Since Sarah has caught up with me on her dining report, I guess it's time to start writing my next installment. Day Four was a busy day, so here it goes. This was our plan:
Saturday, November 22nd:
*Small snack in room before we go - Snack at Main Street Bakery?? Cinnamon bun or french toast loaf?
8:00AM: Magic Kingdom-be there for rope drop. Spend time on the Fantasyland rides and getting photos with characters.
10:55AM: Brunch at Chef Mickey's-CR (1 TS credit/person)
12:00PM: Grammie and Nora return to hotel for naps/pooltime, Kelly and Sarah head back to MK to ride "the Mountains"
3:00PM: Head to HS for dinner and Fantasmic
3:50PM: Mama Melrose's/Fantasmic Dinner Package (1 TS credit/person) - Cancel 48 hours prior if need to
6:15PM: Get seats for Fantasmic
7:00PM: FANTASMIC
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Okay, so I know what you're thinking--is all they are going to do today EAT?! Well, yes and no. We did do a lot of eating, but we did fit in a lot of other stuff to!
Read on to find out more (as Elmo would say)....
We were up early-thanks to yours truly! Sarah got something special from "tinkerbell" (me again-I even brought glitter to leave pixie dust-I had been doing this each morning for Sarah and Mom).
And Nora got more princess mail. I can't remember what she got on this day. I think maybe a fancy hair thinger that you'll see her wearing later in the week. But, her letter was from Cinderella:
Dear Nora.
I am so happy you came to visit me at my castle! Isn't it beautiful with all the Christmas decorations! Sounds like you have a lot of neat things planned for today! Say "Hi" to Mickey for me at "Chef Mickey's" breakfast! I know you will love all the beautiful colors of Fantasmic!
Love, Cinderella "Princess Rella"
In no time we were dressed and on our way to the TTC.
Now, Nora had been bound and determined that we were to ride on the Ferry Boat this morning. She had been seeing them travel back and forth across the water from the beach and whenever we would say, "let's go get on the monorail" she would reply, "No, ferry boat." So, we promised her that we would take the Ferry Boat to Princess Castle on this morning. Well, when we got to the TTC to the entrance for the Ferry there was a CM who told us that the boat wasn't running yet-oh, no! Nora was dissapointed, but we were able to distract her yet again with visiting dancing mickey and minnie! After a quick "hello" we were on the mon-e-rail headed for MK rope drop! We made it through the gate and were waiting all by this time..
I was so proud of us! On our previous trip we didn't make it to Magic Kingdom for the opening so this was a MUST do for us-well, me at least! They had some CMs out helping to entertaining the waiting kids. Nora had fun playing with this hula hoop!
They also had some mickey shaped "glitter" AKA pixie dust! You can see in that previous photo that they had arranged the mickey pixie dust into mickey heads. Nora had fun with this stuff for sure.
Look Aunnie, I got one!
Geez, if I keep all this pictures up I'm gonna be at my 25 pic limit before we even get inside the MK! So, while we were still waiting for the opening ceremony Sarah took Nora to see some of the pretty Christmas trees that were decorated outside the train station. I guess while they were "exploring" a CM came up to Nor and put some mickey pixie dust on her head. I guess to grant her an extra magical day at the MK! Maybe Sarah can fill us in on the details of this, because I wasn't there for the actually event, just got the pics after...Okay, I just got the official story from Sarah. Straight from her: so the pixie dust - nora and i went for a little walk around to keep her occupied while waiting for the rope drop. a nice cm came up to her and mentioned how cute she is and then dropped a handful of pixie dust on her head - she didn't really understnad what happened i think, but she liked it when all of the sudden a bunch of pixie dust was falling off her head....okay, there we have it
And finally it was time...they were having some problems with the microphone, so like every other word was lost, but that's okay. We were just happy to see the train coming 'round the bend! And then the main guy himself...
The rope-drop ceremony at MK is just so magical. It gave me goosebumps and I seriously had tears in my eyes when the train came around and Nora started pointed at each character, "There's snow white, there's Alice, " etc. It was one of my favorite moments of the trip! So once we got through the train station and everyone sort of dispersed, we headed towards the left and Nora had fun looking in the windows of the shops! Her favorite? Snow White and the 7 dwarfs, of course.
And when we rounded the corner, she spotted it...Princess Castle! "Look, Momma, Princess Castle!"
We continued our walk down Main Street and I believe we got a photopass pic taken-why I didn't have them take a pic with my camera as well, I don't know-I am notorious for this. We always have lots of photopass pics, but don't order them --so expensive! Here is a pretty Christmas decoration from the lampposts on Main street:
When we go to Magic Kingdom we almost always go left, bringing us to:
Sarah had decided to listen to her tummy and head to Main Street Bakery for a cinnamon roll, while Nora, Mom and I ventured onward. She said she would meet up with us. We took our time enjoying an almost empty Adventureland. Nora stopped to pop some bubbles that a CM was blowing. This may have been the most fun part of her day! I have such a great video of her running around and popping bubbles, "I got one, I got it, Mommy, look I got one!" hehe.
Then, she and Grammie rode Aladdin's Flying carpets. BTW, I think Nora rode every "Dumbo"-like ride in Disney--carpets, triceratop spin, and dumbo itself. Oh, well, she's two and that's what is fun, right?!
By the time the carpet ride was over, Sarah was back with a half eaten (LOL--not half i guess..) big gooey cinnamin bun--yum! We all shared and Nora was especially sticky by the time we were done with that thing. We had no time finishing it before boarding the Jungle Cruise! We had a really funny driver, who made the lame jokes actually seem comical!
Nora really enjoyed this ride, as did the rest of us. Such a classic Disney ride! (Sarah and I learned some secrets about this on our Keys to the Kingdom tour, but shhh...my lips are sealed!) We continued through Adventureland, stopping, of course, to ride Pirates. Nora seemed to enjoy this ride especially since it was another boat ride! Also, the swords in the gift shop that you exit into were a big hit with her. Geez, I thought she was supposed to be a Princess! We had to kind of watch the time, as we had brunch reservations at Chef Mickey's for 10:55AM. We agreed that we needed to head back towards the monorail by 10:15AM. This didn't give us a lot of time for more rides, but we def. wanted to make the best of it. Our next stop was Big Thunder Mountain Railroad. Normally, we would have done Splash Mt at this point, but none of us wanted to get wet and have to sit through CM with soaked clothes (eventhough sometimes you don't really get that wet on Splash Mt) There I go getting off topic again-So BTMRR is Sarah's favorite ride and BOY was Nora bigtime offended that she couldn't go with us! She started crying, "Nora go too"
Poor girl-Grammie convinced her to go with her--Poor girl again...hehe...and off Sar and I went. There was virtually no wait--maybe 5-10 minutes if that. What a fun ride. Towards the end I hear my name being called and it's Mom yelling to me. She and Nora had a prime viewing spot and were waving to us! Nor was quite proud of us as we exited the ride--"Aunnie and Mommy ride train". After that we decided we would try to do Haunted Mansion and then head over to the Contemporary. But, we got sidetracked by this:
She ended up with a Minnie Mouse complete with Cowgirl outfit (we were in Frontierland, afterall!) and she was very pleased! With no major crowds, we were able to easily make our way over to the HM. Unfortunately, the ride was experiencing some "Spiritual" difficulties and was temporarily closed. It was getting close to time to leave, anyway, and Grammie needed a bathroom, so we decided we would walk through the castle, so Nora could see it up close and then head for the exit.
As we walked around the castle we noticed something we had never stumbled upon before--Cinderella's wishing well. Now, we knew it was there, only because Sarah had gotten me a Disney trivia book for an early Birthday gift and I had been emailing Mom and Sarah trivia questions daily and there was a question about what was the name of Cinderella's wishing well? Does anyone know? Well, the answer was "Rags to Riches"--I think Sar and Mom both got that one wrong! So, we stopped for a photo-op.
Then we came upon this magical lady....
After seeing the Fairy Godmother we had to usher Nora quickly through the castle, as we knew if she saw the Carousel we'd never get out of there on time! We all hated to leave the MK since we were on such a roll with doing and seeing so much especially due to it being early and not crowded. We did NOT wanted to pass up Chef Mickey's, however, it was something we all (esp. Mom and I) had been looking forward to for sooo long! So, we said goodbye to Princess Castle and hopped back on the Mon-e-rail. Chef Mickey's was only one stop away! YUM!
**Okay, so it's telling me I'm over the limit on pictures, so I'm going to do 2 posts of day four**Sorry for the inconvenience