The Happiest (and sometimes most stressful) Place on Earth

For the kids' Spring Break, we went to Orlando for the whole Disneyworld experience.  Caroline has been to the Magic Kingdom a time or two, and Julie & i went as kids, but this was our first time as a family, and the first time for the little ones.  6 & 8 are good ages for it, i think.

Lodging: i found a great place, and a great value, called Regal Palms Resort, located about 15 minutes west of Disney, away from the bustle of Orlando, but you can never get away from the traffic.  We rented one of their 5-bedroom houses, complete with a backyard pool.  It was so nice to spread out, and give everyone (well, everyone except David) their own rooms, rather than being cramped into hotel rooms.  I would recommend this place for anyone, though it's probably better to get one of the houses, and avoid the high-traffic, likely worn-out townhomes.  The kids had a blast at the huge clubhouse pool, complete with lazy river and a very cool waterslide.  We couldn't have been more pleased with how this choice turned out.

Parks: we did all 4 Disney parks - Magic Kingdom, Disney/MGM Studios, Animal Kingdom, and EPCOT.  My least favorite was Magic Kingdom; my favorite was probably MGM Studios.  Our favorite ride - and this was a unanimous vote - was the Tower of Terror at the Studios.  Plus, we got to see a theme-park-version of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?, and the day-end Fantasmic show was wonderful.  The best live show we saw was the Lion King show at Animal Kingdom.  The best of the 3-D shows was Philharmagic at MK.

Other: we checked out the Holy Land Experience, which i found pretty interesting, though a little expensive.  And we saw the La Nouba show by Cirque du Soleil.  It was also very expensive, but worth it.  If you've never seen a CdS show, you owe it to yourself to catch one.

But the part that made it quite special was that my parents got to join us.  It was nice to have them there to enjoy the week with their far-away grandkids.  They treated us to a wonderful character breakfast, the Supercalifragilistic Breakfast at the Grand Floridian hotel.  We got to meet Winnie the Pooh, Tigger, Alice in Wonderland and the Mad Hatter, and Mary Poppins.

All in all, it was quite a full, and quite a special, week.