life in sverige...: disney. paris. france.

6:00 am

ben used his banana phone to call mickey and let him know we were coming.

escalator to the bus station.

7:00 am

view from the bus to skavsta airport which is a 90 minute ride from stockholm. mental note, cheap flights = more hours of travel.

10:30 am

ryanair, 90% ontime, cheap, and landing 2 hours from where you really want to go.

(comment from leslie... bryan told me you have to pay to use the bathrooms on the plane. not true, but i did bring coins to the bathroom the first time.)

ben is practicing his swedish by reading star wars comics in swedish.

france.

(comment from leslie: i am not sitting next to ben on a plane ride again. the whole time he kept yelling out "we are going to crash... i just know it... we are going to crash!)

where's paris?

just farmland in france's champagne region. 2 hours from paris.

1:00 pm

now onto the bus for the final leg of this journey. 9 hours from our house to mickey, the kids were great and leslie behaved too. like i said, cheap flights = longer travel. but regardless of how long it took, we all enjoyed the experience.

view of champagne country from the bus window.

3:00 pm

destination reached, new york new york hotel.

ben took momma for a ride, not a bad driver for being 4 years old.

you can only image how excited ben was for the star wars ride.

on board the space station, preparing for flight.

ben had to touch the x-wing.

leslie found a little bit of home.

it was back to star tours for ben. one time wasn't enough so he went 4 times.

chillin while momma and ben were spinning in the teacups.

teacups... also mom-mom's favorite ride.

mickey shaped pizza, cool.

ben and momma took to the twilight zone tower of terror, a 200 foot free fall in the dark. ben made the height restriction by one-inch and loved the thrill of the drop.

the girls headed back to the hotel for a nap and the boys went to the super-awesome stunt show.

lightning mcqueen was the special guest.

motorcycles were jumping, cars were driving on two wheels, and then there were............

FLAMES!!!

definitely awesome boy time.

this one's for pop pop.

dinner at chef mickey's was a blast.

jessie.

tigger.

a scruffy cat? maybe from alice in wonderland?

chip.

rabbit.

happy high five to signify good times.

daddy wanted to go to paris so the girls mapped the trip.

lunch outside the louvre.

ben is getting really good a drawling.

louvre. we wanted to go in, but the que was too long. damn que.

paris was warm, 70 degrees, reese chilled in the shade of the stroller.

on the river seine.

a picturesque street on our walk from the louvre to the eiffel tower.

eiffel tower, built in 1889 as the entrance to the world's fair. the tower stands 324 meters (1,063 ft) tall, about the same height as an 81-story building.

we wanted to go up, but again, the que was too long so we got this picture to mark the visit.

really, have they seen our gas prices and the 14 trillion dollar debt.

it's a small world after all.

gigi and grover didn't make the trip, so jedi mickey filled in.

this was being promoted in disney village, really, at disney.

tea party at woody's roundup coral. this was the last stop in the park before heading back to stockholm.

ben was excited to meet woody.

reese had her eyes on minnie.

on our last night ben and i hit disney village for some arcade games and star wars toys. believe it or not, they were cheaper in disney paris then stockholm.

our hotel, including outdoor ice skating rink.

4:00 am

patiently waiting for the shuttle bus to the airport, which is 2 hours from paris.

6:00 am

not so happy face.

6:01 am

another not so happy face.

8:30 am

waiting to board on the tarmac.

always a happy girl. i think she was trying to get the attention of the japanese couple sitting in front of us. they were eating raw shrimp and sausage that they brought on board. it smelled and reese was trying to tell them it smelled.