Cynical New York Mom goes to Cinderella Breakfast at the Magic Kingdom

Breakfast with Cinderella at Cinderalla's Castle

Feminists get a bad rap. If you believe the pundits (and you know you are), feminists are anti-men, anti-family lesbians. Well I am am none of those things. I would just like to live in a world where I get paid and respected like the opposite sex.

That said, as I raise my daughter in a world that is pretty much still hostile to women and especially women if color, I have tried to instill a sense of purpose, self-esteem and of course, that she can do and be anything she wants. I have never been one of those moms that encourages the whole disney princess way of life yes, I bought one princess dress back when she was three and have only bought one Disney DVD, Cinderella, of course. My daughter never ran around in her dress like other little girls except when she had playdates so suffice to say I would not classify us a disney besotted family.

So when I was planning this trip, the first piece of Advice I received was to book a character meal, especially the princess meal. Okay. I will go along with the herd. Why not? I booked the Once Upon Time breakfast at Cinderella’s Royal Table inside the Iconic Cinderella Castle. Who knew it was such a big deal? Not this clueless mom. We arrived 10 minutes early and all I could see was little girls in their disney princess dresses. And there was my daughter in her recently purcashed tinkerbell t-shirt and ballet skirt from Target. It was cute but no match against the sea of blue Cinderella ballgown. Since we had a few minutes, we wandered into the castle boutique. You could say it was fate, I think. And there they were nothing but princess dresses and accessories for every Disney princess character. So what did I suggest to my daughter? Would you like a Cinderella dress for the breakfast? She looked at me and bless her heart “what do you want mommy?” “let’s get it but we have 10 minutes” Maybe it was guilt or my own internal feelings of inadequacy or that she doesn’t have grandparents to buy her these things or that I never had Cinderella dress or that hey you are only 7 once but next thing you know we walked out of the store with a dress, crown and gloves. Well, as we stood in line waiting to have our picture taken with Cinderella, I was happy and so was my daughter. She was beaming. She really looked soo precious standing there with Cinderella.

After our picture, we went upstairs to the main dining hall where we were seated overlooking the cinderella’s carousel. How apropos.

But as they announced each of the princesses, my daughter was visibly excited and thrilled to each of them. I could sense the level of excitement build as each princess approached our table for the requisite signing of the autograph and picture.

When they brought the picture over with my daughter and Cinderella and saw how beautiful she looked in her newly bought dress, I was
Moved to tears and I was happy that i
Made reservation against my better judgement because every little girl should have their princess moment.