DDA Chapter 26

[Tammi67]

Day 3 Cont......

As we pulled into the Boardwalk, this calming feeling came over me. I can't explain it, I just felt much more relaxed. This truly is my Happy Place. I dropped the kids and the luggage off at the entrance then went and parked the car.

Check-in was smooth, and we were in our room in minutes, after the third and final bug inspection. I had reserved a Boardwalk view, high floor, near an elevator. We were on the third floor, relatively close to the elevator. I didn't realize that being close to an elevator, with a boardwalk view would put us right where all the games/stands are. So there was more noise than I expected, but it really wasn't that bothersome. It was nice to leave our balcony door open and take in the breeze and the sounds of games/people/boats etc. Here is the view that greeted us this evening.

We were hungry and anxious to take in some Disney atmosphere so we walked over to the Yacht/Beach Club area with the intention of eating at Beaches and Cream. I expected there to be a long wait but it was probably only 20-30 minutes or so, which was fine. We sat at the tables outside while we waited. The kids called their dad, I called Bob and then my parents, and before we knew it our table was ready. It was good to be home. We had a nice meal and a leisurely walk back to our room.

We walked around on the boardwalk some more and then headed in to get a good nights rest.

 

[tinknme]

Love the BW pictures Tammi!

 

[Tammi67]

Day 3 - Magic Kingdom

Sunrise.....

We headed out at 8 and stopped at the Polynesian for a quick bite to eat. I think we had rolls and bagels. When we were done we found out that the monorail was down so we had to take the boat from the Polynesian, which was fine, something new for us. The sun was just rising over the resort.

When we got to the entrance it was CROWDED. Or maybe it just seemed that way since we arrived later than I had planned, and we were at the back of the crowd instead of the front. It wasn't long before the opening started.

And we were off....

We leisurely made our way down Main Street, stopping to pin trade with some cast members. Our first stop was for FPs at SM and then we bumped into these guys with no line.

We rode Buzz, and the kids always insist on a picture here.

We meandered up to the Teacups

And then waited for the opening of Toontown. We decided this was a Must Do since it will no longer be. Alyssa wanted to see the Fairies, a first, and we needed to go through Minnie's house one last time. Now, remember yesterday, when I had to bribe Alyssa to get her picture with the superheroes? Well, the deal was, that if she got her picture with them, I would make Nicholas get a picture with the Fairies. She was all for that!

Her favorite was Vidia. Then we jumped back in line for the Princesses.

 

[Tammi67]

Cont.....

Minnie's house...

As the crowds started filtering in, we filtered OUT. We rode Pooh, just to check out the new queue, which was entering for kids. The line for Snow White was short so we jumped in it.

It was now just before 11 and we were getting hungry. We popped into Pinocchio's and had lunch.

Small World was down and the line for Peter Pan was long, so we opted for FPs. We got these as well....

Too bad it wasn't an attraction that you really NEEDED a FP for. But still, it was a nice Disney Magic treat.

We found Mary by the carousel.

and then made our way down to Liberty Square. The line for HM was long so we bypassed it. Here is another must do picture spot for the kids.

The line for BTMRR wasn't terribly long so we decided to brave it. I think the posted time was 20 minutes but it didn't take that long.

We bypassed Splash this trip since it was too cool to be walking around in wet clothes. (stay tuned, we get to do that tomorrow). The wait for Pirates was longer than we wanted so we just hung out with this Pirate.

We rode the Jungle Cruise, with an elderly driver that we could barely understand. It didn't help that we were right near the engine that drowned out the speaker.

The park was getting CROWDED and I knew the kids wanted to swim, so we went back over to Tomorrowland to use our FPs for Space and then headed out.

As we were walking out of Exposition Hall, this Princess was hiding back in the corner. I don't think anyone knew she was there.

We got back to the BW and the kids swam for awhile.

We had a 6PM dinner at Boma, one of my favorite restaurants. I realized, though, that now that I have to pay full price for Nicholas, I need to lay off the buffets. He doesn't eat NEARLY enough to warrant me paying adult prices.

 

[mommykds]

Tammi,
Thanks for your prospective on US. So you did HP in 1 hour? Wow, It does look pretty cool though.
Love your report. I feel the same way about the buffest now as we are all Disney "adults". ugh

 

[mommykds]

Marci,
You have a great outlook. Sending you prayers.

 

[Tammi67]

Tammi,
Thanks for your prospective on US. So you did HP in 1 hour? Wow, It does look pretty cool though.
Love your report. I feel the same way about the buffest now as we are all Disney "adults". ugh

Yep, one hour. Only because we had that early morning hour before it opened to the rest of the people. After that it would take forever. We were the first group into Ollivanders, after that we went to FJ, Hippogriff and the Dragon coaster, all of which were walk-ons. Then we walked through some shops and were done.

 

[babytrees]

I have been thinking about Jennifer all night. I hope things have improved for her by this morning.

I have not heard anything yet. When I do I will update as soon as possible.

Marci-you are such an inspiration to me!! As Elin said, You ROCK!!

It turns out it was a good thing we did not got out of town (we were going to go to Virginia Beach but there was over a foot of snow in parts of our travels) as I called this morning and they had not switched my scheduled time with somebody else...I would have been a no call, no show

 

[tmfranlk]

Marci - You amaze me! Your outlook is inspiring. I hope the pain subsides quickly and that the treatments go well. We're praying always.

 

[lovesdumbo]

Marci-continued prayers for you.

Jennifer-hope you're feeling better soon.

Tammi-loving your trip report and all your photos. I hate paying adult buffet prices for Lizzy. I figure with Joe paying kid prices we were still doing OK as he eats well (don't know where he puts it). Not sure we'll do too many buffets as Joe will be 10 in less than 2 weeks.

Elin-glad to hear you all made it home safely. AKL CL is pretty special! I wanted to go there for my bday trip but with 3 adults BWI CL will work better for us and that is pretty nice too.



Yesterday we had no electricity for over 12 hours. Just as the house was getting very cold and we were starting to worry we got a reverse 911 call from the police that the electric company had plans to start restoring power in about 2 hours and that a shelter was available at the school. We actually got power back in less than 1 hour from the call.

I had my doctor's appointment canceled yesterday but they called this morning and have me reschedule for today at 5pm. Today would be exactly the same days out from surgery as the pin was removed last time so I'm hoping he'll do it today.

 

[Blueeyes101817]

Tammi-Im really enjoying the report!

 

[bear74]

Welcome Julia and Sabrina!!!

Merry First Christmas!!!

Thanks Bernadette

 

[bear74]

so far today no fever. still having abdomen tenderness. The Dr. says at least 48 hrs of IV antibiotics. I just wish I could get rid of this migraine. I have had a headache since friday, though it was pretty mild on Sat. Then Sunday afternoon it got bad again. luckily I had migraine meds at home, took one and within an hour the headache was gone. It came back around noon yesterday and has not gone away yet. Jeff went to the house to get my meds as the pain meds they are giving me here Percocet and Ibuprofen are not touching it.

 

[Tammi67]

Jennifer - I'm glad to hear the fever is staying away. I hope the same for your headache!

 

[Tammi67]

Day 4 - Epcot

We woke up to rain today. At least it wasn't too cold. So we donned our ponchos and headed out, making our way up the boardwalk toward the International Gateway. They were just starting to let people in as we reached the turnstiles. However, the more we walked, the harder the rain came. By the time we reached Future World, our socks were wet. As we reached the backside of the fountain they were just dropping the ropes and we were hanging a left there by the Character Spot to head to Soarin' for FPs. I was looking in the windows for characters/lines and didn't see any. It actually didn't look like it was open. I asked the kids if they wanted to go in for pictures. Nicholas said no, but Alyssa did. The rule is if one person in our party wants to do something, we do it. So we backtracked the few steps to the entrance and CMs were there to greet us. I must have looked puzzled because I remember one saying "yes, we're open". They ushered us inside and then closed the gate. As all 5 characters approached us the lightbulb finally clicked as to what was about to happen. We were the first family of the day!!! That meant a photo op with all of them!! Mickey came up to me and gave me a huge hug. They doted over all of us. Unfortunately we were dripping wet and it took us a few minutes to get out of our ponchos and get the camera and autograph book out of the backpack. Another small dose of Disney Magic. You can see how wet are pants are in some of the pictures.

We got bundled back up and made our way to the land for FPs. While we were there we road The Land (Alyssa loves this) and had bagels at Sunshine Seasons. From there we went to Crush, where again Alyssa got chosen to ask him a question, Nemo, back to Soarin' and finally to Figment. We decided to go play in innoventions with the hopes the rain would die down. They did The Great Piggy Bank Adventure, Where's the Fire and some other thing. By the time we left the rain did stop, but it stayed gray the rest of the day.

We made our way over to World Showcase. The plan was to eat around the world and take in the holiday storytellers. Our first stop was Norway for some School Bread. Yum! We listed to the Three Kings tell of La Navidad in Mexico. I don't have pictures of them, as they are on Nicholas' Camera. From there we went to the American Pavillion and waited in line for Santa and Mrs. Claus.

To bad Epcot can't schedule their storytellers so you can just go from one country to the next. The way they have it you have to bounce all over the place. One of our favorites was La Befana in Italy.

Helga, in Germany, told of the first Christmas Tree and the first Nutcracker. Of course Alyssa liked this one the best, and was all proud of herself when Helga asked if anyone had danced in the Nutcracker. Helga asked her questions about it and told Alyssa of her experience being a Mouse in the Nutcracker.

We stopped for some lunch at the Yakitori House in Japan and shared the combo of chicken, beef and salmon. After that we made our way down to France and met with Marie.

I shopped in the tea store in the United Kingdom while we waited for Father Christmas. Again, Alyssa was selected to help him with his jingle bells. I forget what it bells had to do with the story. But he gave her a jingle bell to keep.

We decided that we were storied out so we stopped for the first Mickey Bar of the trip before heading back to our room. We picked up a pizza at Boardwalk Pizza and took it to the room to eat. It was nice to get back and get out of our wet shoes!

 

[my3princes]

Tammi it sounds like you had some magical moments on your trip.

 

[tmfranlk]

Tammi - Sounds like a great day! I've always wondered why the storytellers can't be better scheduled. Seems like the first time I planned a Christmas-time trip I had based my plans off the previous year's schedule and it was pretty much in order. However by the time that year's schedule came out, I had to replan and jump around. Seems like we always miss a few storytellers because of the jumping around.

 

[lovesdumbo]

so far today no fever. still having abdomen tenderness. The Dr. says at least 48 hrs of IV antibiotics. I just wish I could get rid of this migraine. I have had a headache since friday, though it was pretty mild on Sat. Then Sunday afternoon it got bad again. luckily I had migraine meds at home, took one and within an hour the headache was gone. It came back around noon yesterday and has not gone away yet. Jeff went to the house to get my meds as the pain meds they are giving me here Percocet and Ibuprofen are not touching it.

Sounds awful! How are the girls doing? Hope you're feeling better and home soon!

Very cool!

Tammi - Sounds like a great day! I've always wondered why the storytellers can't be better scheduled. Seems like the first time I planned a Christmas-time trip I had based my plans off the previous year's schedule and it was pretty much in order. However by the time that year's schedule came out, I had to replan and jump around. Seems like we always miss a few storytellers because of the jumping around.

Last year they didn't even publish a schedule-so you didn't even know where to jump around to. I think Lizzy & I did manage to see most of them but it wasn't easy.



Got my pin out today. I talked to the doctor about the pain in my right foot. He said when I come back in 2 weeks he would xray both feet. He said it sounds like the pain in related to the cut in the bone and that he could prescribe a bone stimulator-you wear it at night. He said he felt it would eventually heal but it can take up to a year. I only have 4 months, 1 week and 6 days for it to be Disney ready.

 

[tmfranlk]

Sounds awful! How are the girls doing? Hope you're feeling better and home soon!

Very cool!


Last year they didn't even publish a schedule-so you didn't even know where to jump around to. I think Lizzy & I did manage to see most of them but it wasn't easy.


Got my pin out today. I talked to the doctor about the pain in my right foot. He said when I come back in 2 weeks he would xray both feet. He said it sounds like the pain in related to the cut in the bone and that he could prescribe a bone stimulator-you wear it at night. He said he felt it would eventually heal but it can take up to a year. I only have 4 months, 1 week and 6 days for it to be Disney ready.

Hope your foot heals quickly!!

I always get my times from this site before I go: http://pages.prodigy.net/stevesoares/
He has the times for just about everything - published and unpublished. I've actually found over the last 5 years since I've started using that site that many of the times change very little from year to year. Maybe 10-15 min here and there, but many of my times from our last Dec trip 4+ years ago are still the same as this year.

 

[babytrees]

Sounds awful! How are the girls doing? Hope you're feeling better and home soon!

Very cool!


Last year they didn't even publish a schedule-so you didn't even know where to jump around to. I think Lizzy & I did manage to see most of them but it wasn't easy.



Got my pin out today. I talked to the doctor about the pain in my right foot. He said when I come back in 2 weeks he would xray both feet. He said it sounds like the pain in related to the cut in the bone and that he could prescribe a bone stimulator-you wear it at night. He said he felt it would eventually heal but it can take up to a year. I only have 4 months, 1 week and 6 days for it to be Disney ready.

Fabulous for pin removal!!

My doctor said that 8 months to a year in would be the best my ankle would be....we are close to a year now (where does the time go?) and I haven't had a truly pain free day, I wish for you pain free days soon!!