A Magical Christmas!!

*Warning: Picture overload.*

This past weekend our family loaded up and headed to Disney for "Mickey's Very Merry Christmas Party". The Griswold Family vacation consisted of my family of 4, my in-laws, my brother-in-law and his girlfriend.

We all decided WAY back in April that we would make a long weekend out of our trip and a mini-vacation. We stayed Friday through Sunday at the French Quarter, and had a great time!
Friday night was the Merry Christmas party and it did NOT disappoint. It was our second time attending, but everyone else's first and they loved the parade and such as much as we did! Free cookies and hot chocolate helped too. (Let's just face it y'all. It wasn't really "free" since we paid an arm and a leg for each ticket to the event. But it's nice to think it was free.) ha-ha


Walking into the park and seeing this HUGE Christmas tree just made me all giddy! The picture is a little blurry, but you can still see how HUGE this tree is!

We were able to ride several rides with minimal waiting time since this is a special event and the park wasn't full. I love NO LINES!



This is one of my most favorite pictures from the entire weekend. Both my boys LOVE Thunder Mountain Railroad (a roller coaster) and this is Carter with his hands raised on the ride ! I LOVE IT!! Isn't it adorable??!?!?!!I don't know about ya'll, but parades make me feel like such a kid again! I LOVE A GOOD PARADE and DISNEY sure does know how to do a GOOD parade!

For this particular parade, people start lining up VERY early in the night for a good seat! We didn't get a spot too early, but we did get there and have to save a few spots! This here is how we do it in the South. (I hear banjos playing). Just kidding. Jenni was doing something else and I made her lay back down just for a photo op. Ahem, one would think this might/could/would end up on someone's blog one day. Just saying is all. hee-hee-hee

Our whole crew waiting on the parade! (yes, I will photoshop the string out, and no, I have no idea who those guys are to the left.)

Disney's parade floats and entries are always so pretty and festive!







And the characters all come out!





After the parade, look who we saw!!!

Our Friday night closed out with an awesome fireworks show! Disney is known for its fireworks and they were just beautiful!
wow! BEAUTIFUL!!!
Saturday brought Epcot, Hollywood Studios, then back to the Magic Kingdom. We had a blast at Epcot on our favorite rides: Soarin' and the GM Test Track.



And again here I am trying to get a good picture for my in-laws. WHY? I ask you WHY do I do this to myself????



I made dinner reservations at the Crystal Palace for dinner on Saturday night. It was SO GOOD. I fell in love with their garlic mashed potatoes and the German Chocolate Cake. Not necessarily in that order either! HA!

This was a character dining experience, so the boys got to see Tigger, Pooh, Piglet, and Eeyore!

I think Nolan was licking ice-cream off the side. God love him, I think he thought he was never going to get ice-cream this good again. ! ha!


After dinner, my wonderful in-laws took the boys for some special time with just the four of them. Cecil and I, and Edward and Jenni were able to ride some rides and catch up with some of our other family that was there at the same time!

Our cousin, Jennifer (who was there with her boyfriend Matthew) and Cecil!

Jennifer and her sweet boyfriend Matthew!!!

The Motley Crew. ha!

Sunday morning brought dark skies and rain clouds. We decided to hit Hollywood Studios so Nolan could ride the Toy Story ride! Look who we saw when we exited!

One of the boys favorite things to do at Hollywood Studios turned out the be the Stunt Show they do! It's awesome!!!

After the show, we headed back home to reality. boo.

What a wonderful weekend full of fun, family, friends, and of course, lots of love and laughter!

~CB~