But Did You Die? A December 2019 TR *COMPLETE 12/13*

[syderial]

I was in Epcot while everyone was waiting for the rope drop so early, I decided I'd rather visit that area later when the craziness dies down but we do want to go back

 

[lvcourtneyy]

Sounds like a great night in Epcot!

We loved the holiday overlay for LwtL too.

 

[ashw100]

Man pandemic time is weird, it simultaneously feels both like a long time since I updated, but also like it was yesterday. I hope everyone is staying healthy. Other than a very socially distant road trip to some national parks, we've pretty much been staying home.

Petrified National Forest


Grand Canyon

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As I sit on hold for what is sure to be a long wait with Disney to figure out what to do with my annual pass, I figured now was as good a time as any to do an update. So let's go back to a time where we stood shoulder to shoulder with strangers to watch fireworks, let kids play with the interactive queues, and could walk around with our face bare.

Are We being Burglarized?

We were getting quite hungry at this point, one might even say hangry, so we went in search of some sustenance.

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We decided on the QS in Mexico that I can never remember the name of. We split some empanadas and nachos.

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It was so good and really hit the spot. We then went inside the Mexico pavilion. The entryway is always so crowded with people sitting down to get out of the sun, I have never been able to properly look at the Coco stuff.

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The boys also got there first postcard from the Kidcot station inside.

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When in Mexico one must do The Three Caballeros.

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I got so excited to find a hidden Mickey in the end scene, but the picture was too blurry. Maybe next time I will remember and get a good picture. The pavilion was so quiet, so I went to check out La Cava, and there was no wait. Two avocado margaritas please.

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This was Joe’s first one, and he thought it was just okay. Divorce papers are on the way.

We stopped in China to check out the Shanghai holiday kitchen. We just got the Mongolian beef boa bun, that we each just took a bite of. It was good, but not memorable. We were getting ready to move on when the Jeweled Dragons were walking to their performance area, so we opted to stay and watch.

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It was very entertaining, the boys were mesmerized.

Since we were there, we decided to stop in and get their next postcard.

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While we were in the store, Mine and Joe’s phone started to chirp, our alarm at home was going off. I have to say it feels quite helpless in this situation. We left the store and Joe got on the phone with the security company. Meanwhile I called my friend down the street to see if she could check on the house. After much back and forth, we determined that our cat had probably triggered the alarm, that only ever happened one time before, but it was definitely jarring. After the adrenaline rush of thinking our house had been broken into, we were starting to loose steam. We promised the boys ice cream though, and I knew we could get some at the African Outpost. C and J got their ice cream no problem, but then the machine broke for N’s. The CMs were so good and tried diligently to get it to work. It wasn’t perfect, but in the end N got a mountain of slightly chocolate ice cream, and Joe and I got some vanilla for free for our troubles.

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We found some tables against the lagoon and enjoyed our ice cream. Joe went off in search of his croque glace (because one ice cream isn't enough on vacation) on the other side of the lagoon, while we relaxed.

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Joe finished his croque glace on the way back, but he did bring me a grapefruit beer.

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We’ve had the bottle version from the store and it’s just not as good as from the tap.

There was no reason to move so close to show time, so we just enjoyed each other’s company. N even got a massage.

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Soon it was time for Epcot Forever, we didn’t have a spectacular view, but I didn’t mind.

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The show was okay, I really love the music of Epcot, but at the end of the day it’s just some fireworks. We walked back to the hotel via the International Gateway and turned in for the night. It had been a pretty spectacular, yet long day.

 

[ashw100]

So far 40 minute on hold, so update number two for the day it is.

Disney, Fix Your Rides

We woke up super early for our very exciting day. We got to MK around 7:30. We were held at the train station with all the other dining reservation guests.

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C entertained his brothers by pretending to be Santa. They needed to get the practice down for the next day.

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When we were let in, I didn’t think we needed to rush off to breakfast, so I took my time taking pictures.

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I just love all the Christmas decorations. We were walking down Main Street and N suddenly jumps out of the stroller and hops right in the pathway of the trolley car coming down next to us. We of course jumping in to grab and then chastised him for doing such a reckless thing. This put him in a bad mood for a good portion of the morning, as you will see.

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It's almost a smile

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At least he put his arm out

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He was much better when dad was behind the camera

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I love the side view of the castle, but gave the boys a break for this one.

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I have never noticed this sign or props before. Is it new or I am just not that observant?

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I promise we are headed toward breakfast, I just wasn’t in much of a rush.

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We can’t pass the sword in the stone without trying to pull it out.

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When we finally got to our breakfast location, I see that my dawdling was actually a bad idea. The line for Be Our Guest was very far back. N was still super cranky, he would basically be fine and then just start pouting out of no where. It was as if he remembered the trolley incident from earlier all of the sudden. I let him take some pictures with camera, to cheer him up.

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5 year old photographer savant everyone…

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We had done the online order, and thankfully the huge line moved quite fast. We were in the dining room in 10 minutes.

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N was back to being a crank and it put a big damper on breakfast. We ate our food relatively quickly, but it was a yummy breakfast. Was it $25 yummy, nope, thank goodness for that dining plan.

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The real reason we has booked the breakfast was to try and get on Seven Dwarfs. The line was backed all the way around SDMT to Be Our Guest. We got in line and a woman gets in line behind us with her 5 year old daughter and tells her to stay with us while she ran to the stroller. She didn’t ask us to watch her daughter, just left her there with us. I am sometimes still in shock that I am responsible for the three humans I created; I don’t want to stumble into taking care for other people’s kid without even being consulted. I was just praying this little girl didn’t take off or do something crazy until her mom got back. Soon after mother and daughter were reunited, a CM came over to announce that it was possible SDMT wouldn’t be opening on time that morning. They made everyone move over to the other side of the attraction entrance toward Winnie the Pooh, and we decided to wait.

Sadly, at park opening a manger CM came over and said that SDMT was still down, and they did not know when it would be back. Since we already had a FP on a different day, and I didn’t want to waste prime touring time waiting for a ride that was broken down, we moved over to Winnie the Pooh.

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Now I am not a very observant person when it come to rides. I will see threads of forums or on Twitter about how XYZ attraction has a million things wrong with it that I and most other people wouldn’t notice. However, there were so many broken effects on Winnie the pooh this morning. Multiple animatronics weren’t working and effects like the fog in the Hufflelump scene .

Next we wanted to get on iasw, so we walked to the other end of Fantasyland, only to find out that it too wasn’t yet up and running this morning. Determined to get on something, we went on the carousel next.

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If you’re wondering why N’s face looks like that, it’s a funny story. He has picked out a horse that was green that he wanted. Well someone got to that horse first. So me being the awesome mom that I am, found a green, gold, and pink horse, N’s three favorite colors. That was the reaction I got, he was just having a tough morning, just like the MK rides were apparently.

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Next up, we took a spin under the Sea.

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I could sense a turning point in our morning, we were not going to let the rough stuff effect the awesome day we had planned.

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[lvcourtneyy]

It stinks to have so many rides down when you have a touring plan in place but it sounds like you made the best of it. Hope the morning turned around!

 

[missangelalexis]

Sounds like a nice night at Epcot! Except for the moment of panic with the house alarm!

Ah that stinks about SDMT being down at park opening! And then IASW! But glad you still got on some other rides and tried to turn the morning around!

 

[cindianne320]

That food at EPCOT looks yummy. I never did get to see Epcot Forever.
What a bummer that so many rides were down in the AM!

What are you doing with your AP? I have one, and live in MN. I was supposed to go in April, cancelled, and I am afraid the same thing is going to happen in October... But I am afraid if I cancel, buying a new one will be way out of my price range!

 

[Samrsp93]

I can see all of this crankiness in my future. My son will be 3 going on 4 when we go

 

[ashw100]

What a productive meet and greet session!
Looks like you guys had a lot of fun!

We did, or we try at least

It stinks to have so many rides down when you have a touring plan in place but it sounds like you made the best of it. Hope the morning turned around!

I hate nothing more than when things get in the way of my touring plan, I'm a planner through and through.

Sounds like a nice night at Epcot! Except for the moment of panic with the house alarm!

Ah that stinks about SDMT being down at park opening! And then IASW! But glad you still got on some other rides and tried to turn the morning around!

That almost robbed feeling is more thrilled than rockin rollercoaster

That food at EPCOT looks yummy. I never did get to see Epcot Forever.

If it makes you feel any better, you really didn't miss anything

What a bummer that so many rides were down in the AM!

I hate when it happens, but the blessing of going consistently means we'll always be back to do those rides next time.

What are you doing with your AP? I have one, and live in MN. I was supposed to go in April, cancelled, and I am afraid the same thing is going to happen in October... But I am afraid if I cancel, buying a new one will be way out of my price range!

So I had actually cancelled mine in June. We had a May trip that I rescheduled to August, but at the time I just didn't think I'd be able to get back within the extension time frame. Fast forward to now and watching the parks opening, we are actually considering going on the August trip. I can't undo my previous cancellation but when they added the additional 30 days, I was able to get that. So my pass expired 7/28, now it expires 8/27, which gets me my August trip if I decide to take it.

I hated cancelling in the first place, so I know it's a tough decision, sorry.

I can see all of this crankiness in my future. My son will be 3 going on 4 when we go

I think it really depends on your kid, of course all kids will be cranky at some point. My youngest is the most temperamental child we have, so it tends to be more prevalent with him.

 

[ashw100]

But Did You Die?

Having done all that we could accomplish in Fantasyland, we went into Storybook Circus next.

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Interesting side note, I had really wanted to stop in Big Top Souvenirs that morning, and I never had the time. The next day I saw the headline that a fire had happened in there and it was closed for the rest of the trip.

We went for Dumbo first. They only had one side going, but opened the second side soon after we got in line.

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N really wanted a green Dumbo, and I wanted to make it happen for him, so we quickly walked over to it. Funnily enough there was another mom who’s kid also wanted a green dumbo, and she flat out ran to it. Thankfully we each had our eyes on different green Dumbos.

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After our high flying adventure on Dumbo, we had to do Barnstormer next. What was interesting is they stopped us and asked C his age. I was confused, one because he definitely looks older than 7 and two this is our third trip riding Barnstormer with three kids, and we’ve never been questioned before. But I guess they just needed to double check that he could indeed ride alone, since three wouldn’t fit in one vehicle.

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The queue for Barnstormer has the best view of the Tron construction.

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The boys had an absolute blast on the Barnstormer, they all really love that ride. Joe and I had been scoping out the different holiday popcorn buckets that were available. We had seen two different green aliens in Christmas jammies, a Santa Mickey, and a Christmas tree. I had finally convinced Joe that the tree would offer the best value, because we could actually use it as a decoration during Christmas, so we stopped at the popcorn cart outside of Storybook Circus and bought it.

We had our first FP of the day over in Tomorrowland at Buzz. N was clearly in a better mood by now, and Joe wanted a picture.

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We dubbed this super squinty smile the extra sharp cheesy grin. It pretty much every expression he makes when meeting characters so it is very common throughout the TR. Buzz was fun as always, although I am forever chasing the high that was being a Galactic Hero, a couple of trips ago.

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Womp womp, not even close.

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Our next FP was for Space Mountain.

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Now I pretty much knew the boys would hate this one, but out one ride rule was still in place. C was being dramatic as always and begged us to let him say his final words before he died. We reminded them all how they had been so dramatic before Splash too, and it hadn’t been that bad. Here is where Joe came up with our catch phase we repeated throughout the trip, “but did you die?”

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They of course didn’t get the reference, but I loved it. We asked them after all the scary rides, but did you die? That's what they call A+ parenting right there folks. Here’s the picture they will show when we get our award.

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This is J’s classic pose for all rides, he just puts his head down. Can you believe, they didn’t die? They did all hate it though. After Space, I was checking the app to double check our reservation for the evening when I noticed I had two reservations for droid building. Now I am 99% sure I had canceled the original reservation. I week or two before the trip I had grabbed an earlier time and thought I cancelled the late one. Well of course now I am panicking because to cancel it now is going to cost us $300. I called the reservation line and was told I could not cancel it. I tried to do my best to not stress out until I could talk to someone in person. For now, we had our final FP to use at the Tomorrowland Speedway.

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N just bounced back and forth hitting the center bar the entire way, OUCH.

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This was C’s first time to drive, and he was slow. Done with Tomorrowland for now, we headed across the park to Adventureland. I spotted a guest experience stand near the sunglass hut and we got in line. We explained the situation, and thankfully he was able to call someone and get the reservation canceled without the penalty. I am 100% sure he did not believe me that I had canceled it, but I didn’t care, as long as I wasn’t out $300. We made it to the Pirates League right on time for the boys pirate makeover.

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We saw Captain Jack while the boys were picking their pirate names.

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C’s pirate was the same one who made over J last time.

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Overall it was another really great experience. N’s pirate probably shouldn’t have been doing the job or at least worked on someone older. She did not have the patience for the fidgety N, but all the boys really liked it. I am very sad to see this experience is going away. The price was really good, and there’s not many experiences that both boys and girls will enjoy. This sums up how we feel about Pirates League going away.

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Some more pictures before the sun melts the makeup off.

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[ashw100]

Sword Fighting and Droid Building

We headed over to Sir Mickey’s to see if I could get some PP pictures of the boys in the studio there.

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It was an absolute mob in there, so we turned right back around. N found a Sorcerer’s of the Magic Kingdom portal and wanted to try his pirate key on the lock.

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We got a spot right outside Ye Olde Christmas Shoppe. It was perfect, we were in the shade, and could even feel the AC spilling out into the street. The boys practiced their swordsmanship.

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Joe and C went over to Sleepy Hollow to get us all a snack, while the rest of us held our parade spot.

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The Nutella waffle has been on my must try list for years, and I finally remembered to get it.

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I actually really liked this, the waffle was closer to an ego style with smaller holes than a Belgian, which I was expecting. This made the waffle softer and easier to eat. Plus you can’t go wrong with fruit and Nutella.

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We also got some powdered sugar monstrosities as well.

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I had forgotten to mention, but on the same day that we got there, the Snowball Express got there as well. The Snowball Express is an event put on by the Gary Sinise Foundation. They take families that have lost a parent in the armed services to Disney for a few days. We had seen them scattered throughout the parks every day, but that day in Magic Kingdom there was massive groups together. We found out during the parade why that was. The children of the fallen service members opened up the parade that day.

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I always promised myself I will just enjoy the parade and not take any pictures, and then I inevitably end up taking hundreds. I will try to keep it to the ones one the characters interacting with the boys.

Flynn spotting pirates in the crowd

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The lost boys were scared of my pirates

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Peter Pan was having none of the pirates

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Captain Hook spotting a fellow handled-bar mustached pirate.

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N got to sword fight with Grumpy

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C crossed swords with Chip

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N was so cute waving to all the characters, but when he saw Mickey he jumped out of his stroller to say hi to Mickey. When the big cheese comes around, you show respect and stand.

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We were ready to head out for the day. We followed the parade to the front of the park and were directed to the flag pole area, and then were marooned there until the parade ended. We did get to see the parade a second time, so there’s that.

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N passed out sometime during the journey.

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Our break was pretty nonexistent this day. We let N sleep for a bit and the rest of us just relaxed in the room. When he woke up, we was done with the makeup and wanted to take it off. We hopped on the boat to Hollywood Studios for the evening. Had to get a shot of Joe’s spirit jersey.

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We had to head straight back for our droid building appointment. I still didn’t really know the layout of the land, but we found it with some cast member guidance.

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I really like the inside. All the different droids lining the shop were so cool.

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Joe helped N, while I took on the other two. After you check in, you tell the CM what package you want to do. You can do the droid plus the backpack and a personality chip or just he droid. The droid was expensive enough, so we stuck with that. You pay and they give you a basket which tells you which parts you need. You are then led to the conveyor belt that has all the parts. There you select the parts for your droid.

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Once you pick your parts, they lead you over to the droid building stations where you assemble your droids. At the time, it was about one CM to every two or three stations, so there was help if you needed it. Once your droid is assembled you pop it in the activation station while it activates.

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Once activated the CM give you a run down of your droid and then boxes them up.

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The entire experience was very quick. I believe we were in and out in under 15 minutes. Also, I do not think the reservation was necessary, we saw a woman walk up and ask to build a droid, and they let her. I would also steer young children FAR away from the BB units. J was the only one smart enough to build an R2 unit. The BBs must be opened to turn them on and off. It is a huge pain in the butt, because I requires us to do it every time. Save yourself the annoyance and go with the R2. On the other side of the shop they have all the accessories you can get for your droid. The boys opted not to customize their droids. In a little side shop off the main droid building one they have a shop that sells more Star Wars stuff.

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We had brought backpacks into the park, so we put our droids in the backpacks for easier transport. The boxes they give you are big and bulky and not comfortable to carry around. Outside the droid building they have more droids on display.

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[cindianne320]

Love the pirate makeovers! My boys are going to miss that experience- our youngest loved it!

Sorry about the droid cancellation fiasco. Glad you didn’t get charged!

 

[missangelalexis]

Haha I love the pic of the boys clinging together for dear life before Space! So glad they didn't die!!

Phew glad you could cancel the droid appointment without penalty!

The boys looked great after their pirate makeovers!

The droid building sounds like a fun experience but so fast!

 

[Lesley Wake]

At least he put his arm out

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haha, looks like he's a hostage!

Sadly, at park opening a manger CM came over and said that SDMT was still down, and they did not know when it would be back. Since we already had a FP on a different day, and I didn’t want to waste prime touring time waiting for a ride that was broken down, we moved over to Winnie the Pooh.

Ugh, that's annoying. And then all the broken rides is especially annoying!

I always promised myself I will just enjoy the parade and not take any pictures, and then I inevitably end up taking hundreds. I will try to keep it to the ones one the characters interacting with the boys.

Yeah, same! Though I love those Peter Pan character interactions!

 

[ashw100]

Love the pirate makeovers! My boys are going to miss that experience- our youngest loved it!

Ours too, I hate that they got rid of it.

Sorry about the droid cancellation fiasco. Glad you didn’t get charged!

Me too, $300 downt he drain would have sucked

Haha I love the pic of the boys clinging together for dear life before Space! So glad they didn't die!!

Me too

Phew glad you could cancel the droid appointment without penalty!

Very thankfully he helped us out.

The boys looked great after their pirate makeovers!

Thanks, so sad it's our last time

The droid building sounds like a fun experience but so fast!

It was, they really pump you through there.

haha, looks like he's a hostage!

Wait til you see what he did to me the following day

Ugh, that's annoying. And then all the broken rides is especially annoying!

Yeah, not a great ride morning,

Yeah, same! Though I love those Peter Pan character interactions!

It's so great that they really made a point to interact with the boys

 

[ashw100]

What Happens if You’re a Scaredy Cat

We were on a Star Wars high, and I needed to meet my favorite baddie in the Galaxy, so we walked across the park to Launch Bay. I have to show you all these AMAZING photos that the photo box took for us.

A randomly zoomed in one

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I mean who wouldn’t want to pay $169 for these beauties

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At least you can really see James’ fear in this one.

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Oh look a decent picture.

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If you can’t tell I am MAJORLY again the photo boxes. I was so happy to meet Darth Vader though. I am not one who likes villains, but he is my favorite Star Wars character by a mile. I am so happy he is finally meeting. Since my boys were now bonafide droid builders, we had to go say hello to BB8.

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Hugs for BB

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We always have a lot of fun with BB8, the CMs there are so good, facilitating the conversation. I was starting to feel quite hangry, thankfully we had an ADR coming up. Our ADR was at 50’s Prime Time. The wait felt like it took forever, and the seating area was very crowded. But we passed the time playing Heads up. Our server was okay, didn’t do anything interesting to talk about. In fact I didn’t see any silly antics happening, maybe they stopped doing it? Either way, I went with the PB&J milkshake and pot roast and it was well worth the wait. The pot roast is so flavorful and fall apart delicious. And I never say no to peanut butter and ice cream.



I have no idea what we got for dessert, so it must have not left much of an impression. After dinner we split up. Joe took C and J to do….something. While I took N to the Twilight Zone. I had grabbed a FP earlier, and N had been telling me this is his favorite ride and he can’t wait to go on it for months. Before we walked all the way over, I confirmed that he did in fact want to go and boy was he excited, so off we went. The Sunset greetings were going on, but we didn’t stop longer than to snap this picture.

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He was so excited going through the queue.

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We made it through the library, and as we got to the boiler room, we asks, ”what happens if you’re a scaredy cat?” and I say, “Then you don’t ride.” And he says, “ I think I’m a scaredy cat”

I mean I had pretty much figured this would happen. I tried to tell him it would be fine and he never explicitly asked to leave, so we just stayed in line. He actually got on the ride, and while I wouldn’t say he enjoyed it, I don’t think he is scarred forever either.

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I was proud of him for being brave, and reassured him that he didn’t have to ride again. I now remember that Joe and the boys had discovered the Disney play app features in Galaxy’s Edge, that I had conveniently forgotten to mention to him earlier. So they had been doing some missions on there while we rode.

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N and I made our way over to meet up with Joe and the boys as we had another very important ADR to get to.

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Our reservation was here

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We were led to a standing only table near the back of the cantina with two other men already there. It was very hard to take pictures in there.

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N loved dancing to the music

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This alien in the tank here laid eggs for one of the boys drinks.

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Our server was amazing!! He was totally in character and had puns for days. He really made the experience fun.
Just like from the Cantina on Tatooine, bounty hunter droid head taps.

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I went with the Yub Nub, which came with the souvenir mug that I also purchased.

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It was very strong and very fruity, but I loved it.

Joe got the Jedi Mind Trick.

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His was way too bitter for my liking.

C got the blue bantha.

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It was just the blue milk, with a nasty cookie on top.

J got the Jabba Juice.

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I loved his, but it pretty much tasted like straight pineapple juice.

N got the Carbon freeze, which was by far the coolest drink.

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The dry ice is actually separate from the drink and encased, so you can’t accidentally drink it. Our server had a whole prepared funny thing to say when we delivered each drink. I loved that he got really into it. It was a fun experience, although not having a seat, definitely sucks. It was very loud and rowdy when we were in there, and I only felt a little out of place with kids in there. The price tag stung at just under $100, but I did get the souvenir mug. We opted not to go back a second time later in the trip, but I am happy we did it once.

 

[ashw100]

Standing up to a Stormtrooper

Joe had taken N for a potty break, so the other two and I hung around the Millennium Falcon, taking pictures.

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Of course then C had to go so we switched out.

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It was taking Joe and C a long time to get back and I was antsy waiting, but it turns out there was a good reason. Apparently C had seen stormtroopers out and about and stopped one of them. He wanted to know where his payment was for the mission he had completed with Joe earlier. He had secured some blasters for the first order. Well the stormtrooper was a good sport and led Connor over to the milk stand and got him a free blue milk.

When we were all back together, the park was nearing closing time and MF:SR was at a 15 minutes wait, so you know we had to hop in line.

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I finally got to be the pilot and man is it hard. I have no skill when it comes to video games, but I felt like I was moving one direction, but the system wasn’t as responsive as I was expecting. We crashed for a third time. We also had someone put with us this time, and I felt like I needed to apologize, but he was very cool. N was so excited to be an engineer with this man and talked to him the whole time leading up to the ride.

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When we got off, N was still talking about the stormtrooper mask he had asked for the day before, so we let him use his money to buy it.

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J was also still wanting the Poe helmet, so we walked over there for him to buy that.

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We left as the fireworks were going on and there was a lengthy wait for the boat back to the hotel. We settled in for the night. It had been a good last day with just our family. The next day the rest of my family would descend on Disney World, and we would have to share our bubble with everyone else.

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[missangelalexis]

Sounds like a great night at DHS- lots of Star Wars fun! N was a trooper going on ToT!

 

[Lesley Wake]

If you can’t tell I am MAJORLY again the photo boxes.

Me too! It just takes out all the personality!

We also had someone put with us this time, and I felt like I needed to apologize, but he was very cool. N was so excited to be an engineer with this man and talked to him the whole time leading up to the ride.

Haha, if I had a kid actually excited to talk to me about the ride, I would love it when I do single rider!

 

[ofcabbagesandkings]

I just found and read your whole report! We also did a Dec 2019 WDW trip, with two boys ages 8 and 3. They loved everything Star Wars even though my youngest was too short for ROTR. We asked to wait for a booth at the Cantina and it didn't add too long to our wait, but maybe we just got lucky or maybe they took pity on me because my little one was too tired to stand. That cookie was gross. I've never seen my kids reject cookies but they were both not having the one that came with the blue bantha. We didn't take the booth space up for very long though because my eldest had to get to Jedi Training. We built droids and to my amazement they still play with them sometimes. There's a new app that enables you to control the droid using your phone, play tic tac toe against it or even teach it a choreographed dance (better with the R2s, of course). Other than the expensive droids, we managed to find two cheap-ish souvenirs in GE, the small plush shoulder Porg with the magnet, and a deck of Sabacc cards that we still play with. I think they were between $15-20 each. It's nice to reminisce a bit about that trip. It really feels like it was a lifetime ago.