Checked in.

We've arrived!  

Today we checked into our resort.  We are staying at the Port Orleans Riverside.

The Magical Express (disney shuttle) picked us up at the airport this morning.  Its a service offered to anyone staying on a Disney property.

We arrived and checked in around 9am.

The grounds here are spectular.  Making you feel like you're in New Orleans with the magnolia trees (in among the palm trees of course) all the rooms are located in various mansions spread across this massive resort. 

We are staying in a Royal Room located in Oak Manor.   It's a slight upgrade from the standard room and well worth it.  The decor is all things Princess and the Frog, along with a print of Aladins Magic carpet on the floor.

Very Royal and princessish. Even the taps are shaped like Aladins Magic lamps.  Disney knows how to make those special touches noticeable to the little ones.  Christopher kept saying 'hey, this is from beauty and the beast.  Hey this is from Cinderella' 

The main selling feature for me was how close its located to the lobby. 

After unpacking we headed to the pool Aka old mans island.  A nice sized pool with a waterslide.

The kids really liked this.  

We headed back to our room around noon to get changed and ready for lunch.

Our resort has a water taxi service to Disney Springs.  (This used to be called Downtown Disney) It's about a 20

Minute boat ride.  We opted to take this vs the bus as it's such a beautiful day here today.

The boat comes every 20

Minutes so there isn't really a wait.

Disney springs is basically a huge shopping district with quite a few varieties of restaurants.  There is no admission and free for anyone and everyone. I thought Chris would like the T-Rex restaurant as he loves dinosaurs so much right now. 

The reviews were right.  It's was incredible.  VERY busy which is probably why it took me 6 weeks to get a reservation here.  The kids ate the staple pizza and French fries (we even allowed small sodas today as a treat)

And because we have the Disney Dining  Plan Jason and I opted for the most expensive item on the menu.  Steak.

:)

Oh my goodness, heaven and earth it was amazing.  For desert we combined our desert credits and got this mammoth concoction of 4 giant brownines, ice cream, whipped cream, caramel, fudge sauce and butter finger bits.  I don't need to say anything else. Lol. The 5 of us couldn't finish it.

We finished up and wandered back to the water taxi.  Stopping at the Lego store and various other Disney shops to "window shop". Along the way. Everything is incredibly expensive and overpriced.  We will let them pick out something special later on in the week so for down we just look. 

After we returned to our resort we decided to check out the smaller pool located next to our building. 

Our social 6 year old clAims she met her new BFF at the pool :). 

We Swam until dark.  

After we changed into our PJs we walked back through the winding paths and over the bridge to the main lobby to refil our resort cups with ice water (Jason loves ice water at bedtime) and browse the mini store. (Crazy overpriced)  

On the way back we noticed Alice in Wonderland playing on the outside movie screen.  Cast members (aka resort staff) 

were handing out towels so we sit on the grass and enjoyed the movie as a family. We didn't quite make it through the movie when all three kids started getting dozy.  Off for some rest.  Another fun day planned for tomorrow.