Complete! Our 1st Grand Gathering!! finished 10/19

[kaw1218]

I am going to post the links to each chapter
Chapter 1 the origin of Gimpy
Chapter 2 The Drive
Chapter 3 Our arrival
Chapter 4 Sunday at MGM
Chapter 5 Late night at Magic Kingdom
Chapter 6 EPCOT part 1
Chapter 7 EPCOT part 2 ' THE DINNER'
Chapter 8 Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique
Chapter 9 Hoop de Doo Revue
Chapter 10 EMH at Magic Kingdom
Chapter 11 Breakfast at Crystal Palace
Chapter 12 Dinner At Chef Mickey's
Chapter 13 Lunch at LeCellier
Chapter 14 a brief glimpse of Animal Kingdom
Chapter 15- MGM and Lunch at Sci Fi Dine In
Chapter 16 Finally Animal Kingdom
Chapter 17 Our Mission: Goats!
Chapter 18 The bus ride.....




Updated chapters

Dinner at O'hana

POP century Hippy Dippy Pool Party!

The End is near...... and here!










Pretrip dated 9-2-06

Since I found the Disboards a few months ago , I have spent hours if not days, reading trip reports.
I love them all. Some make me laugh, some make me cry, and there were a few that made me glad it wasn’t me.
Each one is its own little mini Disney novel

. So here is my story.

Ok, this goes back a few months.(quite a few actually)

It was a Saturday night in early February and we were snowed in with a few friends. DH’s best friend-Buddy- and his wife-Jenn- to be exact. We were sitting around and all decided that we would go on vacation together this year. Group vacation, what could be more fun!!!
Out comes my laptop . Destination suggestions start flying....
the beach? ....no, DH doesn’t ‘do’ sand.... how about Universal?.....nope, too far.......Jenn suggests camping....we don’t have to stay in a tent, though do we? (since she was serious, I just have to say, DUH! )...ohh, lets try Vegas, no way.....too expensive.....(I had to try though )

How about Virginia?. we can go to Williamsburg...now that sounds like a keeper!!! Yea!!! We made a decision! Now at this point, we try to coordinate schedules..... for 2 hours( I really wish I was kidding about that). We finally decide that 2 long weekends in September will work great for all involved.
So now we begin looking for a place to call our own while in VA. We come across the Great Wolfe Lodge. Now that place looks awesome!! It has its own indoor water park! Sign me up!
Ok, this would probably be a good time to mention that our vacation budget isn’t very large this year.

Its about this big.
Which means we will come close with the hotel, transportation, and meals(I already have season passes)
Of course, at this point there is that little voice in my head(I think its ) telling me that we could go to Disney for just a little more. Of course I HAVE to mention that.
Nope that idea is shot down real quick.... way to expensive I’m told(hey I was even willing to stay~gasp~ offsite-the sacrifices I am willing to make!)
Ok, I am happy, I am going on vacation with a great group of people, I can always try for Disney next year.
Now I know everyone is sitting there looking at the screen, shaking their heads, saying ‘uh, why are you putting a TR on the DIS about Williamsburg?’. Well, sit tight my friends, what happens next will amaze all(especially if you actually KNOW how my DH is about Disney)

Ok here is where we will fast forward a little. Its now almost the end of March.....
I get a call from Jenn, 2 trips will be too much for them, they only can go one weekend.
Ok no problem, we can still go both I tell my kids. A few days later.... they only want to go for 2 nights instead of 3. Ok, but can we book it soon, I want something definite. I want to be able to countdown to my vacation(even if its not Disney) A week goes by.... now I am getting antsy. I want to pay for this so I don’t spend my vacation money.
Meanwhile I am still checking the Disney website in hopes that they will miraculously bring down the cost of a vacation so much that no one can pass it up. I really should just make mousesavers my home page.
Apparently I am getting so antsy (I love that word) that I am driving DH . I am once again on the Disney website drooling over all the great things. DH gets my attention. He just saw the commercial where they tell you that a family of four can do Disney for under $1500. DH tells me to see what that includes.
Now I am going to stop here and give a little background info on DH. DH a.k.a. Joey, went to WDW twice when he was younger. That is all you need, his mom told him. He saw and did everything so there was no need to go back. I am shuddering at the thought of my kids being told that. So when we took our kids for their first WDW trip in September 1999, DH said not again until they are in high school. Ok I said. Now we went in July of 2000. Got a great deal, and DH said ok, but we will not go back until both kids are in high school. Yeah, OK. So when we went in September 2002, DH said we will not go ----see a pattern??? oh, you can also add May 2004 and September 2005, but after this trip DH said we are NOT going back to WDW until the kids are married and on their own.
Now back to DH telling me to see what we get for our $1500.
SO I start searching immediately-wouldn’t you ?.....and what do I find???? FREE DINING!!!! Oh, pixie dust has been sprinkled all over my laptop!!! DH tells me to book it. Just like that- book it!

Yeah we are going back to Disney, again. I then call Jenn and family and tell them about the free dining, they then tell me that they decided to skip a vacation this year and purchase a new home.(good thing I didn’t wait much longer!)
So I start my own little celebration. This will be the first trip that me, DH and our dd’s have ever taken alone. Sounds like a great adventure!
I book and pay for our trip.
This is where everyone is saying I thought the title says Grand Gathering, shouldn’t there be more people? Oh, but there are.

My mom has accompanied us to every Disney trip we have taken. But this time we are staying at POP to cut some costs. Only 4 to a room there. And mom cannot afford to get a room herself. I tried all different resorts, and it just was not going to work. Ok, there is always next year. (sounds good to me). Mom is a little disappointed, but she understands.
I went into work and was sooooo excited that I told my Aunt Carol the minute she walked in the door. I’m going to Disney....I’m going to Disney!!! I told her all about it...she hands me the

and tells me it is my job to convince Uncle Bob that they should go too. Now with free dining how hard is that? 5 minutes later, I am headed home to email my travel agent to add another room. Aunt Carol calls me later to say she has room in their room and they want to invite my mom. Sure the more the merrier(what happened to our small family trip? Oh well, it gives me a reason to try for next year!). Ok, I email the travel agent again. Now we are set. We have our rooms, tickets, and meals paid for. I just have to make a few ADR’s and find some airfare for auntie and uncle. The rest of us are driving so we are ready. But its only April. Plenty of time for things to change. And they do.

My cousin decides that I cannot go to WDW again. I don’t see why not, but I guess everyone has an opinion. Then she decides that she will go to WDW this year.(I will not go on vacation with my cousin, my DH will not go on vacation with my cousin, my aunt and uncle will not go on vacation with my cousin-again a pattern)

I feel it is my duty to tell her about free dining. But wait!!! It starts in August, she can go for her DD’s birthday. Yeah! She went in August, which still leaves September for us! I know I am a terrible person for thinking all of this, but let me just tell you one thing, she called from Disney and told us how bored she was, there was nothing to do, they ruined the POTC and none of the TS restaurants were any good. See where I am coming from on this one?

So my auntie decides that she has 3 grandchildren, 2 are going in August and she has one spot left in her room. Can’t leave a child behind, can we?
Add on Steven!
After yet another email to the travel agent, we are officially a Grand Gathering! Whoo hoo!
As a recap we have:

Me- Kelly- 30- lover of all things Disney, employed at the big orange home of the LGMHPC’s(lime green mickey head paint chips)
DH-Joe-31- not so much a lover of all things disney, but goes for me!!(yeah right, deep down he is a lover, he is just to manly to admit it!!)
DD10-Alyssa- I just noticed on the first day of school the other day that my baby is no longer~sniff~ she loves her friends,

, and the phone!
DD7-Amanda-Mandy- Bubba- she loves Home Depot-Tony Stewart,

, and ice hockey, she is my ‘easy going, nothing bothers her’ kid. Now if I can get her to keep her closet clean! My mom, I had her hooked since her first trip in ‘99. a great built in babysitter, she goes every where with us.
Aunt Carol- auntie-carol- my mom’s sister- she also works at the Depot with me. She loves to go on vacation. she like disney, will have a great time, but does not make it her life calling to attend WDW every chance she gets.
Uncle Bob-well, he’s just Uncle BOB!!! he works at the Depot too! Yes all at the same store! It’s a family thing. Very easy going, he just goes with the flow.
and finally we have Steven
Steven is my cousin, my mom’s nephew, and Aunt Carol’s grandson.
He’s a great kid, very well behaved and we cannot wait to spoil him and then send him back to his mother!!!


Here’s a laugh for you. I like to think I am a planner. I have all the guidebooks, I signed up for Tourguide mike. I keep a notebook and pen next to the

so I can write down everything.

But, I try every year and we will still get on the first bus that comes to the stop and go from there- I can just hear the sharp intake of breaths. Yes, I pretend to plan, and then we will pretty much wing it. Hey, what can I say? It seems to work for us!
After hours of reading my books and the dis, I have my ADRs all booked, airfare for 3(the rest of us are driving) and one ultimate packing list.
And I still had 63 days left...........
I spent an awful lot of time posting on the dis....and making t-shirts,changing ADR's, swiping LGMHPC’s from work, changing ADR’s, collecting the best pennies for our pressed pennies, changing ADR's .
Now here I am less than a week from leaving. We have all our glow bracelets,ziploc bags, quarters in mini m & m tubes, the bodyglide, our colorful crocs-mine are pink!!, a dis-meet/ pool party planned and a huge pile of clothes -pretty isn't it?

that will soon be neatly tucked away into suitcases. If only I can be as organized as Cyn!!!
Whew! If I still have anyone with me, I will hopefully have most of my TR finished before I get home( 16 hours is a lot of time in a

!!)

 

[hockeymomoftwo]

Kelly, awesome pretrip. I'm so excited for you to go (i think mainly excited for me but I'll throw you into that too). Can't wait to read your trippie. Getting ready to post my pretrip soon also.

 

[cynderella]

Hey! My organizational skills got an honorable mention in your pre-trip! GREAT start. I cannot wait to read the actual TR after you get back. It ought to be a riot! I am soooo glad you decided NOT to travel with your cousin. Nothing is more irritating than someone who is bored with everything all the time.

Have a great time on your trip!!

 

[dwheatl]

I feel it is my duty to tell her about free dining. But wait!!! It starts in August, she can go for her DD’s birthday. Yeah! She went in August, which still leaves September for us! I know I am a terrible person for thinking all of this, but let me just tell you one thing, she called from Disney and told us how bored she was, there was nothing to do, they ruined the POTC and none of the TS restaurants were any good. See where I am coming from on this one?

So my auntie decides that she has 3 grandchildren, 2 are going in August and she has one spot left in her room. Can’t leave a child behind, can we?
Add on Steven!
After yet another email to the travel agent, we are officially a Grand Gathering! Whoo hoo!

Great job diverting the kill-joy cousin. I am very protective of our Disney trips and will only meet with 2 of my 3 sisters and 1 of my best friends (and only one of those at a time). WDW trips are too short to waste on miserable people.

As for adding on Steven, that's the kind of No Child Left Behind plan I can support!

 

[kaw1218]

Kelly, awesome pretrip. I'm so excited for you to go (i think mainly excited for me but I'll throw you into that too). Can't wait to read your trippie. Getting ready to post my pretrip soon also.

Thank you, I am excited for you too!!!! I love the surprise!!! Hang in there, you are strong

Hey! My organizational skills got an honorable mention in your pre-trip! GREAT start. I cannot wait to read the actual TR after you get back. It ought to be a riot! I am soooo glad you decided NOT to travel with your cousin. Nothing is more irritating than someone who is bored with everything all the time.

Have a great time on your trip!!

Well the way I am .... your organizational skills deserve more than a mere honorable mention

Great job diverting the kill-joy cousin. I am very protective of our Disney trips and will only meet with 2 of my 3 sisters and 1 of my best friends (and only one of those at a time). WDW trips are too short to waste on miserable people.

As for adding on Steven, that's the kind of No Child Left Behind plan I can support!

This is my cousin

I think everyone can now understand

(of course we couldn't leave Steven behind....oh his mom is taking her Disneymoon at the end of September, which gave us an even bigger reason to bring him)




Thanks for all the postitive feedback all!!!

 

[aprilshugah]

ok--just so all of you know--i am steven's mom--not the medusa cousin (that is my sister) and kaw1218 is so on the ball with discription its scary!!!!! thanks for the mention of how awesome my kid is--by the way i heard he wants to get his head shaved uhg!!!! not before the wedding please

 

[aprilshugah]

kaw1218--i am waiting for you to post more of your trip am i just missing it? how else do i know what is going on with my steven phone calls everyday is just not enough p.s. besides you don't get all the good dirt that way--too may people around waiting

 

[kaw1218]

April,
I actually have about 3 days typed out.... I am hoping to have sometime in the next day to post some of it..... if not you will have to wait until I get home.......

 

[aprilshugah]

BOO who wants to wait..

 

[kaw1218]

Disclaimer: Ok, in no way whatsoever am I trying to offend anyone. But I am sure at some point I will So I will apoligize in advance.

I will set the scene for everyone....
Time: 4 am Friday morning September 8.
Location: Home Depot.
More specific location: the break room.

So there I was, counting down the last 2 hours until I was free of work. I would be leaving for the motherland in less than 15 hours. I was so excited I was almost bouncing off the walls literally{of course the 2 Mountain Dews may have had some kinda effect on me too }

In walks Aunt Carol. Or should I say in limps Aunt Carol. Oh no

! she did something to her knee. Two days before we are to begin our tour of the 'World'!
By the time I left at 6am, she was really limping

. And considering the fact that I work with a bunch of well mannered, considerate, and caring individuals, Gimpy was born.
I think everyone at HD get coined with somekind of nickname...... I can't divulge mine though.

.... after all this is a family board.

I told her to get home and rest it before she does anymore damage.
Now might also be a good time to mention my aunt is kind of a drama queen. So there is some doubt to the level of pain that she is experiencing. But I am still a little scared that she won't be able to walk the parks.
Oh well, off to home I go, praying all the way.

After I get home I wake my kids for school and give them direct orders to not fight on the way out.

I had plans of getting a few good hours of sleep in before I had to get up and finish packing the car.
As it was my living room still looked like this

I still had a long way to go.......

 

[kaw1218]

So this is where the actual trip begins! Whoo Hoo!
and I have to add

{gotta love dancing cheese}

OK, now that I got that out of my system.

I did not take any notes on the drive down. So I will say what I know from the pictures we took.

We left the house at 5:50 p.m..

We are off!!




We went to the WAWA to fill up the gas tank.
We left the house at 6:02 p.m..

Hey doesn't that look familiar??

(OK I just had to do that, my mom forgot the AAA card, soooooo our trip lasted all of 12 minutes before we had to go back home )

So we were on our way. Now we live in Pennsylvania,

a few miles north of Philly. So we are talking about a 16-19 hour drive(depends on who is driving - last year DH received the first souvenir, a nice $200 speeding ticket )

We cruised all through Philly rush hour traffic

, just to stop dead in Delaware

. Delaware is all of 11 miles on I95..... you should sneeze and be through Delaware, it is normally a blip on our trip........ nope, not this time........ it took us about 40 minutes to get through. Now when we saw the traffic and decided to play the license plate game. You know where you try to find as many different states as you can. This will normally give my kids a few hours of entertainment(not all at once. We just bring it up every once in a while)
We saw 27 different plates in Delaware. No not a typo.... it was 27. Well that killed the game for the rest of the trip, why look for Alaska and Hawaii?(fyi we even saw Quebec, California, and Oregon-how much further away can you really get???)
After all the traffic finally cleared we were on our way. After we pass through the Maryland welcome sign and beeped and waved to the guy peeing on the side of the road, we stopped for dinner at a Craker Barrel. We always try to eat there on the way down or back-I guess its one of our traditions. This was actually a pretty long pit stop(almost 2 hours). And then back on the road again.

We marked the states by taking a nice blurry picture of each state welcome sign.

VaBear, I figure since bears don't get to drive that oftenthis is for you!!! Isn't it pretty??


We stopped here for breakfast

Note: do not feed birds carrot chips they will through them back. Which we learned the hard way at a rest stop in Georgia. Well we didn't actually feed the birds the carrot chips. They stole them and then got mad at us. Go figure!

Isn't fun taking pictures of tired cranky kids that have been cooped up in the car for hours?

The rest of the drive was pretty uneventful until we actually hit Florida.
It was at this point that we started to hear

So after I threatened my mom with some duct tape...... all was quiet

Then we started calling a few family members(note: we left at 6:00 p.m., I slept five hours on Friday and was up a 3pm.....so by the time we hit Florida, I was awake for 16 hours.....add a little caffeine... and poof....there ya have it......me and a cell phone

)

So we call my sister...... she is not a morning person BTW. Well that call lasted about 10 minutes before she hung up on us. So we called my cousin who was driving my Aunt and Uncle to the airport.
Is anyone else aware that there is an ‘adults entertainment establishment’(a.k.a. strip club) in Philly Airport? Well that tidbit of info entertained us for about 20 miles.

Every year that we go to Disney my DH tells us that we will not go again the next year. So when we do convince him to go, I try to think of new things to do, so he won’t say that we are boring him.
Well, every year we drive. So every year we pass all those Daytona Beach signs.
Now those of you that have been to the Jersey shore will understand this. The ocean at the Jersey shore is a little scary to me. You cannot see the bottom(even in about 6 inches of water) and there is almost always lots of debris, driftwood and tons of seaweed. I have heard that it is not like that in Florida.

So, every year, I ask if we can stop by the beach. Nope, we have a schedule. Oh yeah, I forgot, our ‘schedule’. You know the one where you want to just get to Florida before the next day?
It is 10:00 a.m.! We normally don’t get to Disney until Dinner time. I try to convince him that we are ahead of schedule( if you were to meet my DH you would realize that he...... is a blockhead......)

Imagine my surprise when he actually takes one of the beach exits!!!!! I could not stop smiling. I was so excited(my kids? Not so much....they have seen an ocean, mom) Oh well, I will be happy.
So, we detoured through Ormand Beach long enough to fill our shoes with sand, and get a few pictures.

and then....... a little while later.......

{sigh} it is such a beautiful sight.

 

[kaw1218]

When we arrived at Disney, My DH dropped me off at the front of Pop Century. This has got to be one of the most loud and colorful hotels I have ever seen! It was great!

In all our trips we have only stayed at Port Orleans(Dixie Landings) and Carribean Beach. Never a value, so while I was loving the look, I was also nervous. You know, that am I going to see a major difference, is the step down from moderate going to make me upgrade in two days, will the kids hate me because there is no slide at the pool?

Or am I the only obsessive compulsive one out there? I was determined to make this the ‘best trip ever’.

I walked in the lobby, with the kid in a candy store look. You know the one. Mouth open to the floor, zombie like, staring at everything, walking into stuff.
The line for check ins was about 100 people long(I wish I was exaggerating) But, this is the most magical place on earth, this is part of the experience.
Eventually they did bring in reinforcements, about 10 more CMs to help. So I was only in line for about 45 minutes.
I had to request first floor, because Aunt Carol(gimpy-called that in the most loving and respectful ways),was still limping around.
The nice CM told me that if I had at least one person from the other room, I can check in both rooms. You know, so they don’t have to stand in that enormous line. Yea!!!! I can do that. One quick call to DH and I can have my mom over here, and we will be on our way.
Sure..........if he answered his phone. Ugghh!!!!!
Well I had to accept that THEY would be standing in that loooooooonnnnnnngggggggg line. So the nice CM started giving us me all my hotel and park info. Just as she finished, my mom walked up!!!(talk about perfect timing!!!!) Now if that isn’t a reason to celebrate, I don’t know what is.
Now we are the proud owners of room cards , for rooms 8170 and 8171 in the 90's building!!! Our room was right by the pool! My kids were loving this, they can see the pool from our window.

(I have heard people complain about having rooms right by the pools and the noise, only one night did we hear any noise or kids running by.)

My mom goes with us every year. She is really a good traveling campanion. She comes along, watches the kids, and maybe once or twice wants a meal. We were in our room for about 30 seconds and the disney magic set in. She wants to do something. She is practically jumping on the bed. I had to tell her to settle down or I would put her in charge of gimpy all week. [Now don’t say it. I know someone out there is thinking how mean I am, just think ‘drama queen in pain’ and you too would behave at the thought of being in charge of her. Don’t get me wrong, we love her, we just don’t want to have to be responsible for her.] She sat on the bed nicely.

At this point everyone is here, all our luggage is in the room. Uncle Bob, Carol and Steven are waiting for ME to deliver theirs.
Now the rest of the day is quite a blur for me. By the time I went to bed, I was awake for 29 hours. Now that normally isn’t a big deal for me, I do it all the time, but all that driving wore me out. And the caffeine was wearing off.

I do remember eating dinner at POP’s food court

, going to DTD to once upon a toy so my kids can have $53 of potato head parts( boy DH can fit tons into those little blue boxes)


I vaguely remeber telling my mom, aunt and uncle that I will not repeat our Adrs again, that they are just too old to remember and that they will just have to follow me when they get hungry. It’s not like they wouldn’t ask me in an hour anyway. I did give them a printout with them all listed, but apparently once you hit that archway, reading stuff like that is no longer an option.

Sunday

I woke up at 6 am. So I took my laptop out to the pool, pulled up a lounge chair, and began downloading and organizing all our pictures.

Wow it had only been two days and we already had alot, of useless shots that really needed to be deleted!

like this one:

I just don’t know why we took some of these.... but they are fun to try to figure out.

I also had a few visitors.

Although they wouldn’t tell me if they were fellow disers.

After I went back to the room and woke up the gang, I tried to organize the room a little. (Yeah, right, like I can really accomplish that one! )

 

[kaw1218]

We were out of the rooms by 10:30. Off to MGM.

Here is our first group picture.....

Title: Oldest Daughter just informed all that she WILL NOT be taking any pictures with the rest of the family.

So, I had them take the picture anyway...... gotta keep all those little memories for the grandkids! And then I informed her that she is now in charge of Gimpy. She rolled her eyes, but then looked warily at Aunt Carol. Wow I am beginning to like that threat!

Note the crowds, or should I say the lack of. This was taken at 11:30 Sunday morning. It felt like we were the only ones there.

We walked down Mickey Avenue in awe. It always has that effect. We only had a short amount of time before our ADRs at 50's Prime Time Café, so we jumped in line for the Great Movie Ride. No wait! BTW: They added a few newer movies to the last part!
The herd moved over to Prime Time.
We checked in and found out Cousin Charlie will be serving us! (We met Charlie last year too!)

He's a bit of a prankster.
We had a nice lunch filled with shrimp, meatloaf, potpie, and onion rings.
and dessert

Oh, yeah Happy Birthday Kirsten! (The nice, embarrassed girl who sat behind us didn’t want Charlie to sing to her, so how could we resist?)

So now that our bellies are full(a theme to this trip-free dining!)we stood outside trying to decide what to do. Well Indiana Jones is right around there somewhere(oh yeah, turn around!)
We went to see the show-no waiting for that either! Awesome show. We headed over to the more intense rides. My youngest has been properly bribed to ride RnRc and TOT. (Amazing what one of those Turkey Legs can do!)
We picked up FP for TOT and jumped in line for RnRc

. It said a 15 minute wait. It was more like five! Amanda LOVED it. Over to TOT we headed. Uncle Bob decided to brave this one too.
Now I do not like TOT, I know I do not like TOT, but because I was bribing DD7 to get on, that was part of the deal. By the time we were to get off the elevator, my DD had to pry my fingers from the hand bars in between the seats. She informed me that it was a good thing she didn’t need one of those uh-oh bars.

But as you can see, we survived.

When we got off, my mom asked DD7 if she would go on either of the rides again with out the promise of a turkey leg

----she was ready to go again now!!!

Now we learned later in the trip that any time Aunt Carol asks if it is going to rain, it will.

Apparently she asked, because the skies opened up

and out came ponchos.
We left MGM and headed back to the rooms. Our bus drivers were Gordon, and Rosie(who was earning her ears) Gordon, asked us a few trivia questions. If you ever want to impress a CM, know who Daisy Duck’s nieces are. He told us that about 1 in 350 bus loads know the answer. My DH told him that I was a disney nerd. So he then asked how many stones were used to build the castle, and what 10 animated Disney films have only one word in the name(like Dumbo )
I guess I am a disney nerd because I knew all the answers.

When we got back to the room, we found the first of many towel animals. Today we got a cute mouse and a really neat toothbrush holder.

The rain stopped so my mom took the 3 kids to the pool.

After about 10 minutes, I went to the pool too. They were having way too much fun!!

The one thing I love about my Digital camera is that it is water resistant.
That means we can have pictures like this....

When we were done , DD7 and I went for a walk around POP. There were NO LGMH’s!!!!!!
Well, that was disappointing. So to make ourselves feel better, we went back to the room and put temporary tattoos on everyone. Even Uncle Bob was sporting a nice sparkly purple my little pony.(awww.......isn’t he a good Uncle Bob?)

 

[kaw1218]

After we made ourselves pretty with our sparkly tattoos, I had to literally drag DH away from the Sunday Football game.

Doesn’t he understand that he was supposed to DVR everything and watch it all when we get back? This is Disney World for the love of Pete!!!
When we finally got the herd outside we headed to the bus stop. We just missed the Magic Kingdom bus, so we took the Epcot one. We jumped on the monorail and headed over to MK.
As soon as we got in we got our EMH bracelets. and of course, Aunt Carol says she was watching

. and they are calling for showers.
No lie, 10 minutes later, it started raining. Now I don’t know how many people are crazy enough to try to walk down Main Street in the rain, 10 minutes before Spectro Magic starts.
Apparrently we are. That is one experience I do not want to repeat.............ever. Out of the 8 of us, 6 got run over by an ECV, literally run over! There was a couple that was giving all people in ECV’s a VERY bad name.

They were quite rude.

We finally made it far enough to cut through tomorrowland. Now it was really pouring , so we stopped at Buzz figuring we would stay in line no matter how long it was because we were at least dry. Well, 5 minutes later we were blasting our way to Zurg. I actually hit 171,000 points!!! But DH still doesn’t believe me!!
When we got off it was still raining so we rode buzz again.

I love those lasers!
By now we were hungry, so we stopped at Cosmic Rays. I go and grab a table. I sit Aunt Carol down,

.
Now My DD7 is very independent and I keep getting told that I am too overprotective. So when she asked to get the napkins and all, I agreed(it was 10 feet away...but still, my heart was racing the entire time)
Not only is she independent, she is also pretty short....she couldn’t reach the straws. there was a nice gent from the UK that asked her how many, and proceeded to count out 8 straws for her.... I waited until she walked away, and then I went to thank that nice man.
We got to watch some of Wishes as we sat and ate our dinner. We all thought the food was pretty good. We tried the chicken and ribs, and of course the kids got chicken fingers. Before we left I pulled glow bracelets out of my ‘mary poppins bag’. (my kids swear I stole it from her!)

this one is aunt carol and uncle bob, they wanted to 'glow' too!

After we were done we headed to Fanastyland. We ruled out the spinning teacups, I am thinking that would not have been a good idea.

We rode Snow White(no wait), saw
Mickey’s Philarmagic(walked right in)

and then saw a 35 minute wait for peter pan. That is just Crazy! So we grabbed FP’s and jumped on Its a small world minus Aunt Carol and Uncle Bob(cause he says it steals his soul!)Yes he is a man who will proudly wear a shiny, sparkly purple My little Pony tattoo, but he won’t ride through the evil possessed small children.

From there we walked righ in to the Haunted Mansion, and then went to use our Peter Pan FP’s. As we were walking toward POTC I detoured to Splash Mountain-no wait-(All the elders swore they wouldn’t go on this year ......I am very evil, so I try to trick everyone-so far it has worked.)Well, that one backfired....I got SOAKED!!!!!!!

We got on POTC with a 2 minute wait-I love the changes(I won’t ruin it by reveal them though)!!!!! We jumped on the Magic Carpets with absolutely no wait. Then we took a few pictures by the castle as we were leaving.

Notice how my DH is so excited to be in the picture?

We then drug our exhausted bodies back to POP to bed.

 

[dwheatl]

Sorry about the rude ECV people. DH drives one, but he's very careful. Back before the "Have you ever had a shock at WDW" thread got pulled, someone wrote that her brother yanked the key out of a rude driver's ECV, and threw it onto one of the roofs on Main St. That's pretty awful, but I can see where the temptation came from.

 

[kaw1218]

Sorry about the rude ECV people. DH drives one, but he's very careful. Back before the "Have you ever had a shock at WDW" thread got pulled, someone wrote that her brother yanked the key out of a rude driver's ECV, and threw it onto one of the roofs on Main St. That's pretty awful, but I can see where the temptation came from.

Normally I just keep going and try to ignore people like that, but the older couple were trying to ride side by side down the sidewalk on main street. They had the front half of the sidewalks roped off for Spectromagic. So there was only like a 4ft walkway, and people were pushing it was awful. the man kept running peoples feet over. I guess that was his way of telling people that he wanted to go first after that guy I was almost tempted to take the key myself.....

 

[OhMari]

Where did you get all the cool "add-in's", I don't know what else to call them.

I liked how you added your road trip to Disney and stopping at the Beach. We are drivers too, and our kids sometimes remember the road trip more than the destination.

I just have to mention the ducks in the water at the pool. Thank goodness for chlorine. In Wisconsin it is almost impossible to swim at any lakes without getting swimmers itch. The DNR blame it on the Ducks, they saw they bring the parasite to the lakes.

Thanks for sharing, how was your aunts foot.

 

[Al and Kate's Mom]

Loving your trip report - keep it coming!

 

[mousebit]

Lovin' it so far. More, please...

 

[dwheatl]

I just have to mention the ducks in the water at the pool. Thank goodness for chlorine. In Wisconsin it is almost impossible to swim at any lakes without getting swimmers itch. The DNR blame it on the Ducks, they saw they bring the parasite to the lakes.

We get that in CA, too, from geese. The park rangers said we should shower after we swim, then rub all of our skin briskly with a towel. The parasites are like little worms that crawl under your skin, and rubbing them with a towel crushes them and then they don't cause a rash. Pretty gross, though.