Once upon a time...

...there was a Magic Kingdom.  And four grown-ups who prefer quiet and uncrowded places gladly went to that Kingdom for the sake of two very special children.  And do you know what?!  Seeing the Kingdom through the eyes of those kids truly was magical!!!

Yes, my parents treated us to Disney's Magic Kingdom.  It was the first time the kids had gone and, as Abigail summed it up, "This really is magical!"  We got such delight out of watching the kids take in all of the "magic."  The weather was gorgeous, the lines were short, and we had a wonderful, memorable time together! 

 We met Mickey and the Princesses first thing in the morning.  Seeing Abigail with the Princesses was...well, magical!  Our usually-shy princess glowed and chatted and wasn't shy at all.

 

I love this shot of my parents and kids.  Bruce and I thoroughly enjoyed watching scenes like this all day.

Abigail had chosen the Dumbo ride as her first-of-the-day ride.

David chose the International Speedway.  He was so excited that I couldn't even get him to look away from the track so I could take a picture!

Look at these two -- they are standing exactly the same but mirror-imaged.  Do you think they're related?!

Bruce and I got to ride all by ourselves on the Pooh ride and then took this picture after we got off.  It is an amusing aspect of parenthood that the ride of choice pre-kids would be the Tunnel of Love but during young-parenthood stage, it's Winnie the Pooh! :)

My camera was on the wrong setting for this one, but I had to post it anyway.  Disney does magic and does it well, I must say...here Abigail was using her spending money to buy a necklace, and the cashier asked if she could sprinkle some of Tinkerbell's pixie dust on her.  The look on Abigail's face was priceless (and we are still washing sparkles out of her hair)!

We rode Prince Charming's Carousel a couple of times, but the night-time ride was my favorite.  It was so pretty with all of the lights.

 I love this picture of my parents!

Cinderella's castle was lovely, especially at night.

We popped in at Mickey's place one last time to see if Minnie was there for Abigail...and she was!  Look at that smile!

We were all a bit bedraggled by that time of night (what happened to my hair?  It looks like I swam in the castle moat!) but it was worth it.

We stayed for the Electrical Parade and for the fireworks.

 And then we went back to the resort and tumbled into bed...a perfect ending to a magical day!

Thank you again to my parents for the wonderful day and memories! 

~

(On a side note here for those of you who plan to go to Disney with your kids someday: in my opinion, our kids were at the perfect age to experience Magic Kingdom (at least for those of us who plan to go only once in a blue moon).  The kids were old enough to remember it and yet young enough for the magic to happen.  They were also old enough to understand the concept of marketing etc, and we discussed that at length prior to visiting.  We saw sooo many toddler/preschool age kids having meltdowns because they were tired and just wanted their beds and/or they couldn't understand why they couldn't have every toy they saw...and we were especially glad we had waited!)