“This could possibly be the best DISNEY day ever!” * 4/21 * More Birthday *

[Dugette]

That is a very strange choice of gift, given the situation. Maybe they think they'll need them to ward off further injuries in the kids' club!

I hope you do fill in some gaps and add to the TR!

A December visit? May I suggest sometime between the 7th and the 14th?

[jc040404]

Originally Posted by jane2073

My goodness!! Such insight for one so young!!
It's funny but also kind of sad because he is probably right!

That's my Andrew! It is probably right, huh? Lucky for Disney, I guess, we'll be back anyway. Miss the parks!!

Originally Posted by Dugette

That is a very strange choice of gift, given the situation. Maybe they think they'll need them to ward off further injuries in the kids' club!

I hope you do fill in some gaps and add to the TR!

A December visit? May I suggest sometime between the 7th and the 14th?

Too funny!! I wonder how what they'd do if a child showed up wearing these things! Oh well. I'm glad it's over.

Our dates are December 13-15th right now. We'll be there at the same time again? 239 Days to go! It seems like forever.

[jc040404]

Back to the big birthday trip of 2012! Here's the last post about it. We'd just had lunch at Sci-Fi, a break from the sun at POR, and were on our way to MK for dinner!

It's kinda fun looking back at last year's birthday while I'm currently planning this year! You probably won't notice, but there was no actual birthday cake at Disney last year. I left two voice mails, but they never got back to me! We'll do something else instead in the next updates. I'm hoping to have better luck this year!


At the TTC, the boys were begging to do a transportation race again, but the silly monorail was closed. We all hopped on the ferry boat to cross instead. It was probably the better choice anyway. This day was still icky hot and sticky, so the air felt great.

As we crossed, something different caught my attention. I could hear Disney music! I looked around for it and spotted a speaker in the corner of the boat. Odd. When I pointed it out to John, he claimed there was always music playing on the ferry. I really didnt remember ever hearing it before, but ok. I do usually take the monorail!



Blake asked to ride the train around the park first, but I think it was closed at the moment, too!



Whatever the reason, we snapped a few pics and left.

We ended up checking out the Sorcerers of the Magic Kingdom game instead. Andrew had asked a few times about this, but we just hadn't gotten to it. The CM in charge wasn't all that helpful, but we began the training. It was cute and soon both boys were set with cards to play. After the cards were tucked into our autograph book bag, no one thought of them again! Even Andrew forgot about going to the next step until we were home. Oops!

Next up was a quick set of FPs for Big Thunder Mountain Railroad and dinner.





I actually have notes about this day, but lemon slush is the only thing written about the meal. Hmmm. Mustve been a story there Ive forgotten.

We enjoyed a few rides in Fantasyland..











And Blake tried his luck with that silly sword again.



He put a lot into it that time, but it didnt budge!

Our BTMRR FPs were up, so another collection for Poohs ride followed before walking across the park. Blake was too excited to be trying this one!





Blakers got first ride, of course, but it didnt go well right away. I held our FPs to the CM, who then checked Blakes height. She smiled and we walked into the line. The LONG line. Id read about FP lines being a bit ridiculous, so I thought nothing of it at first. Then I began to see other guests racing ahead in the opposite line. These other guests were carrying FPs! But, the guests in front of us had them, too. I was more than a little confused until I caught the attention of someone passing.

We were in the wrong line!

Blake took my hand and we left the queue. The CM from before was now missing, but another was definitely checking for fast passes at the other entrance. Hmmm. When did Disney change that? I told the CM what was going on, mentioning the number of guests with FPs in the wrong line. He simply shrugged. There wasnt much he could without leaving his post. We joined the correct line, and I filled some of the rest in on the confusion on our way up. Weird, right?


So happy to be forty inches!!



The first BTMRR ride with Blakers was my favorite yet! He giggled his nervous giggles, and held on so tight. He declared half the ride his favorite part and wanted to go again right away! So much fun!

Andrews turn came next, with only a little bit of trouble. My big kid really cant handle these rides so well now, but really tries. He can handle this better than Star Tours, so it was back on his sometimes list anyway.

When we finished up both rides, it was now just ten minutes until the parade would be here. No!! If youve been reading my TRs long enough, you know why being back here makes me panic at that time. We had to get out of here! Crossing towards Adventureland looked like the best plan, but sounds of the train caught us on our way. We decided to run for it and caught the last train of the evening. Hooray! Blake was getting his train ride after all!

Jumping off at Storybook Circus, I was thrilled to see a short wait for the Barnstormer. We dont manage it much, despite how the boys love it. Unfortunately, something was going on and the CMs didnt know when the ride would be running again. Sadness.

Next door, Dumbo was at thirty minutes and wouldnt make our plans either. At least our Pooh FPs were ready!

After celebrating with Pooh, John admitted that he was done. Remember he had just been really sick. We had been in the park a little later than even I anticipated, but I know he just wanted the boys to have fun on their birthdays.

Our leaving time worked out really well. We managed to get out of the parks before the scary after Wishes chaos, and were able to watch the fireworks from the ferry. We all love that!







That was it for the big birthday!

Tomorrow - More Birthday Trip fun & Blake gets an old wish unexpectedly granted!

[AprilRenee]

Yay!! Love updates! :-)


(Ps. Caden pics going up soon! )

[jc040404]

Originally Posted by AprilRenee

Yay!! Love updates! :-)


(Ps. Caden pics going up soon! )

Thanks for letting me know about the pics! I totally missed the Easter set and I've been hoping we'd get to see some new ones this month. Hope Caden (& his Mommy & Daddy!) had a great first birthday!! He's growing up too fast!

[jc040404]

Everyone slept late the next morning, of course. We woke up and watched cartoons. It was lazy, but I know John really enjoyed the break. We didn’t have any park plans for this day, so things just moved slow.

As lunchtime started calling, we headed away from our cozy room to the boat dock. I’d made an ADR at T-Rex and this would be our adventure to get there. It was an interesting experience. There were a few people waiting, just one family. We joined to wait and watched lots of people join the area. Everyone was more interested in shade and keeping cool, so it was a nice atmosphere.

That is, until that family decided to show up. There’s always one! As the boat approached, a family of five ran down to join us and crowed by the ropes. Hmmm... Of course, they would board first and those that had been waiting for quite some time remained to wait some more. Even though we got on the boat, it bugged me. Boat waiting lessons were probably learned. Crowding the rope is much smarter than staying cool.

In total, it took an hour to get to Downtown Disney! I was shocked and told John we’d take the car next time. (We don't.) It was wild to see those 1-1 1/2 hour suggested travel times being scary accurate. It was a little funny. On our first birthday Disney trip in 2007, we left Pop Century, by car, as early as Disney recommend for buses. (Earliest, before opening ADR at Crystal Palace) I didn't know any better at the time and thought everyone should follow this. Yeah, we were the second family at the park that day!

Anyway, we made it to T-Rex in plenty of time for our ADR.









This was our first visit to T-Rex and the boys loved it!


Those drinks are huge. We brought the bone cups home, but they would’ve been better left. They were fun for the meal anyway.

I only remember some of the food. I ordered some sort of chicken and zucchini dish. The description seemed good to me, but it tasted awful. I’d avoid whatever it was. Blake went with the Pepperoni Paleo Pizza. We all had way too much fun saying that over and over.




my handsome birthday boy

When no one bothered to get back to me about ordering a cake, the boys voted for something else instead. The chocolate extinction ended our meal!



That was wild! Andrew was a little afraid of it! He gave it two thumbs down and said the cake tasted too fudgy. It was more like giant brownies. I thought that was pretty darn good, but I love my chocolate. With the exception of Andy-Roo, we all ate way too much of this. There was more than enough for the four of us and we had tons still left over. Big dessert!

After the check was paid, we drifted into the gift shop. The boys picked out a few toys and John got a travel mug. I even remembered to use our AP discount. Very rare for me!

At the back of the shop, Build-a-Dino was waiting for us. The boys got in line to make two special toys. First, they had to pick out their dino. Andrew went with the stegosaurus on the right..



and Blake picked this guy.



This was all very cute. We’ve never been to Build-a-Bear so I didn’t how things worked. Now, I just can’t remember how it worked! The boys did really enjoy it and want to go back.






Blake was my dino buddy.





They picked out an outfit each, skipping the shoes. At the register, we met an awesome CM (that probably isn’t an actual CM but a dino store guy, huh?) that made things so much fun. When he found out we were from Saint Petersburg, he started singing. Have you seen Anastasia? It was the “Rumor in St Petersburg” song. Cracked me up! We had a fun chat. He also promoted a clearance sale that we grabbed. In the end we had three little dinos, the two big ones that the boys picked out, and two outfits.

We did a little more walking around and decided to head back to POR. Then it started raining. Nice. We didn’t worry too much. On the ride to DTD, we were told the boats still run the rain. Lightning is the only thing that stops them and we didn’t see any of that. Unfortunately for us, Disney saw it somewhere. The boat was not going anywhere.

Hiding out from the rain for a while, we skipped through a couple more stores and soon saw where the buses hide. We chose to go for it and caught a POR bus that was just pulling up. Perfect! Riding a Disney bus had been one of Blake’s wishes since he could first say the word!

At first, things were pretty nice. The bus was mostly empty and an awesome mom across from us taught me what I needed to know about stops and such. We were pretty clueless about this stuff!







I can’t believe I don’t have Blake’s bus pic on here! Oh well. We enjoyed the empty bus and watched the rain go away. How annoying is that? I bet we would’ve only need to wait a short bit longer to take the boat. Blake was enjoying every silly minute of this, so it all worked out. It was fun to grant this wish for him.

Then we got to the water park. Lots of wet and smelly guests joined the bus. It was now VERY crowded. We slid together and held the boys, opening up seats to others. Despite making room for as many as we could, I watched one of those women glare at John the rest of the ride. He was doing great on this trip, but still wasn’t 100% better and took advantage of every chance to rest. This is the guy that still stands when the monorail is totally empty so that says a lot! Thank goodness she didn’t dare to speak. After reading so many seat entitlement threads on the DIS, I don’t think I would’ve been very kind. We’ll never use buses again. It’s way too stressful for me!!

[jc040404]

We got off the bus at the first stop in the mansions at POR. I’m not certain if we needed to get off just yet, but I was definitely thrilled to be done with the ride. It only got more crowded at the stop just before this one. The quiet walk back to our room was wonderful!







Such a pretty place! We need to go back here. (Just skip booking river view!)

In our room, mousekeeping had left the “most awesome ever” towel animal yet. Blake’s words, of course!


How cute is that? We don’t usually get anything so nifty




another pretty room pic

I decided to do something unusual this trip and took pics of a few things we bought a T-Rex.






^ Don’t buy that thing. John only used it once and it started leaking really bad. I haven’t thrown it away, but it was never used again.


“Blake-in-the-box”

We had a rainy POR evening, with snacks and some more shopping. John jumped back into the Disney antenna topper game and purchased one to match all the rain. (Mickey in the yellow poncho) I only remember getting some Mickey sprinkles. Those silly things are usually a dessert staple around here, but we’ve been out for a while. Perfect reason to buy new APs, right? When I said that recently, John reminded me that I didn’t need a park ticket to buy them. He stinks. I think I'm ready to go back anyway!

[jane2073]

The pull of Disney is strong!!

We love T-Rex!!! My daughter is a dinosaur fanatic! Through the years we have ended up with three build-a-dinos. And matching babies. Sigh.

[jc040404]

Originally Posted by jane2073

The pull of Disney is strong!!

We love T-Rex!!! My daughter is a dinosaur fanatic! Through the years we have ended up with three build-a-dinos. And matching babies. Sigh.

Too strong. The BEST plan is putting park time off until Christmas so we could cover next year's holiday with the same set. The FUN plan says just buy APs again today. It stinks that every time I calculate buying different tickets for December, APs just make more sense again. Are you still doing seasonal passes?

The dinos are cute though, right? I kinda hope the boys ask for it when we're there in June. They don't really need more toys like that, but I think they're too adorable.

[jane2073]

That was exactly why we got our tickets in mid November. We got them last year on the first day of the Jingle Jungle parade and Osborne lights. And the last day they are good she be the first day of both again.
That said, I bet we renew again. I am thrilled they are finally getting a new parade at MK.

We get seasonal passes. The blackout days are not too bad-usually when it is too hot or too crowded.
I did a regular annual pass for the free parking.