got a little help from dad but mostly did it himself. There didn't seem to be much rhyme or reason to his trades, but he sure has fun. We decided early on that these would be H's pins (he earned them by being helpful around the house) so we would try to let him make decisions on what he wanted to trade.

Our next fast pass was for Winnie the Pooh. We hopped right on. Our party of five fit in one honeypot. H was a bit scarred when the thunderstorm came and asked twice if it was "just pretend" but exited the ride full of smiles. 

Ready to take on something else we hoped onto the Carousel since there was no wait. All of us were able to ride. Jeff shared a horse with little O. 

I used my touring lines app to check the wait times. Dumbo had a really short line, so short they were not using the play and pager system. We loaded up into our flying elephant in under 10 min. Despite the picture, H had a great ride. O was also all smiles. Our party of five took up two elephants. 

Another check of the lines app and we discovered we had time for Its a Small World before we headed to our lunch reservation. This was a great relaxing ride to calm everyone down before lunch. We even tried to snap a picture of the "Holland" dolls... not a great picture, but we saw them dancing in their wooden shoes.

The Be Our Guest lunch reservations could not have gone more smoothly. We had a 12:00 lunch reservation and had pre-ordered online. We showed up, scanned our magic bands, paid for our food and chose a table. We had just enough time to walk H through all three of the dining rooms before our food "magically" appeared at our table. 

Everyone liked their food and we never felt rushed. We ordered 30 days out, so we honestly couldn't remember what we had ordered. I had the tuna salad. It was delicious and the only meal I snapped a picture of at lunch. My mom has the vegetable quiche, Jeff had the ham & cheese sandwich and H had the pork with applesauce and mashed sweet potatoes (which we fed to O.) As always O was free and was given a plate to share our meals. I also got a "grey stuff" cupcake for the table to share. It was delicious and should not be missed! 

After lunch it was time to use our third fast pass for the Little Mermaid Ride. Once again we hardly had to wait and were loaded right onto our clamshell. Again, our party took up two clam shells. H loved all the music and singing. 

When we got off the ride H said he wanted to play at the Dumbo play area and meet Ariel. We went to the Dumbo play area, since we were already in new fantasy land, and let H play. We grabbed a pager since we were already there waiting. When the pager went off, H was not ready to leave. A cast member added time to the pager and H continued to play. The next time it went off he was ready to go ride Dumbo again. This time there was no wait at all between when our pager went off and when we loaded on to our elephant. 

 There is a Dumbo between the two rides so that you can get a nice family photo.

The line for Ariel was so long, so we decided to try our luck adding another fast pass. The place to do this is in tomorrow land and it turned out we could get a fast past faster then waiting in the line. We had some time to kill while we waited for our fast pass time slot we thought we would ride a few things in Tomorrowland.

The Peoplemover was on the top of our list but the line almost looped all the way around the plaza so we hopped onto the Carousel of Progress. Surprisingly it held H's attention. I'm not sure he learned anything as he said "they had Christmas and a dog" when we were exiting. It served its purpose though because when we came out we walked right onto the Peoplemover.  Sigh. I love the Peolemover. I could literally ride it over and over.

They actually had all the lights on in Space Mountain when we went through there so it was neat to see the roller coaster in the light.

Getting Off the Peoplemover. 

H wanted to go check out the "Monster's Inc" ride, which turned out to be the Laugh Factory. About half way through the line he lost complete interest, but we were able to coax him into the theater. O was sound asleep in the Ergo at this point. The show was super cute, although very much over H's head. The adults got some good laughs though. It does seem like if you want to be part of the show you need to sit on the interior aisle.

Finally, time to meet Ariel. The only thing H was able to talk about since before lunch. We used our fast pass and walked right in and what does H do... totally clam up. (I wish this was my pun, but it was Ariel's.) He literally hid behind his hat and would not make eye contact with her.  I finally coaxed him into taking a photo but he just could not look at her. Of course what does he talk about all night... how much he loved talking with Ariel!

We decided to ride the train all the way around the Magic Kingdom while we discussed the plan for the rest of the day. When we boarded at the Circus stop the train was packed. We actually all had to sit separately.  (Of note, we were asked to fold our stroller and put it in our row... so that was inconvenient.) Anyway, by the Main Street stop the train had cleared out and we had the opportunity to all sit together. H wanted none of that. He wanted to ride with Grandma up front.

We did a full loop and an extra stop to get back to Main Street. We got off an exited the park just before 4pm. We came back to the hotel for some pool time. The boys were having such a blast at the pool... ok, ok, I went down the water slide a few times too... that we decided to just eat dinner by the pool.

I took O back for bed after dinner and H got to stay for the campfire and marshmallow roast. My amazing husband even returned with a S'More for me. We brought S'More supplies with us. Disney supplies the marshmallows.