Hi.
See this handsome guy?
Yeah. Ralph.
(I don't know. Everyone that meets him calls him handsome.)
He's not gonna be in the next, like, 7 posts.
Sadly (for him), they don't let dogs into Walt Disney World parks and resorts.
In protest, he tried to eat a Mac N' Cheese yellow cheese powder packet.
The only thing that got him was:
A) Put outside. I swear I didn't yell because he was too ridiculous looking.
B) Yellow cheese powder on his nose that his tongue was not long enough to lick off.
C) This picture.
Ralph spent his vacation at The Ranch.
At The Ranch they have big, open fields for him to run in with his doggie pals and, his favorite, a kiddie pool.
So, don't worry about 'ole Ralph.
He had a doggone good time while we were away.
On with the vacation!
This was our 20th anniversary/Do-Over Family Disney vacation.
7 months of intense Disney planning and it was time.
It literally takes all day to fly from the PNW to the East Coast. All day.
Our flight left at 8am, so we kinda had to get up early.
I was not asleep in this picture.
I was resting my eyes.
We arrived in Orlando at 4:30pm, gathered our luggage, popped on our Magic Bands and hopped on the Magical Express for the ride to our resort.
Of course, we had time for the standard try-to-scare-Mommy, "Um, do you have my wallet?" question. Ha. Ha.
Mikey was entertained with the silly Mickey Mouse cartoons they had playing.
But soon, the cartoons ended and the "Your Disney Vacation" spiel began.
Mikey didn't last long.
ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ
We arrived at the Polynesian Village Resort ready and raring for dinner.
We had a quick and mostly painless check-in.
We got our lei's and headed off to our longhouse....
Room #.....
This was the view outside our room.
It was this cool spikey tree that had what I can only explain as "truffula tree" fuzz on it.
The room was pretty big.
Two queen beds and a couch that turned into a bed.
TV, desk, two closets, a mini-fridge, a sitting chair in the corner.
The bathroom was pretty spacious too.
We didn't stay long in the room.
Just long enough for Huzbend to retrieve our groceries.
Then it was off to find dinner.
We ate at Capt. Cook's.
It was okay.
The layout of this place was totally confusing.
But we finally figured it out and placed our order.
It was nothin' special.
Just fast food type stuff - BBQ pulled pork sandwich, hotdog and fries, GF chicken nuggets and fries and a Hawaiian flatbread pizza for me.
After scarfing our food, it was time to hit the Lava Pool.
First up, was the kiddie water playground area adjacent to the pool.
My kids love pools.
Hence the super smile below.
The water is heated to about 82 degrees.
But, there was a stiff and downright chilly breeze blowing in off of Seven Seas Lagoon.
Here, Huzbend demonstrates walking quickly from one pool to another sans towel.
Next, we headed over to the main pool and the kids hit the water slide.
As dusk gathered, I spotted some familiar looking people entering the pool area.
Who could that be?
A little backstory: I knew they were gonna be there. The kids didn't.
I had been texting my Mom throughout the day and actually waved to her from the pool when I saw her on the balcony of her room across the way. Tee-hee.
Sooooo sneaky.
Anyways, the kids had no clue and even were in the pool with eachother for a tiny bit before Huzbend directed their attention to the side with a comment, "Hey! Don't we know those people?"
After realizing who it was, my kids swam over yelling and screaming. It took Joe and Soph a few minutes to process that their cousins were standing in front of them.
Then the happy squeals came.
Katie and Sophie swam together.
Huzbend, Joey and Mikey swam for a bit but decided to hop out of the pool to find out where the resort "Movie Under the Stars" movie was playing. It was supposed to be "The Force Awakens" that night.
In actuality they had TWO movies playing, "Little Mermaid" for the little kids and "The Force Awakens" for the bigger kids.
Kelly and I stayed in the pool to watch the girls who quickly made friends with other girls in the pool and ignored us.
We froze our butts off.
We were the last ones to leave the pool and went searching for the boys.
They were over near the beach still watching the movie.
While we were there, Wishes, the nightly Magic Kingdom fireworks show, began.
Sigh.
At the Poly, watching a Star Wars movie with fireworks in the background.
Oh, Disney, I love you so.
Katie did not want to watch the movie again.
She doesn't like when the bad guys kill lots of people, so we left Huzbend, Mikey and Joey at the movie and returned to our rooms to get ready for bed.
This was a giant tiki head located outside our longhouse.
I'm pretty sure that we didn't get to sleep until close to midnight or later.
Katie's favorite part of the day: Meeting Joey and Sophie at the pool.
Mikey's favorite part of the day: Watching "The Force Awakens".
