Fun with the Finger's: DISNEY!! A Long Trip Down & Day 1: Hollywood Studios

Last week we thoroughly enjoyed our winter break in sunny Orlando, Florida! We spent our break in Disney World! We have been so excited about this trip for the last few months. I was very excited to get to some warm weather. This beach girl is ready for winter to leave! We decided we would leave on Saturday and drive at least half way down so we could enjoy most of our day on Sunday. What sounded like a great plan turned into an almost disaster! Our ride down was fine, the girls did great, Kelly was fine driving and we made great time. We had decided we would try to stop in Gainesville, FL. After calling a few hotels and they were booked we thought we would just go further because the girls were good and we were fine to drive on. Soooo....I started calling hotels in the next town of Ocala. On the 3rd call, the receptionist informed me that she thought all the hotels in the area were completely booked. Not good! When you drive by and see lots of hotels absolutely full it is not a good feeling. BY this time Kate was starting to get ill and sleepy. We had to stop at a McDonalds for a snack and to get her some milk. Kelly was calling more hotels only to find there was a dog show, horse show, drag race, and go-kart race in the area and all hotels were full. At this point I felt like Mary & Joseph with no room at the inn and wishing for a barn! Kelly finally found a room but it was in Orlando so we would be driving the entire way. The girls fell asleep so that helped. When we got to our hotel it was 12:45 and when Kelly went in to check in he was told that the room was booked by mistake and they were full! What are the odds!? On top of that he thought most of the rooms in the area were full! We were livid at this point. He got on the phone with the company who had booked the room and they did find us a room at a hotel close by. We ended up at the Hilton at around 1:00 am! We were so tired! So, we ended up in Orlando but dog tired and knowing that we would never leave again thinking we could find a room...we would have a firm reservation. Thankfully it all worked out. We were definitely saying our prayers and I had texted my mama so she was saying one as well!
We did sleep in a little late on Sunday, but we were all soon up and ready to begin our fun vacation! We stayed at the POP Century resort and got checked in easily. We unpacked and then decided we would spend our day at Hollywood Studios. It was nice being able to FastPass rides on our phone! We had not been to Hollywood Studios last year so it was fun to go there. We could do everything we wanted to do in this one day. We saw some great shows! The girls loved Disney Junior Live, The Little Mermaid, and Beauty and the Beast. We all also LOVED the Toy Story ride. Cohen met several characters that she wanted to see, Sofia the First, Belle, Mulan, Mike & Sully from Monsters, Inc., and Pluto and Minnie Mouse. Kate liked the characters from a distance but when it would be our turn to go up to them she would shy away. The 2 characters she ran right up to was Lightening McQueen and Mater! My little tomboy girl loves cars! We happen to be walking by a small street when a lot of the characters walked out and no one was really around. This is where we saw Minnie, Pluto, Mulan, Belle, and several others. Kate would stay in the stroller eating her snacks but a lot of the characters would come up to her, like Chip & Dale, Tweedleedee and Tweedledeedum (?). She would give some high fives. I think both girls really enjoyed their first day! We headed back around 9:00 because we knew we had a busy day on Monday, and we were still pretty tired!