Pulling off a Big Surprise

We considered spending Christmas 2014 in Disney, and I ended up cancelling our reservations because I didn't feel like I had planned far enough in advance to make the experience what we wanted.  Shortly after Christmas, we decided we would plan a trip for Em's 5th birthday, but that we'd make it a surprise.  The last three months have been so fun for me to plan, but very tough to keep secret from Em!  We really didn't tell anyone we were going, mostly because we didn't want to risk anyone accidentally telling her.

Monday morning, we woke her up at the same time we normally would for school and told her she wasn't going to school the whole week, but we were taking a surprise birthday trip.  She was very excited and of course asked a lot of questions.  We wanted to keep the secret as long as possible, so she was in suspense all the way to the airport and on the flight.  When we landed in Orlando and started seeing Mickey everywhere, I opened my bag and asked her to look in the side pocket, where she found her Magic Band.  I don't think she could even believe it at first--and she was almost as excited about her blue glitter band (blue is her favorite color, and I painted clear glitter nail polish on it for lots of sparkle)!

We took Disney's Magical Express transportation from the airport--they picked up our checked luggage for us so we didn't have to wait at baggage claim, and we headed straight to the Wilderness Lodge.  This is Em showing off her Magic Band.

She changed clothes when we got there into a festive birthday outfit, and we picked up this Happy Birthday button at the front desk that they customized for her.  It led to everyone we saw all week telling her happy birthday, which was pretty cool.

We got to the hotel a little after noon, and took the bus to Hollywood Studios for the afternoon.  It had rained all morning and was a little overcast, but not hot at all.

There just doesn't seem to be a lot for us at this park--we knew we weren't going to repeat everything we did last year, so it made it a logical choice for a short afternoon.

Em was pretty excited to see the real golden coach from the Cinderella movie!

And the green army men from Toy Story!

She couldn't resist the face painting.

And of course a few Mickey-shaped treats!

We did see Disney Junior Live, which we hadn't seen last year.  It was okay, but all of the seating was on the floor and the stage was up so high it was tough to see the puppet-type characters on the stage.  Em loved the end where she got to dance and pop bubbles that blew from everywhere.

We went to the Frozen singalong show, which was mostly singing to the movie clips, but Anna, Elsa and Kristoff did come out at the end for a last rendition of "Let it Go" while it snowed on the audience--again, this was Em's favorite part.

I took this picture as we were leaving the park, because Em found this deer again--it was the first thing she saw and loved last year, and I just think it's cute to look at the comparison and see how much she's changed in a year.

This is the same picture last year--and no, I didn't ask her to kiss the deer either time!

We left the park before dinner and went back to the hotel--our bags had arrived by then, along with the groceries I had ordered for our room and a birthday surprise of balloons and a stuffed Goofy for Em!  Mick and Em went down to the pool while I unpacked and organized our room a little.

Em played in the kids' area of the pool for a couple of hours and loved it--her favorite thing was the kid-sized water slide.

It was a fun, full day and we were all exhausted, so we had a fairly early bedtime to get ready for a big day on Tuesday!