Your ULTIMATE SURVIVAL GUIDE to Disney World at Christmas Time! UPDATE x2 10/21

[Disneyfreak508]

Chapter 32: A Brief Christmas/New Years Trip Introduction!
December 21st, 2011 - January 2nd, 2012

Alright everyone, so the first portion of this trip report is COMPLETE!

**Applause, Applause**

Overall, I would like to say that I had an absolutely wonderful time with my Mom on our spontaneous jaunt to the World. We had a lot of laughs, made tons of memories, and ate so much great food! Spending my Mom's 50th birthday in Disney and going through the actual Disney audition experience was absolutely wonderful! I will always remember that trip and look back on it fondly.

But now it's time to continue moving forward! We have a whole other trip to relive, here! And if you thought this last one was good... just wait until you read about the next one! It was honestly probably my favorite vacation to Disney of all time! (besides the frump trips... but they're in their own separate category) There was something about this trip that was ridiculously magical, and I get filled with so much joy whenever I think about it. I can't wait to tell you everything!!

There are a few differences between the past trip and this new trip so I wanted to just point them out very fast.

First off, there is an addition to our cast list!

Here's the whole family picture:



Of course My Mom and I went on this trip. We are the two crazy Disney fanatics in the family who planned this whole thing!

The other two members of our family are my Dad and my brother Jonathan! You may remember them from my February Trip Report.

My Dad is a really great guy and he's very big on the whole "relaxing" thing. Because of him, I tend to chill out a lot more on my family vacations. However, he's a good sport about going places in Disney when it's necessary! We had a lot of fun times together on this trip, especially when we went to get some early morning Toy Story Fastpasses!

My brother, Jonathan, is usually described as a very "chill" person. He's not huge on touring the Disney parks because he doesn't do thrill rides at all. He would much rather spend his day in the hotel room. However, he does enjoy Disney for the food, so I guess I can live with that. You will also noticed that he and my Dad also love spending time at the ESPN Zone at the Boardwalk. They just love their sports!

As you can tell, my Dad and my brother take a much more relaxed approach to the whole Disney vacation thing. They go off and do their own thing a lot of the time, so that leaves my Mom and me time to do basically whatever we want! It actually worked out quite nicely because we got to accomplish a lot but we still got that family time in when the boys were up for it!

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Next I am going to give you the back story on how the trip was put together:

We booked this vacation 11 months out with DVC. (since we were staying at our home resort!)

We were originally only going to go from December 24th-January 2nd, but we decided to extend our stay. There was literally no reason not to!

Okay, I'm gonna be honest, the main reason I wanted to add on those extra days was mostly because of THE BREAD from Kona. I didn't have enough room for a dinner reservation there in my original plan and I NEEDED THAT BREAD. Food. Controls. My Life.

We wanted to keep the resort cost low for the extra days, so we used the Interval timeshare to book.........

an off property resort.

Okay, okay. I know what you're saying.

"OH NO, NOT AGAIN!!!!"

We actually booked this before we booked our other early December trip. So this whole "off property" thing was in the original plan for this Christmas trip, and it's what gave us that delightful idea for our other quick early December trip. Ha. Ha.

So now you're wondering... will it work out this time?

You will have to keep reading to see what happens!

So the hotels were booked, the reservations were made, and BAM! A Disney vacation was planned. HOORAY!

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Another addition to this trip report is TWITTER!

I tweeted live from Disney throughout this whole vacation, and I am going to incorporate the tweets into my trip report updates! (Thank you Lia/__disneygirl for that wonderful idea!) Whenever you see a tweet, it will be bolded and italicized - just like this.

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And I think that's about it! THIS TRIP WAS FREAKING AWESOME. Words cannot describe how excited I am to tell you about everything. Literally, this was the most jam packed and wham filled trip of my LIFE! I hope you're ready! We have a lot of different experiences, many new restaurants, tons of holiday pictures, and SO MUCH MORE coming your way! YAY!

CHRISTMAS/NEW YEARS IN DISNEY 2011/2012
Who: Me, Mom, Dad, and Jonathan
What: Our Family Vacation to Disney for Christmas and New Year's Eve!
Where: Mystic Dunes (the off property resort) and Bay Lake Tower!
When: December 21st, 2011 - January 2nd, 2012
Why: BECAUSE I LOVE DISNEY!

IT IS TIME TO BEGIN!

Continued in Next Post

[Disneyfreak508]

Chapter 33: THE INTERLUDE
December 10th-20th, 2011

So as you know, we had a little bit of time between the trips! We were only home from December 10th-20th and then we left on the 21st.

A lot happened during those days, especially since it was the Christmas season. I thought I'd do a short recap of my few days in between Disney trips before we jump into the next section of the trip report!

So here we go!

We arrived home on December 9th and only had 12 days until we returned!

December 11th, 2011

Two days after I got home from Disney I went to my new college to shadow! I stayed with my friend Kelsey from high school who is currently a sophomore in the same Theatre Performance program that I was joining! So she told me all about it! She introduced me to a lot of people and everyone was getting ready for auditions for the spring semester!

I honestly felt more at home there within the first few hours than I felt at my old school for the first three months. The atmosphere was just so much better! And now looking back on it, I definitely can see why I felt so welcome. This school is perfect for me!

I had to audition while I was there since I would be joining them next semester! My audition was at 9:45 pm which was the last slot of the day! I sang "If Only" from The Little Mermaid broadway show and I performed a monologue from "Seating and Other Arrangements."

I felt that my audition went pretty well so I hoped they liked me! I didn't get cast for the upcoming semester but I wasn't expecting to. They hadn't worked with me yet and didn't know who I was. So it gives me even more incentive to work hard for the upcoming fall auditions!

December 12th, 2011

I went with one of the freshman girls, named Josie, to two of the Freshman classes. (I actually am good friends with Josie now!) They had Acting (where they were performing their scenes) and Intro to Theatre. (where they were presenting their projects) I met a good amount of the freshman class and it was really fun to sit in on theatre classes!

That night we had dance auditions. Those made me a little depressed because it was so hard for me to keep up with the dance they taught us. I took dance when I was little but then I quit, and it's my BIGGEST regret ever. We get to take dance every semester now though so hopefully I will get better!

December 13th-15, 2011

I came back home and did a lot of miscellaneous preparations for the holidays!

During the Christmas season I basically go to Walgreens every day because I love looking at all of the stuff. They have SO MANY holiday themed Disney items. It makes my life.



Lion King Snow Globe!



This Princess Can was filled with the ingredients to make hot chocolate!



The Charlie Brown Christmas tree! (I want this.)



JINGLE COOKIES! ♥



I bought these Disney Christmas cards and I sent them to all of my friends for the holidays. They were so adorable!



During any holiday season I always buy the Pillsbury holiday sugar cookies. I have an obsession with them. THEY ARE SO DELICIOUS! These ones were Christmas trees and they were perfect:



Every year for Christmas my Aunt Marsha and Uncle Jimmy give me Disney movies for my Christmas present! Thanks to them I have a pretty great collection! They live in Virginia and since I wasn't going to be at my Grandma's on Christmas this year, they sent me my present in the mail! This year they got me The Emporer's New Groove, Up, The Lion King, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, and the new Winnie the Pooh Movie!



December 16th, 2011

On this day we went over to my Nana's house and had our family Christmas party! The grandkids (there are six of us) made a gingerbread house all together! We combined two kits to make a gingerbread mansion! It was awesome - we had a gazebo, a pond, a pathway, etc. It was quite extravagent, I have to say.







While we worked on that, my Mom, my Aunt, and my Nana made cookies. YUM!



I helped my Nana decorate her tree a few days before so I took lots of pictures of it!



She has a set of beautiful Snow White ornaments because Snow White and the Seven Dwarves is my Nana's FAVORITE movie of all time. They're so pretty!







And the manger was all set up too!



We opened our Christmas presents and all of the girls got Vera Bradley duffle bags! (thanks to a wonderful sale that I found on cyber monday!)





My cousin Justine and my favorite part of our family parties is THE ICE CREAM CAKE! We always attack it. They're just sooo gooood. And this one was a cute little snow man. SUCH GOOD FROSTING OMG.



After that party I went to pick up Kristen and she came to sleep over. We went out to dinner with my Mom and then we watched the Muppet Christmas Carol!

December 17th, 2011

Kristen and I relaxed all day and then eventually got up to get ready for an Ugly Sweater Party at our friend Ellen's house!



Real cute, right? Our sweaters were UGLY. Just kidding I actually thought they were precious. Mine was from my Nana. And I'm wearing my Santa Mickey Hat! YAY!



Ellen gave me my Christmas present which was a Jasmine Barbie Doll! AHHH! And not only that, but she cut out my face and put it on the picture of Jasmine! On the back of the box, all of the princesses were on there and she cut out all of our friends' faces and put them on each princess. IT WAS AWESOME! Ellen is one of the coolest people I have ever met.



She had GREAT food at this party. Cupcakes in a Cone are the staple food of any Ellen Party, and this time they were shaped like DEER! IT WAS PERFECT!



Ellen also had a DEER RING! I had to take a picture.



The party was great! I got to see a ton of high school friends and catch up! We all sang Christmas songs and enjoyed spending time together. It was wonderful!

Continued in Next Post

[Reberella]

Yay! more to this trip report! I reallly enjoy your trip reports, so Im excited for this one to be a double feature! Hahahaha yay!

[Cinderella Girl]

I love your trip report!! I have read the whole thing and you are a great story teller. I am going to WDW in August with my mom. So excited!!!! I know it will be hot, but we are both teachers, so our travel times our limited.
Can't wait to read more of our report!!
Molly

[Reberella]

OMIGOSH!!!!!!!!!!! I NEED those socks! I absoloutley love them!!!!! Did you get those in Disney?

[Caretames1]

We can't wait to see more Disney Christmas!

[Disneyfreak616]

I KNOW I'm terrible at commenting, but I did read the whole mother-daughter section and I can't wait for the new one! And I'm in the Interlude!! We look super cute going to Ellen's. And so many deer! I love Christmas. <3 Hehe we're precious. I miss you. </3 YAY TRIP REPORTS!

P.S. 22 days!!!!!

[TinkerBrig]

I am so excited to read the other part of your trip! It sounds like it`s going to be good!

I love The Emporer`s New Groove! Sadly, I have not seen the new Winnie The Pooh movie so you will have to tell me how cute it is!

Can`t wait for your next update!

[FancyNancy]

OMG those Vera duffles.

[ronnmel]

OMG! Deer cupcakes! How awesome!

[Amerangel89]

Originally Posted by Disneyfreak508

[SIZE="3"][COLOR="Red"][FONT="Book Antiqua"][CENTER]Chapter 33: THE INTERLUDE
December 10th-20th, 2011

I had to audition while I was there since I would be joining them next semester! My audition was at 9:45 pm which was the last slot of the day! I sang "If Only" from The Little Mermaid broadway show and I performed a monologue from "Seating and Other Arrangements."

OMG I LOVE THAT MUSICAL AND THAT SONG!!! Can we talk about how GORGEOUS that quartet is? It should have been in the orginal movie b/c I just love the way it fits so well to how each of the characters feels.

Originally Posted by Disneyfreak508

During any holiday season I always buy the Pillsbury holiday sugar cookies. I have an obsession with them. THEY ARE SO DELICIOUS! These ones were Christmas trees and they were perfect:

OMG those are my favorite cookies EVER!!! I have the Minnie Easter ones in my fridge I should probably make soon...hmm.

I seriously CANNOT WAIT to read your next TR. You have definitely mastered the art of the TR that makes me miss "home" and so happy I could scream. All at the same time.

[mermaid764]

Yay you're starting the second part

Bay Lake Tower is such a gorgeous resort and I can't wait to hear what you guys thought of it, and hopefully you had a much better off property experience.

Your Christmas celebrations sound like they were a lot of fun, and I love how you're including all that info before starting the rest of the TR.

Looking forward to more!

[Aussiesalad]

Yayyyy part 2! How exciting!
That's awesome you got to shadow and get a bit of an intro to your new school! It's so good when something just feels right straight away!
You girls look adorable in your "ugly' sweaters! I love those parties!

I cannot wait to read about your FREAKING AWESOME trip!
Christmas at the world would be soooo magical!!!

[__disneygirl]

Yay, shoutout to me! Everyone read my TR!! Even though I haven't updated in ages. SOON.

OMG, "wham filled". I'm going to describe things as wham filled from now on. Thank you, Jess. My next TR update is going to be so wham filled no one will even know what to do with themselves!!!!

I have sooo much Disney stuff from Walgreens too! haha

Ok, all your pics are adorable but that one of you and Kristen in the ugly sweaters is my fave. YOUR MICKEY SOCKS ARE SO AWESOME!

I love how deer stuff just seems to follow you around. Every time I see one, I think of you LOL.

So excited for this TR!!!!

[209Disney]

I am looking forward to reading the next part of your trip!!