Rope Drop is Tip #1!! A June 2016 TR...updated 10/31 pg 19 post 373 THE END!

ArielSRL · Jul 23, 2016

Jfsag123 said:
I am now sitting here drooling over that cupcake and wondering how pathetic it would be for me to specifically incorporate getting the cupcake into my plans for the next trip.

Not pathetic at all! It was most definitely on my plan for this June and will be for next June! Great time to grab them is headed out for a break, I think. Or if you need a quick break during the day without leaving the park.

And so much yes on the Disney Jr floor. We saw the show on our first trip and haven't been back, partly because I can't bring myself to sit on that floor again! I love how into it Will was, though!

It was so painful! And I'm a teacher and have to sit on the floor sometimes, but that was too much. But we'll be back, I'm sure, as the boys loved it!

You got great Jawa pics, despite not having your trading items. We had items to trade, but my pics are terrible.

I was so glad we saw them but was so disappointed I had left the trinkets in the stroller.

And your hair looked fine! As you know, I know all about the hell of trying to manage hair in that crazy humidity. You appear to have done a much better job than me lol. I just stuck a pair of sunglasses on top of my head to try told it all together and prayed.

Thank you. With naturally curly hair and living in humid GA, I deal with frizzy hair on a daily basis. You should see the amount of hair products I use to attempt to de-frizz! Didn't work in WDW though. Oh well!

ArielSRL · Jul 24, 2016

Day Three 6/6/2016 ~ Disney Springs

Okay, y'all...I'm going to attempt to finish up day three. I'll apologize, in advance, for the lack of photos in this update.

So after our break, which started much later than we had originally planned (again..shocker!), we headed to Disney Springs.

Now before I get further into the recap, if you were following along on my PTR, you may (or may not...lol) remember, this was supposed to be our Epcot: World Showcase evening. The night before though, or maybe that morning, Mom and I discussed changing it. Originally we had planned Wednesday night to be our Disney Springs night with an ADR at T-Rex. However, a couple weeks before our trip, Disney decided to add the Star Wars fireworks to DHS only on select nights for our trip. So we ended up deciding that after our T-Rex dinner, instead of doing some shopping, we would hop to DHS for the fireworks. But now, we had to decide when to do our DS shopping, especially since Mom had told AJ about the Lego Store already! We threw around doing it on departure day but then we realized that maybe we should skip Epcot on Monday night because it would be a lot of walking, especially for my dad. So then, we figured, if we were skipping Epcot, let's just head to DS. So we did.

Of course, by the time we got there, it was raining, as it had been off and on all day. The first place we headed was the Lego Store, as AJ was quite obsessed at that point.

Will was asleep in the stroller so it was up to AJ to pick out the Lego sets. He took quite awhile to figure out what to get. At first he picked one for Will (the bigger blocks for the younger set) and one for himself (medium sized blocks for his age group). But then my parents said they would throw in some money, so he ended up picking three...all of them the bigger blocks for the younger set. What a good brother to pick three sets he could complete with his brother.

After this, I think we had to make a bathroom stop but it was raining so much that I walked the boys through a building with, I think, a few shops in it. One of them was Tren-D (I think) and I saw quite a few things I wouldn't have minded getting but in the end, I got nothing. Around this time, we were getting hungry so we decided to head to Earl of Sandwich. We had eaten here before and it was fine before. Well tonight, we were not in for a repeat performance.

For one, the boys were having a little meltdown. They both wanted to open the Legos right then and there and that was NOT happening. Dad and I were in line to get all the food and my mom was trying to keep them calm. I was trying to decide what I wanted, plus I was a little confused with what was included on the DDP. I kept having to leave the line to ask Mom what she wanted because I would offer her the wrong items and once I forgot what she said! In any case, we eventually got an order in but I still was confused with sides and desserts and I think I picked the wrong thing. Well the cashier was just brutal and was obviously annoyed at my stupidity. Sorry, wench! She also tried to give me a small cup for my drink and I had just read that I could get a large cup if I wanted. Not a huge deal but it would mean less trips to the drink machine and that's valuable when you have two kids melting down. She tried to argue but eventually gave in.

I didn't take any food photos so I'm not sure what everyone got. I'm fairly certain I got the Chicken Caesar Wrap and I got a Grilled Cheese for the boys. Anyway, the service was kind of sucky, our moods weren't good, and the food was just okay. So I'm gonna nix a repeat visit to EoS for now.

After this, it was getting late. We still hadn't hit up WoD or any other stores but oh well. That's what happens when you get off the schedule. On the way back to the car, I got a hit on TP ressie finder. I had been trying to move my Chef Mickey's ADR for Thursday from 5 to 5:30. Well, one showed up so I went onto MDE to try to grab it. Of course, while I was booking it, the app prompted me that I needed to cancel my 5pm before I could book the 5:30. I was feeling very apprehensive about doing that, but I went ahead. Well, guess what? It cancelled the 5pm but messed up before it booked the 5:30! I tried to go back on and book it again but, of course, it was gone by then. Oh my gosh. I was ready to cry at this point.

All the way back to SSR, I continued to reload the app to see if I could get the 5:30 booked, but nothing. Once back to the room, I decided to call in to dining and see if they could help. I'll spare you the details but will just say that I finally, after a very long time, got the CM to rebook my 5pm ressie. OMG...what a mess.

After this messy evening, I was ready for bed! As was everyone else, so off we went.

Next up: Day Four 6/7/2016 ~ Animal Kingdom (part 1)

iheartbelle87 · Jul 25, 2016

ArielSRL said:
I got the Angus Bacon Cheeseburger with French Fries, Strawberry Lemonade Slushie, and the Triple Chocolate Cake. I think I ate a fair amount of my food. Again, I got the boys the Chicken Breast Nuggets, this time with French Fries, Strawberry Lemonade Slushie, and the Triple Chocolate Cake. They ate...wait for it...practically nothing! Probably some Cheerios and Goldfish I brought.

Ah! I love those Mickey Straws! Did they come with the drinks or did you have to purchase them?

Jfsag123 · Jul 25, 2016

Oh I got frustrated for you just reading that. I can definitely see why you would have been left with a bad taste in your mouth (no pun intended) where Earl of Sandwich is concerned. We actually did a lot of back and forth in that line trying to figure out what we wanted as well. And I know it gets that much harder with melting down kids.

I'm glad you were able to recover your Chef Mickey's reservation, but I'm sorry you had to go through all that stress to get it! It reminded me of when I was trying to book my Soarin' FP and the system kept glitching and ended up not only failing to book Soarin', but also canceling my Test Track reservation.

Silver lining of the evening- it sounds like AJ may have saved you some future meltdowns by picking Lego sets his brother could help with. What a sweet brother! Looking forward to hearing how your AK day went!

ArielSRL · Jul 25, 2016

iheartbelle87 said:
Ah! I love those Mickey Straws! Did they come with the drinks or did you have to purchase them?

They came with the slushies. Oh and at BOG my son mentioned wanting one so they just gave him one.

Princess Leia · Jul 25, 2016

Disney Springs always seems to take up more time than you anticipate. Trying to rejig plans is never easy. That was good AJ picked out ones that Will could do too. I'm sure he was really pleased to get his lego sets. Just wait until your trying to construct projects like the Death Star with 7 separate boxes of lego. I can feel the stress of the Mickey ADR. The heat always seems to compound the stress and then it feels like it's not just the children having a meltdown. Well done for keeping it together!

wampuscat7 · Jul 25, 2016

I just wanted to say thanks for the trip report. Your kiddos are just adorable!

ariane37 · Jul 25, 2016

We all end up having that one morning/afternoon/night that just sucks when we're there

I hope that was your worst! It makes it worse when you switch your plans thinking it'll still be fine and then things go south, because then you're thinking you should've just kept things the way you originally planned them........

Ah, Tren-D! I love that store. I've gotten a few things there but usually see like 10 that I want every time I go in lol. Usually I see some clothes but then I want to try them on, and I don't feel like trying them on, so I don't want to spend the $$ only to have to make a trip back to return them. The difficulties of WDW vacations :rotfl:

ArielSRL · Jul 25, 2016

Jfsag123 said:
Oh I got frustrated for you just reading that. I can definitely see why you would have been left with a bad taste in your mouth (no pun intended) where Earl of Sandwich is concerned. We actually did a lot of back and forth in that line trying to figure out what we wanted as well. And I know it gets that much harder with melting down kids.

It was just all very confusing and the employee's attitude didn't help. But a bad day at Disney is better than none at all, right??

I'm glad you were able to recover your Chef Mickey's reservation, but I'm sorry you had to go through all that stress to get it! It reminded me of when I was trying to book my Soarin' FP and the system kept glitching and ended up not only failing to book Soarin', but also canceling my Test Track reservation.

It was so crazy! I couldn't believe that that happened! And I honestly wasn't sure if I was going to get the phone CM to get it back for me. It took a long time but I finally got it done. And spoiler alert...I actually got it changed to 5:30 another day but that day, I called in to get it changed! Learned my lesson!

Silver lining of the evening- it sounds like AJ may have saved you some future meltdowns by picking Lego sets his brother could help with. What a sweet brother! Looking forward to hearing how your AK day went!

The funny thing is that Will would still rather play with AJ's "older kid" Legos! AJ loves playing with the three sets that are age appropriate for Will, though!

ArielSRL · Jul 25, 2016

Princess Leia said:
Disney Springs always seems to take up more time than you anticipate. Trying to rejig plans is never easy. That was good AJ picked out ones that Will could do too. I'm sure he was really pleased to get his lego sets. Just wait until your trying to construct projects like the Death Star with 7 separate boxes of lego. I can feel the stress of the Mickey ADR. The heat always seems to compound the stress and then it feels like it's not just the children having a meltdown. Well done for keeping it together!

Thank you for the sympathy! Fortunately we do get the Chef Mickey's ADR worked out to the later time eventually, so I didn't even have to fight to get that one back but, of course, I didn't know that at the time!

Oh and the Legos! AJ has some like "age 4-7" sets and I can't even take those! Too many small pieces for me!

ArielSRL · Jul 25, 2016

wampuscat7 said:
I just wanted to say thanks for the trip report. Your kiddos are just adorable!

Thank you!

ArielSRL · Jul 25, 2016

ariane37 said:
We all end up having that one morning/afternoon/night that just sucks when we're there I hope that was your worst! It makes it worse when you switch your plans thinking it'll still be fine and then things go south, because then you're thinking you should've just kept things the way you originally planned them........

Yeh it felt a bit like a waste of a night but I doubtbAJ thinks that with his three new Lego sets! Lol

Ah, Tren-D! I love that store. I've gotten a few things there but usually see like 10 that I want every time I go in lol. Usually I see some clothes but then I want to try them on, and I don't feel like trying them on, so I don't want to spend the $$ only to have to make a trip back to return them. The difficulties of WDW vacations

Part of it was I wanted to wait til closer to the end of the vacation to make my purchases so that I knew my budget and I had seen all the choices. But in the end I think I ended up with a coffee mug, some antenna toppers, and some stickers for my car! I'm gonna keep working on a getting a bag though and I'll check back in Tren-D next June!

vamassey1 · Jul 26, 2016

We always end up in the Leggo store too. AJ did great picking out his sets. Sorry for the bad experience at EOS. I always get that bad feeling when MDE makes me cancel something too.

ArielSRL · Jul 26, 2016

vamassey1 said:
We always end up in the Leggo store too. AJ did great picking out his sets. Sorry for the bad experience at EOS. I always get that bad feeling when MDE makes me cancel something too.

Yep, certain we will be there next June and I'm planning on Disney Springs on arrival day, so I guess the boys will have sets to play with the whole trip! LOL

Yeh, I'm sure EoS isn't like that all the time but I'm gonna be sour on it for awhile.

As far as the cancel thing, ugh...can't they come up with a way to book first, then mandatory cancel?? Oh, it's Disney IT...why am I even asking. LOL

ArielSRL · Jul 29, 2016

I totally planned to do an update tonight but for the second time in as many days, the Internet is out at my house. I'm having to use my phone and my data just to check the DIS. Not sure what's up but here's hoping it's back tomorrow or I guess I'll be on the phone complaining to someone.

I did write the update and save it so I'll post it as soon as I can.

Jfsag123 · Jul 29, 2016

ArielSRL said:
I totally planned to do an update tonight but for the second time in as many days, the Internet is out at my house. I'm having to use my phone and my data just to check the DIS. Not sure what's up but here's hoping it's back tomorrow or I guess I'll be on the phone complaining to someone.

I did write the update and save it so I'll post it as soon as I can.

So frustrating! Hope it's fixed tomorrow and stays fixed!

ArielSRL · Jul 29, 2016

Jfsag123 said:
So frustrating! Hope it's fixed tomorrow and stays fixed!

It's fixed so I'm gonna try to get it posted ASAP but it's hard with Will around. He will leave me to my iPad but not my laptop. Plus I'm running some errands in a bit so we'll see how it goes. It will eventually be done today, even if it's midnight, as long as the Internet stays up!

ArielSRL · Jul 29, 2016

Day Four 6/7/2016 ~ Animal Kingdom (part 1)

So today was our AK day and as some of you know, there was so much drama leading up to this vacation with Rivers of Light. BTW, the rumors are rampant again…but I digress. In any case, I never thought we would go on our trip with no ROL, but here we are, with no ROL! We had an ADR for Tusker House at 10:40 and Yak & Yeti at 6:45. We had FPs scheduled for Meeting Mickey & Minnie from 5:20-6:20, the Safari from 7:25-8:25 (originally scheduled for morning but then switched once nighttime hours were extended), and Jungle Book for 8:25-8:45. I had wanted to change my TH ADR to a JB show package but I wasn’t able to do that online or on the phone so I went ahead and scheduled the FP, knowing I would use my extra FP for EE, if I could.

On this day, I think I got up around 7:30, along with Mom. AJ probably got up but there were a few mornings where he went to the bedroom and went back to sleep in the bed with my dad and this could’ve been one of those mornings. I don’t have much to say about the morning except we made it to our ADR...barely, but we did.

We grabbed some Photopass photos before heading in:

I know we got in the gates and used the restroom. I went to Guest Services to finally get Will a first visit button because we really hadn’t had a moment to stop up until then. We didn’t really rush to TH as we wanted to look around some, but then we finally made it. Keep in mind I had planned to do the safari and Lion King before the ADR. Oh well….

A photo of the Tree of Life I took on the way in:

When I checked in to the restaurant, I asked if we could change to the JB package. The CM checked with a manager and he said it was fine. So basically we had the option to sit on the dining pkg side or the FP side, which makes what happen slightly funny…but I’m getting ahead of myself! After checking in, the boys got into some dancing:

We got called back to be seated fairly quickly. And here is where I was a bad Diser again because I have no food photos. I do know that we did enjoy the food here. There was quite a bit of offerings, both normal breakfast fare and some authentic African offerings, I’m assuming. I did, however, get some character photos.

First up was Daisy:

Next, we had Goofy:

Then came Donald:

Finally, the big cheese himself:

The character interaction here was really nice, along with the food. As a matter of fact, I decided to put it on the schedule for next June, we liked it so much. But I actually started thinking I wanted to try Sanaa and since we have one day at AK, I’m not sure I want to do two TS on that day. And also, because the boys eat nothing and we are not doing the dining plan next June, I don’t want to pay the character buffet prices for them. But, we really did enjoy it quite a bit. I will say we went just a tad too late because our last trip up to the buffet, they had already started switching over to lunch food and we didn’t really want to try any of that.

After we left Tusker House, we decided to head right down the hill for the 12pm Lion King. But I’ll wait and post about that and more of our day, another time.

Next up: Day Four 6/7/2016 ~ Animal Kingdom (part 2)

Princess Leia · Jul 29, 2016

Great update!

ArielSRL said:
A photo of the Tree of Life I took on the way in:

It looks really busy in this photo!

ArielSRL said:
When I checked in to the restaurant, I asked if we could change to the JB package. The CM checked with a manager and he said it was fine. So basically we had the option to sit on the dining pkg side or the FP side, which makes what happen slightly funny…but I’m getting ahead of myself!

Was the JB package included in the Dining Plan? Interested to see what happens later.

ArielSRL said:
And here is where I was a bad Diser again because I have no food photos. I do know that we did enjoy the food here. There was quite a bit of offerings, both normal breakfast fare and some authentic African offerings, I’m assuming. I did, however, get some character photos.

You do have some food photos - I can see Mickey waffles and a boiled egg on the plates on the table. It would be stressful enough getting the children settled, dashing off for food to take back to the table whilst watching out for characters. You've got the most important photos the ones with the boys with the characters. They look like they really enjoyed it!

ariane37 · Jul 29, 2016

I have a feeling you'll be to the parks like 1.5 hours before RD every day next June lol!!

Glad you enjoyed TH. We haven't been there since 2012, but we've done lunch and breakfast and always enjoyed it. If Chris didn't want GG breakfast in November I probably would have suggested TH but I really don't need another character meal!

Rope Drop is Tip #1!! A June 2016 TR...updated 10/31 pg 19 post 373 THE END!

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