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Tuesday, August 3, 2010

Day 3-Chef Mickey's & Downtown Disney

Wednesday was such a fun day!  We got to have breakfast with Mickey, Goofy, Donald, Minnie and Pluto!  This was the meal we were looking forward to the most.  It is the most popular character meal, and almost impossible to get a reservation.  I checked every day online from the minute we booked our flight and nothing was available.  About 2 days before we left, I thought I'd try it just one more time, and by some miracle...a slot had opened up!  It was at a perfect time for us and we were thrilled!
We had done 2 days of the Disney parks, and today was my mom's last day, so we decided to take our time and go to Chef Mickey's, then head to Downtown Disney.
Chef Mickey's is located at one of the resorts next to Magic Kingdom and the monorail goes right through the middle of the hotel!  You can see it while you are eating breakfast and it is so neat!
I didn't get a picture of it so I pulled this from online...but you can see Chef Mickey's down below-such a neat place!
When you get there, they take your picture and then bring it to your table later to see if you want to buy it!  It comes with recipes, and some coloring pages and a photo of all the characters, too.  Of course, nothing is free!  But we had to get suckered into buying it!  Ha!
This is just the neatest place!  This is all cereal and fruit, then they have another huge buffet with everything you can imagine...
Including Mickey shaped waffles!  And everything is absolutely delicious!  Again, it is hard to concentrate on eating because the characters are en route to your table!
And again, Andrew just had the time of his life!  It was so funny, Goofy was the first character to come to our table and Andrew hugged him for the longest time!  Goofy was looking at his watch!   Ha!  Here is a short video of Andrew meeting Goofy and Donald...


Just like our dinner at Crystal Palace, they have everything timed to perfection.  Once all the characters get through your table, they start a celebration and everyone swings their napkins around and all the kids parade around the restaurant.  It is so fun!
*Thanks to my friend Lisa Ceballos for designing these pages using Creative Memories Disney software
 I just love the look on Andrew's face here.  Pure excitement and joy!
Lots of people have asked me how the characters sign autographs in those costumes!  Here's a picture of Pluto signing!  Ha!  You have to have a really fat pen for them, it works best!  I got the cutest pens at Michaels for $1 before we left.
At the gift shop Andrew wanted to buy a Peter Pan playset with his money that Papa gave him before he left.
Lugging around his big purchase!  Ha!  He wouldn't put it down and he wanted to play with each figure one at a time.
We hopped on the monorail and rode around the resorts for a while.  Andrew loved the monorail!  We stopped off at the Grand Floridian resort to check out how the other half lives!  Ha!
We'd never be able to afford to stay here, but we had fun visiting!  It is a beautiful hotel.
They even have a white sand beach!
Ga Ga and Andrew relaxed in a hammock!
We finally made our way to Downtown Disney.  They have lots of shopping and other fun things to see and do!
This is the largest Disney store in the world!  And it is huge!  I had to tell my mom and Craig to keep their phones turned up to make sure we could find each other because we were for sure going to get lost in there!
Pictures don't really do it justice either, but it was a beautiful store.  Things hanging from the ceiling and all around you!
Peter Pan and Wendy were in one section of the store, flying around!  (See Andrew looking up at them?)
We visited Legoland, where they have a giant dragon out front made of legos and it is actually in the water!
Woody made out of legos!
Andrew had fun riding the little train!
This was my favorite part of Downtown Disney!  The store was called Once Upon a Toy and when you walk in you see this giant display of Mr. Potato Head stuff.
You could pick out a huge potato and fill it to the brim with pieces, or you could choose a box and fill it with pieces (this was the cheaper option).  Andrew already has the giant potato storage container and several potatoes, so they let me just stuff a box with pieces and not get the potato (so I had more space to fill with pieces!)  I was having so much fun!  I picked out all kinds of pieces and they were all Disney themed- they had Dumbo ears, Donald Duck's beak and hat, Peter Pan's hat, a Mickey balloon, Mickey ears, Buzz feet and tons more!  I just went crazy!
This is where all the boats dock coming from the resorts.  You could take a boat to and from our resort, but it closed down this day due to the weather.  I guess if there is a storm within a 20 mile radius they close down!  It actually happens a lot in Florida!
This place was really cool.  We didn't know what it was at first, but it was a big restaurant like the Rainforest Cafe, only it was all dinosaur themed (they have a Rainforest Cafe, too!) 
There was a huge T-Rex right when you walked in!
Andrew was so excited about this giant Mammoth!  He is obsessed with all the Ice Age movies, and he loves the Mammoth the most.
We had a great day!  We were sad to see Ga Ga leave, but the Disney part of our vacation was coming to an end.  My best childhood friend lives in Florida with her husband and son, so we were excited to get to stay with them for a few more days.  She came and picked us up at Downtown Disney and took us to her house, where more fun adventures began!  They have a pool and Andrew just had a blast.  Plenty more adventures to come... check back soon!