It was nearly 9 am and we had been taking pictures since shortly after 6 am. The time really flew by that morning. Paul told us that he had taken nearly 300 shots. I would love to see if there were more that werent on the site or in our proofs. Im trying to wait the 3 years to get the discounted CD, but it is hard to wait that long!
After getting back to the hotel we said our goodbyes. Paul offered to take my bouquet to Disney Floral since it was going to get picked up by Keepsake later that day for the preservation. We walked into the lobby of the Grand where lots of people stopped and stared. I had to chuckle to myself because I knew so many of them must have thought it was our wedding day. After all how many brides get the satisfaction of wearing their dress twice! Once back in the room we took some picture on the balcony and then decided to get a quick nap before we had to check out. We also ran down to the lounge to grab breakfast before catching some Zzzs. I had already changed, but I still had in my tiara. I had a little girl ask me if I was a princess; it was funny because I was wearing Capris and a polo shirt, but the tiara must have been a sign.
Before we had our nap I decided to take my hair down. It wasnt done as tightly as she had done it for the wedding and since my hair doesnt hold curl well anyway I decided it was best just to take it down.
After a quick nap of about one hour we got up and packed up our luggage. Kris called down to concierge and they said that they could handle the moving our luggage over to POR from the GF. That was a relief considering we still had a lot of miscellaneous things like flowers and my dress that we were already going to have to handle anyway.
We went over to POR to check in and we ran into several family members including my grandma and aunt in the lobby who were leaving that afternoon. They still had 2 hours until their Magical Express, but they wanted to make sure that they didnt miss it! After chatting with them for a while we went to check in and discovered that we had actually been given a King room. I know these are hard to come by, so I was excited. Disney Honeymoons had also left a certificate at the desk in our name which was a nice touch too. Our room wasnt ready yet, so we headed over to my parents room to pick up the tuxes that had to be delivered to Mens Warehouse that day. They were really great about letting us keep them the extra two days until our MK shoot.
We loaded up our car and then my parents headed over to Animal Kingdom while Kris and I went to take the tuxes back. We discovered that we had misplaced his suspenders and we had to tell them that the one tux had a rip in it (it was there when the best man first put it on) so after that was all straightened out thankfully they didnt charge us anything extra- we decided to stop for lunch. Several family members had stopped at the Five Guys burger joint near the mall a few days earlier and our other family from Virginia had talked about it too, so Kris and I decided to check it out. We are big burger fans and we loved it. They pretty much have every topping imaginable and then you select what you want for your burger. They also had cut their fries and it is deliciously sinful!
After finishing up our lunch we called my parents to see where everyone was at the park. We told them that we were headed in their direction and we drove over to Animal Kingdom. The first thing we did was to meet them by the Tree of Life where we took a couple of shots.
We then went over to get fastpasses for Expedition Everest. Kris had never ridden this up to this point, so I was excited for him to have his first ride. We rode Dinosaur while we were waiting twice in a row!
Then at that point since we didnt have that long between we hung out in the area with the carnival games near Primeval Whirl. Kris and I rode Primeval Whirl three times in a row (another one of our favorites)
Then Kris and my dad challenged each other in the shooting game.
At that point it was time for our fastpass and we headed over to the ride. Kris loved it!
After we finished we headed towards Africa where we rode the Kilimanjaro Safari. I decided that on this trip I wasnt going to take any pictures. I usually take a ton of animal pictures and the last few times I had written it I was with my maid of honor who has me take even more than I normally would; I swear Ive had 100 shots from one single ride. It was nice to sit back to enjoy the ride. When we were getting ready to unload one of the jeeps accidentally went up on something near the loading area, so we had a little bit of a backup, but nothing too bad. It was starting to get late and we had a group reservation at Ohanas, so we headed towards the front of the park. On the way out we hit up Its Tough to be a Bug and got some more shots in front of the Tree.
We then piled in the car and drove over to the Polynesian with my parents riding along. We were going to have a pretty big group that night too that included some people that hadnt made it to Liberty Tree the night before. Some of Kris family was even able to make it which was really nice too. When we got there a few of our guests were already there, so I ran up to get us checked in at the podium. Trying to give people directions over the phone; this was an image that was repeated throughout the entire week:
We only had to wait about 20 minutes before our table was ready and by that time all of our guests had arrived. A lot of people had already gone home, so it was nice to still have a decent size group with us that night. This is by far one of our favorite restaurants.
My mom and I had picked up special leis for him and I to wear and the lady who does the singing came over to our table just after we had our salads and asked about our wedding. She gave us some more leis and invited our group to stand up to learn a special hula.
Maid of honor and I:
We actually got quite a few members of our group up for the dance which was a lot of fun. My maid of honor grabbed my camera to capture the moment for us. My little cousin who had celebrated his birthday the day before really wasnt too into it at first, but after a little coaxing he agreed to join us. He looks totally bored in some of the shots. Its funny because well still mention doing the hula and he says that we made him do it.
Just as we were finishing dinner Wishes started going off at MK. We had a great view through the windows. It was cool to watch Kris families' expressions since they were not visiting any of the parks that week. They were amazed at the quality of the fireworks. They were staying on property, but were just enjoying the resorts and had done other things in the Orlando area besides Disney. They had missed the DP because they had gone to the beach with their sons, so this was their first exposure to Disney fireworks.
The evening was quickly drawing to a close. Some of my cousins were heading off to DTD, but Kris and I were exhausted from our 4 am wakeup call, so we headed back to POR and crashed.
The wake up call came way too early in my opinion and shortly after we got up Anna called to say that she was in the lobby. Kris went down to get her since there are all the different elevators to take for concierge. He had not met her the day of the wedding, but thankfully she was easy to spot with her toolbox full of makeup. She set to work right away recreating the same hair style that I had two days prior. I had forgotten my veil at my moms room and since there was nothing that we could do we just adjusted my hair a little bit to compensate. We talked about the details of the wedding and she finished up in no time and we said our goodbyes. It was kind of surreal that I would never see her again after first meeting her for my trial back in September; it was official that the wedding was finally coming to an official end 
It was still nice to get at least one shot with the Wizard of Oz stuff in the background. All of these pictures were taken by Kris or I on our camera, so it was nice to be able to have these at least. I also bought one of the ones that Paul took with the Judy Garland footprints.
You'll just have to bring them when we meet up so I can see them then. 
I loved the shot of you two on the bridge in Frontierland. So cool...I didn't even know you could see the castle from there. (Mental note...remember to take picture on bridge in Frontierland next visit). 
I can definitely bring all the proofs to a meet! We have bought a couple of 8x10 and 5x7 enlargements too 
The shot in Frontierland is pretty cool, I never knew you could see the castle from there either!
I totally agree about Yachtsman; we have been there before, but it just didn't fit into our agenda this trip. I love their mushrooms too! Our last visit was during our planning sesssion trip last September. 
... did you hear that they stopped doing character meet and greets with him now in the park. We saw him in March, but I heard he's gone now 
