7 Days of Magic....at the Happiest Place on Earth

[Pixeldust Fairy]

OMG...that BED!! That is a work of art!! She must just lOVE it!!

Congrats to your son for doing so GREAT in his competitions! My son is just starting out (on his 4th belt in the junior ninja program) and I hope he sticks with it.

I am loving your reports! Thank you so much for sharing, and adding in photos. Oh, and you got to ride POC!! How awesome!

Thanks for the congrats. I hope your son enjoys martial arts as much as we do. It is really a great sport. It implements team, as well as individual ability. We really love it.

 

[Pixeldust Fairy]

I have really enjoyed reading about your trip!Congratulations to your son! That's awesome! And, speking of awesome-WOW! That princess bed is SO cool! Looking forward to hearing about the rest of the trip! Your kids are so cute!

Thanks for reading I am so glad you have enjoyed it.

 

[Pixeldust Fairy]

WOW what a craftsman your DH is- that bed is AWESOME!! Does she actually sleep in it?

Looking forward to more of the report....hope you got on SM it is our fav ride at the MK!

Bev

Yes she does sleep in it. It is fully functional. He spent alot of time making sure that it met up with all the safety requirements. She loves her bed. I do have to say that the only thing she protested about while we were at WDW was not being able to go to her "night night". Thanks for staying tuned.

 

[MI mom of 3]

OMG that bed is amazing!! How long did it take him to build that?

My DS13 does Kung Fu and I am amazed at the amount of energy they use. They are true athletes!!

 

[Pixeldust Fairy]

OMG that bed is amazing!! How long did it take him to build that?

My DS13 does Kung Fu and I am amazed at the amount of energy they use. They are true athletes!!

Yes they are true athletes. I dont think they get the respect they deserve. As for the bed, Brinley was born in July and he started working on it in October finishing up around April of 05. She has been happily ever after dreaming in it since then.

 

[Minniespal]

Enjoyed reading ~ Thanx for sharing.

 

[Tanya90210]

That is the coolest bed I think I have ever seen!!!

Your son did awesome!! you must be so proud

I can't wait for the rest of your report

 

[Pixeldust Fairy]

Day 6 Sunday July 2nd


Okay, now I dont know about the rest of you but after 5 days of non stop going its a little harder to hop out of bed today. I still manage to get up and have the kids ready before park opening. We are headed to MK because we have PS at Chef Mickeys. We are so excited to have our first character meal. I dressed Brinley up as Minnie Mouse. After little research I had scheduled this breakfast later in the morning at 11:15 so that we would get some serious park roaming in the early part of the morning. We decided to take on Fantasy land. We covered Winnie the pooh, the tea cups, Peter Pan and the Indy speedway. We browsed some of the near by shops and headed to catch the monorail at about 10:30. Here is a picture of Brinley, Kiefer and Bryce as we headed to the monorail.

When we arrived at CM we were a little early, but they took our picture and asked us to wait to be seated and I was surprised that we barely had time to hug goofy and they were seating us. Yea, I cant believe our luck with this no waiting thing. We were starving by now. I usually had the kids eat a bowl of cereal before we left the room, but I was out of cereal today and we just had a granola. Oh well, we were here now and the buffet looked great. Our server came by and gave us some OJ and explained how the characters would rotate around the room and that we should probably hold off on getting our food because they were starting our room now. My kids were so excited, especially Brinley. First it was Chip and Dale, next Pluto, Minnie and finally Mickey. This took about 20-30 minutes to meet all the characters. Here is one of the many photos we took there.

We were surprised at how we got so much attention from the characters. I guess it was because the restaurant was not really full at that time. When we got up to get our food WOW.. the buffet was fantastic. My boys were in kid heaven at that moment. I was really impressed with the cheesy bacon hashed browns. I am going to have to attempt to make those at home. We took our time and ate till we were full, never feeling rushed. We even got to see a second round of characters before we left. When we finished, my kids have acquired a radar that finds pressed penny machines and the Contemporary had several.
I knew that we would be returning to MK at the hottest part of the day, but I didnt want to go back to the resort. I think I just wanted to spend as much time possible there knowing our trip was winding down. When we arrived back at MK people were already staking out position for the parade. Wow we were at CM a long time. Since we had missed the afternoon parade on Wednesday we wanted to catch it today. We found a good spot and were happily enjoying some popcorn when the clouds started rearing their heads. Okay now I did not realize what a sauna the hot pavement under a wet poncho makes. We were miserably hot and it was raining. After a few minutes of rain they announce that the parade is canceled. Disappointed, we tried to find some shelter from the rain for a while. Making our way to fantasy land our thoughts were to catch Philharmagic, but that was everyone elses thought also, so we trudged along to frontier land where we found some relief from the rain in the breeze way between frontier and adventure land. I had read that as long as you have your poncho, disney still is in operation, but we noticed alot of rides stopped during that time. Brinley had fallen asleep during this rain fiasco, we were soaked and she was perfectly dry and asleep hmm go figure. Since we were so close to the aladdin ride we let Brinley finish her nap and the twins rode it twice. As we were walking to POC we were distracted by a street show. It was the Pirate tutorial with Captain Jack Sparrow, of course we watched it. I knew that the premier of the ride was on the 7th and who knows it might have even been the REAL Jack Sparrow. Well maybe it was just wishful thinking on my part. The show was quite enjoyable. Here is a photo I snapped of that.

I was impressed at how well disney casts these parts. When that was over the park was starting to awaken after the rain and we had early reservations at Tonys. We headed that direction and arrived early, but they seated us anyway. Our meal was ok. I think it was just ok because it was so cold in the restaurant our food got cold before we had a chance to eat it. But none the less we were happy to be sitting down and having a meal together. After dinner, we headed back to the resort for some much needed rest. Yesterday when we returned to our room mousekeeping had left us updated park ours and events. I was so excited about tomorrow night, Disney was having a 4th of July celebration early on the 3rd of July. What a way to end our trip with a bang. Thanks for reading everyone. Tomorrow filled with crazy events.

 

[fizz13]

Just found your report and loving it Had to say...I know exactly how you feel about opening ceremony at MK, I get the same way, congratulations to your son, thats awesome and hope he has much success in the future, Brinley is just adorable in her Minnie outfit, just sad my DD is too big for this now, and Wowser to the new Jack Sparrow, I'll be sure to check him out. Will keep reading and thanks for sharing a great trip,

 

[pooksma]

Been out of town for a few days and am catching up.
*Congrats again to your son (still waiting to know how you got that trophy home...)
*wow what a bed!!!!!!
*great shot of the twins with Chip and Dale!

 

[janets]

Really enjoying your trip report. You are one brave mama to take 4 kids alone to WDW. Mega congrats to your son on his awesome tournament results. My ds8 is a green belt studying traditional Okinawa karate and has finished 1st or 2nd place in all his in house tournaments. Now that's he's progressed to green, we'll probably be entering some outside events in the next year. I might have to keep this in mind for the future. And now that ds4 has started as well, it might become a family thing. What style of martial arts do most of the participants study?

Hope you have a picture of that 1st place trophy. Would love to see it.

 

[Pixeldust Fairy]

That is the coolest bed I think I have ever seen!!!

Thanks so much. My DH couldn't resist building it for her. He started shortly after she was born.

 

[Pixeldust Fairy]

You are one brave mama to take 4 kids alone to WDW.

Thats what all my friends here at home told me. They were pretty worried about me and if I would have all my hair when I returned.


At the US OPEN all martial arts styles are practiced. It is not specific to one type of training. Which is a good thing. It allows you lots of different views on the many styles that is the martial arts world. Its alot of fun.

 

[Pixeldust Fairy]

Day 7 Last day at WDW

Well this is it. Our last day at WDW. You can bet we are going to make the most of it. After receiving the notice about the special Fantasy in the Sky fireworks celebration and missing the share a dream parade yesterday, it kinda changed all my plans. I originally planned on going to MGM today, but I was so afraid that we would not be allowed into the park due to it reaching capacity I was inclined just to spend the day at MK so we wouldn't miss either. So off we go to MK. I was up and at em as usual, they kids a little sluggish but they are ready to go too. Ok so maybe I should have read all the info a little better, we arrived at the park to be greeted by tons of people. Hmmm... I knew it would be busy, but this is ridiculous for just opening. Come to find out they opened early today to the general public... OH SNAP... Oh well make lemonade. We walked at warp speed to POC we had to ride it again. Now this is a funny story. As we approached the entrance we noticed that there was a line, but everyone was lining up to the left hand side. We knew that there were two cue lines and the one on the right was empty, so we went to the right and practically ran through the twists and turns of the waiting cue right on to a boat. I am almost willing to bet that if we had gone to the other line we would have waited at least 15 minutes. After that we headed through the very crowded pirate shop towards SM, my kids were so wanting to ride this ride. The line was at a 10 minute wait so we opted not to get fast passes for this one and do the stand by. I let the twins go with Kiefer on this ride and I went back to catch photos of them as they came down the drop. I waited patiently and finally they came around. I caught them as they were heading down, but it was not close up enough to see the expressions on their faces. But here is a picture of them as they made the turn on the other side.

After leaving SM we headed to Frontier land, we got side tracked at the pin traders shop. Kiefer decided today our last day he would get into the pin trading action we had all been having fun with. Go figure.
We headed to Country Bear Jamboree and watched that, it brought back lots of memories. I can remember when I was young, my dad would always nap at CBJ. It was 10:30 were all getting pretty hungry by now so we headed over to Pecos Bill Cafe. ( ok, note to self make more PS ressies for next year) Although counter service is good, you can only have so many burgers in one trip before they all start tasting the same. We ate and headed to FantasyLand maybe if we are lucky it wont be too crowded YEA RIGHT. Once we got to Fantasy Land there was a crowd of people there, but I noticed that Philharmagic was NOT.. so guess where we went. YEP.. we walked right in. I am glad we did, I really love this show and so does Brinley I think I like it so much because I can watch her reaction to it.

We pretty much decided that any rides after that were going to take fast passes or alot of waiting time. We spend most of the rest of the afternoon walking the park, taking photos and checking out every shop around. Here is a photo of the boys horsing around.

Kiefer, Tristan & Bryce pin traded with everyone they came in contact with. We knew we wanted to catch the SD parade so we grabbed a snack , dole float for me.(YUMMY gotta love those) ice cream for the kids. We staked out our spot for the parade and waited patiently. I didn't want to miss this one because I knew it was giant snow globes and I just love snow globes. I am running out of room for the ones I have at home. The parade was great, lots of good photos. Brinley waved at every character like they were just waving to her alone. Too cute. Oh did I tell you the park was crowded After the parade ended Kiefer suggested that we eat dinner early to beat the crowd. I had not made any ressies for this day so we walked to the Plaza Restaurant thinking that at 3:45ish it wouldn't be crowded. On the 3rd of July think again. so we thought we would try Cosmic Rays. EVERYONE... thought the same thing we did. I was beat, the kids were hot and we were just wanting a sit down meal in a cool environment. I didn't want Pecos Bill again and neither did the kids. As we made our way past cosmic rays we stopped at story time with Belle and were going to watch that. In my mind im trying to figure out what to do, where to eat. I did not want to walk from place to place only to find a line of hungry people waiting like cattle to eat. So I got out my handy dandy cell phone and tried to remember the WDW dine phone number.. Hey that's it 1-407-WDW-Dine, so I called and asked if they had any openings for Crystal Palace for 5, she looked and said yes, but it was at 4:00, I said well take it and we will run fast. As she was finalizing all the details she burst my bubble, she thought I said someplace else and no CP did not have any openings. BUMMER. AWWW what a let down, but she said wait a minute, I have a table for 5 at Liberty Tavern at 4:15. OH WE ARE SO THERE. I didn't care if they were serving croutons and ketchup, it was sit down, out of the heat, and oh so airconditioned. We took it and ran with it. The kids were so confused as to why I was in such a good mood. So a little lesson learned for me. It pays to remember those disney phone numbers. Not only did it save us time, but it saved us the running around to find a place to eat.

We made it to LT just in time for opening, we were seated right away and were so happy to be there. ADDED BONUS... Character meal, Thanksgiving type food, and pretty much a quiet start. I guess everyone scheduled for a later time and we had the characters to our selves for a while. We LOVED LOVED LOVED this place. I think we were stuffed by the time it was over. Took lots of photos and guzzled lots of food and drinks. I got major mommy points for this Houdini act. This is my favorite photo from LT.

Stay tuned for the rest of our last Hurrah at Disney.

 

[UtahMama]

Three words: Captain Jack Sparrow!!!!! He really did resemble him, didn't he? I would've gone all freaky !!!! ("Security...there's a middle aged woman hugging Jack Sparrow and wont let go...)
Dont you just hate the last day??? The only thing that helps is planning the next trip!

 

[Pixeldust Fairy]

Three words: Captain Jack Sparrow!!!!! He really did resemble him, didn't he? I would've gone all freaky !!!! ("Security...there's a middle aged woman hugging Jack Sparrow and wont let go...)
Dont you just hate the last day??? The only thing that helps is planning the next trip!

I would have really loved to get a photo with him, but his act was to run away at the end. I think all us women should write to disney and request a meet and greet with Jack Sparrow. I cant believe how close he looked. It was awesome.

 

[Bev J]

Your such a smart Disney Mom to think of calling the Dining number. I am going to put that number in my phone before we leave!!

thanks so much for taking the time to post all this report!

Bev

 

[Pixeldust Fairy]

Your such a smart Disney Mom to think of calling the Dining number. I am going to put that number in my phone before we leave!!

thanks so much for taking the time to post all this report!

Bev

Thanks, I hope it comes in handy for you. I took a stab in the dark hoping that it would pay off, and it did. I hope you have fun on your trip, and looking forward to your trip report when you return.

 

[Pixeldust Fairy]

Hi everyone, sorry I haven't gotten the rest of my last day at wdw on the board. I had to leave town for a wedding, I will try to work on the rest by tomorrow.

 

[Pixeldust Fairy]

After our meal at LT, we were definitely stuffed, cooled off and ready to tackle the park again. We shopped at most of the stores trying to decide what souvenirs to take home with us. Brinley decided this was a good time to take a nap. The boys had alot of fun pin trading with all the CMs . I think they even found a quiet spot and played a couple of games of checkers in one of the shops. It was a nice relaxing way to spend the evening before all the fireworks and parades started. Everyone started staking out their spots for the fireworks really early so we decided to follow suit. Kiefer grabbed a popcorn for everyone and a mickey bar for himself. I was determined to take some good pictures of the castle and of the fireworks. I did my best and got a few. I do have to say that the fireworks were spectacular that night. Not only were they above the castle, but they were also all around. It was great.
After watching the fireworks show. I needed to get an EMH wrist band for us but GEEZ the crowd of people trying to get out of the park was un real. I knew I wasn't going to make it down Main Street with 4 kids and a stroller very fast. I told Kiefer to hang out with the kids and I weaseled my way through, between, and around any way I could to get to City Hall. I was pretty darn proud of myself. but only to my dismay they informed me that I could NOT get wristbands at City Hall. So off I go back to the kids against the crowd now. I laugh about this now but was so hot an frustrated at the time.

Thinking that things had cleared out now, we forged on into Fantasy Land and thought about riding some of the rides we missed, but it was not cleared out, still really busy. I guess thetas the way it goes for the 3rd of July. I had a discussion with Kiefer and we decided as we walked stood at the castle entrance that we should probably not stay for EMH as we had to be up by 4 am to catch our bus at 5. We just wanted to make that magic last as long as we could. We walked along mainstreet towards the busses and were inclined to stay and watch spectro magic one last time. I have to say walking away was hard to do. But I guess we can start planning for next year. And hey there is always the dis to keep me goin. Thanks every one for reading, I have really enjoyed putting our trip down in words. I plan on printing everything out and putting it in our scrap book. Hope you all have just as magical of a trip as we did.