disney at christmas

[Sherry E]

Thank you Sherry!
The Small World one was close to closing time. It's really difficult to get a decent picture without a ton of people.

Your photos are fantastic as well!! I especially love the dark one with the sparkly lights! Awesome!!!
I'll have to get some of that peppermint icecream! Yummm!
Such a cute pic with pooh!!!!

This thread is getting me so excited!!!

I am planning another trip this year for 12/1- 12/3 so hopefully I'll be able to get some more good shots this year. Although after looking through this thread I am a little worried about crowds now. We are planning to go on Wednesday and Thursday so I am hoping those days won't be too bad.!?!

Thank you for the nice compliment! And, of course, you have posted even more amazing pictures for us to admire!! Love love love them! Every time I look at someone else's photos of DLR during the holidays, I almost feel as if I am seeing what it looks like for the first time, all over again! When I was (yet again) combing quickly through the whole thread today, just to be sure I wasn't re-posting pictures I had already posted, I was seeing some of the other DIS-ers' pictures that have been in this thread for months and was looking at them as if it was the first time I was seeing them (even though it was probably the 50th time I have looked at them), and I was reading most of the posts of people's holiday/DLR experiences and opinions again! I kept saying to myself, "Ooooh...that's a really cool shot." "Oooh...that is sooo pretty." "Ooooh...that's a great description...can't wait to get there..."

Well, I would think a Wednesday and Thursday would be okay for you at DLR. I mean, I tend to think the whole holiday season will be very crowded anyway, but mid-week days will be much better than weekends, I would guess (maybe someone else here who has gone in that first week of December can offer some insight?).

I am not sure of what the SoCal AP block out days are, so I don't know if they are blocked out on December 1-3 or not. If they are not blocked, it will probably be super crowded. But it should be fine. With proper planning and paying close attention to the early DLR holiday reports that start to come in when the season starts in November, you should have a good idea of what to expect.

And you must post some more beautiful pictures for us here when you return!!

Am now picturing Sherry taking that picture into a photo-poster place....

That would be amusing. That photo of the Mickey wreath/garland is so clear and close-up, it almost looks 3-D!

 

[Sherry E]

Okay, well time for another bump! By the way - I looked at the number of views on this thread about 3 weeks ago, and it was at about 16,400. Now, we are over 20,100, so that's a pretty good jump in 3 weeks!!

I scraped up some more holiday photos to post - these are from December 2008:

Goofy – tangling with some Christmas lights:

Mickey – tangling with some Christmas ribbon:

Jack Skellington examining a snowflake:

Main Street Christmas Tree Ornaments:

Fire Dept.:

In DCA:

More Caroling Fun & Games at the GCH:

In DTD:

Nighttime in DL:

Look at all the people!

For some reason, in 2008, the sparkly ‘icicle lights’ on the Winter Castle were turning on and off intermittently throughout the night. This was one of the ‘off’ periods (in the photo below). Even though the colors are pretty, I like the icicles better, so I was pleased to see that the icicle lights stayed on all night in 2009!!:

The PPH tree and ‘presents’ are so colorful!!

A rainy, gloomy Monday before Christmas:

You can see the Main Street Christmas tree (off in the distance) in between Walt and Mickey!!:

I love the juxtaposition of the owl in the foreground against the gloomy sky, the Winter Castle backdrop, and the people running around in their rain gear!

 

[azdisneylover]

When do the winter specials start to show up? We would like to be onsite PPH or DL from 12/23/10-12/28/10. Any site online to see what Disneyland offers for Christmas trees, and Christmas stockings, what they look like and the cost?
This has got to be the best thread ever! I love the photos! Thanks all for being so kind as to share them!

 

[Christina-B-Na]

Christina-B-Na I love your pictures. The one of the train station is most excellent. Thanks for sharing!

Thanks so much Tksbaskets!! The station one was taken through the gate right before opening time.

Everyone's pictures are sooooo great! This is the best thread!

Like Sherry E said.....Everytime you look at this thread you see something new about the holiday decorations that you might not have noticed before. Love it!!!

 

[ado121]

i found my disneyland pictures from christmas 2007. now i have to figure out how to add them!

 

[Sherry E]

i found my disneyland pictures from christmas 2007. now i have to figure out how to add them!

Yay!! Woo hoo!! Do you have Photobucket? I find that to be the easiest way.

 

[ado121]

 

[ado121]

 

[Sherry E]

Those are lovely photos, Ado121!! I cant wait to see more!

When do the winter specials start to show up? We would like to be onsite PPH or DL from 12/23/10-12/28/10. Any site online to see what Disneyland offers for Christmas trees, and Christmas stockings, what they look like and the cost?
This has got to be the best thread ever! I love the photos! Thanks all for being so kind as to share them!

Yes! Best thread ever!!!

As for hotel special offers - I am guessing, and, again, maybe someone else can jump in to add further insight, that there will not be anything much in the way of discounts for the DLR hotels for that period of time between 12/23 and 12/28. Just a guess. It has appeared that many times, the discounts for the hotels have only gone up to about mid-December, or possibly to the weekend immediately before Christmas. Once it gets into the week before Christmas and the week after, there are generally no substantial discounts/special offers available other than 10% off with an AP or with AAA, and perhaps with the Disney Visa as well.

Vacation Planning would be who you contact to get the Christmas tree and the Christmas stocking for your PPH room. We have not seen the stocking yet, but Aussietravellers posted 2 wonderful pictures of what the tree looks like in this thread. It is adorable and I want one!! I will find the page with the pictures...

Page 14, Post #304 of this thread is where Aussietravellers posted the photos of the adorable mini-Chrstmas tree from Vacation Planning.

Thanks so much Tksbaskets!! The station one was taken through the gate right before opening time.

Everyone's pictures are sooooo great! This is the best thread!

Like Sherry E said.....Everytime you look at this thread you see something new about the holiday decorations that you might not have noticed before. Love it!!!

I agree - this is the best thread!! We should all give ourselves a round of applause for keeping it alive with beautiful contributions, and thank everyone who has come aboard to ask questions or share info and join in with us. This is really, really helpful for planning purposes, as it is giving folks a lot of info and details about the DLR holiday season, both in descriptions and in visual representations! I never get tired of looking at photos - I keep going back and looking at the whole thread over and over again, so any new additions are super exciting!!! And yes, I see something new (meaning I hadn't noticed it before) every time someone posts a series of photos - sometimes I even see something new that I didn't notice before in my own photos!! I like the beauty shots, I like the crowd shots, I like the random, out of the way shots, I like the dark shots - all of it!!

 

[ado121]

thank you!

the others i have have my kids in them so i have to see how i can kinda fog their faces first.

we went at night and didn't take any photos. it was enough with all the people and the 3 little ones.

this year we will have 4 but will be better prepared for it.

as for the disney deals around christmas, we went early december and went with alaska vacations. try them. we got flights for 4 and hotel for 5 nights for $1200 cad. this year we are looking at flights for 5 and hotel for 6 nights for $2000 cad. but i want to saty somewhere difffent than last time and its not an alaska air hotel i guess.

 

[Sherry E]

Nooooo! This thread already slipped down to Page 2!! And I hate having to bump it just yet because now Christina-B-Na's photos and Ado121's pictures have been moved to the previous page, but it needs to be bumped!!!

 

[Sherry E]

I never thought this looked particularly Christmasy, even though it is pretty - I guess I would expect more in the way of something with deep reds and greens - but these little floral arrangements were hanging around the Partners statue in December of last year, and they do switch them up specifically for different seasons and holidays. Around Halloweentime, they have decidedly more Fall-type colors. This was what they chose for the Yuletime season of 2009 (it almost looks more Easter-ish to me):

 

[Christina-B-Na]

Alright, I'm thinking that instead of posting multiple pics...I'll post them one at a time when there's a need for a bump.
We gotta keep this thread from slipping to page 2!!!


Mainstreet

 

[azdisneylover]

Does anyone have pictures of Christmas items like stockings, and ornaments, etc that can be ordered to be sent to your room during the holidays? Also, can Disney gift cards be used in the Lego store in Downtown Disney?

 

[aussiegirls]

Christina-B-Na, that last photo of Main St is beautiful. It looks insane there though, soooooo packed. Do you remember when this was taken? Was it close to Christmas or was it much before Christmas?

Thanks

xxx

 

[Sherry E]

Alright, I'm thinking that instead of posting multiple pics...I'll post them one at a time when there's a need for a bump.
We gotta keep this thread from slipping to page 2!!!

Very good thinking, and it makes a lot of sense. I probably should have done that as well, to stretch all the photos out over time and not run out of them so quickly. Although I have to admit, for purely selfish reasons, I greatly enjoy it whenever you or any of our other DIS-ers posts a bunch of pictures at one time!! I love pictures! In fact, I suspect that is largely what has kept people tuning in and following along with this thread - they like to flip to random pages and see lots of colorful, interesting Christmasy photos all in one place. But I can also see the practical need to conserve photos as well and just do one at a time, for bumping purposes and for the sake of not running out of photos to post.

Oh, such dilemmas! There is a simple solution to this problem for all of us - we all just simply have to go back to DLR during the holiday season (as soon as it starts in November, and all the way to early January when it ends) and takes lots and LOTS of photos of everything that looks even remotely holiday-ish, explore every corner of all the hotels, all of DTD and both parks, and then we will never run out of photos to share...well, at least not until the next holiday season!!

Does anyone have pictures of Christmas items like stockings, and ornaments, etc that can be ordered to be sent to your room during the holidays? Also, can Disney gift cards be used in the Lego store in Downtown Disney?

Did you see Page 14, Post #304 of this thread is where Aussietravellers posted the photos of the adorable mini-Chrstmas tree from Vacation Planning (2009)? Isn't that the cutest thing?

I agree - I would love to see more pictures of the trees and of the stockings and any other holiday touches to the DLR hotel rooms provided by Vacation Planning! Let's hope someone posts those.

Not sure about using the Disney gift card in the Lego Store - hopefully someone will answer that. My guess would be that they cannot be used at Lego, though, because it is not a Disney-owned store. I could be wrong, however.

Christina-B-Na, that last photo of Main St is beautiful. It looks insane there though, soooooo packed. Do you remember when this was taken? Was it close to Christmas or was it much before Christmas?

Thanks

xxx

I will say the crowds in that photo Christina-B-Na posted look similar to - or maybe not even as bad as - the ones we encountered on our DLR December trip last year, all day long. It was extraordinarily crowded the whole day - more so than the two previous years we had been there. It really made me wish I had made a full weekend trip, or gone for several days, rather than the one day we were there - because I just couldn't get as many photos as I would have liked, due to the crazy crowds everywhere we went. I was short on time and just not able to get around as easily because there were huge masses of people everywhere we went - especially in New Orleans Square. I hope hope hope it is not that bad again this year.

 

[Sherry E]

I wanted to remind everyone who may be lurking out there and enjoying our pictures that we would love to see your DLR holiday photos too! Whether you have one photo to share or 100 photos, whether they are 'perfect' frameworthy photos or the not-so-great ones that we all get now and then on our cameras, whether the photos are of decorations, merchandise, holiday food, DTD stuff, DLR hotel stuff, random crowd scenes, flowers/plants, characters in holiday attire, the Candlelight Processional, the Reindeer Round-Up, the Holiday Tour, parade stuff, window displays, random out-of-the-way things - we welcome all of it!!

Also - anyone who is willing to answer questions from other DIS-ers planning their holiday trips, please feel free to jump in and share your insight and info with us here, because as we get closer to the holiday season, there will likely be more questions asked. We still need to know, for example, if there are any special meals or special food served only on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day.

One thing I enjoy - when I go back to the beginning of this thread for the 150th time and scroll through the photos yet again (it puts me in a good mood to see them - what can I say?), I enjoy seeing all the different perspectives of familiar things, as well as seeing thigns I haven't noticed before. For example, one person's photos of the Main Street Christmas tree are not exactly the same as another person's photos. The lighting may be slightly different, there may be more or fewer people in some of the pictures, it may be at a different time of day, the vantage point is slightly different, etc. Same thing with the decorations in NOS - one person's photos are not the same as another person's photos. This is why it is always a great idea to just post whatever you have - because, chances are, it will be a bit different than anything else we have seen.

I also really enjoy the assorted pictures with crowd scenes in them - I think those do a good job of showing people who are planning their DLR holiday trips what kinds of crowds they might expect to run into. In fact, the photos with the crowds probably do a better job of explaining how packed it is better than anything we could describe verbally!

So keep 'em coming, everyone!!

 

[deejdigsdis]

Sherry, I love your dedication to this thread!

I know I've posted Christmas pics a couple of times, but I can't remember which ones I've done so I may be repeating myself. (You might be able to let me know, Sherry, as you may have memorized the thread. )

A holiday brownie from the bakery. Not the best-tasting (I would have preferred some mint flavor involved), but festive nonetheless!

And this was my sitting-on-the-curb view as I enjoyed my brownie...

And how about a sneak-peak of the horses' holiday wear... PLUS... I Spy Mickey!

 

[ado121]

And how about a sneak-peak of the horses' holiday wear... PLUS... I Spy Mickey!

[/QUOTE]


love this! so cute...

 

[Sherry E]

Sherry, I love your dedication to this thread!

I know I've posted Christmas pics a couple of times, but I can't remember which ones I've done so I may be repeating myself. (You might be able to let me know, Sherry, as you may have memorized the thread. )

You would think I have the thread memorized, but not yet!! Strangely, I seem to have a better recollection for what other people have posted that what I have posted. So that's most of the reason why I find myself scrolling back through the thread over and over - so I can see what I have already posted so I don't post all repeats (a couple duplicates can slip by here and there, but I don't want to post 25 pictures that are already on one of the earlier pages!), and then, in the process, I find myself re-appreciating what everyone else has posted. Often times I think I have posted things in this thread already, when, in fact, I had posted them somewhere else, in some other thread.

In any case, I checked the stuff you have already posted (on pages 13, 15 and 20), and nope. No Christmas horse booty anywhere to be found!! That picture is hilarious - and yet, Christmasy at the same time!!

The brownie looks good, but I remember you said somewhere in another thread (maybe in your TR) that either the brownie was not as good as you thought it would be, or maybe it was that it didn't have a holiday flavor to it, but, rather, just the holiday sprinkles and that was it.

That Penny Arcade photo is so pretty - and it's something we haven't really seen here thus far!!

Thanks so much for digging up some more holiday fun for us, Deejdigsdis!!

Yes, I am dedicated to keeping this thread alive!! You know, it started last year, fairly early on, and it was picking up some steam with the photos that were posted, but then it kind of dropped out of sight for a bit. And then we had a whole holiday season since then, so I got to thinking that there are probably all sorts of folks who have photos to share before the next holiday season.

I am also dedicated to the Halloween at DL thread, but, boy howdy if that isn't a tough thread to get going!! We have a lot of dedicated followers in that thread too, and they have done a great job in posting amazing Halloweentime photos of all kinds of great stuff, and answering questions, but it just is not as easy to find as many people with photos to share of Halloweentime as it is for Christmastime, and I think people just love Christmastime at DLR so much more (you can tell by the number of views). Plus, we need more people to come forth and answer the questions posed by people new to that thread, just as we need people to answer questions here.

But I will carry on for the cause!!