WDW Day 5: Chef Mickey & Animal Kingdom

My big request for this trip?  To celebrate mom's birthday at Chef Mickey!  I still remember celebrating mine there two years ago!

Same spot 2 years later!




Chef Mickey has the BEST Mickey waffles on property!

Seriously!  Mom has the 3rd degree burn on her mouth to prove it!

Character time!

One of the best parts of Chef Mickey is that you actually celebrate all the birthdays in the restaurant!  They sing a song and dance around with napkins and the birthday girl gets a cupcake!

Goofy!

Pluto!

Donald!

Time for a quick change and then we headed off to our next adventure...

Animal Kingdom!

I was so excited to hold Baby Simba again...

2011...


Drums!

We headed up to Rafiki's Planet Watch to see the animals...

If you know me... you know how much I love the sculptures at the zoo!

Rafiki!

Gotta love a petting zoo!

While mom and dad braved Expedition Everest... I got a Yetti!

After Expedition Everest we watched Lion King and Finding Nemo.  I LOVED Finding Nemo!  It's amazing!  Huge puppets and actors and everything is so vivid!  Do not miss it!

Time for more characters! 



Baloo & King Louie from Jungle Book...

Pocohontas & Meeko...

 

and of course I had to find Chip & Dale...

Where I had an awesome surprise!  Their handler was my very first Fairy Godmother in Training at Bippity Boppity Boutique.  Mom explained to her how much she means to us and Miss Susan actually cried.  It was totally a Disney moment!  She loves working at the parks and we are absolutely bonded!

Here we are together two years ago...




Our next bit of Disney magic...

Donald was headed out for a break, but he stopped and asked his handler to help him pick some flowers. He brought me the flowers and everyone around watched...

and then we saw Thumper!

Hanging out waiting for the parade to start...

Here it goes!

This parade was one of the low points of our trip, the woman next to us was SO pushy!  She would shove her kids at every character that went by and then after they said hello to them they would pass me by.  Mom just kept seeing my disappointed face. :(

See?

I did score one!

But that's ok... the rest of the night was a blast!  We headed to dinner at Whispering Canyon... which is a joke because there is NOTHING quiet about Whispering Canyon!  I dare you to ask for ketchup with your food... watch what happens!

SOOOO fun!

We made a ketchup tower...

and we might have asked for ketchup 3 different times!

Isn't this bridge inside the hotel cool?

Gotta love any day that starts with a Mickey Waffle and ends with a Mickey Bar!