A trip (report) down memory lane...Sept 2016 free dining/WWoHP/beach vacation

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Hello! I have posted a few times on the boards but have never attempted a trip report, though I love reading them. It has been about 6 months since our last trip and I am in full Disney withdrawal, so I figured why not relive the memories and share some of our experience with everyone here! I'm not sure I'll be great at this but it will be fun for me to attempt, and maybe it will tide me over until our next visit.


To start out, let me introduce myself and my family. My name is Shayna. I am a 30-ish year old nurse, wife, mom, lover of good music, all things Disney and Harry Potter, books, thrift stores, crafting, travel, and warm weather. I live in North Carolina, just about an 8 hour drive from Orlando. My favorite things about Disney World are watching the Wishes fireworks show, trying out all the restaurants, and Tower of Terror (that is just at the moment, ask me again tomorrow and you might hear something different!). To support my Disney addiction, I work full time at an immunizations clinic and some nights/weekends at a long term care facility. My life goal is to someday move to Florida and work at Disney or Universal, someway, somehow. I’m sure they hire nurses and if not I’m totally cool with being the Fairy Godmother or something

(Casual Friday at work!)



My husband, Tommy, is also 30-ish years old and works in a government contractor position dealing with warehousing/logistics. In his free time he enjoys working on his car, photography, music, and craft beers…typical guy stuff I suppose! He plays banjo and guitar for fun as well. We have known each other since we were 12 and actually dated for a while in high school, but finally made it official 8 years ago! It took him a little convincing to jump on the Disney train, but I think he is finally on board woo hoo! His favorite part of Disney by far is drinking around the world LOL but he also loves the thrill rides and shows. He is a lot more relaxed than me when it comes to vacations and planning, but we balance each other out well.

(This one is a year or 2 old but one of my fave pics of us!)


We have 2 children, Gabriel (14) and Chloe (7). Both are full out Disney addicts like me, as if they had any other choice growing up with me as their mother Gabriel is in his first year of high school and plays in the marching band. He also loves anime, playing guitar/drums/keyboard, and video games. He is super smart and more on the shy, quiet side. His favorite part of Disney is the Japan area in Epcot (he wants to live there someday!), finding hidden mickeys, and all of the roller coasters. Chloe is in 2nd grade and alternates after school activities; right now we are trying softball and before that was cheerleading. She also loves American Girl dolls, silly kids youtube channels, swimming, and music. She is really creative and artsy, and a little bit of a drama queen at times (no idea where she gets that from!). Her favorite thing about Disney World is meeting all the princesses, the castle, and Tower of Terror (spoiler alert-she was terrified to try it then ended up riding it back to back about 8 times haha).

(Chloe and Mr. Ollivander aka Ollie, one of our 2 kitties. We also have a dog!)

(Gabriel holding my step brothers baby, a few months ago)



This trip was only our 2nd trip as a family, though I had been once as a child with my family also. Our 1st trip was in June 2012 for Gabriel's 10th birthday. This trip we weren't celebrating anything specific, we just wanted to try out free dining and staying on site for the first time and it was a good week to work it into our schedules! The kids had to miss their 2nd week of school but of course there were no complaints from them about that haha. I'm not sure when our next Disney trip will be, but definitely in the next 3 years before Gabriel moves on to college. We have a cruise planned in December with my best friend and her family, so that is our next big vacation. I am pretty excited for that! It is on MSC cruise line and going to the Caribbean for a week. We try to take a good vacation somewhere at least every year. I love the planning part of it and also try to make crafty things for our trips. This trip I made almost all of the Mickey ears you will see in the pictures, some of our shirts, and most of the skirts me and my daughter were wearing. I also hand painted all our magic bands. To me, getting ready for the trip is half the fun! As you can probably tell already this report is going to be a little word-y and a lot picture-y. I think I had about 1000+ pictures between photopass and our own pics but I will try to narrow it down a bit! On this trip we spent the 2nd-9th in Orlando and then the 10th-11th at Tommy’s aunts home near Clearwater, Florida. We stayed at All Star Music resort other than the 1st night which was at a cheap offsite hotel. We visited all 4 of the parks as well as Disney Quest and split up for 1 day which me and Gabriel spent at Universal Studios (can’t go to Orlando without visiting my very favorite castle-Hogwarts!). Our total budget was under 3k for the trip but came in well under that thanks to couponing and deal hunting. Well I guess that’s all the basics! Hopefully I’ll be able to update this frequently, I am really excited to relive our awesome trip!

(Family photo from our 1st Disney trip, June 2012)

Throwback! My 1st Disney trip with some of my cousins back in the late 80s/early 90s sometime. I'm in the yellow stripe shorts!

 

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Tentative outline, will add links as I get them done. I also plan on adding a trip video!

Chapter 1- Hot glue and stitches and paint, oh my! Pre-trip planning fun
Chapter 2- How many Mickey ears are too many? Pre-trip planning fun part 2
Chapter 3- RIP Mrs. Johnson...a very sad start to our trip Travel day
Chapter 4- FINALLY Disney day! A surprise favorite meal and impromptu photo shoot- Disney Springs Day 1
Chapter 5- When the clock strikes 12...a very late night at the castle- Magic Kingdom Day 1
Chapter 6- MSEP and more Magic Kingdom fun- Magic Kingdom Day 1
Chapter 7- You mean Mickey actually eats with us? Our very first character meal ever!- Animal Kingdom Day 2
Chapter 8- Why bad weather can actually be a good thing at Disney- Animal Kingdom Day 2
Chapter 9- Who says 14 is too old to be a Jedi- Hollywood Studios Day 3
Chapter 10- Sometimes ride line friends are the best friends- Hollywood Studios Day 3
Chapter 11- No pain no gain!- Epcot Day 4
Chapter 12- Soarin' and sippin' -Epcot Day 4
Chapter 13- More soarin' and more sippin' -Epcot Day 4
Chapter 14- The only reason I would ever wake up at 530am on vacation is...- Magic Kingdom Day 5
Chapter 15- I want adventure in the great wide somewhere- Magic Kingdom Day 5
Chapter 16-On Top of Splash Mountain- Magic Kingdom Day 5
Chapter 17- Try the grey stuff, it's delicious!- Magic Kingdom Day 5
Chapter 18- Beware of Hitchhiking Ghosts- Magic Kingdom Day 5
Chapter 19- Oh, a world of wishes, a world where dreams come true- Magic Kindgom Day 5
Chapter 20- I solemnly swear that I am up to no good- WWoHP Day 6
Chapter 21- Mischief Managed- WWoHP Day 6
Chapter 22-After all this time? Always- WWoHP Day 6
Chapter 23- Quest for some last minute fun- Disney Springs/Disney Quest Day 7
Chapter 24-Food and family at the beach, a perfect ending- Clearwater FL Day 8
Chapter 25- Do we really have to go home? Travel Day

 

[TEAMJACOB]

I'm in. Sounds like most of us on this site, "having Disney withdrawals". I totally understand.

 

[cheerupem0kidx0x]

I'm in. Sounds like most of us on this site, "having Disney withdrawals". I totally understand.

Yes, the struggle is real! Thanks for joining

 

[cheerupem0kidx0x]

Chapter 1- Hot glue and stitches and paint, oh my! Pre-trip planning fun​

I had been planning our next Disney trip since right around June 26, 2012 (the last day of our last trip) and finally the year 2016 seemed like it might be the year I could turn my plans into reality! We had done so much adulting...Finally bought our first home, husband got a new car, built up our savings, and had been at my new job long enough to have some vacation time in the bank. I knew I wanted to go during the free dining promotion and I knew I wanted to stay on site. Last time we rented a vacation home with our best friend and her family, which was nice, but I wanted the full Disney in your face 24-7 experience. Plus Tommy liked the idea of being able to park the car and not move it for the rest of the trip. So all that was left was picking the date and waiting patiently for the free dining promo to be released. Sometime in April the stars aligned and I was able to book us the exact dates we wanted, at the resort we wanted, and with all the dining reservations we wanted! We picked All Star Music because we are a very music-loving family and it was in our budget. I was nervous about not being able to get some of the harder to find reservations like Be Our Guest and Cinderella's Royal Table, but luckily I didn't have much trouble. My plan for the free dining promo was to upgrade to the regular disney dining plan and then use all the table service credits for character meals, and try to get the max value out of all the QS and snack credits as well. Last time we went we had some really good meals, but we didn't do any character meals because they seemed so outrageously priced, but then I really regretted not doing any after our trip! So this time I wanted to make up for it. I know there are all kinds of debates on here about whether the dining plan is worth it or not. But in our case it was 100%! Everything was already paid for and done before the trip, we could pick whatever we wanted on the menu and not have to worry about the cost, the snack credits were great to have, overall I feel like it helped me relax and enjoy our trip even more. So there's my 2 cents on that. Anyways...in real day to day life I am not a super organized or planning type person AT ALL. I am very chill, go with the flow, everything might look like a mess but I know exactly where it is so don't touch my mess, type person. But when it comes to vacation, especially a Disney vacation, I turn into a type A super planner like no other. I spent hours *coughcoughMONTHScoughcough* agonizing over crowd calendars and menus and touring plans. Tommy definitely thought I was going overboard, I do remember one instance in particular where he got a little irritated that I was asking him what he wanted to eat for lunch in 5 months so I could preorder at BOG haha. But in the end he admitted my psycho planning paid off. Our fast pass date came on July 5th and since they changed the time you can start picking fast passes to early morning, I set my alarm and woke up with a slight 4th of July party hangover to get my fast passes the second I could. True dedication! I ended up realizing I could have slept in because all the fast passes I wanted had multiple times available for the next few weeks. I know because I changed most of them over the next few weeks several times haha. But I finally settled on what we had and then all that was left was to count down the days! And work on tons of projects I had going for our trip. Oh yeah, and try not to tell the kids, because this was supposed to be a surprise trip! The keeping the secret part was so hard because I am not a very good secret keeper. The plan was not to tell them til as late as possible, preferably as we were driving and almost there. I was able to get away with some random disney questions to get an idea of stuff they wanted to do because they knew we were planning to go back to Disney "someday" and its something we discuss often. But a few days before the trip they started to really catch on. We told them we were going to PA for a family reunion to explain why I had to ask their teachers for work in advance for the next week, and that was believable because we normally do go to PA around that time of year for a reunion. But I think all my crafting gave it away, it was just too hard to get that stuff done without them seeing any of it! I tried to play it off like I was "making it for a friend" or "to sell on ebay" but if they did buy it, they definitely thought something was up when they saw disney items getting thrown on top of my suitcase a few nights before the trip lol. Ah well, I tried! I am just not meant to be good with surprises I suppose. We ended up putting our magic bands in a box and having them open it, then told them we weren't really bringing mickey ears to grandma in PA, we were bringing them to Disney World of course! They were still sweet enough to pretend to be a little surprised

This is how I saved the most money on our trip! It was kind of confusing and I don't think it works anymore because target changed their policies last I heard...but basically I used a gift card site called raise to buy discounted target gift cards, which I then used to buy disney gift cards on top of my 5% off red card discount and ebates cash back. Between all that and swagbucks I saved several hundred off the trip!

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10210211880198915

The not so surprise, surprise trip reveal video! I did manage to keep it hidden a lot longer than our first trip. On our first trip, we were going for Gabriel's 10th birthday which is in June. I finally caved around Easter time and couldn't stand to keep it in any longer! I ended up doing an Easter egg/scavenger hunt with clues and little presents to go on the trip (like outfits, autograph books, mickey ears, etc). It was a really cute idea and they were a lot more surprised cause they had no clue!


So as I said in my intro, I really enjoy crafting and sometimes the things I make actually turn out cute! I saw a really long thread on here somewhere filled with pictures of decorated magic bands and knew I had to customize ours. I originally was a little intimidated about painting them and was going to just order decals. But in the end I decided to give it a try and I think they turned out pretty good considering painting isn't my strongest skill. I found ideas on here and on pinterest for inspiration, the only one I really came up with all on my own was Gabriel's Kingdom Hearts theme design. For those who don't know that is a Disney/Final Fantasy mash up type video game that for some reason isn't anywhere in the parks we found out. Why?? It's such a cool game and you'd think Disney would want to promote it. But anyways...I settled on Toy Story theme for Tommy, Nightmare Before Christmas theme for me, and Little Mermaid theme for Chloe. I used acrylic paint/clear nail polish sealer on all of them and it held up pretty well! We got lots of compliments from other guests and even cast members. When Ariel saw Chloe's band she even requested one for herself next time we visit Here are some pics of our bands...

Chloe's Little Mermaid design

Tommy's Buzz Lightyear design

My Nightmare Before Christmas design

Gabriel's Kingdom Hearts design

More crafting continued in next post....

 

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Chapter 2- How many Mickey ears are too many? Pre-trip planning fun part 2​

The answer to that question, of course, is that there is no such thing as too many Mickey ears! This was another project that I spent way too many hours obsessing over on pinterest and had such a hard time narrowing it down. So I decided we would have a different pair for each outfit! Tommy and Gabriel weren't quite as into the ears as me and Chloe, so I only made 1 boy pair for them to share lol. Packing all those mickey ears sure was interesting! I followed some tutorials on youtube to figure out how to make them but really it wasn't too hard. I don't think mine came out quite as good as some of the beauties I saw on etsy but they were a lot cheaper and fun to make! As for the skirts, I had been thrifting vintage disney sheets and curtains for quite awhile. I saw all kinds of projects people had made from them on pinterest (see a theme here? I may be a little pinterest obsessed as well) and figured one day I would put them to use. A few youtube tutorials and a couple hours later I had several skirts done! Another super easy project if you have basic sewing machine skills. Again, I am a hobby craft-er/beginner at sewing so my seams and hems weren't the prettiest but I still got a ton of compliments on them in the parks. They were also very light and comfy to wear, which was nice in the brutal humidity of Florida. Finally, I worked on some shirts using freezer paper stencil technique. This is something I had used before so I was a little more familiar with it, no youtube tutorials needed but they are out there if anyone is interested in learning. The paint has held up thru many washes and they still look great. I didn't think I'd convince Tommy to wear our super lame couples shirts but he agreed without much fight surprisingly and even still wears it sometimes. His shirt got a ton of laughs at the park, that was probably the most commented on project out of all the stuff I made! And one of the easiest! I also made a little countdown to have on my desk at work, I used an old picture frame and just erased the marker off the glass every day to change the number. My coworkers had fun counting down with me. I explained to one of my coworkers about dalmatian day (when you have 101 days left) and told her I was planning to wear black/white scrubs and my 101 dalmatians scrub top. She was super sweet and wore black/white with me that day to celebrate even though she's not the biggest Disney fan My other coworker also had fun changing my countdown and seeing how long it'd take me to realize haha. On the day we were leaving for our trip, I had to work part of the day, and my boss was even nice enough to let me wear my nurse ears to work lol. I got some funny looks from my patients that day for sure.

Ears for days! The nurse ears and frozen ears were from etsy, my best friend had them made for her "I made it thru nursing school" graduation trip and was nice enough to pass them on to me for this trip (or forever cause they are still in my closet oops!). The minnie ones with the red bow and pink bow next to those 2 were found at thrift stores. All the rest are ears made by me!

Freezer paper stencil shirts for me and Tommy. Still can't believe I got him to agree to this LOL he's a keeper for sure.

Freezer paper stencil shirt for Gabriel for our day at WWoHP. I may or may not have stole this shirt after our trip lol.

skirts for me! Chloe had a matching dalmatians skirt too. The Roger Rabbit skirt was actually made from a curtain valance. That was one of my favorite fabric finds!

More skirts for me and matching ears. The frozen fabric was a curtain I think, it was a little heavier of a fabric. Almost wanted to keep it and use it for Chloe's room, it was so pretty. But she has a Rapunzel theme room right now anyways. I also made Chloe a matching Little Mermaid skirt. Her 7th birthday party was Little Mermaid theme and we both wore our skirts for the party too.

My little countdown on my desk

Mr. Ollivander wanted to visit Hogwarts too poor kitty had to stay home. Luckily my in laws agreed to come tend to our pets and our pool while we were gone!

Not quite sure, but I think the big lion king backpack and minnie bag sitting on top of the suitcase might have been what tipped the kids off that we weren't really going to a family reunion in PA hahahaha. Told you I am horrible at keeping secrets. *Side note* see that blue deodorant looking package there? That is called body glide and you can get it at sporting stores or sport aisle of walmart/target. If you are like me, and have thighs or other body parts that like to rub together when you walk, that stuff is amazing to prevent friction and chaffing! One of the best disney tips I can give to you my fellow curvy, thick thighed friends!You're welcome

Travel day turned out to be an awful start to our trip, but thankfully it didn't spoil the whole time. Continue reading more in the next post!

 

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Chapter 3- RIP Mrs. Johnson...a very sad start to our trip Travel day
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September 2nd 2016
Two words you don't want to hear on Disney travel day...death and hurricane

I woke up bright and early for work, as usual, but today I had a little extra pep in my step! It was Disney travel day!! Since we were already taking a whole week off work and kids were missing their whole 2nd week of school, we decided to work our usual schedules that day and then leave immediately after work. We always drive since 1-Im terrified of flying and 2-flight costs are insane compared to driving costs. So we had about an 8-9 hour drive ahead of us, which would put us in Orlando at roughly 1-2am. We are late night people and the kids always do fine in the car so we weren't too worried. I had a cheap offsite hotel reserved already, just somewhere to lay our heads for a few hours and rest. Our bags were packed and ready to go, all we had to do was make it thru the work day.

Rockin the mickey ears at work before we left for our trip! The disney scrubs are just my norm, I have a ton of different ones.


I normally try to avoid the news...too depressing. But I had been keeping up with the weather for our trip and knew there was a threat of hurricane/tropical storm. I refused to panic because growing up in NC you learn to be skeptical of weather reports. Most of the time when they predict a horrible blizzard or crazy hurricane, we end up with 1/4in of snow or rain with a slight breeze. I was a little more concerned about the weather in Florida once we got there, but it looked like as we were driving down the storm was going to be moving north. So I was hoping the worst we would get is rain on our drive down, which I could deal with. Of course, the schools here don't share my "don't overreact" policy when it comes to the weather, and shortly after I got to work I got a phone call that schools would be closing for the day. At this point it was sprinkling rain outside and that's it! The storm wasn't even suppose to reach us until late that evening. But let's close schools for the whole day...sigh... I knew it would be best if I didn't have to leave work early if I could avoid it, so I started making some calls to see what we could work out.

As I was in the process of dealing with this fiasco, I got a phone call from one of our best friends, David. This is a man who is like a brother to me, he is my brother's best friend and pretty much grew up with us. Normally my friends don't call me during work hours, so I knew something must be wrong. When I picked up I realized he was crying. I asked what was wrong and it took a minute for him to be able to speak. He told me his mother had died that morning, suddenly and unexpectedly. She was only in her 50s and they believe she had a heart attack. He was a wreck, obviously. I kept it together until we hung up but then I broke down crying. I was so sad for him, I lost my mom 9 years before and knew how horrible it was to go through that. I couldn't even believe this happened. At that point I knew I needed to be there for my friend and I would be worthless at work anyways between being upset about my friend and stressed about the school/weather situation. My boss agreed to let me go home once he heard what happened, luckily. I left work and immediately drove to my friends house. He had also called Tommy and told him what happened. Tommy was able to leave work as well and went to pick up the kids, then met us at Davids along with my brother. We just sat with him for a few hours, talked and cried and hugged. I told him we would reschedule our trip, he was there for me when my mom died and there was no way I wasn't going to be there for him. He told me absolutely not, he wouldn't hear of it and if we missed our trip it would make him feel even worse than he already did. I knew he was right, it would be near impossible to change the trip at the literal last minute without losing a bunch of money and we had no trip insurance, but it felt so wrong leaving him.

With heavy hearts, and heavy rain, we packed up and got on the road sometime that afternoon, I think it was around 5pm. Neither me or my husband were really much in the pre-trip excitement mood we had been in earlier, but the kids were still excited so we put on a good face for them. The weather turned out to be fine (see I told you, they overreact around here!), we drove through rain most of the way, but nothing drastic. We usually stop to sit down and eat around Savannah, GA area but since we got such a late start we just grabbed some fast food at some random exit shortly after we got on the road. The kids slept and the drive wasn't too bad. We made it to Orlando area sometime close to 2am. We were exhausted and ready to lay down! The hotel we had reserved was the Maingate Lakeside Resort. It was minutes from Disney, cheap, and had decent reviews. Our room was okay, for a cheap hotel, it was clean and we had enough space. The beds were comfortable. My only complaint was the check in process. We had about 3 people in line ahead of us and two of the 3 were there to complain about issues with their rooms. There was only 1 person at the desk so it took forever. They also didn't seem to be very nice or accommodating to the people who were complaining from what I could overhear. But luckily I had no problem with our room and once we got checked in we hit the bed immediately! We planned to get up early-ish for our first real day at Disney and we were determined to make it great despite our rough start.

On the road

2am and exhausted, but still smiling! We made it to Orlando!

This was our room at the offsite hotel...not too shabby for like $40/night!

 

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Chapter 4- FINALLY Disney day! A surprise favorite meal and impromptu photo shoot- Disney Springs Day 1
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September 3rd, 2016
We woke up around 9am...in ORLANDO!! Yay We had planned on getting up earlier but everyone was so exhausted I figured it'd be best to sleep in a bit. We would need all our energy for our marathon day because Magic Kingdom was open until 1am! We had planned on heading to Disney Springs for lunch and to waste some time until our room was ready. We wanted to drop all our stuff off before we headed to the parks for the day. Once we were ready we headed out to our first stop...lunch! I had read many good reviews on Wolfgang Puck Express and it seemed like a great value for the dining plan. I can definitely say I wasn't disappointed! It turned out to be one of our favorite meals of the trip, food-wise, and we had more than enough food. We even packed up some for later. I had the bacon wrapped meatloaf with mashed potatoes. SOOOOO good! Gabriel had a cheese pizza, which was enough to feed at least 2 people. Tommy had the Turkey Club sandwich. And Chloe had the kids spaghetti. For dessert we got a slice of cheesecake to share (very creamy and delicious), and then a cookie and brownie to share later cause we were too full for another bite. If anyone is thinking about eating here I would definitely recommend it!

My meatloaf meal. I am a meatloaf lover and this was one of the best I've had! Those cripsy onion strings were great! I also like that they serve the food on real plates and it looks fancy like a table serve meal, even though its a quick service.

Tommy and Chloe, she brought her doll "Rose" along for the meal

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Me and the kids at Wolfgang Puck Express

After the meal we really wanted to take a nap! But our room wasn't ready yet. So we took a stroll around Disney Springs area and just took in the sights. I had also read about a little studio by the Ghirardelli store that does pictures for photopass that I wanted to check out. If I hadn't heard about it here I would have never noticed it just walking by! You go in and tell them you have photopass and they will set you up to take studio pics. I have read online they now offer different backgrounds but when we were there it was just the plain blue background. They did a couple different poses. It was fun and didn't take long. And we got some okay pictures! I wanted to go back with more dressier outfits on but we never ended up making it. Maybe next time!

Pose 1

Pose 2

\
One with just the kids

Just us!

Finally our room was ready, so we headed over to All Star Music! We did online check in prior to the trip so we just went straight to our room. We were in the Rock section building, I cant remember our room number but we were facing the parking lot and in a corner on the 2nd floor. The room was nice, but let's be real it is only for sleeping and showering! We are all about the parks. So as long as there was a bed and a shower I couldn't complain. We got all our stuff unpacked, debated on taking a quick nap and decided against it. We were ready for Magic Kingdom! We walked down to the bus area. I could see why having a preferred room would have been nice because it was a bit of a walk from our room, but we enjoyed checking out the pool and all the decor. We stopped by the food court to pick up our refillable mugs. A short wait later, we were on our first ever Disney bus ride, heading to Magic Kingdom!

Obligatory room pic!

Rock Inn

Gabriel liked the big guitars by our room

Waiting for the bus, btw it was HOT already!

Caught a glimpse of the monorail! We never did get to ride it this trip, but we did last time.

Magic Kingdom bound!

Continued in next post...

 

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Chapter 5- When the clock strikes 12...a very late night at the castle- Magic Kingdom Day 1
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We arrived at Magic Kingdom around 3pm, still plenty of time to enjoy! I absolutely loved all the Halloween decor, Halloween is by far my favorite holiday and Disney Halloween is just even more awesome. I really was hoping to fit in a MNSSHP but it came down to either that or WWoHP. And I just couldn't give up my Harry Potter day. But it's on the list for next time!

A ton of halloween decor pics in this post!

We had a rough game plan of what we wanted to accomplish and we had 3 fast passes ready to go. We had some time to kill before our first fast pass for Space Mountain and the Festival of Fantasy parade has just started, so we stopped to watch for a minute.

Then we continued on to Adventureland! We did the flying carpet ride and Jungle Cruise first. I really wanted a dole whip, but I knew we were going to be trying out a different snack later so I resisted.

First ride of the trip!

Jungle Cruise. I love the corny jokes and puns on this ride. Our tour guide was a good one!

It was hot and we still had time to kill, so we moved on to Hall of Presidents to cool down! Hall of Presidents is the best cool down spot IMO.

It was then time for our fastpass finally! So we made our way over to Space Mountain. This was to be Chloe's 1st real roller coaster. She had been on some smaller ones at Carowinds back home, but she wasn't tall enough quite yet on that trip for any big ones. We had showed her videos to get her prepared and she was nervous but ready! Our theory was we would strongly encourage her to at least try every ride once, but if she absolutely didn't want to we wouldn't force her. I think I was more nervous than her since you can't sit side by side. I spent most of the ride trying to hold on to her shoulder lol I was scared she would fly out of the seat, but of course she was fine! She wanted to ride again so we did one more time.

To be continued...

 

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Chapter 6- MSEP and more Magic Kingdom fun- Magic Kingdom Day 1
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After Space Mountain, our next fast pass was for Haunted Mansion, one of my favorites! We did a few more rides in Tomorrowland before heading over to Haunted Mansion.

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10210401978831262

Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin...Tommy always wins at these kinds of games! But I was kinda close...

We ran into this guy, who was super talented! He used his wet mop to make a picture on the cement

On our way to Frontierland, we stopped to take some pictures of the castle and feed Cinderella's ducks! This was one of those little, unplanned fun moments that just sticks in your memory. Those are the best <3 The sun was beautiful, the scenery was gorgeous, everyone was happy and enjoying the moment. Couldn't ask for more!

Then we headed over to Sleepy Hollow to try out the funnel cakes and ice cream sandwiches I had read so much about with one of our snack credits. These things were huge! And really yummy. We probably could have shared one of each but we were greedy and we all got our own haha.

So in real life my 7 year old does not use a stroller lol. Shes been past that stage for about 4 years or so. We borrowed one from my brother just to use to lug all our bags and stuff around. We like to pack snacks and water bottles, extra clothes, something for characters to sign, cooling fans, etc and it's so much more convenient to park it in the stroller rather than carry it all. But Chloe did end up taking advantage of it a few times when she got tired of walking in the heat! Dont judge! I would have been in a stroller too if I had fit Especially by about 3 days in, my feet were killing me!

We found a great view to enjoy while we ate and thankfully the sun started to go down. I underestimated the heat! I love hot and I am used to it from living in the south but this was on a whole other level of heat lol. The cooling towels and mist fans did help a little.

After we finished our snacks it was time for our next fastpass, Splash Mountain! This is one of Gabriel's favorites. Chloe was a lot more apprehensive about this one but she agreed to try it. She ended up...not really loving it :/ she said the characters were creepy and the drop was scary. But I was very proud of her for trying. At least she liked Space Mountain.

Gabriel wanted to do funny poses on all the rides

We took turns riding without Chloe a few more times since the line was short. Unfortunately Thunder Mountain was closed during our trip We really missed that one. After a few more rides it was time for Main Street Electrical Parade! I'm glad we got to see it one more time before it was gone. It such a pretty parade. We were a little late finding a spot so we had to squeeze in a little corner but we ended up with a pretty good view. I packed glow sticks for the kids also, like 200 of them, so they passed them out to some kids around us and they all had a good time.

Alice in Wonderland is one of my very favorite movies!

After the parade we rode Splash Mountain again, because lines were so short. Overall on our whole trip the lines weren't bad, if you have a good plan and know when to hit the headliners and use your fastpasses. We got to see some fireworks on the ride, which was pretty neat. My favorite was right as we came over top of the big hill I could see fireworks above the castle. I tried to get a picture of it but it didn't turn out good. I wasn't worried about missing Wishes because we had another night at Magic Kingdom planned for that.

Then we made our way over to Fantasyland to meet Ariel, we couldn't pass her up with all our Little Mermaid gear on!

Photopass with Ariel. She loved our outfits and ears!

Love the picture, so sweet

Ariel admiring Chloe's Little Mermaid magic band

I might have been fangirling just a little bit. She is one of my favorite princesses (tied with Belle!)

The purse I am holding is what we had all the characters sign. Last time we brought a big picture frame mat. I like to find stuff that we will actually use or display rather than just an autograph book. I still carry the bag around everywhere!

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10210445857088191

We also rode the teacups! Blurry video quality sorry. This is one of the few rides I remember from when I came to Disney as a child, so it has a lot of nostalgic love for me, as I am sure it does for many people! Plus as I already said, I love Alice in Wonderland! Bucket list goal someday is to open the park and ride the teacups with Alice or Mad Hatter.

Then we did Astro Orbiter. This was not my ride. First, we were really squished and uncomfortable in there. Second, I love roller coasters but have a huge fear of heights (makes sense, I know) and this one was just too much height and not moving enough to distract me I guess is the best way to explain it. If I am going super fast and flipping around I don't have time to be scared of the height. If I am just moving in a big circle or slowly up and down, I get really freaked out! Like Ferris Wheels...I cant even. The ski lift at Blizzard Beach, no thanks. But put me on Expedition Everest and I am good to go!

\
The view was nice at least

We tried to ride Dumbo but it ended up closing while we were in line due to technical issues Oh well another day!

Finally at 1am they started to close the park and it was past our bedtime! So we headed back out to the buses to return to our new home away from home! Riding the bus instead of driving back was nice. I don't think we got to sit very often on the buses but it still beat driving. Perfect 1st day!

 

[TEAMJACOB]

Sorry for your friends loss!
Looks and sounds like you guys had a great time. Loved your creativity with the magic bands, skirts, tops and ears. They came out great.

 

[cheerupem0kidx0x]

Sorry for your friends loss!
Looks and sounds like you guys had a great time. Loved your creativity with the magic bands, skirts, tops and ears. They came out great.

Thank you ♡ he is still struggling with it, him and his mom were very close.
We did have an amazing time! Looking back at it all now makes me appreciate it even more. Nothing like the memories you make at Disney, its worth every penny!

 

[cheerupem0kidx0x]

Chapter 7- You mean Mickey actually eats with us? Our very first character meal ever!- Animal Kingdom Day 2
​

September 4th, 2016

Today was our day to visit Animal Kingdom. On our last trip we participated in the Disney Y.E.S program (youth education series) and our class was at this park. Basically it is a class you can sign up the kids for in the parks, they offer all different ones, and then you get your tickets at a discount. Used to be a much better discount back then, but even just doing the class was a cool experience and I would love to do it again sometime. Ours was all about the animals of course. Anyways, this trip we didn't have the Y.E.S program class so we were on our own to explore.

We got there awhile after park opening, we needed some sleep after our late night. The first thing we had planned was breakfast at Tusker House. I scheduled it for right before lunch time started because I heard you could sample some of the lunch menu that way too. It turned out to be a great idea! This was our first ever character meal and we were so excited. Chloe thought Mickey would actually sit down and eat with us haha so she was a little disappointed to find out that he just visited but she was happy either way. We had to wait a bit for our table so we just walked around and explored the area. It was brutal hot that day already. Once we were seated our server told us about the special jungle juice they served, it was so good. I wish I could replicate it at home! The food was all very good too. We had a huge variety of stuff from the buffet. Some traditional breakfast stuff like mickey waffles and eggs, and some more adventurous African dishes. Towards the end they did bring out lunch items and we tried a bit of that too, it was all very tasty. Our meal didn't feel rushed and the characters came around a few times. The cast members were great about helping take pictures and making sure the characters spent time with every table. Also, I had organized a photopass share for our trip and one of my fellow photopass group members happened to be dining at the same time as us. So we stopped to meet her and her daughter. Overall, a great start to the day and with full bellies we were off!

Exploring some of the shops while we waited for breakfast time!

Tusker House breakfast

Daisy signing our purse

Mickey hugs

He may be too cool for a lot of things now that he's a big teenager, but you are never too cool for a Mickey hug

Even us big kids love Goofy hugs

After our meal we decided to watch the Festival of the Lion King show since it was right there. And it was SO HOT outside so anything indoors sounded great! Last time we went me and Chloe watched Lion King but Gabriel and Tommy missed it so it was their first time seeing it. Even though we were one of the last ones in we ended up with a great seat in the front somehow.

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10210302987676545

These guys were AMAZING

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10210302991396638

Another very impressive performance

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10210303128800073

Chloe said she wished she could do that. Me too, Chloe!

After the show it was almost time for our first fastpass, Kali River Rapids so we made our way over there, getting a little lost on the way. Immediately after that we had another fastpass for Expedition Everest. This is one of my favorite roller coasters! Last trip, we rode it about 12 times back to back at the end of the day. This time the line was pretty long so we just rode it once with the fast pass. Chloe was VERY iffy about trying it out. The entire time we were in line she kept saying she wasn't going to do it, so we had planned on asking for a rider swap. But at the last minute she said she would try. My brave girl! The picture that came of it was priceless. She looks TERRIFIED, and she was, but she said she liked it. She didn't want to ride it "ever again" though haha.

That face!

Gabriel has no fear of roller coasters, he's been that way since day 1!

After that we decided to take the train to meet Rafiki! We also got to feed some animals in the little petting zoo area and pet a giant bunny and a snake inside. We just took our time here walking around and looking at everything. This part of Animal Kingdom was new for us since we didn't make it over last time.

Tommy was already yawning!

Chloe wants to be a vet when she grows up, so she had to get a picture here!

After awhile we decided to head over to catch the Flights of Wonder show...Continued on next post...

 

[cheerupem0kidx0x]

Chapter 8- Why bad weather can actually be a good thing at Disney- Animal Kingdom Day 2
​

So, up next was Flights of Wonder show. We didn't end up with as good of seats for this one, but it was a great show anyways!

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10210303270163607

After the show I think we wandered some more. Then we decided to get some ice cream and walk over to see the Finding Nemo show. None of us saw that one last time, so it was on our list of must do's.

She used the stroller a lot this day haha

This show was really good, but I think I liked Lion King show a little better.

Chloe loved the bubbles at the end!

After the show we decided to head over to Dinoland USA, another new spot for us. I had heard of Primeval Whirl and honestly it wasn't even on my radar. It sounded like a lame kiddie roller coaster and I just wasn't that excited to try it out for some reason. But Chloe wanted to try it since it seemed more her type of roller coaster than the ones with the big crazy drops. Turns out I was SO WRONG! We had the MOST fun on that ride and it was so unexpected, I absolutely loved it! At this point it had started to rain and the park had cleared out so there was no line. We kept riding back to back probably about 8 times. We would all just bust out laughing the entire time everytime the ride jerked or spinned. Ahhh, another one of my favorite unplanned fun moments. The rain had started coming down harder so they had to stop the ride, otherwise we probably would have just kept going. We had a safari fastpass coming up anyways. I had picked our fastpass time for around sunset, planned it perfectly because I wanted to see the sundown safari. It ended up being kind of a let down Maybe it was the rain, or the heat of all day, but the animals were mostly hidden or not active at all and it was too dark to get any good pics. But on the last trip we had several awesome safari rides so it was okay!

After the safari we decided to get food. I had planned on using a QS credit here at Flame Tree BBQ for 2 reasons. 1- I heard it was an excellent value of a QS credit and 2-Last trip we kept walking past it and it smelled AMAZING but we were so full from Yak & Yeti that we didn't get to try it. The portions were definitely huge. We ended up splitting 2 meals between us. We tried the ribs, chicken and pork combo and subbed out the dessert for extra sides so we could share. Now, coming from NC I am a little judge-y when it comes to good BBQ. But it wasn't bad! Wasn't the best I'd ever had but it was satisfactory lol. I liked the seating area too, very pretty view. Unfortunately right as we start to eat it started POURING rain. And it didn't look like it would let up anytime soon. On the bright side, I brought our dollar store ponchos and we were more than prepared to trek thru the rain. We finished our meal and left to find a near empty park. We weren't too sure what to do so we just wandered for awhile. Most of the rides were on hold while the rain was so heavy. Finally it let up a little and they started running again. We rode Kali River Rapids, there was literally no one else there to ride so they let us just keep going and going without getting off and getting back on. I think we did that about 5 or 6 times just for the novelty of it. If we weren't soaked before the ride, we definitely were after! But at least it had cooled off some. After that we went back to Expedition Everest and it was the same way, no line at all! We took turns riding since Chloe sure wasn't ready to give that another try anytime soon. Gabriel even offered to sit with Chloe so me and Tommy could ride together, something we hadn't really got to do before. I was a little nervous leaving them to wait in the gift shop (I might be a bit of a helicopter parent sometimes) but he is very responsible and protective of her so I knew they'd be fine. Finally it was time for the Jungle Book show to start almost. We had the package for it with our meal. But sadly, they ended up cancelling both shows because of the rain One of the only things during our trip I was really bummed out about. We decided to walk around a bit more and then called it a night. Back to the hotel to get rested for another day!

Me and Tommy are in the back, but the couple in the front...omg funniest pic ever

We were suppose to be pretending to sleep on this one

view from Expedition Everest

The time Tommy convinced me to ride in the front. So much scarier!

Rain faces

Next day on the next post....

 

[cheerupem0kidx0x]

Chapter 9- Who says 14 is too old to be a Jedi- Hollywood Studios Day 3

​

September 5th, 2016

Since we had kind of an early night last night, we woke up in time to make it to Hollywood Studios just after park opening! We aren't morning people really if you haven't noticed lol. We even got up early enough to grab a quick breakfast at the resort. We had our fastpasses and meals scheduled and a plan of attack for the day. First up was our fastpass for Tower of Terror, but Chloe wasn't quite ready to try it yet so we did a quick rider swap. I was able to get another fastpass for later that evening and hoped she would change her mind by then!

We are in the 2nd row on the left, that was our spot almost every time we rode!

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10210445386836435

This is one of my favorite rides ever! Love the theme, love the drop, love everything about it!

Right after that we raced over to sign up for Jedi training. I didn't realize there was an age limit and Gabriel was really excited thinking he was going to get to do it since we missed out last time. But apparently age 12 is the cut off to be a Jedi Chloe signed up still and she was a little nervous to go on stage. We had to come back later for the actual show, so we went to do our Toy Story Mania fastpass and stopped to watch March of the First Order on the way.

I love all the decor in this area too. After the ride we met a green army solider outside and got his autograph!

I played against Gabriel this time and I won!

We had to hurry up to catch our next fastpass, which was for Frozen Singalong. The show turned out to be so much better than what I was expecting! It was really funny, even some college age guys in front of us were laughing the whole time. We loved the snow at the end.

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10210445839127742

Not the best quality video

After the show of course we had to stop and meet Olaf for some warm hugs!

By then we had time to watch the Little Mermaid show and the Muppets show before it was time for lunch! We did the Fantasmic dining package at Mama Melrose. This was one of the dining reservations I had the hardest time deciding. Originally we had planned for dinner at Hollywood & Vine, but most of the characters were characters we would meet at other meals and I was a little iffy because of the bad food reviews. Mama Melrose turned out to be a good choice for us. It was a TON of food since you get appetizers included and it was pretty good! For appetizers we had the ahi tuna, vine ripened tomatoes with mozzarella, and crispy calamari. For our meals Gabriel got the Charred Strip Steak, I got the Penne alla Vodka with Shrimp, Tommy got the Seafood Cioppino, Chloe got the kids spaghetti. And then they brought a dessert sampler with Valencia Blood Orange cake, tiramisu, and lemon cheesecake with passion fruit pearls (my fave, the little pearls were good!). By the end of the meal we were way too full to move!

Always a goofball

Continued in the next post...

 

[2Gma]

I'm joining in...haven't got all the way through your posts yet...we, too went in Sept 2016 and I'm starting to have "Disney withdrawl." It's Spring Break here so I'll live vicariously through your trip report!

Love all your custom made Disney gear. The magic bands turned out awesome! Sorry for the loss of your friend's mom, that must have been really hard to leave him given the situation. Looking forward to reading more...

 

[Sarahboo]

OMG. The couple in the first row of the EE photo, I totally laughed out loud!

 

[cheerupem0kidx0x]

Chapter 10- Sometimes ride line friends are the best friends- Hollywood Studios Day 3
​

Finally we struggled out of our booth at Mama Melrose because it was time for the Jedi Training show! Chloe went to sit in the practice area and she started to get really nervous. She's a little shy sometimes! But it turned out great. She had fun fighting Darth Vader and thought it was so cool she got to be on stage.

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10210292602896932

Jedi Training

Since we were in the area we went ahead and rode Star Tours, then Gabriel wanted to make a light saber for his souvenir. After, we headed over to the Indiana Jones show. This turned out to be really interesting. In real life I am normally a little shy and reserved. I also have a huge fear of public speaking. But for some reason, Disney brings out the extrovert in me I guess because when they asked for volunteers to be in the show I jumped up and down and waved my hands! I hadn't thought far enough to think what I would do if I actually got picked lol otherwise I might not have done it. I got picked and had to go on stage, it was about this time that I started wondering why in the world I volunteered for this. They had us "audition", we had to do our best scream. I'm surprised mine didn't come out like a squeak I was so nervous! After we got officially casted, they had us walk to the back of the seating area to give out our "costume". Mine was a hooded robe type thing. They finished picking the extras and then they gave us all our directions. Off to the stage we went! Throughout the show we had to do different things, like pretend to be shopping or cheering the fight on. It was such a cool experience to have the perspective of a show from the stage. There was one guy who was picked as an extra from the crowd and they called him out to do a fake fight scene. He started doing crazy stuff like back flips, and we realized he must have been planted in the audience but was really part of the show lol. He was really good! And then there was a part where they had a huge explosion and the fire up there was so hot! After the show was over we got to meet the director and the actors. I'm glad I overcame my fear and went for it, it turned out to be a great experience. My kids were super impressed too haha.

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10210445830927537

Idk why all the videos from my husbands phone uploaded so blurry, but I am in the middle there!

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10210292653738203

Another part of the show, I was somewhere in the line of extras!

At this point it was time for our next fastpass at Tower of Terror. This time Chloe decided she would give it a shot. She was so scared, I was sure she would back out at the last minute. But luckily, a little girl about 10 years old was in line ahead of us and realized Chloe was scared. She did the sweetest thing and started talking to Chloe about how nervous she was the first time she ever rode it but how fun it was. She even offered to sit next to her and hold her hand, but Chloe wanted to sit with us the first time. Chloe immediately calmed down and even started to get excited. We ended up riding again with them and talked while we were in line for awhile. Her and her mom were such awesome people. On our 2nd ride Chloe decided to sit next to the girl and they had fun riding together. After that Chloe decided she LOVED Tower of Terror and we spent another hour or so riding it back to back. I got my souvenir at the gift shop, a really cool Alice in Wonderland print by Jasmine Becket-Griffith. I love her artwork, its so creepy and pretty at the same time! The print is now on my desk at work

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10210401928149995

This was like $300, I want it so bad!

Happy she rode Tower of Terror!

the print I bought

We still hadn't rode Rock'n' Rollercoaster yet and Gabriel was dying to ride! I was able to grab a last minute fastpass and we did a rider swap. Chloe was just a little too short for this one and she was okay with that.

Gabriel's face hahaha

We ran back over to Tower of Terror for a few more quick rides before it was time for Fantasmic!

Fantasmic is one of my favorite disney shows! I love that there are so many characters and it just screams Disney to me! It was tough this trip because they also had the Star Wars fireworks show going on and it started within 15 minutes of Fantasmic. So there was no way we could see both. Even though we had already saw Fantasmic before, and have never saw the Star Wars fireworks, we decided we just couldn't miss Fantasmic. We had the reserved seating area for the dining package and we got a really good spot. The kids got out some of our glow sticks again and we were ready for the show.

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10210292764300967

After the show we had time to squeeze in 1 more ride on Tower of Terror lol and then it was time to go! We stopped by the photopass place so I could get them to upload our pics from Jedi Training (they give you a card with a number to enter and it's way easier to have them do it at the desk so you dont have to go thru 100s of pics of other kids on your account). Then we made our way to the buses to head back to our room. The next day was going to be our Epcot day!

To be continued...

 

[cheerupem0kidx0x]

I'm joining in...haven't got all the way through your posts yet...we, too went in Sept 2016 and I'm starting to have "Disney withdrawl." It's Spring Break here so I'll live vicariously through your trip report!

Love all your custom made Disney gear. The magic bands turned out awesome! Sorry for the loss of your friend's mom, that must have been really hard to leave him given the situation. Looking forward to reading more...

Thanks for joining Thats cool we were there around the same time. It seems like forever ago to me! This report was suppose to help with the Disney withdrawal but I think it's making it worse lol.

 

[cheerupem0kidx0x]

OMG. The couple in the first row of the EE photo, I totally laughed out loud!

I didn't even notice it til we got home and was going thru pics, I was like OMG that is amazing hahahaha