The Better Late than Never Trip Report Extra long update! 10/30

[ohboyx3]

And…. four months later she starts her trip report. No real good excuse… When we left for ten days in Disney we were full of excitement. When we returned home, we were just plain tired! No one loves Disney more than me…. But I needed a vacation from my vacation! It was back to baseball (all stars) for the boys and school for me. I was an idiot and took three classes the summer semester. Not really sure what I was thinking! Anyways…. I posted pictures on Facebook and shared stories with the family, always having the intent to start a trip report. It just never happened over the summer. I recently received my vacation pics from Snapfish in the mail and sitting here looking at them made me want to relive the magic once again. It was also sort of bittersweet since my husband said that the next family vacation needed to be somewhere different. Although he enjoyed it, he felt as though we were limiting ourselves. Me… I could go to Disney every year and be happy. I relented… but I honestly stayed away from DIS boards… knowing that there wouldn’t be a trip for me anywhere in the near future. Lo and behold… just when I’m least expecting it, my husband says to be yesterday…. “honey… I’d like to go back to Disney” “Um… excuse me? I don’t think I heard you correctly?” “I want to go back… I was looking at the pictures on my phone and decided that the kids won’t be this age very long, and I want to enjoy it while we can… Maybe we can do a day at Universal though ok?” “What in the HECK?” Well… I am no dummy! You better believe I’m jumping on this one! Even if it means being a Disney traitor for a day or two and going to <GASP> Universal! But first… Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. On with the trip report! So here goes… Better late than never!

The Cast:
ME:

Amanda. The planner and Disney obsessed member of the family.I’m 33 and mother of three boys. I’m a substitute teacher during the school year and currently studying to become a full time teacher someday. I’m also a cub master. My life is exhausting, but worth it!
JONAS:

My Hubby. The love of my life! He has put up with me for almost 14 years! He is 33 and a General Contractor. He supports my Disney habit, even though I’m pretty sure he’d rather be lying on a beach somewhere. Don’t get me wrong! He gets into it like the rest of us when we’re there… just not quite as obsessed. 
JONAS JR:

Guess who he is named after? He’s my preteen at age 12. He is such a good boy. I know, I’m biased… but seriously everyone that comes in contact with him is always impressed at his maturity. He is always helpful and has such a fun sense of humor. He is a seventh grader this year and on the tennis, wrestling, and baseball teams.
JEREMIAH:

Our soon to be ten year old and 4th grader. Jeremiah literally thinks he is a Jedi. No… I mean… I think he may need therapy in the coming years. He will probably be one of those thirty year olds going to Star Wars conventions… I thought it was cute at first, but now it’s a little weird. I mean… Shouldn’t he be outgrowing it by now? Even our six year old said: “Jeremiah… Jedi’s aren’t real!” To which he replied: “You haven’t even been to the galaxy, so how would you know?” LOL. See? Anyways… He is much fun to hang around!
COLE:

Last, but certainly not least! He was 6 on the trip and has since turned 7. He is my Disney FANATIC! I attribute it to the fact that his first trip was when he was 18 months old and then again when he was three. He can’t get enough of the Disney magic. He will FINALLY be tall enough to ride almost everything. Read on to see how that all pans out….

TRIP SYNOPSIS:
It had been three years since we had last been to Disney. It was time to go again and we knew it. I hardly had to do any convincing. I NEEDED this trip. We felt that we were finally in a place financially that we could afford to go and decided to go for it. In previous years we had always gone in January. This time we thought to do things differently and try it in May before the Summer crowds get crazy. The plan was to pull the kids out of school three days before summer vacation giving us a head start on the crowds. The thought occurred to us to splurge and stay in a Deluxe resort… but then we decided we would rather stay longer, so a value it was. We opted for the ASMu family suite. Thinking it would be perfect for our family of five and giving us some much needed space! Sooooooo we have our dates… we have where we’re going to stay…. Now the choice of when to tell the kids… We decided to let Jonas in on our secret, because he would have to arrange to take a couple of his finals early. The other two boys were kept out of the loop. It was so TOUGH not to tell!!!! BUT it was WORTH it!!!! On the morning of May 17th we dropped the boys off to school just like any other day…. When we got back home my husband and I packed up the car and got everything we needed to in order. We picked up Jonas from the middle school first and then went to pick up the boys from their school for an early dismissal. We told them we were checking them out early as a surprise to go eat lunch at our favorite little burger joint. Here is how it all played out once we were at the restaurant:
I could watch that video over… and over… and over….

UP NEXT: ROAD TRIP and arriving a day earlier than our planned check in.
Please stay with me! I want readers and I promise we have a fun filled trip with plenty of pics and surprises!!!

 

[ohboyx3]

Chapter 1- Video Surprise

Chapter 2- Orange trees?

Chapter 3- Magic Kingdom

Chapter 4- More Magic Kingdom

Chapter 5- Ohana's and the room key fiasco

Chapter 6- Going Green?

Chapter 7- long update. Mission possible? Dinner @ Garden Grill

 

[ChefDisneyLu]

AWESOME!

Cant wait for more! Thank you for sharing!

Lisa

 

[ohboyx3]

It’s Fall Break and I have a chance to hopefully get a couple of installments up. A nasty bug has hit our family and Jeremiah is going on day 3 of 103 fever. I’m thankful we didn’t plan our trip for Fall break after all which was the original plan. Speaking of Fall Break… I mentioned that my husband said we could go back sooner than later! The tentative plan for now is to go October 2012. We have never been in the Fall and I’ve always wanted to go to Mickey’s Not so Scary Halloween Party. So….. yes, it’s a year away…. But that gives me plenty of time to plan the perfect trip AND to save for it…. Enough with that… Here comes part 2: THE ROAD TRIP.

I last left with with the video of our Surprise. I am SO thankful for the iphone and it’s videotaping capabilities! I’m glad I got their responses captured. Who knows? Maybe it’ll win us a free trip someday! LOL. We didn’t dawdle over lunch that’s for sure. We quickly finished our meals, grabbed a few drinks to go and hit the road! We didn’t have to stop at home, because we had packed everything including the DVD players and were all set for a (hopefully) uneventful road trip. See Last time we hadn’t even made it to Atlanta before my dear husband got pulled over for speeding. Sigh. Anyways… We weren’t very far on our way when I decided to break out the goody bags for the boys. I had made one for each one. I wish now I had taken a picture…. But you’ll have to settle for a list of what I included. In each bag was:

A new Disney T-shirt
A pin lanyard and pins (I ordered these off Ebay)
A pack of gum
A container filled with quarters for the pressed penny machine (My husband was NOT happy about this one… “You gave them a whole roll of quarters apiece??? For a PRESSED PENNY machine?? That is the BIGGEST waste!” LOL He got over it…
A pack of glow necklaces for the nighttime festivities
Their autograph books and a sharpie

AND a DVD of the Clone Wars series. Well this wasn’t put in each bag… but you get the idea…. We were going to be at Disney for Star Wars weekend. All the boys are huge fans, but I hadn’t told them this yet… I wanted to keep one more surprise under my hat!
They were most excited about the pins and lanyards. This would be their first time pin trading and they couldn’t wait to start. In fact, they started by trading with each other and putting them all on their lanyards. This took some time… Smart Mom am I!

The trip was pretty uneventful. We stopped once for gas and dinner at a Cracker Barrel just outside of Valdosta I think… The food was good and it filled us up, but I couldn’t help but anticipate the offerings that would soon be before us! I had taken a lot of time in planning our TS meals and I couldn’t wait to soon be eating at some of our favorites, as well as trying some new places!

Here is my funny for this installment… Honestly everyone should have a Cole in their family. Six year olds are just, well, fun. At least ours is anyways… So as we are driving through Florida we start seeing orchards all over. I say to my family… Look guys at all of the ORANGE trees to which Cole replies very excitedly, “Really?? There are ORANGE trees?” He said it with a little too much enthusiasm and then I realized he thought I meant the color orange… not the fruit! LOL. Funny kid!

We were a couple hours from our destination when I decide to check in with a friend of ours who’ll be joining us on the first two days of our trip. My good friend Angela and her Daughter Caroline live in Tallahassee and decided to tag along. Angela and I were pregnant at the same time and Jonas and Caroline were best buddies until they moved to Florida the year they were to start Kindergarten. We have always kept in touch and we were all looking forward to seeing each other and experiencing some Disney magic together. Turns out they were just a couple hours behind us! We agreed to meet up at the resort when they checked in. Even though it was late we knew the kids would be giddy with excitement! Oh who am I kidding? I was too!

The original plan was to stay offsite this first night and then check into ASMu in the morning. My husband asked me if it was ok to try and get a room for this night so we didn’t have to worry with moving everything. You think I’m going to argue with that????

Soon we are seeing signs for Disney and we know we’re getting close. Here is my attempt at a picture of a sign in the dark while moving:

TIP: As much as I LOVE my iphone do not use it as a GPS when driving to Disney. I typed in the address of the resort and it lead us to….. central casting?? What the crap? Anyhow…. If anyone could possibly get lost in Disney it’s us…. And we did. Quite. So bad that we actually had to stop in another resort and ask for directions. No kidding… I don’t even know how that is possible since there are SIGNS for EVERYTHING EVERYWHERE! I should insert here that we have a track record for being lost. When we were engaged (this was pre 9/11 mind you) I managed to get us lost on the way to the Nashville airport and we ended up on a runway. No lie… but I digress. Oy… Anyhow… A lovely CM at Coronado Springs sent us on our way and soon we found ourselves in the parking lot at ASMu. Maybe we gave her a laugh for the day…. My husband said she is probably used to it… but somehow I don’t see that seeing as I never hear about people getting lost here at the DIS.

So I venture in with Jeremiah and Cole to try and secure us a room for the night. The lobby is EMPTY and by empty… I mean there is nothing there besides the little disco ball that is spinning. AND here is why I love DISNEY. We weren’t in that lobby for two minutes before my boys wind up with these……

I mean…. How awesome is that? It takes just a few minutes and the nice CM gets us a room in the Jazz building for just one night. It’s not a suite, that won’t be available until the next night, but we can suck it up and deal with it! We are just glad to be here! She goes on to tell me that our suite will be in the same building, so we’ll just have to move rooms in the morning and check back in to get our park tickets. I’m doing the happy dance at this point and feel like I am getting a bonus day to my vacation! We head back to the car where my husband and Jonas are waiting and find the lot nearest to the jazz building. Thinking we were staying offsite I had packed an overnight bag. We grabbed that and a few snacks and unloaded for the night. Here was what was waiting for us on our bed:

The boys and Jonas headed out for a quick swim (they just couldn’t stand it) and I waited on my friend to call saying she had made it.

It was near 11:30 when they finally pulled in. We met quickly in the parking lot and exchanged quick hugs and hellos and decided that we were all going to turn in for the night, after all we had a big day ahead of us. We settled in for the night… all but a little squished…. And it didn’t take long until everyone was out. Me? I was sleepy…. But so happy. There is nothing like that first day that you check in… knowing that your whole trip lays ahead of you.
STAY TUNED!

Next up: Magic Kingdom, Ohana’s, the great room key fiasco… and hurry up before I poop on myself! Umm… yeah…. That’s our family

 

[ohboyx3]

AWESOME!

Cant wait for more! Thank you for sharing!

Lisa

I have a reader!!! Yay! I hope there are more to follow!!!!

 

[ohboyx3]

When I left off we were headed to be after a surprise and a looonngg day of travel. We were up early the next morning. I left Jonas to get what little we had packed up and put back into the car until our new room was ready, gave the boys a pop tart (breakfast of champions), sent my friend Angela a text message to make sure she was up and ready, and headed up to the front desk to check in for our package reservations.

The place was hopping already by 8 am. Much different than our check in last night when I was the only one in line. There seemed to be quite a few checking out, so I took that to be a good sign. This resort was definitely a change from the others we had stayed in. Our first trip in 2006 we stayed at the AKL which was deluxe. Of course we didn’t have to pay for one child who wasn’t even two yet, and the others were still considered children! Plus, we could all still feasibly sleep in a regular room and put Cole in a pack in Play. In ’08 we stayed a POR in one of the rooms that slept five. It wasn’t a bad switch…. But I would say it is a big difference going from a deluxe… to a moderate… and then to a value. It was much more crowded for one thing… but I hadn’t seen the suite yet, so I’m still rather optimistic at this point. After a little trouble… the CM was having computer issues… and after having him add the water parks and more option to our tickets he issued me our key to the world cards and we were good to go, promising a text message when our room was ready. Angela had texted me back at this point and her and Caroline were set to meet us at the bus stop. I met my family at our car where they had just finished packing up and we were headed to the bus stop in hopes for a very short wait for the MK bus! On our way we ran into our friends and they commented on how much we looked like the “perfect Disney family!” We were all in our Disney Tees and had our pin lanyards on. The boys were ready to do their first trading!


After a very short wait for a bus we were headed to meet the mouse. One short ride later and we saw this:

I hadn’t anticipated making it there for opening, but we managed to make it there just after they had opened the turnstiles.

I had one mission in mind and that was riding Splash Mountain! Our previous two trips were taken in January and Splash was always inevitably closed. My husband and boys had never ridden it. Ever. Plus, I was anxious to take Cole on his first EVER over 40” ride! We would finally be able to ride everything together as a family and without a child swap! I’m pretty sure we were the ONLY ones that had that idea, because that part of the park was dead. We even had time to stop and pin trade with some Cm’s in Adventureland… I wish now I had taken pictures, but I didn’t. Sorry. Here is one of us at the entrance to Splash though.

It was a walk on! So How did Cole like his first thrill ride experience? ….

He hated it. I was beginning to worry if we would get him on anything else the rest of the trip! I couldn’t understand it! Jonas was his age when we first took him and he rode everything without any fear. Hmmm. Well… Our rule is that you have to try everything at least once. No flames please on that! So… Next up was BTMRR. K… So I sorta told him just a little fib on this one… I told him it was a “fun, little train ride…” There was no wait for this either. We hoped right on and I couldn’t enjoy the ride because I was laughing so hard at Cole who was yelling… “THIS ISN’T A LITTLE TRAIN RIDE! I DON’T LIKE THIS AT ALL! HOW ARE WE NOT FALLING OUT OF THIS THING?” LOL!
After reassuring him that we would try something a bit more tame, we back tracked through Adventureland and rode Jungle cruise and Pirates.

Take that Jack Sparrow? You have nothin on my husband!

At this point we hadn’t even gotten a fastpass yet. We stopped to watch Pirate tutorial where Jeremiah was chosen to come up on stage!

After this we decided to head over to Liberty Square and wait on Jonas Jr. and Caroline who had run to get FP’s for Space Mountain to use later in the day. This is a good place to stop for now I think…


STILL TO COME: Magic Kingdom part 2, our room key fiasco, and “Hurry before I poop on myself!”

 

[kokotg]

Followed you over here from my TR....loving yours so far! The surprise video is great . I'm very impressed with Jonas for helping you keep the secret!

And we get terribly lost at least once every trip, so don't feel bad!

 

[DWGal210]

Hi!! Great start so far!

The kids look like they're having a good time already. Poor Cole! What a sweetie.

Can't wait to hear all about your trip!

 

[ohboyx3]

Time for another installment! I hope more readers come, but hey it is fun reminiscing!


Have I mentioned it’s nice having a 12 year old with a cell phone on this trip? Definitely something we had not experienced before and it came in handy more than one time on this trip!

So we had just sent the older two to get fastpasses for Space and we headed over to Haunted Mansion. For some reason it was down at this time in the morning for some unknown reason. We passed it up and decided to go into Fantasy land to see what we could accomplish before lunch. I called Jonas on his cell and he informed me that they had gotten the fast passes, but were watching “Push” the talking trash can! They made their way over to us and we decided to wait standby for Peter Pan because we figured the line would be much longer the later it got. We got stopped on this rider several times… I’m pretty sure it was to let people off and on or something…. It wasn’t any big deal. I think this is my favorite ride in Fantasyland. I know it’s old and out dated, but it’s just so darn cute and I love the pirate ships sweeping you up over the city. Cole was much more satisfied with this sort of ride. WIMP! Next my boys just HAD to try and pull the sword from the stone…

Maybe Dad could give it a try….

Maybe if all 4 of us pull at once…..

Oh how I was wishing it would magically pop up. They would have freaked out… But alas it didn’t oh well…. They wanted to try again later in the trip.

Nobody seemed interested in Dumbo or the tea cups…. This is what happens when you have a family of boys.

We headed for Philharmagic which is definitely my favorite 3D show on property. It just makes you feel good!!! Here is our obligatory glasses photo. Cheese!

This was a first for Angela and Caroline and they both really enjoyed it. It’s always nice to see things through someone’s eyes for the first time.
There was still some time before our fastpasses for Space could be used so…….. much to my whole families disappointment we hopped on It’s a Small World.

Jonas was particulary thrilled… See?

In order to entertain himself he kept telling Cole to wait for the huge drop coming up… even bigger than Splash he said… LOL BROTHERS!

After what seemed like an eternity for the boys we were getting a bit hungry, so we decided to grab some lunch. I wanted to try Columbia Harbor House so we headed that way. After looking at the menu my husband decided that he didn’t want something there, so he and Jonas went somewhere else for a burger. Heaven forbid they eat a sandwich or something! But whatever…. I was a little annoyed… but I pick my battles.

Angela, Caroline, Jeremiah, and Cole enjoyed our meal. I got a tuna sandwich with fries and a cheesecake for dessert I think… and the boys had mac and cheese I believe with a chocolate chip cookie. Angela had the fish and chips and Caroline got chicken Strips. This was our first use of our dining plan and it sure did feel good… especially when I saw what Angela had to pay OOP for her and Caroline’s lunch. I know it doesn’t save a whole bunch…. But it’s worth it just for the whole sticker shock effect. Especially at table service meals! Plus, my kids absolutely love being able to get a dessert with their meal. That’s something we never do back home… so it’s all part of the vacation for us! I digress…. Ok back to day 1!


With full stomachs Jonas messages me and lets me know that HM is now open! So… we jaunt over there and hop in the standby line. We decide to try the new queue. FUN!

I really liked it although… I must confess… I am a bit of a germ a phob and when I see all this interactive stuff I just start thinking off all the little hands that have been on it… and what those little hands have been doing…. And what if someone is sick… and then we get sick… and then our vacation is ruined!!! I know… I know… I have issues. But thank the dear Lord for those little pocket bac’s. I carried one with me the whole trip and I didn’t even care if my husband rolled his eyes at me… I gave everybody a squirt and we were good to go! My husband thinks I am completely ridiculous!

Loved the ride of course! Jeremiah and Jonas and Caroline chose to ride together, they were finally getting over their 12 year old awkwardness… I tell you… those two can text all day long, but trying to get them to have an actual conversation was ridiculous! Jeremiah and I rode together and Cole and Jonas rode together. Poor Angela was on her own. She didn’t seem to mind. I loved the new feature at the end. I won’t spoil it for you here… but if you haven’t seen it you’re in for a treat. It’s really cool!!!

After that ride it was getting really hot out… Pretty much uncomfortably hot… SO we decided to use our first snack credits of the trip. For what else than Mickey bars! Both Jonas’s had the regular ones, I had an ice cream sandwich and Jeremiah had an itsakadoozie!!!

Cole who is my weird child that doesn’t like any sort of ice cream or popsicle had a popcorn… which wasn’t anywhere near the ice cream cart… but whatever.. we got him some. Mom of the year I am.. Hee Hee. We found a shady spot and watched the river boat. That’s still something I have never done at Disney… We have one here in Chattanooga that we’ve been on several times and it just never seemed like something I wanted to waste my time with. Hmmm…. Thoughts?

Feeling good we headed towards Tomorrow land. I managed to talk to boys out of not doing the speedway… The line was loonng and I didn’t feel like baking in the sun right then. Why is that so darn appealing to boys??? Even my husband??? Did he not get enough driving in during the NINE hour trip down here??? Sheesh!

Well…. Guess what? SM is down…. SO we hop on the Peoplemover. Love, love, love this ride! Except people in the car infront of us were making out… I mean really making out. So much so that it was slightly disturbing…. My husband was laughing his head off…. The 12 year olds were giggling and everyone else was entirely grossed out. Whatever… I guess Disney really is the Happiest place on Earth… Truly.

Trying to get that image out of my head we went to destroy the Evil Zurg. The wait was only 10 minutes! We rode once and then hopped right on and rode a second time. We all love this ride, but I couldn’t wait til they were able to try TSM at HS later in the week. It hadn’t been open when we had come before. I actually beat my husbands score… I don’t know how. I must have got lucky and hit a high point target. Who knows? It had never happened before and it never happened again the whole trip.

Next up was Stitch. Of course there was no wait for this. This would be a first for Cole and I. I had always sat out of it because Cole wasn’t tall enough. For some reason my husband loves this ride. LOL. I think it’s because he likes Stitch… I don’t get it. What a bust. I remember riding Alien Encounter and must say Wow… What a let down. Oh well! I checked another thing off my list I hadn’t done before, so we’re good.

Next we did Laugh Floor. This is a family favorite of ours. Last trip my husband was picked out of the audience. He was this time too. He was Sully. Something about the bald head maybe? He always gets picked for stuff! Anyways… it did not disappoint! We just love this and knew we’d be coming back on our second MK day.

We checked to see if Space had reopened and it HAD! So… We used our fastpasses and all rode. Cole was a trooper! He didn’t like it…. But he did it! That ride is faster and bumpier than I remember… LOL I must be getting OLD! Jonas, Caroline and Jeremiah all wanted to ride again. The line wasn’t long… So we said go for it. The adults and Cole sat this one out. If I remember correctly he used this time to pin trade with all the vendors around SM and Angela purchased a pin set for Caroline. She saw my boys trading and wanted to get in on all the fun. My husband was even looking for him a set… He didn’t get one… but maybe he’ll give in later in the trip?

Here is a pic of Cole while we were waiting on the others.

Isn't he cute?

It was getting to be later in the day by now and I had 5 pm reservations for Ohana. We may have ridden one other ride… I keep thinking we went for one more ride on Splash? Anyways… at some point we said goodbye to Caroline and Angela and promised to meet up later back at the pool. They were going to stay and watch the parade and fireworks, we were saving it for our second day. One more pic of our kids in front of the castle. I love this shot!

We browsed in a few shops down Main Street, the boys did some more trading and we hopped on the monorail headed to the POLY!



Up NEXT: Dinner at Ohana’s, the great room key fiasco, and Hurry before I poop on myself! I promise I will actually get to that next time…. It’s a funny story!
.

 

[ohboyx3]

Followed you over here from my TR....loving yours so far! The surprise video is great . I'm very impressed with Jonas for helping you keep the secret!

And we get terribly lost at least once every trip, so don't feel bad!

Wow! Thanks for reading! I enjoy reading about your adventures as well. We love the video I'm so glad I decided to take one at the last minute. Even if it was just from a phone. Yes... I was surprised he kept the secret. It was fun having him in on it! I just added another installment. Phew.. It's work!

 

[ohboyx3]

Hi!! Great start so far!

The kids look like they're having a good time already. Poor Cole! What a sweetie.

Can't wait to hear all about your trip!

Thanks for stopping by! Cole was a trooper! He might even like it by the end of the trip.....

 

[mamamary]

Love reading your trip report!

 

[kokotg]

We've never done the Riverboat, either...I'm not sure anyone rides it. It seems like every other trip report I read says, "the riverboat is one ride we've never gotten around to doing..."

 

[ohboyx3]

When I last left you we said goodbye for a short time to our friends Angela and Caroline and headed to the Poly for our reservation at O’Hana. This was our favorite meal last trip and one my husband specifically asked to eat at again. What better way to start our trip by eating there our first night. We arrived about 15 minutes early for our ADR’s which is good for us since it always seemed we were running 15 minutes behind or more on our last trip!

Anyways… we got there and it didn’t look crowded at all. I had made the reservation early in the evening hoping to avoid the worst of the dinner rush. Also, depending on how we were feeling I left it up in the air as to weather or not we would go back over to the MK for the fireworks or not. I wasn’t too worried about it since I knew we would have another full day there. We checked in without any problems and I asked that if at possible we be seated in the main dining room with the fire pit, as we had missed out on this last time. She assured me that it would be no problem, handed me a pager and off we went to have a seat and admire the beauty of the Poly.

We waited…. And waited…. And waited…. And waited some more.

By this point we were STARVING and everyone was getting a bit grumpy. We had eaten lunch pretty early and it had been awhile since our Mickey Bars!

Our reservation was for 5:00. At quarter to six I asked how much longer it would be… and also that if it was because I requested to sit in the main room that I would take it back! I was very friendly… No need to get grouchy with them. I just hoped that this wasn’t going to be the trend everywhere we ate. I don’t remember waiting long at all here before and our last trip was right after Christmas!

Anyways… Finally at about 6:30 we got called back. Honestly… we were very close at this point to just ditching our ADR and finding a CS service place. I don’t care how good the food is… an hour and half is too long to let someone wait! I was actually really relieved that we didn’t have any set plans, because that right there would have really messed them up! Oh well… determined to have a great time, I wasn’t going to let that get in our way.

Here is a picture of Jeremiah chowing down!

The dinner did not disappoint. I’m not a huge seafood eater, so I skipped the shrimp, but my boys and hubby at my share! I enjoyed the pork and steak the most. Not a huge fan of the noodles they serve, but the pineapple bread and salad are amazing and more than make up for it. The bread pudding of course was awesome as well… but I think my boys pretty much stuck with the plain vanilla ice cream with the Mickey sprinkles. Cole was out of luck since he isn’t an ice cream eater. I don’t think the boys took part in any of the games they were too busy eating, but they had plenty of things to do for the little ones. Sadly… mine are kind of outgrowing this. I don’t remember anything striking about our server, but I don’t remember anything bad either. He was average as far as I remember and kept our drinks filled which is great in my book. We tipped accordingly and were overall satisfied.


If you get a chance to go here, you should. I’m going to give the benefit of the doubt and hope that our waiting was not a usual occurrence. We will definitely go back, but if we wait that long again we will think twice.

Any chance of seeing the fireworks were dashed because of our wait. It was okay though. We were all pretty tired and the boys were asking at this point to go back for a swim. This was all fine with me, because while they were all swimming I could get things unpacked and settled in the room. It always feels so good to do that!

On the bus it occurred to me that I had never received the text message that our room was ready. I did, however, have the room number written down from this morning and I just chalked it up to technology… It wasn’t that big of a deal. By this time it’s about 8:30 and we are all ready to get in our room. We stop by the parking lot and retrieve our luggage from the car and head off towards our new room. There is no one empty handed, as we just wanted to make one trip.

At this point we REALLY wanted to get into our room… for a few reasons. All of the boys, especially Cole needed to go pee. When Cole has to go… he has to GO. There isn’t waiting! All that Sprite at dinner was making nature call! My husband started getting stomach cramps due to something that must have disagreed with him at dinner and he was feeling pretty miserable. He started feeling uncomfortable in the bus and it had only gotten worse as we got back to the resort. Never fear we would soon be I our family suite with TWO bathrooms quicker than you can say “Mickey Mouse!” Or so I thought…. My husband asked what room we were in. We stood outside of it and it was very apparent that someone else was living in there. They must have written down the wrong number… No problem I will just leave everyone waiting run up to the front desk and figure out what’s wrong. So I leave my family stranded, desperately needing to use the bathroom and run as fast as I can to the front desk. Seems they reversed our room number so the digits were off just a bit. No big deal… I am on my way. Upon my return everyone is looking a little desperate. We slide the card into the slot and…. It doesn’t work…. Not. One. Card. Worked. You have GOT to be kidding me??????? So I RUN all the way back to the front desk, which let me just tell you, that is not an easy run ok!!! Especially after you walked in the parks all day!

As I’m waiting for the next available CM I get a text from my husband that says, “Please hurry, or I am going to poop on myself!!!!”

At this point I am in between laughing and crying. I can’t believe our luck, but I am laughing because I know that this will end up being a story that will go down in family history… Hey Mom… You remember that time Dad almost pooped on himself in Disney??” LOL. I finally get a CM to help me and she tells me to wait by our door for maintenance. They will have to redo the lock. Oh boy. This is going to be fun to tell the DH. I run back to see my dh looking a little green and explain to him the situation. Luckily, it didn’t take maintenance long to get there and fix the problem. They ended up having to issue us all new cards and bring them back to us later. Let me tell you when he opened that door everything was dropped and there was a beeline for the rest room. This was the first of many occasions that I was glad we had a room with TWO restrooms!!!!!

Because of this whole fiasco I didn’t get any first impressions of the room photos. Sorry.

My husband recovered and he and the boys headed out to the Calypso pool for some night swimming. Right as they left Angela called. They had stayed for the fireworks, ridden dumbo, and a bunch of other rides and really enjoyed themselves. Caroline wanted to swim with my boys, but she was afraid we had already been. I explained to her the series of events of the night and that no they were just headed that way now. She met them at the pool and they had a great time swimming until pretty late in the evening. I was so glad they ended up staying and enjoying their park time and didn’t waste it waiting on dinner with us. If I was only going to be there two days I would want to spend as much time in the parks that I could.


I was able to get everything unpacked and put away and set all the beds out for the night. The boys beds needed to be unfolded and made up. I also stocked our little pantry with the breakfast goods and snacks I had brought from home and went to the gift shop and purchased some milk, OJ and cream cheese.

All in all I’d say it was a successful day with a few comical moments thrown in for good measure. My guys finished their swim and we settled in for the night. We were set to hit Epcot in the morning!

 

[Anya22]

I'm following along! enjoying your report so far. This is only the 2nd trip report I have followed and I can see how this is going to turn into an addiction for me!

 

[ohboyx3]

I'm following along! enjoying your report so far. This is only the 2nd trip report I have followed and I can see how this is going to turn into an addiction for me!

Glad to have you along for the ride! This is my first report.. so we are both new at this!

 

[ohboyx3]

Love reading your trip report!

Thank you!! I'm glad to have readers and that you chose to follow along!!!

 

[ohboyx3]

We've never done the Riverboat, either...I'm not sure anyone rides it. It seems like every other trip report I read says, "the riverboat is one ride we've never gotten around to doing..."

Well at least we aren't the only ones... I always see people on there and wonder why? Could they not find anything better to do? Thanks again for following along! I was happy to find your report about three boys also. Us moms have to stick together!

 

[dort]

Great trip report so far, looking forward to more.

 

[ostrom]

I'm joining in. Love that MN Twins hat!