Renewed, Reunited and Finding Our Hillbilly Bone- An Oct. TR- UPDATED 4/16

[jecskc]

I wish I could eat the ice cream too!! Beaches and Cream is definitely on the intinerary for the June trip since we are staying at YC. I think a Kitchen Sink will be in order. I'll have to share a plate of the onion rings with someone. I like onion rings but Katie doesn't.

Unfortunately we had to cancel our trip over the weekend. The condo where I have my Groupon ended up booked up by the time I got around to switching my reservation. It wasn't that big of a deal, but I wasn't feeling too good about spending hotel money I hadn't planned on having to spend. Then my SIL ended up in the hospital for the third time in six weeks. Between the buyers remorse over the hotel, and then feeling that I should delay our departure by a day to help out with my nieces and nephew, I decided just to reschedule the whole thing. We would have only had two full park days (which would have been 10s), and it is just too much time in a car all there in a row when there isn't something new or special your going to do. It all worked out for the best anyway.

Too bad you had to cancel your trip. I hope your SIL is OK. You could reschedule for April 6-10 ....... just saying.

 

[Pixie Princess]

We head back over to DHS to enjoy the rest of the day. No celebrity sightings on the return trip. When we get back, the Animation Academy is destination one, and two, three and four..well you get it. My DD LOVES the Animation Academy. In fact, she’d just as soon stay there the whole day. We draw a couple of characters, and I notice that it is approaching the time is approaching for a showing of the Beauty and the Beast show. I LOVE this show. Belle is my fave princess, Beauty and the Beast is my fave Disney animated movie, and the only other show on property that beats this one is FOTLK. DD is more than content to stay and draw some more while I go watch the show. I tell her to just keep rotating through until I get back. No problem mom!

I head on over to the show, and get a seat toward the back of the theater. I’m sitting behind a family whose kids are all over the place, but once the show starts, they are mesmerized. Don’t you just love that! It is one of my favorite people watching aspects of WDW..seeing people get caught up in the magic. I remember those moments with my own DD. And we still have them, just over different things. Like last October, I did the free dining thing, and decided to try some restaurants that I normally wouldn’t because my DD is picky and I couldn’t justify the cost of a meal simply going to waste. We went to Citricos. I was super excited about that. They had a chicken dish so I figured there was shot DD would be okay. Well as it turned out, I was only lukewarm after the experience, but she loved it. It is exciting seeing her try new things, and really get caught up in a more “upscale” dining experience. In the spirit of full disclosure, most of her joy from the experience came from a lemon dessert. That thing looked amazing! Wish I could have had some.

But I digress, the show was spectacular as always, and I head back to the Animation Academy to meet up with DD. She is in the waiting area, and they are about to seat the next class. We decide to go ahead and do that class. At this point my DD tells me I am going to be upset because I have missed out on drawing Pascal. Oh snap! No-I-di’nt miss out on Pascal. Ooo I am steamed! Oh well, maybe we’ll get to do something cool like Buzz or I’ll get another shot at Tink. My last one was horrible!

Well we end up drawing Jack Skellington. Thinking it should be easy? Well, it wasn’t. Not for me anyway. My poor Jack was horrible. All out of proportion. Nose wrong, smile wrong, bow horrible. After that debacle, I need to feel better about my abilities so we go another round in the class. And boy, oh boy, am I glad we went back through because we got to draw Dug! Here are the new pieces of artwork we will be adding to our gallery.

DD's artwork

I am not supposed to show this next one. It is Jiminy Cricket. He wasn't going like she wanted, so like some other people in the class, she decided to draw him in a Halloween costume. She thinks he looks more like Chip.

I think Flynn is in a bit of trouble with Pascal

And here's mine

We decide to leave on the Dug high note, and go try something we never have. Voyage of the Little Mermaid.

 

[Pixie Princess]

Too bad you had to cancel your trip. I hope your SIL is OK. You could reschedule for April 6-10 ....... just saying.

I did reschedule for spring break, but unfortunately DD's is the first week of April. We'd have to leave the day after you got there b/c we have to be home for Easter. These darn school schedules just never seem to mesh do they?!

 

[Pixie Princess]

So we headed on over to the Voyage of the Little Mermaid. There are about ten minutes before the next show so we wait it out in the little lobby area. We enter the theater and grab our seats and wait for the show to begin. The music begins and then scenes from the movie begin to flash on the screen in front of us. I begin to think this is going to go the way of the Chronicles of Narnia “attraction.” Well at least if it does, I can quietly sing along to the songs. Then we hear the strains of Under the Sea begin. The stage is filled with puppets acting out the song. Think the Finding Nemo show, but dark so you don’t see the puppeteers. It was really, really cool! Way better than the Nemo show. This thing might not be so bad after all! Unfortunately that is where the coolness pretty much ended. Not that the rest of the show was horrible, but it was kind of a let down after the very cool puppetry. I really did like the rain effects, and or course the bubbles at the end. I am glad we saw it, but I don’t think it will be on our “every trip must do” list.

We leave Ariel and her friends, and head on over to TSM to use our FP we grabbed earlier in the day. I do better, but not by much. My honor has not been restored. Sigh. We do some more Star Tours, GMR and watch some of the Citizen of Hollywood performances, and watch a little bit of the AI final show on the big screen outside its theater. We cap off the night by going to see Fantasmic! We’ve only seen it once- three years ago. We weren’t particularly impressed. Especially since we followed the directions on the Times Guide and showed up to the theater 45 minutes in advance of the show. We could have walked in at show time and found a seat. Live and learn.

I’m really hoping we enjoy it more this time. The first time we went to see it, I had of course wanted to see it, but a co-worker of mine insisted that I MUST see it. He swore up and down it was the best night time show there. I figured, dang it must be awesome if he thinks it is better than Wishes. We were let down. Not that the show is horrible, but it ain’t Wishes..or Illuminations for that matter. So I’m hoping the passage of time and the fact I don’t have all this hype building the show up, will lead me to enjoy the show far more. We head over to the theater about 15 minutes before the show starts and get a seat in the second to the last section on the right side of the theater. The two kids in front of us are bouncing off the walls. Clearly tired and desperately trying to stay awake. I think, well if nothing else, I will enjoy their response to the spectacle. The hour approaches and the show doesn’t start. The wave breaks out in the theater, and makes numerous passes through the stadium. The people on the left side of the stadium are tickled no end at this, but eventually have to give up on their entertainment as the rest of us have grown weary of throwing our hands up and going “woo”.

Finally the show kicks off. I do love the music when Mickey appears. It was a ringtone on my old phone. Anyway, I sit there trying to get it to it, and I just can’t. It is cute and all, and I do really like the water screens, but for me it is just missing something. I can’t put my finger on what it is. I just don’t get all misty, and Disney-ey when I watch this one. The kids in front of us clearly feel the same way, as they were in to the show for about five minutes and then were bored. The big boat o’ characters appears, the show ends and now we inch our way out of the stadium.

We finally break free of the crowd once we leave the stadium, and head out to Sunset Blvd. At one of those little carts of light up and glowing fun, DD notices these horrible 80s era glasses with the shade slats that light up. She must have them and is willing to spend her own money for them. Like many things making a re-appearance from the 80s, these glasses really should have stayed there. Oh well, if she wants to spend her money, that’s fine. We find a green pair that matches what she is wearing to MNSHHP, and she purchases them and wears them proudly out of the park. As we depart a get a few pictures on Sunset Blvd.

We exit the park and head back to our lodge. DD is excited because tomorrow she gets to sleep in! Yes, I’m going to let her have a morning off, and actually we will be doing something the next day we’ve NEVER done. We are going to spend the entire day at the resort doing all the activities there, swimming, going to the campfire and maybe the movie. Wonders will never cease.

 

[jecskc]

I did reschedule for spring break, but unfortunately DD's is the first week of April. We'd have to leave the day after you got there b/c we have to be home for Easter. These darn school schedules just never seem to mesh do they?!

But .... we can still see tyou for a little while, right ?? Let me know your plans for Friday, April 6 and the following Saturday. The kids would so love to see your DD.

 

[jecskc]

Your Dug looks really good. I love that they have so many different characters for you to draw. We only did Pluto that one time. I am kind of luke warm to Fantasmic as well. I enjoyed it, but not as much as the other shows. DD and DS really love it though. I can't believe that you have never seen VotLM. I agree on that as well. It was OK and had some good effects, but not a must do.

 

[Pixie Princess]

But .... we can still see tyou for a little while, right ?? Let me know your plans for Friday, April 6 and the following Saturday. The kids would so love to see your DD.

If we are there that Friday, I'll definitely let you know what we are planning to do. Right we are going to be there March 30 - April 3, but I really need to look at what sort of hotel deal I can find off-site. With everything that has been going on with my SIL (she went back in the hospital on Wed.) I just haven't had time to dig around for alternate accomodations.

 

[Pixie Princess]

Okay, so I have been away way too long. My SIL has had some pretty serious health problems pretty much since the beginning of the year. After my last update it got bad again, and I have been busy helping with my nieces and nephews, and since I work from home, I have been getting her too and from doctors and hospitals. Happily, they seem to have gotten to the root of the problem and she is on the way to recovery. So, an other update is coming in the next couple of days.

Okay, now that you've picked yourself up off the floor, I have something exciting from my most recent trip (March 29- April 3) to share.

My daughter was in the MM&Y show this past Sunday!!!!!!!

I was so excited! It was the only photopass experience we had during our day a MK, and it got picked for the show. Disney is now officially forgiven for not putting the picture of my DD and niece w/ Cinderella that I sent to the Memories website in the show.

As soon as I get the picture from Photopass I'll share it here.

 

[Pixie Princess]

So, I have to apologize up front, this will be a picture-less chapter. For reasons that escape me, it never dawned on me to carry my camera around on this day. However, it did mean that I was fully “in” which I prefer.

As I mentioned, it was all good news for DD since today was a resort day. This is something we’ve never done before. I don’t even really like making time for swimming because I figure we have access to a pool at home, so why do something we can do at home. However, DD loves it, and after learning the hard way to take a break when the weather is boiling hot, we’ll make some pool time if the weather calls for it.

DD was looking forward to sleeping in, but she wouldn’t be sleeping in too long. We looked at the AKL activity schedule the night before and activities start pretty early. We get up and head to the Mara for some breakfast. Being the adventurous sort, I go for the African breakfast. Hm.. not a winner. I have discovered, that while I like eggs and while I like tomato, I am not a big fan of the two mixed together. There was also a babootie, and like a Boma, I was not a fan.

We finished breakfast headed and headed back to the room to get ready for our first activity, medallion rubbing. If I’m being honest, this was probably my favorite activity of the day. We meet up with a CM in the lobby of the resort. The resort has several large metal medallions in the floor. We start at the one right at the entrance, and using crayons, we rub over the various images of the medallion.

We next went on to do some pin trading, animal observing and yum, yum, cookie decorating! This was much fun. We were able to pick an animal shaped cookie and use various colors of frosting and some sprinkles to decorate our cookie. I have to say, I am pretty happy I do not have a picture of my cookie. It was pretty hideous!

We eventually took a pool break. As we got to the pool area Disney trivia had just kicked off. Well, needless to say we jumped on that. We missed the first question, but that’s okay. We got in on the second question and we were off. It was about 20 questions. Some of the questions were super easy. The kind of question any kid who had seen the movie about which the question was asked could get. Others were pretty hard..clearly geared toward the parent helpers, or serious Disney buffs. Everyone turned in their answer sheets, and while a couple of CMs tallied the scores, another read out all the answers. We’re feeling pretty good b/c we got all but one question we answered right. And it was an easy one at that. It is too embarrassing to share…they’ll make me turn in my DISboard I.D. Oh okay, I’ll tell you….the question was who was Mike and Sully’s nemesis in Monster’s inc. Well, we answered the question, after some debate, the wrong name. I don’t remember what we said, but it was the name of another Disney different character, or maybe a character from the laugh floor. I want to say we said Russell, but I’m not sure. Anyway, we totally missed the ball on Randall. Anyway, the CMs have the score and are going to announce the winner. The young lady who is to announce the winner says the winning team got 18 right, and starts to giggle. As she’s doing so she says, “I don’t think I can say this team name.” When she said that, I knew it was us. However, I have to say, her tone made it seem as if we had a “blue” name rather than one she just found ridiculous. She asks another CM to announce the winner, and he says “the winners are the Hillbilly Vampires.” I know what you’re thinking,”So this is where the ‘Hillbilly bone’ in the title comes from.” Well actually it doesn’t. That is later. In fact I didn’t even think about our trivia team name when I came up with my sad little title. Hillbilly Vampires, is actually our old team trivia name. It was inspired by a poem my DD’s Girl Scout leader’s husband wrote. I happened to have read the poem before we played our first team trivia game. We were struggling for a name, I suggested Hillbilly Vampire, and the rest is well…the rest.

But back to the real story…. Happily my DD bounces up to collect our prize…some sort of light up, furry, rubber ball thing. It’s name was Igor..my nephew killed it months later. So, DD played some more games before heading to the pool. We hung out for a couple of hours and headed back in to get cleaned up for dinner at Wolfgang Puck Express, one of our favorite CS places. Being that sunset was approaching I snapped a ton of pictures of the animals, and will put them all in the next post.

Before heading out to DTD for the evening we made one more trip down to the pool for the marshmallow roasting. There was a bit of a breeze so you had to dodge the smoke that evening, but it was fun thing to do.

Overall, it was a great day just hanging out at the resort. Imagine that- you can have fun at Disney without spending practically every second in a park. Wonders will never cease.

 

[Pixie Princess]

Savanna pictures from our resort day.

 

[jecskc]

My DD loved the games at the pool !! Your animal pictures are so good. I just love the giraffes !! They are my favorite !! I take the cruddiest photos, but it is fun to post them anyway. We meant to do the pin trading, but never got around to it. Since we were at Kidani and most of the activities were at Jambo, we didn't do much at the resort. Plus, we had only four days.

 

[Pixie Princess]

My DD loved the games at the pool !! Your animal pictures are so good. I just love the giraffes !! They are my favorite !! I take the cruddiest photos, but it is fun to post them anyway. We meant to do the pin trading, but never got around to it. Since we were at Kidani and most of the activities were at Jambo, we didn't do much at the resort. Plus, we had only four days.

AKL is definitely a place you could spend a week and never see the inside of the park and still have plenty to do. Hard to squeeze parks and lots of resort time in just four days. I can't wait to hear more about the time you spent at Kidani. We never ventrued over there.

I'm a big giraffe fan after staying at AKL. I liked them before of course, but just being able to sit and watch them for hours...I just love them now..and zebras. When we went on the safari a couple of weeks ago, the giraffes were all in the road causing traffic jams. It was great. One crossed the road right in front of us. We were doing a slow roll because of it, and we got to just coast along and watch her lope along to get some more breakfast. It was great!