By the time we arrived at the airport, the Advil had started working and I was feeling better. The kids both did awesome on the flight to Orlando. We had a stop in Chicago first, and Joseph was so excited that he screamed (happy screams, apparently) when the flight took off each time. Madeline did great eating then easily falling asleep for the flights. We landed in Orlando about 20 minutes before my parents, who were joining us for the whole week. We probably should have waited for them, but we were trying to get checked in to our hotel, the Art of Animation resort, and over to the race weekend Expo before it closed at 7pm. Joe had given Scott and Tricia our waivers for the 5k, half marathon, full marathon and Joseph's kid's race so we knew we'd at least get the packets, but wanted a bit of time to check out the vendors at the Expo.
Disney provided bus transportation, and although they were as efficient as possible, there was lots of traffic and nothing moved very quickly. We made it to the Expo about an hour before it closed, and had just enough time to realize that all of our shirts were really big, browse the additional race merchandise, and pick up a new running skirt for me, a car magnet for the van and a shirt for Joe before they started closing things down. By this time, we managed to meet up with my parents and took the bus back to the resort for a late dinner at the food court.
Joseph was pretty wound up, being at Disney, waking up early, skipping his nap and staying up late, so it took a while for him to fall asleep. Madeline, on the other hand, fell asleep in my arms, stayed asleep for a while, and was a breeze to put down for the night. She even slept through the night! We put her to bed around 9pm, and didn't hear from her again until about 6:30 the next morning! Success! (Too bad that was the only night it happened)
Friday morning, Joe had signed up to run Family 5k with Scott, Tricia and one of Scott's work friends. The race started at 6:30 at Epcot, and I figured I would sleep in with the kids. They arrived in plenty of time, and had fun warming up to the Disney races.
A few pictures I stole from Scotty's blog:
When Joe got back to the hotel, both kids were still sleeping, so I stayed in bed. No point in getting up early! I still wasn't feeling great, but didn't have a fever as of Friday morning.
We finally got up and going around 9am, had breakfast in the room and headed off for Hollywood Studios. I knew there wasn't going to be a ton for Joseph to do, but figured it was close to the hotel, and would be a good way to introduce him to the idea of going to the parks. They also have a Disney Junior stage show, and right now we start almost every morning watching Mickey Mouse Clubhouse. The show was about to be closed a few days later to be revamped, and I didn't want him to miss it.
He definitely got into the show, and loved all of the interactive parts - it rained bubbles at one point, and gold coins (a tribute to the Jake and the Neverland Pirates show) and finally confetti to celebrate Minnie's birthday.
After the Disney Junior show, we headed over to the Studio Backlot tour. I didn't know if Joseph was going to like all of the effects, but he loved it! We quickly learned that after every exciting ride he liked, he'd be asking to go again and again. It became a theme for the week!
After grabbing some lunch, we headed over to meet Sully, from Monster's Inc. Joe had just taken Joseph to see the Monster's Inc. movie in 3D right before we headed to Disney World, so Joseph was excited about seeing Sully.
Madeline was just happy to be out of her stroller and able to check things out. :)
Papa and Mimi did lots of carrying Joseph, not because he didn't want to walk, but because he decided he'd rather be as close as possible to one of his grandparents at all time.
Papa "bonding" with Madeline. She was blowing lots of raspberries, so Papa started blowing them back at her.
She just sat there giggling at him, which then encouraged Joseph to do it too. Although he performs for her constantly anyway.
Finally it was our turn to meet Sully. Joseph became really apprehensive about the whole thing. It took all of us going up to Sully and saying hello before Joseph was ok to even be close to him.
The first family group shot of the week! Thanks to Scotty for taking pictures with our camera, so we wouldn't have to buy the expensive Disney shots!
As we were about to leave, Joseph decided he was ok with giving Sully a hug. Good thing Scott got this shot, because as the days wore on, Joseph became more and more scared of all of the characters, instead of things going the other way around. Before we left home, Joseph had said he was going to give everyone hugs. But by the time he started meeting characters, the best we could get out of him, besides this time, was a high five. Oh well!
After 2 hours spent waiting with the other sick vacationers, the nurse practitioner spent 10 minutes determining that I had the flu, and since I'd been spiking a fever for a couple days, was still contagious and shouldn't run the half marathon. I headed back to the hotel, met Joe, Scotty and Tricia at the food court for dinner, and debated on what to do. In the end, I decided that if I didn't have a fever when the alarm went off (at 3am!), I'd go to the race and just do my best. I knew my chances of getting a PR, which wouldn't have been difficult at all based on my training, was pretty much shot, but I just wanted to finish the race and get that silly Donald Duck medal!
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