Purdy Family Stories: Disney Cruise

Our travels got off to an "exciting" start on Friday afternoon, when we learned our Saturday morning flight out of Grand Rapids had been cancelled. While Delta graciously offered to rebook us on a flight arriving the next day, Kyle eventually succeeded in explaining to them why we weren't interested in arriving AFTER OUR SHIP LEFT PORT, and we managed to get on a flight out of Detroit Saturday afternoon. (A BIG thank you to Grandpa Garry for shuttling us over there and getting our car home!) Despite the rather major change in our itinerary, we landed in Orlando just about 90 minutes later than originally scheduled. Grandma & Grandpa Purdy met us at our hotel later that night with a full gluten-free dinner spread, and the girls (totally high on life at this point) swam with Daddy until they dropped.

Megan was randomly selected by TSA for her first explosives screening. Awwwww! Mom & Dad were so proud of this milestone for our girl. (Really, TSA? Really??)

Once it was established that Megan was not on the no-fly list, we were officially Orlando-bound.

In flight with our friendly donkey, Aunt Kimmy (not joking, the girls, who are perfect and I love dearly, named the donkey "Aunt Kimmy" - cracks me up every. single. time. I hear it)

Passed out after extensive swimming with Daddy - the ONLY way sleep was going to happen for them. They were a tad excited!

The next morning, we were up and headed to the Port with some VERY excited little ladies.

Ready to cruise!

Hannah and her two BFFs - Snoopy and Grandpa Purdy

Daddy and his mini-me

The Disney Dream!!

We were one of the first groups to arrive at the Port, and the whole process went pretty quickly. We had a great draw for getting on the ship (I was highly motivated to get on board for dining purposes, as their gluten-free selection was amazing for our littlest traveler), and even had time to meet Mickey Mouse and collect our first autograph.

Board starts with 1 (as you may have guessed), so yeah, I'd say this was a pretty good draw.

Looking at the replica of the Disney Dream, and looking adorable while doing it.

Meeting Captain Mickey

Our first autograph! Thanks Mickey!

We had lunch right away on board (we knew right away we were in good gluten-free hands), and then it was time for a swim while we waited for our stateroom to be ready for us.

Hannah wasted no time getting acquainted with the Mickey Pool

Waterslides!

Exploring Nemo's Reef

Megan enjoyed the Reef too

Another slide - backwards, this time

Our staterooms were ready for us right away (yay!!), so we got settled in and ready for the Sailing Away party on the main deck.

On deck and ready to party.

The kids always seem to get the best seat in the house...

(that's the Aquaduck - the big onboard waterslide - in the background)

A bit excited to leave port

After the party, we decorated our stateroom doors and got ready for dinner at Animator's Palate, our first restaurant experience of the rotational dining plan (basically, on a Disney ship, you get to try every restaurant on board at least once, which was a super way to do it, in my humble opinion).

The stateroom doors are magnetic and Disney encourages you to decorate. I found a bunch of fun decor on Etsy that thrilled the little ladies. In addition to our custom name magnets, we got Minnie Pirate...