Disney World, iPhonetography, and Why I Love Vacation

Last week, Jamie and I met up with my parents in Disney World for a little family vacay. In case you’re thinking that it’s kind of strange for four adults to voluntarily take a trip to Disney together, the main reason we were going was to take Aaron, a little boy who has been so special to our family. My parents began watching him while his mom Ulana worked when he was just 6 months old, and now he’s 7 years old, which is so hard to believe. In those years, Aaron has become kind of an adopted grandchild for my parents. He spends the night at their house all the time, calls them “Lanie” and “Poppy” (which will be their grandparent names when we have kids someday), and just is generally a light in all of our lives. They’ve been itching for him to experience Disney World for a little while now, so when they told us they were going to take him, I immediately said that Jamie and I were coming along for the ride. (Yes, I’m 26, and I really wanted to go to Disney World. Not ashamed.)

You guys, I love vacations. Seriously. When I was growing up, it’s the one thing my dad insisted on going all out on. My parents always lived well within their means and free of debt, which meant that we didn’t live super extravagantly, but vacation was the one week out of the year where money was no object, we ordered Cokes when we ate out, and we had so much fun. When my brother and I were young, we typically went to Destin, Florida every year, but when I got to middle school, we started taking more adventurous trips to see places like New York City, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Hawaii, Charleston, Boston, and San Francisco. Many of my very best memories were created on those trips, because it was a time when we were together as a family all day, exploring new places, eating yummy food, and laughing ’til our stomachs hurt. (And okay, yes, there were also the times when my brother and I would act bratty and cause arguments, but overall, there were mostly good memories. :) ) I’m so thankful to have that philosophy instilled in me now: work hard and live within your means so that you can play hard too. So that when you’re buying your sixth bottle of $3 Dasani water at Magic Kingdom, you can laugh it off with an “It’s vacation!”

For this trip, I debated back and forth for a long time on whether I should take my “real” camera or just rely on my iPhone to document it all. Ultimately, Jamie insisted that I would not want to drag around a giant camera on all the rides, and I probably would have been too paranoid it would get damaged or stolen anyway. Plus, it’s just easier sometimes to whip out a phone for a shot, especially when you’re trying to shoot backwards while up in the air on the Dumbo ride. ;) Sooo all of the photos you see here were taken with my iPhone, and while they’re not perfect, the memories they froze in time are, and that’s all that matters.

Also, to kick things off, I had to include a photo from our first trip to Disney World back in 1994. My brother and I were the perfect ages (5 and 8, respectively) for it to all be pure magic. And although it was a very different experience going back as an adult, it was still pretty darn magical.

When my parents and Aaron arrived in Orlando on Thursday, we headed straight to the Animal Kingdom for the afternoon, where we went on a safari, rode Dinosaur (which I’m pretty sure terrified the poo out of Aaron), and rode the Mount Everest roller coaster twice because it was so good. (Side note: The fall is most definitely the best time to visit Disney, especially on weekdays. The lines were almost nonexistent and the weather was perfect. How anyone could endure long lines in 95 degree heat is beyond me!)

That night, we went to Epcot, which was my dad and Jamie’s favorite park. It was gorgeous walking through all the nations at sunset, and of course there was plenty of delicious food and beverages from all over the world to enjoy.

The next day, we got up early to hit Magic Kingdom. Aaron was out of his mind excited. That book he’s holding in the middle photo below is the one that our hotel sent my parents a couple of months ago. It had maps and lists of attractions for all the parks, and Aaron literally studied that thing until he had it memorized and carried it around with him to reference throughout the entire vacation. He even had numbered the attractions in order of priority for us. :)

We looooove roller coasters. I mean, LOVE. I’ve ridden every ride I was tall enough to get on for as long as I can remember, so I was especially excited for all the coasters. We did Big Thunder Mountain railroad twice, which was a super fun one. (That’s the ride on the left, and me and Jamie just after it was over on the right.)

The teacups! Yayyyy!

Aaron had talked endlessly about riding Space Mountain, but when we started walking inside, he got a litttttle bit panicked. (He has more of my brother’s attitude about roller coasters, which is primarily “No, thank you.”) We convinced him to ride anyway, and he survived! :)

On Saturday, we spent the first half of the day at Hollywood Studios. The first item on the list was the incomparable Tower of Terror, which made Jamie scream and grab a complete stranger’s leg the first time around. Ha.

Then it was back to Epcot for dinner and more exploring…

Someone was exhausted after it was all over. :)

On Sunday, my parents and Aaron flew back to Knoxville pretty early, but Jamie and I stayed an extra day to go to Universal Studios. I could NOT leave Orlando without visiting the Wizarding World of Harry Potter, which I’ve been dying to go to since it opened a couple of years back. We drank lots of butter beer (which was delicious- very much like a rich cream soda with a yummy butterscotch foam on top), ate fish ‘n chips and a giant turkey leg at the Three Broomsticks, and rode the new Forbidden Journey ride a LOT (Jamie rode it with me the first three times, and then I rode it SEVEN more times after that… this ride is unlike anything I’ve been on, y’all!).

Early the next morning, we bid farewell to Disney, exhausted and all spent out. It most definitely wasn’t a relaxing vacation, but it was SO good to spend quality time with the family, have lots of fun, eat tons of good food, spend an exorbitant amount of money, and most importantly, take a few days off of work to soak up the most important things in life. Good, good times.