First Family WDW Trip Sept 22-28

[AMaloy314]

I think that I am finally recovered from my post-vacation let down enough to do our trip report. Every time I tried to do it before, I got sad thinking about how long it will be before we can do it again!

I'm going to try to post it all on one thread as I have found that I have a much easier time reading other's reports that way. It may take awhile, so if you are following our saga, please be patient with me. Here goes......

[AMaloy314]

Let me preface by saying that due to family illnesses and living across country from my family has led to my husband and children never experiencing a true "vacation". We've always travelled to see relatives when we were able to get time off work and the finances workable. This year, I was determined that we were going to do something just for us! And, Gosh-dog-it! It was going to be as special as I could make it.

My family includes my wonderfully patient husband and my two sons- a 4 year old who would love to be fearless but just can't, and my other son who turned 3 on this trip believing that WDW was set up just as an elaborate birthday gift for him. Then there is me-- a mostly stay-at-home mom with a little bit of pharmacist thrown in for good measure.

Other characters that we will be encountering on our trip are my father and his wife. Now this is a little trickier to explain. I guess I should say that my family has always been extremely close. When my mother died 3 years ago, Dad, my brother, sister and I were devastated. We all wanted my father to come live with us, but he was determined to be independent (not that there is any reason why he couldn't). We resolved to support my dad in whatever he decided to do. He then proceeded to test our resolve by marrying his now wife, P, a year later. I really don't think that we are the type that would have had a hard time with whoever he married, but we did with P. To say that there has been some friction with her would be putting it mildly. We love my dad, though, and are still trying to do our best to like P.

Now that you know all of us, we can start the story.

[AMaloy314]

Last February, I realized that we were going to be getting a sizable income tax refund. I didn't immediately tell my husband, because I needed to set up a plan of attack. The last time I went to WDW was 10 years ago when I was a single career woman with lots of disposable income. No longer is that the case. I needed to be able to convince DH that WDW was within our budget. As long as I could do that I knew that he would go along with whatever I wanted. And what I wanted to was to see Disney World through my kids' eyes while they were still young. I know there is a group who believes that parents shouldn't waste their money taking kids when they probably won't even remember it. I say "Phooey!" to them. Even if the boys don't remember all of it, I will!

I can remember thinking, "Where do I start?!?". Walt Disney World is huge and expensive. Is it possible to do it on a budget that we could afford and still have fun? Could we manage to do all the parks with the kids? How much could the kids do there? All I could remember were the adult oriented things that I had done there. Flying Dumbos weren't on the agenda last trip. How to get there? Where to stay? on and on and on.

First thing I did was jump on the internet. I did a search for Walt Disney World and was shocked at how much information is out there. Yikes! It did nothing but fuel my feeling of being overwhelmed. I quickly decided to go for a more limited approach and I headed to our local library. There I checked out all four (count 'em, FOUR!) WDW guides that our library carried.

Luckily, out of the numerous books available, our library had the best one, "The Unofficial Guide"! To be quite honest, I was not enamored of the UoG when I first started to read it. Although I thought I wanted practical information, I wasn't ready for that practical! I still had pixie dust in my eyes. I wanted my Fairy Godmother to wave her magic wand and create the perfect trip with no effort on my part. As I continued my search for information, I came to see what a great resource "The Unofficial Guide" is. I eventually bought a copy along with a Passporter, but that came later down the line. In the mean time, the UoG listed some other resources on the net including mousesavers.com and Deb Wills site.

Using the above sites, I came across a link to the DisBoards. What can I say here? If you are reading this, you already know how wonderful these boards are. If you are not, I hope you find them soon!

After a couple of days, using the information that I found, I was able to come up with a tentative plan and budget. It would be a lean trip without any extras, but it could be done. I showed DH and he said "Are you sure we can afford this? WDW is expensive." I told him we could and I saw the beginning of excitement in his eyes.

Little did either of us know how valuable these boards, along with the other two sites, were going to be for us.

WOOOO-HOOOO! We were going to Walt Disney World!!

[kaceyisme]

Originally posted by AMaloy314
I know there is a group who believes that parents shouldn't waste their money taking kids when they probably won't even remember it. I say "Phooey!" to them. Even if the boys don't remember all of it, I will!


We have been taking our son (who is now almost 12) to Disney since he was 3. He remembers every trip, including details from his first trip at 3 years old. I definitely don't think its a waste of money either! I'm enjoying your writing, and I can't wait to hear about your trip!

[Minniespal]

Can't wait to read more.

[Dreamer04]

Nicely done. I can't wait for more!

[AMaloy314]

To say I was excited is an understatement. I began preparing like a Survivor contestant who knows his destination. I spent hours reading the DIS Boards. I scoured mousesavers.com. I read each and every page of the UoG. I could recite the menus from Deb's site. On the advice of people here, I purchased a PassPorter and my own copy of The Unofficial Guide to Walt Disney World.

We (and by saying "we", I mean me. My husband just went along with whatever I told him!) decided that Sept would be the ideal time for us. He could take a week from work and my oldest would miss only a few days of preschool. Crowds should be lower. Temps not quite as bad as mid summer. Who could have predicted all these hurricanes?!?

I had figured out that because of the boys and naps, we probably wouldn't be able to do a Value Resort because of the small rooms. I'd also read several reports of noise at some of them. Thanks to mousesavers, I booked a great rate at DoubleTree Guest Suites at DTD. $79 a night and free continental breakfast. I was thrilled!

Naps also meant needing a rental car. Again, I turned to mousesavers.com and ended up getting a full size car with National using codes. After watching and rechecking, we ended up paying only $112 total for the entire trip rental. What a deal!

Next I started looking at tickets. After researching Disney's policy on ticketing, I found that since my little one wouldn't turn 3 until our last day at the parks, we wouldn't have to buy him a ticket. (Just for reference, I can't find the thread, but basically it said that Disney went with the ages of the children at the beginning of the trip). That meant that we had more ticket money that I had planned. Since it was already budgeted for tickets, (Darn!) I'd just have to get 5 day hoppers instead of 4 day for the rest of us. Then I saw that ticket prices were going up that next Monday. Yikes! I jumped in my car and drove to our Disney Store to buy them. Yes, I know, I could have ordered them, but what fun is that?! This way I got to stand and talk to other people about my trip!

In fact, talking to people about our trip is where the big OOPS comes in. I was soooo proud of myself and all my new found knowlege that I was sharing all over the place. My husband had long since gotten tired of hearing about it, so I expanded my 'sharing area' and included my extended family. It was during one of my calls to my dad, that I got into hot water. As we were talking about the trip, he stated,"You know, when your mom was alive she always said that when the grandkids got old enough we would just come get them from you and take them to Disney World. Just us and them." I smiled and replied that everyone would have had a great time. He agreed and said that there is nothing like watching a child with Mickey Mouse. Again, I smiled. I told him that I couldn't wait to get the boys there. He said that he wished we all lived closer so that he could spend more time with all of us.

We've had this conversation many times. He's often talked about selling his house in Texas and moving closer to one of us kids. His latest move scouting trip was to Louisiana. I'm not sure how that gets him closer to my bother and sister in OK or us in OH, but it gives you an idea of his "moving closer" talk.

I laughingly say that if he were in FL, he could spend time with the boys at WDW. Of course, I'm thinking that if he moved there we'd see them on (hopefully) future trips. I'm already feeling a little guilty that we are using a vacation to go somewhere that isn't a relatives' home. He answers, "Oh,no. We couldn't do that. This is your family trip. We wouldn't want to intrude." HUH?! I realized that I had invited him and his wife to come to WDW with us. Or at least that's what he heard. Not wanting to appear as if I was back pedaling as quickly as I was, I mentioned that WDW was a large place and that there is so much to do there that we are going to miss because the boys aren't big enough. I was hoping that he might think that P and he wouldn't find it as much fun being dragged down with two little ones. He didn't even blink. "Well, if we came, we could take the boys for awhile and you and Mike could go do some of the more adult things." Oh well, there were months before the trip. Maybe he would forget about it.

So I began to accumulate things for the trip. Dollar store rain ponchos, trading pins from ebay, a misting fan from Wal-Mart, T-shirts I made for the boys----they all made their way into a suitcase that sat in the bottom of my closet. It was a little embarassing when I had to unpack so my husband could go on a business trip.

I watched the airline sites and got a great deal on tickets for the 4 of us. That made it real. Those little tickets were non-refundable. But still there were months to go.

As time passed, it became apparent that my dad and his wife were going too. He kept insisting that they didn't want to intrude, so I told him that we could just say that we were all taking separate vacations and if our paths crossed, then great. I told him to plan the things he wanted to do and we'd make our plans and see what overlapped. I knew that P wasn't going to want to spend time with us. She gets a little insecure when my dad spends too much time with any of us. I thought this way, she could plan whatever and maybe we'd have dinner together a couple of times.

Speaking of dinners, that was another giant challenge. How do you decide where to eat with all those great restaurants? My answer to that was pour over the menus for hours and hours. It was so much fun. I ended up with a workable schedule that gave us a couple character meals, a couple sit down meals (with my dad) and some counter service. I couldn't wait!

Unfortunately, that is all there was left to do....wait...and wait...and wait. Was the trip ever going to get here?

With all this excitement, I knew there was no way to keep the trip a secret from the boys. But they really didn't have any idea how cool it was going to be. In order to get them into the spirit, I printed off some cards with Disney clip art and had Mickey send them notes. Once a week or so, they'd get a note saying, "Will you have dinner with me?" or "I can't wait for you to see my castle." or "Do you like dinosaurs? There are some great ones here!". They even got a Guest of Honor badge with their names on it so that everyone would know that they were Mickey's special friends. It worked. Soon that's all they were talking about.

FINALLY it was time!

[Credit Man]

Great start!

[kimwim8]

I'm loving this. Please keep going!

[LAH]

I'm enjoying every minute of this!!

Thanks for posting!!

[AMaloy314]

Day 1

We woke up bright and early in order to leave for the airport by 8am. Things went incredibly smoothly and we were out the door 15 minutes early. When we got to the airport, DH dropped off the boys and I to check the luggage curbside while he parked the car. I ran into a little glitch when one of the suitcases was 5 lbs heavy, but that was easily remedied by switching over a few things to the other bags.

We got on the plane uneventfully and things were fine. I don't think that I've ever had a trip that went that well before. We all ate the Lunchables that I packed for the plane instead of paying $10 each for airplane food. I was surprised at how many people brought on their own food. I guess with all the cut backs, travellers are learning that if they want decent food, they'd better bring it with them. The boys were angels and someone even commented on how well they behaved. I was so proud of them!

When we landed, the luggage came out pretty quickly and off we went to pick up our car. DH filled out all the paperwork at the National counter and we went into the lot to get our full size car. Then came the first real snag we had come to. There were no cars in the full size row. Absolutely nothing. In fact there were very few cars at all out there. DH went back up to the counter and asked what we should do. Guess what?! We got the pick of any car in the 'executive section'. Woo-hoo! There was a Jeep Grand Cherokee just calling our name. I guess that the Disney magic sometimes extends to the airport, too.

Since the boys hadn't slept at all on the plane, we drove straight to the hotel so they could get a nap before evening activities.

As I mentioned before, we stayed at the DoubleTree Guest Suites at DTD. They staff there were great. Cookies at check-in. A couple of small toys for the boys at the kids check-in counter and everyone as nice as could be. Bellhop helping bring the luggage up. Wow! Service could not have been better.

When we got to the room, I was a little disappointed. The room had a musty smell (which I think may be common to FL hotels) and things just seemed worn. DH, on the other hand, thought that for the price we got a great deal. I know that if we had paid full price I would have been pretty upset. As it was, I really had no reason to complain. Things were clean and worked fine. It was nice to have the extra space----really nice on the day we got stuck in the room due to Jeanne. I think that next time we go, we will stay at a Disney resort, even if it does mean more cramped quarters.

While the boys lay down to sleep, DH took off to Albertsons to pick up the grocery order that I had faxed to them a couple of days before. This was a service that I read about on the internet and thought would work well for us. DH was very impressed with this. He said our order was all together and wheeled into a refrigerator just waiting for him. The staff their called him by name and opened up a checkout line just for him so he didn't have to wait. This was probably the first time that my husband began to see the value in all the research. If anyone is thinking about doing this , I can't say enough good things about them. I believe that even most of the limo companies will do a 'grocery stop" here at no extra charge. FYI it is the Albertsons at 12981 S Orange Blossom Trail and their number is 407-857-5666.

When DH got back, we relaxed in the room and let the boys sleep for awhile. I wanted them fresh for our late dinner that night.

At 7:30, we left for the Contemporary to have dinner at Chef Mickey's. Our PS was at 8:30 and it is a good thing that we left a little early. DH promptly got lost. We drove around for a bit while he "got his bearings" and finally came across where we needed to be. As we walked from our car, Wishes began at the Magic Kingdom. What a welcome! Problem was that oldest son doesn't like the loud noise from fireworks. He was wrapped around my leg as I tried to walk backwards into the resort so I could see at least a little of the show. I finally gave up and carried him inside.

I had never been inside the Contemporary and to be honest, was never really impressed with the outside. If we hadn't been going to Chef Mickey's, I doubt that I would have even given it a passing glance. That would have been a HUGE mistake. If nothing else, you have to see the monorail going through at least once!

When we checked in at the podium, we were told that it would be about 15 minutes, so we walked back down the concourse to look around. The boys were getting a little fidgety, so I spied the Pin Station and thought we should try a little trading. We practiced saying "May I look at your pins, please?" with the CMs there. The two girls were very sweet. They showed the boys their pins and even got out a book to let them choose from. DSs didn't know where to look first. After much debate, they finally chose a Toy Story pin each and did a trade. The CMs graciously invited us back on Fri for a pin trading event they were having that evening. I was pretty sure that we weren't going to be able to make it back. As we turned to go, DH tells me that he thinks the pin trading looks like fun. He asks if he's allowed to trade or if the pins are just for kids. He never ceases to surprise me.

When our pager went off, we headed in to dinner. I should explain that the reason I scheduled this the first night was to get the boys used to seeing the characters in person. We had been all over the fact that Mickey was big and couldn't talk, but I didn't want to face a melt down when we got to the parks. Chuck E. Cheese totally freaks them out, so I was hoping this dinner would ease things a bit. I'm glad we did it, because there was a gasp and some huge eyes the first time they saw Goofy!

I had wrapped up a couple of Disney CDs to give to our youngest boy for his birthday. (I knew he is still young enough not to realize that the CDs were for all of us to listen to in the car. He was just happy to have something to open.) The CM waiting on us noticed the gifts and asked if we were celebrating a birthday. When we said yes, she brought out a special placemat for him and wished him Happy Birthday. He thought that was great...and it got better later! After dinner was over, our waitress brought out a cupcake for both boys! So nice!

DH and I ate until I thought we'd burst. He was addicted to the prime rib and I was hooked on the ham. YUM! And the mashed potatoes are to die for!

Throughout the dinner, characters came by, but they sensed that the boys were a little hesitant. None of them pushed it at all. They would wave to the boys or do high fives, but none tried to do a big hug. It made my sons much more relaxed around them. I have an adorable picture of my son with some icing that Chip put on his nose. Chip stayed an arms length away but couldn't have given my son a better memory!

After we waddled out, I told my husband about the 5 legged goat on the mural and we tried to find it. When I remembered that you could only see it from the monorail platform, I suggested that we go look. After all, I didn't think we would be back. It was 9:30pm and the platform was empty. We looked up and there he was---the famous goat.

As the monorail pulled in, I looked at the boys and asked if they wanted to take a ride. DH wasn't sure that we would be allowed since we hadn't actually used our tickets yet. I knew it would be ok, but I told him to wait while I talked to the CM there. I quietly used a little more information I picked up here and asked if we could ride in the front car. After a quick check, we were whisked to the front and I laughed to see my DH face when he realized where we were going.

What a beautiful ride. It was dark out and all the lights were up as we rode past the Polynesian Resort, then the Grand Floridian (where my father would be staying the next day) and finally on to the Magic Kingdom. Even the driver laughed when my youngest son exclaimed,"Mommy! Daddy! That's Cinderella's castle!!" with such joy. We oohed and ahhed our way past and back to where we started. As we disembarked, my husband looked at me and said "What an incredible way to end the day."

How right he was!

Back at the hotel, we all fell asleep quickly to get rested up for the next day at EPCOT.

[fizz13]

Wow, I don't know if its just the DIS or if you're stocked up on pixie dust. This is a wonderful report and I am so enjoying reading it. Keep it coming...
Claire

[LAH]

Kim,

I just noticed your countdown clock. HAVE A WONDERFUL TIME.

LAH

[eeyorelor]

OMG your trip report is wonderful keep it coming!!!!Its making me see it through your eyes and ive never been there yet...January isnt coming soon enough..lol..

[LuvindisCruiser]

OMG! My eyes got all misty just reading about your monorail ride and seeing the castle. Oh, I am so jealous and cannot wait till May so we can experience it all first hand ! I was laughing at the beginning, when you were talking about your plan of attack before approaching your husband. He is so like mine it's not even funny !! I thought about my approach about a whole week before I even brought up WDW to my DH. And then, only casually. But, it worked, I am now planning and he is the one who suggested a few days ago, that we should go to Ohana's because he saw it on the Food Channel, and thought it looked really great. Boy, I was surprised, he even know what resort it was in. I can't wait for the rest of your report, it's great !!:wave:

[AMaloy314]

The next morning, we were heading down to our free contintental breakfast at the hotel by 7:00am. Not a bad time considering that I hadn't packed up before we went to sleep. Hubby kindly filled the Brita filter water bottles with ice while I loaded the water mister fan. (I would later find that he threw away the filters because they took up too much room in the bottle! Oh well, it's the thought!) Rechargable camera batteries from yesterday were put into the charger and swapped for fresh. I even strapped on my pedometer so I could give a report on how far we walked.

Last, but far from least, I grabbed my PassPorter. I can not rave about this book enough. I tore the map out of the spirals and put it into my fanny pack. I found this map smaller and easier to read than the actual park maps. The only tip I have about the PassPorter is splurge for the 3 ring binder if you can afford it. It about killed me to pull that map out, knowing that I couldn't put it back the same way.

Food at the hotel was nothing spectacular, but none of us are breakfast people anyway. That is unless my husband finds himself in a Denny's or IHOP. Then, don't get between him and his plate unless you don't need some of your appendeges. Anyway, we ate and headed out.

The park opened at 9am and we got there by the advised 8:30. I could not believe it, but we were parked in the front row. Where was everyone?!? (Maybe they had paid better attention to Jeanne than I had or maybe I was just in denial about it.) We had brought our own double stroller so we just wheeled the boys right on up. Security checked our bags as well as all others, but it was a very quick and painless experience.

There was a very small crowd waiting at the rope, so we kind of hung back on the left hand side. I noticed CM along with his robot standing to the side. Since there was nothing else to do, we went over to take a look at it. Here comes that Disney magic again. Francis the talking robot was there with his handler and gave my sons his complete attention. The boys were called by name (remember those GOH badges?) and engaged in quite a conversation with them. After finding out that my oldest son was 4, Francis assumed it must be 4 months old, because at 4 years old he would be so obsolete that he would have already be made into a toaster. My boys thought that was too funny!

As we were enjoying Francis, the music came up and suddenly a double decker bus full of Mickey and friends (and a few not so friends like Captain Hook) drove up to the rope. Poor Francis, after that he might as well had been that toaster. My sons were enthralled. When the rope dropped, the boys never looked back. I send my apologies out to Francis and his handler. You guys were great, but there is no one like Mickey Mouse.

As we walked into EPCOT, the first things that I noticed were the changes that had happened since the last time I was there. The giant hand and wand at Spaceship Earth didn't bother me. In fact, I liked the brightness and sparkle. Very Disney. Not so with the "Leave a Legacy". They reminded my of highway barriers and really messed up the open welcoming feeling at the entrance. They just smacked of cheap commercialism.

Ok, here is where we run into a scene that I am totally embarrassed to tell everyone here on the boards about. As we walk past the "Leave a Legacy" atrocity, I stop and say "What do you want to do?" and pull out the map. Months of research and reading and I don't have a plan. Sheesh!

We quickly decided to head onto Spaceship Earth since there were no lines. Son #1 asks the whole way up the ramp, "Is this going to be scary? Am I going to get scared? Is it scary in there?" (I point this out because you will be amazed at what this child will do in a few days.) We all enjoy it and decide that the next attraction is Universe of Energy.

But first we have to go all the way back around to pick up the stroller. As we are starting off that way, I spot the Guest Relations building. I ask DH if he would mind if I take our 2 yr old while he and other son go get the stroller. The little guy and I head off to pick up a birthday pin for him. CM gave him one with a cheery "Happy Birthday!" This pin is really neat with Happy Birthday written in several languages..at least that's what I think it says. This was another one of those things that I learned about from these boards. Talk about invaluable information! If he hadn't had this..., well, I'll get to that later.

Off we go to Universe of Energy. The boys love playing with dinosaurs, so I thought this would be great. Just up their alley. Son #1 starts up with the "Is it scary?" routine before we even see the building. <sigh> I thought that we had taken care of that with the first ride. Oh well.

I love this attraction. Ellen is hysterical and Bill Nye has always been cool. The boys found the preshow a little slow, but not too bad before we go into the seats. DSs ended up liking this a lot, but there was some tight hand holding as we went past the T.Rex.

Wonders of Life was closed, so theoretically there was nothing else for the boys to do in this pavillion. How wrong we were! There were those fountains. Dh really wanted to try Test Track, so we sent him off while the boys removed their shoes and socks for some splash time. They weren't anywhere close to being ready to get out, when DH showed back up. It couldn't have been 15 minutes from when he left. I figured he had gotten up there and found the wait was going to be too long. Nope. He'd already ridden it and was back. There was no line at all. Can you believe it?

We continued on around and ended up behind the 'big ball' at another pin station. We let the boys trade for another pin each. They had fun again, but wow is it hard to stand back and watch them pass up a pin that I'd like to have. DH again said that he'd like to do it, but I couldn't talk him into going back when we had finished there.

DH wanted to try to take DS#1 on Mission Space after seeing all the other kids on Test Track, so we separated. Other son and I left for Ice Station Cool to go get a quick drink and kill some time. As we are walking in, he hears "Happy Birthday!" from the CM there. Since, DS is fresh from pin trading at the pin station, he pipes up with "May I look at your pins, please?"when he sees the CM's lanyard. Once again, he sees something special in a pin that I thought should be way down the desirability list, but what can I do? He's the trader.

We sample all the flavors, going back for seconds (and thirds) with our favorites. DS liked the lemon-lime and I loved the Chinese Watermelon flavor. Yes, I even tried Beverly, knowing the secret. How could I miss the experience? There is no telling when we'd get back there! About that time, DH and other son showed up there. DS wasn't tall enough to ride so they came back to find us.

We decided that we'd better get some lunch now since we had PS for the Ice Cream Social at 3:10. I had purchased the Quick and Casual Vouchers before we left and this was our first chance to use them. We decided to go to the Electric Umbrella where we ordered 2 bacon Double Cheese Burger meals (came with fries), 2 large drinks and chocolate cream pie for desert. I also ordered an extra bun to split the burger with the boys. (I was charged $.75). Do not be embarrassed to order the extra bun. The CM ringing me up didn't even blink and the one at the counter mentioned how smart she thought it was. We all got plenty to eat and walked away feeling like we had gotten a bargain.

Just a word about the Quick and Casual Vouchers. I know that several people have complaints about HotWire, but I had no problems at all. The vouchers were convenient, but I think you have to know what you are doing with them to save money. In other words, educate yourselves about these. Don't just assume that they are a great deal waiting to happen.

The original plan was to head back to the hotel to take a nap, but the boys were still going strong, so we made the incredible blunder of heading to World Showcase instead of resting.

On the way there, we were passing the pin station under Spaceship Earth, when husband said that he wanted to get a lanyard and trade pins. DH came back with his lanyard and a great pin of Mickey shaking the hand of a service man that he had purchased. No trading for that one!

As he was doing that, I saw a couple with the bride and groom ears on. I got a quick ok from the boys and we ran over to the newlyweds to give them a pin to trade. How fun it was to spead a little pixie dust!!

Our first stop in World Showcase was at Mexico. The river ride was cool and relaxing. There was a moment of apprehension when our DS #1 saw the dancing skeletons. Luckily, he got over it quickly, but I think he got a little hesitant again about things.

When we left there, we had almost reached Norway, when we came across Snow White all alone. A character alone?! What kind of bizarro world is this?! DS #1 didn't want to get out of the stroller to go see her. He was just fine watching his brother go there and get fawned over. And fawn over him she did. There was a hug, another Happy Birthday and an autograph. We got several cute pictures of him with her and he got to spend at least 5 minutes there alone with her. Snow White was absolutely the best character we saw there. Walt and the gang really got down her hand gestures and personality when they made a movie about this one. I wish we could have heard her sing because her speaking voice was exactly what you see on the screen. I think it was DS first crush.

Being a boy, he got over it quickly when he saw the Viking ship in Norway. They all climbed on that before we rode Maelstrom. We all enjoyed this except for, guess who? DS#1 didn't like the trolls at all. Once we got off, he didn't think it was so bad, but he wasn't interested in doing it again. Instead we stopped at the kidcot station to let the boys do a mask. They had fun and even learned to say Thank You in Norwegian. That was the only time we worked on the mask, but if the boys had been older, it could have really been fun.

We walked slowly through the gift shop on our way out admiring all the different things. One of the CM at the perfume section noticed the birthday pin and followed DS out of the store. She told him that for his birthday she wanted to give him his first cologne. With that, she presented him with a sample of men's cologne. I've got some cute pictures of DH dabbing it on him and DS wrinkling his nose at the smell. I looked around to see if I could find where the pixie dust was coming from but never found its source.

By now it is almost noon, and the boys are beginning to start showing signs of grumpiness. Since we hadn't left earlier for nap after lunch, I was concerned that we wouldn't make it back in time for the Ice Cream Social. We decided to press on. We set off at a good clip to try to get to the American Pavillion to see the Fife and Drum Corp.

We got there with just a couple minutes to spare. DH took the boys over to a pin cart while we were waiting. One of the CM there noticed the birthday pin and asked if DS had talked to Goofy yet. Not knowing what he was talking about, he shook his head. The CM reached behind him and punched something in on a phone behind him. He told DS if was for him and handed him the phone. I'm not sure what was being said but DS stood entranced. Just another bit of magic....but it got better!

We saw the Corp starting up our way, so we said goodbye and went over to watch the show. DS #1 LOVES marching bands, especially the drums, so I knew he'd enjoy this. The Corp did a great show and at the end asked all the children to come up to lead us in the Pledge of Allegience. There were maybe 10 kids there including mine and they couldn't have been more proud of themselves. Of course, my little guys didn't know the words but had a ball being up there anyway. Again, lots of pictures, lots of smiles! Great job Fife and Drum Corp!

When that was over, we wandered into the American Adventure. I was pretty sure that the boys were in no condition to sit through the show, but I wanted to see the Voices of Liberty who would be singing before the show. They were fantastic (as expected). DH even commented that it really shows the state we are in when Britany Spears and other singers are making millions when these incredibly talented singers were probably making just over minimum wage! Just not fair.

Just after the end of this show was when my absolute favorite memory of the trip happened. While the singers were doing a quick 'meet-n-greet' before the American Adventure started, one of the last members still out kneeled down to shake DS #2 hand. She noticed his birthday pin and GOH badge. Although the rest of the singers were almost in the back again, she called them back out. The hall was almost completely empty, but they proceeded to sing "Happy Birthday" to my son. He was so unsure what to do. All this beautiful sound being directed right at him. He didn't even know where to look he was so amazed. It was an absolutely incredible moment. I get teary eyed just thinking about it again.

It was all thanks to you people on the boards! If you hadn't written about the birthday pin, it never would have happened! Thank you! Thank you!

What could we do to follow up that wonderful show except try to hit another one. So off we went to the UK where The British Invasion would be performing. We sat on the curb to enjoy the show. DH (a huge Beatles fan) and I sang along while the boys danced in the street. Near the end of their set the band noticed the same newlywed couple that we came across earlier, sitting on a bench. The band called them up to the front where they had the couple do a wedding dance while they played. It was great!

Unfortunately, all that dancing had made the boys hot and even more tired and cranky. Since we had about 45 minutes before the PS, we decided to go to Journey Into Imagination to cool down and relax before ice cream.

Again, we weathered the "Is it scary?" storm before the ride. Luckily there was no line, so we got right on. I always enjoy this ride, but this time the boys were fidgety and whining. It was impossible to enjoy. All I could do was hope that the thought of ice cream would keep them going.

Ok. Here's a helpful hint. How do you know when you should have stopped long before for a nap? The anwer is: When your 2 year old is crying and saying over and over, "I don't want ice cream, Mommy." I never thought I'd ever hear those words from my sons, but here it was...happening in WDW no less! Instead of using basic common sense and heading for the exit, I tried to justify staying with the old, "Once they are sitting and have the ice cream it will be better". To some extent it worked, but they were too far gone to enjoy the interaction with the characters. We got a nice photo of the family with Chip and Pluto, but we cut the whole thing short and headed back to the hotel.

Did I forget to mention that my dad and wife had arrived at WDW that day? We had PS for dinner with them at the Coral Reef at 7:30 that night. I was not exactly looking forward to that although it would be great to see my dad.

Back at the hotel, the boys went down easily and even DH dozed. For some reason, I just couldn't sleep. Although, I KNEW we needed to stop for rest, I wanted to be at the park!!

DS#1 woke up first after a little over an hour. To let the others sleep, he and I went down the visit the gift shop and look at the pool. Once I had let him put his feet in the water he was hooked. There was going to be no getting around swimming this trip!

We went back up and found everyone awake. DH and I fortified the boys with Pop-Tarts (I know...very nutritious. I'm a bad mom!) in case they wouldn't eat at the restaurant. Then we left to go back to get our PS.

Since I am always obnoxiously early, (I think it is a gift) we decided to go into The Living Seas just a few minutes before it closed. The boys had fun looking at the fish and another great CM was there. He gave the boys some Mickey stickers that they proceeded to plaster all over themselves! As I'm covertly looking at my watch and trying not to appear to rush them through the exhibits in case we are late, they are having a great time. Finally, I can't stand it any longer. <gasp> We might be late!

We exited the building and walked around to the Coral Reef. This is one of my 'must-dos' on this vacation. I love seafood and never get it because the rest of the family won't touch it. I also love to SCUBA dive but the aquarium here is as close as I've gotten in a long time! Anyway, as we round the corner, we see Dad and P waiting for us on the bench. The boys start screaming and take off running to them! A couple that were exiting the building smiled at us and asked if they knew them. DH laughed and said that no, we had trained them to accost strangers. We all got a chuckle out of that.

The table was ready for us when we checked in and we were led to an almost tank side booth on the left side of the room. We enjoyed that view and, surprisingly, the conversation and company. The food was good, but I discovered that I am not a polenta fan. Oh well, learn something new everyday! As we were eating, I looked over and noticed DS #2 eyes were huge as he stared at the tank. I glanced over and exclaimed "Look! Look there's Mickey!" Sure enough, there was the mouse himself SCUBAing around the tank. He even stopped at waved at everyone! I think we all had a good time. We talked about hooking up at MGM on the next day and decided that Dad would call on the cell phone when they got moving.

We paid the bill and made a potty stop on the way out before shooting some pictures with the Nemo sculptures. As we exited the restaurant, our waiter, Bob, came running up to us from the direction of the park, saying "There you are!" In his hand was the daily envelope that held our money for the day. He must have passed us while we were in the restroom. We had left it on the table! I couldn't believe it! Luckily, there was not much in there, just what was left over from the rest of the day. But there is no way he could have known that. He could have been saving our entire vacation by bringing us that envelope! Astounding! Kudos to Bob. A letter is going out to WDW to let them know how great he was!

The boys really wanted to ride the monorail again, so we all loaded up and took another ride. P and I had a nice conversation while Dad sat and played with the boys. It wasn't quite as nice as the night before, but who's complaining?!? We said good night to Dad and P and left for the hotel. Both DH and I were surprised at how nice an evening we had had. No problems at all with P! I'll never know how Disney manages this kind of magic.

Back at the hotel, we let the boys take a quick swim along with some beach balls that the front desk had given them. It was a little cool in the water, but it was very relaxing sitting soaking our feet and watching the boys play.

Finally, it was time again for bed. Not having had a nap, I was ready! I checked my pedometer and saw that I had walked 12,483 steps that day. I have no idea how much distance that translates to, but it felt like a lot. Little did I know that would be the least amount of steps I'd walk while at the parks.

We all fell asleep looking back at a great day and ahead to another.

[LuvindisCruiser]

I am so enjoying your trip so far. I like to see where people with children eat, just to give me some ideas. My children will be 5 when we go in May and I'm pretty naive about all the places to eat. And, I agree about the nap. Some times the kids seem like they are doing great, and then an hour later Wham! we are in trouble and major need of some sleep. (and, that's just mommy!) For our trip I am really going to try to rest during the afternoons, at least that is the plan !! Can't wait for the rest of the trip !!:wave:

[Lyn-CA]

Thanks for your wonderful trip report. I guess the pixie dust and Disney magic is in abundance for people like you and me who TRULY believe. ::yes::

[kathymc]

really enjoying your reports - keep them coming!

I spent my bday in DW in 2003 and it was amazing! I got a birthday pin and loved the extra attention (mind you - I turned 36) the staff at the store in Mexico sang a Mexican birthday song, goofy called me on the phone and the talking trash can ranked on me!

I hope your trip continues to have such wonderful surprises (and glad to see you are all getting along well)

[BlueBayou]

Thanks for the great trip report. Please keep it coming.

[declansdad]

I love reading your reports. My wife and I took our son to this past March, just before his third birthday. I wish we had gotten him a birthday pin but we thought it needed to be on his birthday.

I am reliving some of the magic that my son experienced by visualizing your moments.

Thanks you very much!!

Declansdad

[llij]

Great trip report! Can't wait to read more!

:sunny:

[AMaloy314]

We wanted to save the Magic Kingdom for our last two days in case the kids staged a revolt and wouldn't go to any other parks. So we decided to go to DS/MGM on Friday and Animal Kingdom on Sat.

Once again, we had breakfast in the hotel before taking off for MGM. The food was again adequate for us, but nothing spectacular. For whatever reason, my littlest was becoming addicted to the apple juice and bananas there, things he almost never touched at home. I guess that it is true that things really do taste different when you are on vacation.

When we got to Disney Studios, I set off for Guest Relations with DS2 to get a birthday pin. Both sons already had on their Guest of Honor Badges and after the day before, I knew how important these things were. DS2 got another "Happy Birthday" and we headed over to wait in line to go through the turnstiles. That was about the only time anyone even noticed the pin all day. I'm not sure why. Maybe it blended in with his white shirt.

At that point I was beginning to tug on DS2 shirt to pull it back into place when I realized that I had spent the day before doing the same thing. The T-shirts that I had made for the boys, while very cute, were a little large for my youngest. The pins kept pulling the neck down so he looked like a little rag-picker. Oh, well. DH said that we would look for some t-shirts later. Note to self: Making shirts only saves money if you don't have to replace the t-shirts at the park. Next time make sure they fit!!

Once we were inside the park, it was just a short wait for the "Lights! Camera! Action!" and rope drop. This time, I had a plan. No stopping to figure out where we were going today!! We were going to Muppets 3-D. Well, that was the plan.

On the way there, I remembered about the well at Indiana Jones. I knew we weren't going to get to see the show because of DS#1's loud noise phobia. (Last summer, we carried him screaming out of a very similar show at King's Island). I knew that this would be the perfect time to try it. Up we go and I smugly tell DH to pull the rope. He figures that it must be something I read about, so he pulls....Nothing happens. Ummm, try pulling harder....He pulls again...Again, nothing. Ok, let ME try. Obviously he must have been doing something wrong. I pull... I pull again. Still nothing. Smugness gone, I walk over to the CM manning the turnstile for the show. I told him that I had read about tugging the rope and something was supposed to happen. Was there a trick? Nope, it turns out the Aussies that were in the well had unexpectedly left, with no word as to when they would be back. He said he was guessing they'd had it with the hurricanes.

Ok, that didn't work out exactly as I had planned, but on to Muppets!!

As we round the corner, we come face to face with the Star Tours gun/animal thingy. (I'm sure that there is a name for it. I'm also sure some Star Wars officianado is rolling their eyes right now!) DH and DS#1 want to go on it. I'm not too sure about it, but DS says he really wants to go with Daddy. Off they go. DS#2, who is my dare-devil wannabe, was a little disappointed. I explained that he wasn't tall enough, but it wouldn't be long before he was big. Then he and I took a potty break and went to look at the Tree House Habitat in front of the ride. DS#2 then goes to get "shot" with the water coming from the guns. We decide to go into the gift shop so we can see them come out. No sooner had we gotten inside and they were on their way out. They had not had any wait to get on the ride. DS#1 had a big smile on his face and really enjoyed himself. I was surprised. He just kept saying that it was fun but really bumpy.

Finally, we get to Muppets Vision 3D. I love this show and was excited for the boys to see it. It was great as usual. The grumpy old men are my favorite. DS#2 wouldn't keep his glasses on so he didn't get as much out of it, but the rest of us liked it. When we got home he referred to the Muppets as the 3Ds, so maybe he had a better time than I thought.

The Muppets entrance is right behind the New York Street set, so I wanted to show them how the buildings in movies look from behind. We headed in that direction since we had to pick up the stroller anyway. That's when DH saw a pin cart. We just HAD to stop. I'm glad that we did. The boys traded pins and we had a very nice conversation with the CM. She was there on a college program and was very sweet.

We showed the boys the back of the building facades and walked through the opening onto the street. What a disappointment. Everything was behind board barricades. All you could see was the top of the buildings. I'm not sure what they were doing, but the whole street was that way. We were able to show them the forced perspective of the city, so it wasn't a total loss.

Next up, we headed for Millionaire. As we, came around the corner on Mickey Ave, we see the Disney Stars trailers. In front of them are several characters. DS#1 true to form was not interested in getting too close, so he stayed in the stroller. DS#2 was out of it in a flash! "Lilo, Mommy! Lilo and Stitch!!". Up we go to get an autograph and hugs. He couldn't believe it when Stitch tried to eat his autograph paper! We got a couple really cute photo and then Lilo saw other DS. She and Stitch went right up to him which didn't seem to bother him a bit. We got a photo of them all together and then it was time to move on. Next up was JoJo and Goliath! I think DS#2 was even more excited this time.
JoJo spent several minutes with him, but Goliath had wandered off to visit with some other kids. DS#1 watched but wouldn't get out to visit. After many "Goodbye, JoJo!"s over his shoulder, DS#2 was finally out of earshot.

We had made it to the Who Wants To Be A Millionaire--Play It! set. Gasp! There was a rope across the entrance and no CM nearby! Was it closed? Was it being refurbished?! Oh,no! This was another must do for us....all of us. The kids love this show and play along in the evening while we watch before bedtime. I quickly walk to a CM in a gift booth farther down to ask. He politely tells me (using a voice that preschool teachers use a lot) that it doesn't open until 11:30. Because it is a show, it doesn't run all the time. Feeling a bit stupid, I thank him and go back to consult with DH.

We decide to try to get into PlayHouse Disney. When we get there, we see an ocean of strollers. We unload the boys and DH goes off to find a parking spot for ours. We have 20 minutes before the next show, so I spot the Voyage of The Little Mermaid close by. Thinking we might get in another show before Playhouse Disney, we walk over to ask the CM there if he thought we'd have time. He didn't think so and encouraged us to see Playhouse Disney and come back to this show.

Ok, now what? 15 minutes to kill. What should we do? Oh wait!! There's another pin station! Have I mentioned how great pin trading is? The boys each traded and DH did,too. Just in time for us to get in line. Back we go.

We get in after just a short wait. In this show, everyone sits on the floor pretty close together. Hint: Stay close together with your party. I got separated from DH and DSs at the door, just by a couple people. By the time, I reached them, I literally had to pick up DS2 to put him on my lap to sit down. There was no way to scootch in between anyone. So, take my advice and hold onto belt loops if you need to, but stay together.

This show was fantastic! Everyone (except for, maybe, DH) knew all the words to the songs and sang along. All the favorite Playhouse Disney characters were there. (Ok almost all. DS#1 missed Clay) Bear was there with his whole crew. We saw Rolie Polie Olie, Billie and Zoie, along with Stanley and Dennis--strangely Elsie and Harry weren't there to sing about the Great Big Book of Everything. We also saw Pooh and Friends before Bear came back out to sing the Good bye song with Luna. The boys had a blast. They danced, sang, tried to catch bubbles and carried streamers out with them. I know it was one of the highlights of their trip.

Time for Millionaire. We got there just as they were letting everyone into the studio, so no wait there. The stage manager came out to explain how it all worked. He reminded us that no video or photographs were allowed, and out came the host. I had read all about how to play the game and to push the button as soon as you saw the answer come up. That doesn't get you into the hot seat on the fastest finger part, though. I got the answers right, but was nowhere near the top 10. An eleven year old from Wales was at the top. She did pretty well especially since she was so nervous. At the 1000 point level, they show the rankings. There I was!! #3! DH had hit a wrong button, so he was out. About that time DS#2 decided he was bored. I passed him to DH so that I could concentrate. A couple more questions went by, then she missed one.

When they showed the score board, they start at the bottom and go up. I watched the numbers as they moved up and when they got to the #1, there was my seat number!!!!!! I looked at DH and said (so intelligently) "That's me!!" I mumbled something to him about the camera being under my seat and to not forget it. I was actually more nervous about walking down the stairs than I was about being in the hot seat, but I made it without falling. When the host asked who I was with, they flashed my sons and DH up on the bigs screens. There was DH holding the camera he had picked up for me, looking like he was trying to take an illicit photo. He was really innocent, but it looked bad. Sorry, honey!

I can't remember much about it except thinking that the questions were pretty easy as I got the 1000pt one correct. Woo-hoo! I'd won some pins and a baseball hat! The game pauses here to do some small talk and check the score board. When the game started again, the 2000 pt question was a repeat of the 100pt question. Gotta love that! Unfortunately, it was a computer glitch. The questions were marginally harder, but I still felt pretty confident. This was going great! That's when the 8000pt question came up. Something about Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I think I have seen a total of one show...and that's in 2 to 5 minute clips of each one. I had no clue. All I could think of was "I'm going to have to use a life line and hear about it from DH." He repeatedly has said that no one should have to use a life line before 32000. Oh,well. I asked the audience and got an overwhelming concensus. I make the brilliant comment heard so often on TV, "This looks like a smart audience. I'll go with them." So much for witty repartee. But they were right, so on we went. I got to 125,000 before I had to use my other lifelines to get that Gala Somebody-or-other was Salvador Dali's muse. The 250,000 question was something about how many James Bond movies starred Sean Connery. The choices were 5,6,7 or 8. My opinion that Sean Connery is the ultimate James Bond not withstanding, I had no idea. But you can't win a Disney Cruise by stopping. So I guessed 5. Several people started clapping before the answer came up, so I wasn't alone in being wrong. That actually made me feel better when he told me that the answer was 7. So much for my chance at being a Millionaire! I was taken to a room backstage where you sign some papers saying that you won't be in the hot seat for 30 days and some other legal stuff. Then I was given a lanyard, 10 collectors pins (up to 32000 points), a baseball cap and a polo shirt. Very cool!

I knew that we would be back to play this again because DH is very competitive. But not right then. If we had learned nothing else the day before, we had learned that naps are a necessity. It was time to go back to the hotel. We stopped at McDonalds not far from the hotel to pick up burgers to eat in the room. I had budgeted $40 for lunch and it only cost $15. That was a nice change.

Everyone rested up before we went back to the park about 3:30.

First thing we did was go over to the Great Movie Ride. We had fun looking at all the hand and foot prints before we went in. The kids liked the Wizard of Oz set best, but DS#1 was not happy with the Alien set. My favorite is the end with all the clips of those great movies.

When we got done there, we talked to the boys and they agreed to go back to the Millionaire show. (Told you we'd be back). Neither one of us did great this time. But it was still fun!

We had a 5:30 PS for Sci-Fi and we were getting hungry. We got there a few minutes early, but we hardly waited at all. We were put into a car near the back, but there really aren't any bad seats there. DH and DS#1 sat in the front seat and DS#2 and I sat in the back. Since we had extra money from lunch we splurged a bit and got glowing ice cubes in our drinks! (Tip: You can turn these off and on by tapping on one side or the other. I wish we had known this. We would have saved and reused them at nights) We also split 2 milkshakes which none of us finished. Food was good but service was subpar for Disney. The atmosphere is great and we enjoyed the shows. I'm not sure we'd go back but haven't ruled it out.

As we walked out, DH realized that it had poured while we were eating. We had left the stroller outside but someone had brought it in to keep it dry. It saved the boys from having to sit in a puddle the rest of the evening. Thanks to whoever did that for us!

When we left there, we got a message from my dad that they were coming to MGM after being at EPCOT that day. They had reservations at 7:30 for a Fantasmic dinner package. We met up with them and did some quick shopping--remember those t-shirts we needed? While we were getting them, Dad and P bought a couple remote control toys for the boys. I tried to argue, but I knew that they all really wanted it to happen, so I gave up.

DH really wanted to go on Tower of Terror, so we all headed in that general direction before we had to split up. There was some general talk about which park we were going to in the morning. P was all concerned about the hurricane, but having seen the last report several days before, I was not worried. I told them that we'd let them know but we were pretty sure that we were going to Animal Kingdom unless something changed.

When we split up, Dh started talking to DS#1 about riding ToT. I knew he was wasting his breath. This was the child that didn't like Spaceship Earth! I was shocked when he said that he wanted to go. He had so much fun with Daddy on Star Tours that he was up for this. I think my mouth was still hanging open when they disappeared up the path. DS#2 and I waited around for a bit to see if they would chicken out, and sure enough, here they came back out the same way. Imagine my surprise when I found out that it was just a bathroom emergency. That taken care of, back they went. The line for this must have been longer than anything else in the park although we couldn't see it. We waited and waited and waited. It felt like an hour while I worried about my baby getting on that horrible ride, but it was probably more like 20 minutes.

When they got off the ride and walked back to us, I scanned their faces for major trauma. There was none to be found, only big smiles. When I asked DS how he liked it, he just kept saying"Come look! I'll show you!". He wanted to show me the ride photo! It is the only park photo that we bought the entire trip. In it, he looks to be screaming in terror and pressing against DH so tightly that he almost disappears into DH's side. He is so proud of that picture that he shows it to everyone!

We knew that the fireworks were going to start soon, so it was time for us to leave. Even after ToT, there was no way DS#1 was going to do fireworks.

It wasn't too late when we got back to the hotel, so we took the boys back down to the pool for a swim. They met up with some other kids there and had fun throwing the beach balls around. We struck up a conversation with the children's mother and found out that they were mandatory evacuees from the coast. The hurricane was supposed to hit sometime late Sat/early Sunday. Uh-oh. Maybe P wasn't over reacting after all. DH and I discussed it and decided that we would go to Magic Kingdom the next day instead of Animal Kingdom. If for some reason, the parks closed, we wanted to make sure that we didn't miss MK.

With that, we went back in, called Dad to let him know where we'd be the next day, and went to bed.

PS. I let DH read this before I posted. His comment is that when he reads this it just doesn't seem as great as he remembers this day being. This was his very favorite park!

[LuvindisCruiser]

What a great day! What time would you usually leave to get a nap in? Did your boys actually take a nap? I'm really concerned about the nap, because I really want to stay out late and catch all the night time lights and activities, without 2 cranky children (and parents). I'm curious about the pin trading. How does it actually work? Do you just start buying pins, and you can trade them for any other pin? Please help me, I have 2 five yr. olds, and it may be fun for them to do ! Can't wait to read about the fun at MK !!!:wave:

[Lives4Disney]

I love your report! Very enjoyable read. Keep it coming - can't wait to hear how the Magic Kingdom days went....:)

[Dreamin' Disney]

Great report so far... looking forward to more!

[AMaloy314]

Thank you to everyone who has posted regarding my trip report. I'm glad that you are enjoying it. I wanted to apologize for taking so long to get installments out, but I'm having a hard time getting enough uninterrupted time. Thank you for being patient.

LuvindisCruiser-- I've tried a couple times to pm you but am not having any luck. Do you have your pm's turned on?



I'll do my best to get out another days report soon!


A

[anne60]

With two boys under five, I can't for the life of me understand why you're having trouble finding the time???? I only had one boy, and boy, did he keep me busy!!! I am really enjoying your reports!

[LuvindisCruiser]

{LuvindisCruiser-- I've tried a couple times to pm you but am not having any luck. Do you have your pm's turned on?}

Oops- Sorry, all fixed now ! And, eagerly awaiting the rest of the report !!:wave:

[Angelrose]

I'm really enjoying your report. Thank you for taking the time.

[AMaloy314]

Ahhh. This was it! The day we had all been waiting for. The reason for watching Disney Sing-along Fun At Disneyland video ad nauseum. The day we were entering the realm of children's fantasies.

I'd like to report that we were all so excited that we woke up even before the alarm went off. I'd like to, but I can't. After walking 12,579 steps yesterday, I was wiped out. So were the kids. We must have slept like rocks, but we rolled out of bed when the alarm did go off, even if we rolled very slowly.

We managed to get out of the room and down to breakfast at scheduled time. Because we were moving so slowly, I didn't really get a chance to check out the news about the hurricane. I think I may have been the only person in the state of Florida that still thought there was a chance Jeanne would miss us. Perhaps that was a good thing, since I didn't spend any time worrying about it.

The hotel restaurant, Streamers, again only had 2 or 3 groups besides our family there for breakfast. We had some cereal or bagels (along with a banana) and were out the door. No reason to linger over breakfast here.

Once we passed the toll booth to the TTC, we drove past many empty parking lots. It is hard to believe that the parks could hold as many people as it would take to fill those spaces. We ended up in the 3rd row of the first parking lot. There were more people here than we had encountered at any of the parks so far.

When we got on the tram, there was a group in front of us with matching shirts that was having a great time. No question that they were excited! My boys watched this group raise their arms when the tram went under the tunnel like it was a roller coaster. After that, we couldn't just ride the tram ever again. We had to experience it as an attraction, arms up, squeals and all! It is great being a parent and getting to do that with your kids. And we hadn't even gotten completely out of the parking lot. This was going to be a great day!

We showed our passes so that we could head to the ramp for the monorail and went through the gate. That's when I saw the sign directing us to either the ferry or the monorail. Oooo, a ferry. We hadn't ridden a ferry yet. I attempted to convince the boys that this is a great idea and we took a vote on how to get to MK. When the monorail won by 3 to 1, I invoked the "Mother's Dictator Act" and we started for the ferry. We get about 10 steps when a CM tells us that the ferry isn't running yet. Ok. That has to be Walt's way of reminding me that this trip is all about the kids. I can take a hint. We took the monorail to MK.

As we are passing through security and the turnstiles, I'm telling DH about how I want to get the boys to Tinkerbell's Treasures. He isn't exactly sure what I'm talking about, but he's game. We are waiting outside the railroad station to get to the rope when I realize that there is no train at the station and no opening ceremony going on. Hmmm. Hurricane preparations?

The music came up and we were all let onto Main Street for rope drop. We don't try to push to the front, but when the rope drops we are off. There were a lot of people there, but no one else seemed to have an agenda like we did. DH was pushing that stroller like a madman! We got to the shop just in time to hear the CM say, "Come on, girls. Let's see if we can wake her up." We didn't get there in time for the boys to wake up Tinkerbell, but we did get to see it. Tip: Don't waste your time rushing for this. Our time would have been better spent enjoying the walk back to fantasy land. The whole things consists of some tinkling music and some lights on the wall. Take your time, but do stop in the shop and ask to look in the bureau. Maybe you can see Tink anyway!! Hint! Hint!

First thing the boys wanted to ride was Dumbo. Believe it or not, we walked right on. When we started to get on the ride, the CM was handing out blue and red chips. I'm not sure what they were for, but we were supposed to put ours on Dumbo's outside ear. The CM then came around and picked them up. What is that about? Maybe to keep people from trying to ride twice in a row? DS#1 and DH ended up in a car almost directly across from DS#2 and myself. I didn't get even one good shot of them, but I got a great photo of DS#2's face as he 'flew' Dumbo up and down with the lever. Pure happiness. I was enjoying watching him so much that I forgot to look over the fence to see the construction on 20,000 Leagues. DH told me later that it was totally drained and had heavy equipment out there. I think I had the better view.

Next up was Cinderella's Golden Carrousel. We were the first ones in line for the next ride, and I was scanning the horses. I began telling the boys that Cinderella's very own special horse was on this carrousel and I would show it to them as soon as I found it. Tell you what, there is a lot of horses on that thing. While I was looking, other people were filing in behind us. There was a cute little girl who had obviously come from CRT and was dressed in a princess outfit. I was so disappointed to hear the CM come up to talk to her and tell her that he had a special horse just for her. I knew exactly which one he was talking about. I was sure that little girl was going to be thrilled. I know he didn't hear any of our conversation, so it wasn't intentional on his part, but I was still disappointed. He then came to us and was chatting with DH and myself about the history of the carrousel. One horse went by, and he told us that it was named Liberty and was the only remaining original horse there. He totally saved the ride for me. I knew my boys would enjoy Liberty much more than a girly princess horse. When the ride stopped, the CM let the little girl on first and took her to Cindy's horse with the golden ribbon before he opened the gate for the rest of us. I thought that was really nice. That way, no one could grab the horse when she was all excited about it. DH took DS#2 and they headed for Liberty while DS#1 picked out his ride. My ToT boy picked out a bench seat so that he didn't have to go up and down so high on the horses. Too funny.

On to Snow White's Scary Adventures. DS#1 sat with me, and we made it not so scary by yelling at Snow White not to eat the apple and telling the Dwarfs to hurry up and get home. He was having so much fun hollering that he forgot to be scared at all. I think that he would have been happy to ride it again if we hadn't been going to Mickey's Philharmagic next.

No lines again as we walked right into Philharmagic. After the Muppets at MGM, I didn't think that DS#2 was going to like this very much, but he did really well keeping on his glasses and watching. I'm not sure if my glasses were defective or if it was just me, but for most of the movie, I didn't get the 3D effect. DH mentioned the same thing after we left. Don't get me wrong, though. It was still great. All the recent movies were represented so the boys were extremely familiar with these characters....probably more so than Snow White, Peter Pan, and even Pooh. They really liked it.

We walked right over to Peter Pan's Flight to fly over London. Minor wait here...Maybe a minute, before we caught our boats. The boys loved this one, too.

We walked past a barricaded IASW which wasn't as hard on me as I thought it would be. I guess I was expecting the Disneyland facade with boarded up windows. So it wasn't nearly as traumatic as I expected.

We had already decided that we weren't going to hit Toontown Fair. In heading out of Fantasyland into Liberty Square, I didn't even realize that we had missed The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh. The boys never even noticed.

DH and I took the boys over to go into The Haunted Mansion. We didn't make a big deal about it, and they didn't have a chance to get upset about being scared. There was no one to be seen in line at all. So we stopped and took a photo of the boys in front of the hearse with the mansion as a backdrop, before we started up the path. As we got near the headstones, the CM at the door ushered us into the mansion. We were able to see Leota moving, but didn't get much of a chance to really examine the graves. Immediately, we were into the no exit room. No problems with the boys, even when the lights went out and you could see the ceiling. We boarded our doom buggies, and away we went. Knowing at least one of the stories behind the Haunted Mansion for background really made it more enjoyable for me. DH and DS#1 were in the buggie in front of DS#2 and me, but I was still able to tell DH about the hidden Mickey in the ballroom. This time, I noticed some logs under a dining chair in the ballroom scene. I tried to see where they were supposed to have come from but couldn't figure this whole thing out. Anyone with any insight? I saw the abstract hidden Donald on the back of the chair at the floating candelabra scene. I'm afraid that someone was really stretching to see a duck there. It didn't look like much to me. The boys did fine on this ride until we got to the graveyard area. They did NOT like the ghoulish heads that popped up. There was no hysterics, but we covered eyes for that part of the trip. It made it much better.

When we got off, I started scanning the ground for that elusive engagement ring. I looked all over but couldn't find it. I wasn't about to conceed defeat, so I went over and asked some CMs that didn't look too busy if they could point me in the right direction. One of them kindly offered to show it to me. It can't get any easier than that. As she walked us back over to the awning at the exit, she reminded us that Master Gracey's fiancee was only 16 at the time of her death and still as small as a child. When we reached the supports at the beginning of the awning, she pointed down and there it was. The fiancee must have been pretty small, bacause that ring is tiny. (If you are looking, it is on the left side as you face the mansion. It does look a little like a bolt.) The CM mentioned that it needs to be polished and that it gets stepped on a lot. She then proceeded to tell us about the authentic hearse there. It had been built in England and was actually used at the turn of the century. She said that Florida weather was very hard on it and that it was part of their job to scrape the mold off the wooden wheels. She also mentioned some years ago, they were going to have to send it back to Europe to get it refurbished, and it was supposed to be gone for several months. When Disney heard that it wouldn't be back in time for Halloween, they started to scramble to figure out what to do. Luckily, they were able to find a craftsman in the midwest who specializes in wooden carriage wheels. He flew out and was able to take care of it.

As she went on with her stories, I heard one that was new to me. The empty harness in front of the hearse was originally supposed to be lighted in such a way that if you took a photo of it at night, the developed picture would show a ghostly horse standing in the traces. So far, it hasn't been done. The way she put it was, "The west coast gets everything first." She just laughed when I reminded her that most people like it at WDW better, though.

We let her get back to work with many thanks and then snuck back to take a quick photo of me pointing to the ring on the ground. Or course, you can't really tell what I'm pointing at, but I know what it is!!!

We walked over to the Liberty Tree. I was showing DH and the boys the 13 lanterns that represent the original 13 colonies (the boys weren't much impressed), when the phone rang. It was Dad. He and P were in the park. He told me that he was on a bridge across from the castle. That really narrowed it down for me. I finally got out of him that he was on a bridge to Frontier Land. Problem was there were actually 3 bridges he could have been talking about. Our conversation continued along these same lines. "Ok,Dad. What do you see around you?" "I see some water and there is a double decker bus letting off a bunch of people". "Umm, Dad? Do you see anything that doesn't move around the park?" "Yes! I do! I can see the castle." By this time, I'm laughing. I had just dug out the information that he could see a store when I saw P leaving a restroom right in front of us. I flagged her down and she led us to Dad. He had been about 50ft away the whole time! It is a good thing the park was not crowded. We might never have found them!!

It was 10:30, and they again offered to take the boys around. I knew that Dad wanted to spend some quality time with them, so after a quick consult with DH, it was decided. The boys would go with them for an hour. That way, when we'd meet up, we could all have lunch before the boys needed to take a nap.

DH and I went over to do The Hall of Presidents. I knew that DSs would not have truly appreciated this, but I enjoy it. The animatronics in here are amazing. It is very easy to suspend disbelief with all the Presidents fidgeting, whispering and, well, just acting human. We walked out of there feeling suitably patriotic.

We wanted to go back to the Haunted Mansion again to really get to concentrate on the details. We were rushed past the headstones again, which I tried to resist. One look at the dour CM and I did what she wanted. They really get into character! DH and I had a good time. He hadn't understood what I meant about the hidden Mickey last time so I pointed it out to him on the table. I also showed him the hidden Donald, but he agreed with me that it might take some wishful thinking to see it. It was fun to experience the ride as two mature adults, but we totally blew that when we picked up the hitch hiking ghost. Giggling while we gave the ghost rabbit ears and tried to pick his nose made me realize that we really need our kids, at least to justify our behavior.

Finshed there, we still had some time before we had to meet back up. Since we wanted to enjoy most of the rides with the boys for the first time, we decided to go get a birthday button for DS#2. In trying to get out of the room that morning, I had forgotten it. (Luckily, their GOH badges were on their lanyards.) We set off down Main Street headed to City Hall. As we passed all the balloons, I mentioned how much I like seeing them, but I'd never spend the money on them. We got the pin and were starting back, when DH said that he'd really like to get one for the boys. So we stopped. (I'm such a softy!) The CM with the balloons was struggling with them, just a little, because of the breeze that had started. But we got our ballon, and we went back to Liberty Square.

Since none of them were back yet, I went into the Christmas Shop to look around. I picked out several ornaments that I liked and called DH in to make the final decision. He chose our ornament for the year and I went to pay. Instead of carrying the package around all day, I opted to have it delivered to the front of the park for later pick-up. It should be there in about 3 hours, I was told. The CM told me that they were telling people they were only doing deliveries to the resorts with a 4 day window because of the hurricane. When I filled out my pick-up slip, I noticed that the DTD hotels were on it, too. But I didn't ask if they actually sent packages there.

When I finished there, there was still no sign of Dad, P, and DSs. Since they were 15 minutes late and had not called, I called them. They were just getting off the Indy cars with the boys. They had also done the Tea Cups and (great minds) noticed that DS#2 didn't have his birthday pin, so they picked one up for him. Since they were standing across from Starlight Ray's Cosmic Cafe and that's where I had planned lunch, we said we'd meet them there. DH was a little annoyed, but got over it. We recognized our stroller with the bright lime green bandana before we ever saw them so DH went over to add the balloon. They were waiting for us at the door. DH took the boys to get a table since it was now noon and prime time for lunch. Cosmic Ray's has different lines to order different foods (Who's stupid idea was this?), so I jumped into the burger line while Dad and P went to get salads. We successfully used the vouchers again, splitting the burgers with an extra bun. This time, the CM didn't charge me for the bun although I offered to pay.

Dad and P showed up at the table moments after I did, so we timed that well. They had some kind of chicken ceasar-y salad thing. P complained that it had entirely too much dressing, but that is typical. It was at that point that I figured out that I had hardly heard her complain this whole time. It's too bad Disney doesn't know what a huge compliment that is. After all, this is the woman who, when Dad took her to Hawaii, complained that their two bedroom condo was too close to the ocean and the water was too loud. Disney magic at work.

The rest of us enjoyed our meals. When we all finished eating, we told Dad that we'd call him when we got back to the parks after nap and meet up then.

As we were starting out of Tomorrow Land to go back the the hotel, I noticed that there were no lines at Buzz Lightyear. We made a quick detour to ride this before we left. While we were listening to Buzz give us our instructions, DH surprised me by pointing out at hidden Mickey that I had never heard about. I was very impressed. (For those interested, check out the planet pictures on the wall to the left as you face Buzz.)

This was one ride that I was not sharing my insider's knowlege! DS#1 and I took the car in front of DH and other DS, and we were off. It took me a little while to get the hang of aiming, but by the time we got stopped at the battery room, I was racking up the points. While we were stopped, I aimed at the small batteries at the back of the room and in no time, I had maxed out my points. I casually turned our car so that DH could see my score. The look on his face was priceless as he said, "How did you do that?!" It isn't often that I beat DH at anything, but I have to admit this was fun. I don't think this ride will rank in my favorites, but I surely enjoyed it this time!!

On the way out, I tried to see if I could hear Stitch behind the wall, but no luck. About this time is when our Mickey balloon broke free of his earthly bonds and headed off into the great gray yonder. Tip: It probably is not the best time to buy a balloon when there is a hurricane about to strike. We didn't have it long, but enjoyed it while we did!

We got back to the hotel, DH and the boys konked out. I used my nervous energy more constructively today and watched the hurricane news. No doubt about it, the hurricane was hitting sometime late that night or early Sun. I was really glad that we had decided to go to Magic Kingdom today instead of putting it off.

When everyone woke up, we went back to MK. We called Dad to let him know we were on our way back, and he gave us the news that there had been an announcement that the parks would close early, at 7pm because of the weather. As we entered the parking lot, we noticed quite a stream of cars heading in the opposite direction. I was surprised because, although it was breezy and a little misty at times, the weather was far from bad.

We got back into MK after riding the tram/roller-coaster and the monorail. Since the hurricane was immenent, I wanted to take care of another of my must-do's before we did anything else. I wanted to get silhouttes done of the boys. My parents had one of me done at Disneyland when I was about their age and I thought it was really nice.

As we headed over to get it done, we came across a marching band right there on Main Street. Of course we had to stop to watch. The boys just love bands!

We then went over to the little cart near the China shop, just off Main Street, to have it done. To get each boy done with a frame for each was about $30. A bargain as far as I was concerned. DS#1 sat up in the chair like a trooper while DH took DS#2 off to explore the shops. I couldn't see how it was going, but the CM sure didn't seem to be concentrating too hard on this. It took a while and during this time, I could see snips and paper turning, but not much else. When the CM was done, he went around a corner to put it in a frame just as DH and DS returned. DH left this time with DS#1 in tow to shop. And we started again. DS#2 didn't do as well sitting still, so the CM handed me a little book to read to him while I held him in my lap. It worked out great and we weren't even finished reading when the CM said he was done. After the silhouttes were in the frames and handed to me, I was amazed! This guy was an artist. These silhouettes weren't just some generic head shots. He had truly captured my boys. He even got my 4 yr olds serious eyebrows and 2yo's up-turned nose. I now had my favorite souvenirs from the trip!

I have to brag a little here and tell you that the CM mentioned how well my sons did sitting still. He said some times it is a real struggle. I was really proud of my little guys. All moms need moments like this to look back on when the kids are screaming in the grocery store!

We had PS for Whispering Canyon at the Wilderness Lodge at 6pm, so I wanted to be at the boat dock by 5:30. We called Dad and told him that we wanted to ride the train around the park, so he was going to meet us near the station. They were going to be leaving soon anyway so this would put them back at the front of the park.

We all boarded the train and had a great ride. I had forgotten how much of the park you got to see. It was a lot of fun and very relaxing.

Dad and P left to try to get some Mexican food for dinner at EPCOT, but we still had a little time before we had to leave. A quick look at the map and we knew we wanted the boys to see Pirates of the Carribean. We didn't want them to miss it if the parks were closed for the rest of our trip.

As we walked back through the park, it was getting darker and the rain was spitting a little harder. It still wasn't horrible, but you could tell it was getting worse. And the park was emptying out. By the time we got to POTC, there was almost no one around. We parked the stroller and walked right in. I don't remember the parrot talking, but I'm not sure if it wasn't working or if we had just gotten in so quickly as to miss it. We got the first seat in the boat and off we went. The boys didn't like the cannons hitting so close or the loud noise, but that part was over pretty quickly. We provided a diversion for them when I told DH to call George. He didn't have a clue what I was talking about, but he was willing. (He's such a good sport!) "Hey, George!" didn't get any reaction except some strange looks from the others in our boat. Maybe he wasn't loud enough. So I gave it a try (shades of Indiana Jones' well!) "Hey, George!". This time I know that I heard a snort of laughter behind us. I'm sure they thought we were crazy. We continued on the ride for a bit before I asked DH to give it one more try. The name George was barely past his lips, when the ride stopped dead in the water. I know that I turned pale because my still clueless DH asked me what was wrong. We probably stopped there for 30 seconds while I spluttered out the story of George's ghost. I breathed must easier when we started to move again. We were a little slow getting off the boat, so when we were alone, I asked the CM there if they really had to say good night to George before they closed every night. He looked at me and said very seriously, "No, we don't HAVE to, but we always do." That was good enough for me. I was outta there!

DH wanted to stop to get swords for the boys at the gift shop, but we were running short on time. Maybe another time.

We got back to the boat dock to wait for our ride to WL just past 5:30. We waited under the canopy which was being buffeted by the wind and the spitting rain. We didn't care though. We were in WDW! We sat and waited...and waited some more. Even the people who had come in after us were beginning to grumble about the wait. That's about the time DH turned and asked me if I thought that my ornament would be ok at the parks for a few days. GASP! I had totally forgotten about it! I grabbed my receipt and ticket and headed back to the park. The CM at the turnstile said ( a little snottily), "Enjoy your whole hour at the park before it closes." Whatever. I ran under the train station to get my package and waited in a very short line. As soon as I had it in my hot little hand, I was running. I slowed down as I neared the dock and saw that a boat was just approaching across the water. Although we were among the first at the dock, we were some of the last on the boat. We ended up sitting next to a window that was stuck open. At least it was better than being on the outside deck like some others chose!

When we reached WL and were disembarking, DH asked the CM how long the boat would be running after the parks closed so we could get back to our car. He told us that the boats were almost done, but we would have no problem. We would just need to catch a bus back to the park from the front of the resort.

We walked past a beautiful pool area and saw the geyser erupt on our way into the Lodge. Uh-oh. That meant it was 6:00. We were late. We walked into the beautiful lobby and were awestruck. It was unbelievable. It sure left the DoubleTree Guest Suites wanting. I got to the counter to check in at Whispering Canyon and explained the situation. I was given a pager and told that it would be about 30 minutes. I knew there was nothing they could do. The place was packed! The wait gave us a chance to wash up in the bathroom before we sat down to enjoy some people watching. It wasn't long before the pager went off.

This was our favorite eating experience, hands down, on our whole trip! The boys had fun helping with the ketchup, doing the hokey-pokey and participating in the stick pony race. Not only did they have a great time, but the food was wonderful. DH and I had the all-you-can eat skillet meal. The pulled pork was delicious and the ribs were scrumptious. Service was superb, too. Our server, Allison, was the best we had anywhere. At one point, she had DS#2 stand up on his chair so everyone could see him. Then the whole restaurant sang Happy Birthday to him. He loved it! I've never been in a restaurant where EVERYONE sang the song. Usually, a few tables near the person sang and that's it. Not here. At Whispering Canyon, everyone gets into it. It was wonderful. While we were finishing up, I asked Allison if there had been any word on park hours for the next day. She wasn't sure but checked with her manager. It was official. WDW was closed on Sunday. Before we left, she brought out a birthday cupcake for DS. Too bad we were all too full to have more than a taste.

When we left the building, it was obvious that the weather had taken a turn for the worse. The wind was up and rain was comng down steadily. There were palm branches down and lots of leaves swirling around at the entrance.

At the valet stand, a CM noticed us and asked if we needed our car. DH explained that we were looking for the bus to take us back to MK to get our car. I knew it wasn't good news when I looked at the CM's face. Disney had just shut down the bus service not long before. Ever the optimist, I went to the front desk to ask if the buses from DTD hotels came this way and told the CM there the whole story. Nope. No luck. I was quite rudely told to go back outside and the valet would let us call a cab. I gave the guy the benefit of the doubt as I was sure he was stressed about the storm. So, although, my tension level was rising, I let him go with a dirty look. Back outside again, the valet there tried to call the hotel shuttle for us, but it was already gone. We could tell he felt bad, but there was nothing he could do except call a taxi for us. DH tipped him for his assistance and about 10 minutes later we had a cab.

The cab driver seemed a little put out that he had come all the way over for such a short trip. But he got much more helpful after DH tipped him well as we got out. He showed us the easiest way back to our car before he left. I guess that Hurricane Stress Syndrome really does exist!

When we got back to our room, there was a note under the door telling us the latest news about the storm. It wasn't very recent since it listed that there was no information on park hours the next day. We did get another one underneath our door about 10pm with more recent updates and restaurant info for the next day. DH got that one, because I was feeling every one of the 14,360 steps I'd walked that day. The boys and I were asleep.

That was all I knew until the next day. (Stay tuned!)

[AMaloy314]

This morning had no alarm nor excitement to help get us out of bed...so we didn't. We slept until 8am or so, a full 2 hours longer than we had been doing.

First thing I did was check the view from the window. Yup, it was raining. Yup, it was windy. Jeanne had made an appearance over night. It looked for all the world like a bad midwestern rainstorm. I know that it sounds like I'm belittling this hurricane, but from what we could see, it didn't look like much. The room was extremely quiet and the wind was blowing the rain away from the window so the windows were not even wet.

We lolled around the room in PJ's, watched a little TV, and went through the motions of getting ready. While we were watching the news coverage of the hurricane, we discovered that there was a mandatory curfew in effect until 5pm that day for everyone except emergency personel.

I forgot to mention that we had planned to go over to the Grand Floridian to visit Dad and P today since the parks were closed. The curfew squashed those plans. I called Dad and we planned to reschedule a visit later that evening when the curfew lifted. Dad said that he and P had hardly slept a wink all night. It turns out that they were on the top floor in one of the buildings and they heard the rafters groaning all night. They had been assured that it was normal and the building was supposed to 'give a little', but it didn't get them any extra sleep. We hung up after arranging to call back around 5pm.

We decided to go downstairs to get a late breakfast. Down in the lobby, the foyer was roped off with yellow tape. We could see sand bags in front of the main doors covered with downed foliage. Even though there is a deep porte cochere, water had been blown under the doors there.

We walked over to the restaurant and were surprised to see that it was actually very busy. There was even a line to get seated. There were more people in Streamers than I had seen in the hotel the total time we were there. When it was our turn for a table, we were walked through a maze of roped off areas surrounding buckets slowly being filled though leaks in the ceiling. A couple of ceiling tiles had collapsed from the moisture and the manager was keeping a close eye on a couple others. The outside door to the bar area had been boarded up, but we could hear the wind whistling through it. The glass windows and door at the back of the restaurant had also been boarded up, but we saw the servers changing towels in front of the door several times, mopping up water blowing in. Our table was under a skylight that thankfully was not leaking. It was interesting to look up and see the rain falling so hard on the plexiglass above us.

DH and I opted for the hot breakfast buffet today. It wasn't complimentary, but since it was already so late, we thought it would do as a brunch for all of us. As expected, the food was not the best, but was edible. We chose from waffles, french toast, mini hot cakes, sausage links, bacon, scrambled eggs and some kind of breakfast potato. There may have been grits or oatmeal, but I'm not sure. We ate our fill and left. DH tried to pay the $44 bill, but the staff there was taking room numbers to charge it in order to save time and trouble. It was obvious that they weren't equipped for this kind of volume. To be fair, they did a good job in the circumstances.

Before we went back to the room, we took a quick walk around on the first floor. There was a very small conference room set up with a big screen TV playing movies. There were about 20 straight backed chairs and some kids were laying across 2 or 3 watching the show. It was not a very welcoming site. We went on back up to our room.

This time when I opened our room curtain for a peek, the scene looked much the same with one slight difference. One of the trees lining Hotel Plaza had snapped in half. I-4 was still empty of cars and there were no other changes.

We kept the boys busy with cards, coloring crayons and the plastic animals we'd brought for the air plane. They also watched The Top 7 WDW Attractions over and over. All of us took a nice long nap and slept right through lunch.

When we woke up, we gave the boys Pop-Tarts and pretzels to tide them over until dinner. DH and I snacked a bit, too, and were very glad about that grocery stop at Albertsons.

It's a very good thing that there was more than one TV in the room. I was trying to keep up with the news, but the boys wanted nothing but Krista and her favorite park attractions. They were totally hooked on the "Disney Girl", much to my chagrin. I've never thought much about being a mother-in-law, but visions of one of my sons bringing home someone like Krista gave me the heebie-jeebies. I remember saying at one point to DH, "Someone needs to smack that girl."

I kept an eye on the windows, too. By this time, I was pretty sure that we were on the protected side of the building. That had to be why things didn't look or sound as bad where we were. Sometime after nap, DH noticed that it looked like some windows had been blown out at the Holiday Inn just down the road. There was also a large limb that had come down in the parking lot of our hotel.

Finally 5:00 came. I called Dad to see if they still wanted us to come over. I had caught him on his way down to the desk to make sure we could get in. He told me that he would call me back in just a few minutes. When he did, the news was not good. The CM there had told him that the police had extended the curfew until 6 am the next morning. He continued on to say that even if we wanted to try it, there was a tree down across the road and no one could get in or out of the resort. There went our relief from cabin fever. I talked with Dad a few more minutes and he reported that there were some shingles missing from the roof on some of the resort buildings. That was all the damage that he could see. We ended the call with me telling him that if the parks opened in the morning, we were going to go back to Magic Kingdom to try to see the things we had missed.

Looking out the window showed that people were beginning to move around again. There were a few cars on I-4 and even a couple on Hotel Plaza. The worst of the storm had passed through. My thought was that if people were out, maybe we could get a pizza somewhere. Stupid, I know, but after all day in the hotel room with two little children and Krista, I wasn't thinking straight. We called a couple of places and (surprise!) had no luck. That left us with dinner in the hotel restaurant. It was not an appetizing thought, but preferable to Pop-Tarts and Cheez-Its.

Back down in the lobby, we were told that Streamers was having a limited buffet. A quick look at the menu told me that there was nothing on there that the boys would eat. It was even a little questionable if DH would eat. DH asked if the clerk at the desk knew of any place else that was open. She didn't.

Since we had no place to go, I suggested going back to the room while I tried to come up with an alternative. Being in a different setting had cleared my head a little and I had an idea. I remembered reading about people on the DisBoards getting gift certificates for Baskervilles on restaurants.com. I also remembered that Baskervilles was in the Grosvenor hotel just down the street. DH got on the phone and called to see if they were serving dinner. YES! No one asked and we didn't volunteer that we weren't staying there. We just knew that there was food.

Since we hadn't had any 'official' word that the curfew had been extended, we decided to risk the short drive two hotels over. I took it as a sign that the lobby doors were open again. It was still windy and raining but not as hard, when we got into the car. As we drove, we could see lots of foliage down and a couple small trees uprooted. The way that they came out of the ground looked as if they had just been planted and fallen over.

We went into the hotel and saw a couple of outside lights had blown over in the storm, but no substantial damage there. We had a short wait before being seated at Baskervilles, but when we got inside, we were glad we'd made the effort. It was a much nicer place. The buffet they were having served Prime Rib, catfish, meatloaf and lots of salad type fixings. There was peel-n-eat shrimp, garlic mashed potatoes and some goumet pizza. (I had to pick off everything but the pepperoni before the boys would eat it.) There were some choices for desert, but I didn't get to that table. DH brought back a piece of cake that he and the boys split. All in all, it was a good experience. I wish that I could remember how much it cost, but I know it was worth it just to get out of our hotel.

On the way back to the DoubleTree, DH mentions that he wants to drive up to I-4 to see if there is any other damage. We passed our hotel and turned right onto 535. We noticed more damage almost right away. There were street signs blown down and more trees uprooted. When we saw the back of our hotel, we quickly turned around to go back. The entire side of the DoubleTree had the stucco blown off. The structural steel beams were all exposed. Wow, we really had been on the protected side of the building.

Once we were again in our room, we relaxed, gave the boys a bath and went to bed early. Word had filtered out that WDW would reopen the next morning. YAY! We'd get another chance at MK.

It had been a very long and boring day, but we made it through. I felt badly for the Floridian who also had made it through at long, boring day, but didn't have anything but clean up to look forward to.

[Lynn CC]

I've had a wonderful Sunday afternoon reading your trip report!

Thanks for sharing..
I think it's cute how your DS's love the Marching Bands, they will no doubt be in Band when they get to school!

[Kirby]

I've enjoyed reading about your trip and can't wait to read the rest.

[eeyorelor]

Your trip sounds so great ... Cant wait to read more.. Keep it coming!!!!!!!:earsboy: :earsgirl: :earsboy: :earsboy: :earsboy: :earsgirl: :earsboy:

[fizz13]

Where's the rest of it?! Come on, keep it coming, am really enjoying it,
Claire

[luvmygirls]

Loving your trip report!! I hope my trip to the "World" next year is as Magical as yours sounded!! (Even with the hurricane, it sounded wonderful!)

Shelly:earsgirl:

[Ron from Michigan]

Love your reports, keep them coming.

[Del]

Thanks for sharing your trip. Del

[summersfam4]

Great report! Keep it coming::yes::

Have a Great Monday!

Kelly

[mmaddog56]

Originally posted by kathymc
really enjoying your reports - keep them coming!

I spent my bday in DW in 2003 and it was amazing! I got a birthday pin and loved the extra attention (mind you - I turned 36) the staff at the store in Mexico sang a Mexican birthday song, goofy called me on the phone and the talking trash can ranked on me!

I hope your trip continues to have such wonderful surprises (and glad to see you are all getting along well)

I spent my 47th birthday at MK with a side trip to Chef Mickey's for dinner....I got so many "Happy Birthday's" from CM's but the most special was from Belle....during the parade! We were stading on the front row righ in front of the Ice Cream parlor and she noticed my "Birthday" badge and pointed at it....wished me a Happy Birthday and blew me a kiss!!!!!!!!!:earseek:

To top it all of....when I got back to my room at Wilderness Lodge there was an autographed picture from Mickey Mouse waiting on the desk wishing me "Happy Birthday"...

mmaddog
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[mmaddog56]

Great trip report!!!!

We were there at WDW from 9/18-9/24...

mmaddog
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[leahannpen]

No Way! I'm Not At The End??? Hello?? Please!!!!! :) :)