Monday, Epcot Day!

While we were asking for Disney trip advice, my sister gave rave reviews to a program called RideMax.  We looked at it a little and decided to give it a try--it's basically like buying a guidebook but you don't have to read anything, it just plans out your day for you based on what you tell it you want to do.  So anyway, it also gives recommendations on which park to go to on which day (with the goal of helping you avoid crowds).
Before we left Houston, we planned out our week and our day to visit Epcot fell on Monday, Oct. 22.
We hit the park EARLY!  Like at the gates 45 minutes before opening early :)

Ready to leave the hotel room after breakfast!  I dressed the girls to match every day we were in the park.  I figured that way if one got lost we could hold up the other and say "she's wearing this!".  Also, we put little stickers on their shirts every day that had their names and Dan and I's cell numbers.  Just in case.

We brought our awesome double stroller and invested the $14.88 in an umbrella stroller.  It was great.  Then when we needed to walk fast or the kids were tired, we could let them all ride.  And if Megan wanted to walk, she could and we'd just fold the umbrella stroller and stick it in the big stroller basket or hang it from the handle.

Waiting for the bus outside the hotel...

Outside Epcot's gates!

First ride--spaceship earth.  There was NO line (yay!) but about halfway through the ride I started to go, Wow, this seems a little weird.  All the lights are on and we can see all the machinery and isn't there supposed to be a music track or something?  The answer was...yes.  By the time we got off, the line was shut down for technical difficulties.  But hey, the kids didn't care.  And they gave us a return fastpass that we could use later if we wanted to see it again.

As we headed to our next ride destination we saw that the wait to meet Mickey and Minnie was only 15 minutes.  So we went for it.  And our kids were T-H-R-I-L-L-E-D!  This was the Disney World they'd heard about.

Brooke was our night owl every night.  But by 10 am on Monday, she was ready for a quick break while we were waiting to ride the boats at Living With the Land.

And Candy too.   They woke up for the ride itself and liked it.

Then while Daddy and Megan rode Soarin', Candy and Brookie had snacks.  I rode it when they came out.

Getting ready to go to Turtle Talk with Crush--so cute and funny.  The kids really enjoyed this.

Riding the "clam-mobiles".  I didn't think Megan liked this ride all that much, but she talked about it all week!

Checking out the aquarium--I couldn't resist snapping this of Megan's plumber crack.  Awesome.  Don't worry, it was fixed soon after :)

This was in the ImageWorks area--they had music playing and these moving lights to step on.  Our kids loved this.

Epcot street performers.  These guys used kitchen stuff for percussion.  So fun.

Megan and Brooke right before we rode Soarin' again.  (Poor Brookie was 1.5 inches shy of the 40 needed to ride a lot of things--like Soarin'!)

We headed to the world showcase area in the late afternoon.  We caught Belle right before she headed in for the night.

Outside the American Adventure building.  We didn't really go in to any of the countries--we didn't want to push our luck with the kids.  We just enjoyed all the outside performances.

These Chinese acrobats were so fun to watch.  It's hard to see but they have these yo-yo type things in front of them that they did tricks with.

Epcot's fireworks were at 9 pm.  We had a great viewing spot and the kids loved it.  Megan kicking back while we waited for them to start.

Happy Candy.

Tired, tired Brookie.  She woke up when the show started and stayed up until we were back at the hotel.  But then we all crashed.  It was a great day one!