don't know if i'm elated or gassy, but i'm somewhere in that zone...fall 2014 PTR

[ZehnJahren]

yay! another STL native! i'm actually from Nebraska originally, but I LOVE being in St Louis now. that is so awesome that your cousin is in some of the shows at the muny. i'm for sure going back for hello, dolly! and maybe grease if I can find someone to go with me.

I don't blame you for not wanting to drive the highway after a car accident. I drive a lot for work and see people doing the most ridiculous things on the road! I hope you're feeling better and on the mend!

if we do anything else around town, i'll be sure to post some pictures for you. STL is awesome! it's funny that you're in Chicago now. the family I nanny for moved here from Chicago. they really loved it there. I think it's nice to visit, but not sure I could live there.

be brave and rock that cards gear! I've just recently begun to like watching baseball. I think I can get into it because I actually understand it and know what's happening. our oldest gets to sing take me out to the ballgame during a game next month with her school. it'll be my first ever game--we're pretty excited!

anyway, hope you enjoy the TR. we had a great time!

Thanks for the welcome! I'm glad you love my city; it's a great place to live! My cousin has been with the Muny for a couple of years now.

You just scared me talking about driving a lot for work. I'm really gunshy around the highways, though I feel more comfortable in STL just because I grew up driving those roads.

How exciting you're doing a Cardinals game! I used to love going to the ballpark. My last visit was quite a few years ago, at a playoff game. I think it was game 3 of the NLCS a few years ago.

I read your whole TR; it looked like so much fun!!!

 

[AprilRenee]

I had so much fun going to the Muny with you guys. But golly! Tarzan was NOT all that great. Not gonna lie, I was bored.

However, I'm totally planning to go see all the rest anyway. Sounds like next week's porky and bess is going to be fantastic!!

Love the pixie dust comment. That was great. Caden was good with the fireworks, watched from my lap for a while. Then he got bored and ran around. And any time there was a big one he'd go "woah!!" And run and jump in my lap. Lol. Then off to play again.
Whew! Good news for Disney. I was a little worried he'd be scared this year. And I don't think he'll be bored at Disney cause of the music and the light display going on on the castle. Just a little more exciting than the st Charles fireworks. Lol

 

[STLMickeyMom]

just a quick question--I need some opinions. In a couple weeks we are having the girls friends over for the princess tea party. I was going to let them watch enchanted but then got to wondering about princess diaries. I've never seen either. Which one do you think would be better for a group of 4-6 year olds? Thanks!

 

[AprilRenee]

Probably enchanted. It's about a princess stuck in the real world. It has singing and is more like a princess movie just live action.

Princess diaries is more of a transformation movie about a normal (ugly) girl who finds out she's a princess and has to get all cleaned up and learn to be a princess. More of a pre-teen kinda movie I think. Nothing inappropriate, just might be boring for the younger set.

 

[Tinker326]

Hey late chime-in...about booking a cruise at Disney...

There is no such thing as a bounceback for the cruise while at Disneyworld. They only offer that to book you NEXT cruise while on your current cruise. And the offer is always the same. 10% off the price, Reduced deposit (50% off deposit) and usually an onboard credit that varys by cruise length. 7 days typically are $200 and anything less is usually $100 onboard credit.

If you book your cruise through Small World Vacations they will usually offer an OBC as well.

Your 4th vacay looks great. I made those Red White and Blue drinks last year as part of my Brownie Scout Science Badge......

And I say Enchanted for the 4-6 range. Princess Diaries is a great movie but more for the 8-12 age range I would say.

 

[annegirl]

I would go with Enchanted. When we watched it a few weeks ago both girls (8 and 4) were into it and liked it. I tried to watch Princess Diaries with my oldest a couple of years ago and she was not into it at all yet.

 

[ZehnJahren]

just a quick question--I need some opinions. In a couple weeks we are having the girls friends over for the princess tea party. I was going to let them watch enchanted but then got to wondering about princess diaries. I've never seen either. Which one do you think would be better for a group of 4-6 year olds? Thanks!

I've never seen Enchanted but I love Princess Diaries! I admit it! I don't know if it would work for a group of 4-6 year olds depending on your level of comfort (there's some kissing, very PG but maybe a little old for your group). Otherwise, it's a very sweet movie about an offbeat girl finding out she's royalty; and you CANNOT go wrong with Julie Andrews!!

 

[Marsheliz]

I don't have girls, as you know but I'd think that Enchanted would be best suited for that age!

 

[lvcourtneyy]

Finally caught up again!

As far as the park hours go, like someone else said, I would go with what Josh lists on easywdw and the travel agent calendar, he usually has the link to them with the crowd calendars I think. It lists all the park hours and parade times!

Love the Anna/Elsa pillowcase! Fingers crossed the FP works out! That's my first priority for FP too...I'm obsessed and dying to meet them but there's NO chance I'm running at rope drop or waiting 4 hours!

I agree with everyone else that for the age group, Enchanted is a better choice. I love both movies but I think they'll enjoy the Princess Diaries much more when they're like 10-12!

 

[STLMickeyMom]

thanks for the help, everybody! I just requested a copy of enchanted from the library today for the tea party. I am so excited and so nervous about this party! I just realized that I scheduled it for the day after I get back from being out of town for a week. what was I thinking?!? I can't change it because I already sent out invites, almost everyone is coming and I already changed the time to coordinate with a friend who is having a birthday party that afternoon. i'm sure it'll all work out.....right?

so, other exciting news....right when I had to leave for work on Monday, the mailman was dropping off a package from Terri (denovagirl). I knew what was in there, but I didn't have time to even open it quickly and had to wait until I got home! torture!! she had put in a couple of little gifts for the girls, which they loved, but most importantly were my shoes!!! handpainted wreck it ralph and princess and the frog. here's the pic of the wreck it ralph ones and when I wear the others, i'll post another picture. how stinkin' cute are these?!?



how awesome is the medal on the back? I love it!



and, just because I think it's adorable.....Madison and Ariel went swimming today and had a great time!



only 77 days til Disney!

 

[STLMickeyMom]

Hey late chime-in...about booking a cruise at Disney...

There is no such thing as a bounceback for the cruise while at Disneyworld. They only offer that to book you NEXT cruise while on your current cruise. And the offer is always the same. 10% off the price, Reduced deposit (50% off deposit) and usually an onboard credit that varys by cruise length. 7 days typically are $200 and anything less is usually $100 onboard credit.

If you book your cruise through Small World Vacations they will usually offer an OBC as well.

Your 4th vacay looks great. I made those Red White and Blue drinks last year as part of my Brownie Scout Science Badge......

And I say Enchanted for the 4-6 range. Princess Diaries is a great movie but more for the 8-12 age range I would say.

thanks for the cruise info! i'm trying to learn all I can before we pay a deposit!

 

[STLMickeyMom]

I stayed up way too late the other night working on our park plans. you'd think it'd be easier this trip since we aren't planning on doing everything like we usually do, but it felt harder. anyway, I think I did ok. let me know if you see any major flaws.....

so we are leaving Wednesday, but I think we'll just leave that as a travel day. I haven't planned anything but depending when we get there we might walk around POP and check stuff out a little.

Thursday, sept 25 is our MK day. the park hours that day are 8am-10pm (EMH 8-9). i'm hoping we'll get there at 8. i'm not going to fool myself and plan to be there for rope drop, but if we get to see it, yay!

I think our very first stop will be to see Mary Poppins. the girls have been watching the movie a lot lately and she meets right at the front of the park. they want to ask her to sing supercalifragilisticexpialidocious (seriously? no spell check line on that?) with them and Madison wants to know if burt will be there. I think they wanted to ask her something about being practically perfect also. we've never seen her, so that will be new.

I think after that we'll find some breakfast at the bakery or go over to gastons tavern. I'm sort of leaning towards gastons. I want to try the lefou's brew and get a cinnamon roll! then we can meet gaston if the line isn't too crazy.

after that, I think we'll try enchanted tales with belle. I can't decide if I should fast pass this or not. we've never done it, so i'd like to see the line since I hear it's so cute, but I don't really want to wait in line forever either. thoughts?

after that I think we'll head back to meet ariel (we've never seen her with her tail) and do her ride.

i'm hoping now we'll have fast passes to use to do the 7 dwarves and meet anna and elsa. keep your fingers crossed for us!

we're going to totally skip storybook circus since the only thing we ride there is dumbo and I want to do it at night at MNSSHP. we'll do the tea cups (of course! family favorite!!) and maybe the Winnie the pooh ride. not sure on that one.

I think we'll try the speedway this trip. we've never done it and the girls wanted to do it last time but I talked them out of it because I didn't want to stop. so mean, I know......but, the guilt is working in their favor because i'm writing it down now and if it's written down, well then, we have to do it, right?

i'd also like to stop in the gift shop where space mountain gets out. someone (terri? maybe Jackie?) got pictures in a photobooth there and I forgot to do it last time. they were so cute, I want to remember it this time!

I think by now we should be STARVING and will head over to casey's corner for lunch. another new thing!

depending on what time it is, we'll either find a place to watch the festival of fantasy parade or head over to do mickey's philharmagic and IASW. while we're right there, I'm hoping we can see peter again (if we're early enough) and look around in Rapunzel's bathroom a little more.

then we'll head over to haunted mansion, and maybe it'll be parade time? then we'll do splash (maybe with a fastpass?), POC and the tiki room. we might have to do the magic carpet rides since we'll be right there. I think we'll skip jungle cruise because I don't want to use a fastpass for it and the line is always crazy long.

hopefully by this time it's about 5/5:30. I want to get in line to meet tiana and Naveen. this is an absolute must do for us. Madison has wanted to meet them the last two trips and we forgot once and kept missing them the second time. I'd hate to miss them again.

we can find some things to do if we have time, otherwise, about 7:15 I want to find a spot to grab some curb for MSEP at 8.

after the parade, we'll walk over to tony's for our 8:45 dinner reservation for our anniversary!! depending on when we get done eating, we'll either head out or do some shopping or something on main street.

so....here's the fast pass plan.....

i'd like to try for one for anna and elsa and one for 7D close together. late morning/noonish time hopefully, but i'll take whatever I can get and rearrange accordingly. the third one is sort of a toss up right now. I can't decide if we should use it to do ETWB or go through the regular line there and use the fast pass for splash. I don't think there's anything else we're doing that will have a very long line, really. anybody else been end of September and know differently?

parade watching questions.....is there a good spot to watch MSEP over by tony's restaurant? since we have an ADR there, I thought it might be easier to watch the parade from there and not have to fight crowds from elsewhere in the park to get over there in time. is there a good place in front of town square theater? we've never watched a parade from anywhere but mainstreet by the hub.

I was also thinking that we'll be in liberty square for festival of fantasy. any tips on a good spot to watch from?

so, what do you all think? sorry for the lack of pictures!

 

[STLMickeyMom]

Friday, sept 26, will be an easy morning. we have a breakfast ADR at the poly at 10:15. another new try! i'm pretty excited about this one, I just hope we make it. we're not morning people on a regular day and on vacation and after a late night....well, just keep your fingers crossed for this too!

after we get back, we might swim for a bit and look around the resort a little. grab some lunch if anyone's hungry or just grab some snacks when we get into the park (i see a lot of snacking happening this day). then I think we'll sneak in a nap. we'll leave about 3:30 so we can hopefully be to MK by 4. apparently they'll let you in with your party ticket then. I think we'll try to ride BTMR, grab snacks, whatever seems fun and has a shortish line, but about 6 or so, I guess we'll line up to meet Rapunzel and Flynn. this may not happen. Madison was very excited about it when we talked about it months ago, but she doesn't seem as excited now. and, I have to admit, meeting characters is losing it's appeal more and more to riding rides with little wait. we'll see....if she doesn't want to meet them, maybe we'll head over and meet jack sparrow instead right away.

then I thought we'd do the magic shots by where tiana meets and the haunted mansion. i'd love to grab the party waffle over there too. how good does this look? (picture from google)



I mean, there is nothing wrong with that picture!

of course we'll get some candy and then i'd like to go ride dumbo and the astro orbitor at night!

we'll watch the 9:30 hallowishes, see the 10:05 villians show, and the 10:30 boo to you parade.

after those, we'll head over to meet jasmine and Aladdin if Hannah still wants to do that. maybe we'll pop into the toy story dance party if the girls are still functioning. I guess we'll see how they're doing by then.

and I think that's all. we've never been to a party before. I know you can't do everything. does this list look reasonable for a party at the end of September?

and, just to throw in one more picture to make up for having so few lately....here are my princess and the frog shoes from terri! I couldn't love them any more! Louis and ray are my faves!!

 

[RGirl]

Hi Lori!!!! Just checking in really quickly - I can't believe how quickly your trip is coming up. I'm so excited for your TR!!! You are going to love MNSSHP - before Willow started school, October was our WDW month (well, for two years :laughing) - it is such a great time of year (I know you are going in September, but it must be the same feeling there). Plus, you are doing the party on my birthday - it HAS to be awesome!!!

 

[Jackiemarie21]

Your plans look good to me! I agree it is so hard to plan a short trip. There is so much to do and how do you narrow it down? it's tough, but I am still so jealous you will be going to MNSSHP!

Please try one of those waffle things for me! I will need a very good description of it so I can live through you!


I totally love your shoes!

 

[annegirl]

The plans sound really good. I'm sure you guys are going to have such a blast at the party.
And it is so great to see the countdown numbers getting smaller and smaller!
The shoes are GREAT! Love them!

 

[Denovagirl]

Ok I'm replying to one post at a time so I don't forget! So your first MK day-

If skip FP for ETwB and use it for splash. Like 90% of people will be running to 7DMT and A&E and be in line for quite some time. I don't think your wait will be long at all. And they let in groups for that one, so I heard the line will move significantly with each group. Worst case scenario the lines too long you skip and come back with FP after you use the other 3, I doubt they'll run out.

Speedway was so fun! I have to admit! It's not like other crappy car rides I've been on because a) they actually let the kids drive and b) you really push the gas and control the speed! Love it! Do it!

All the plans look good, you've allowed for multiple possibilities on parade viewing and such so I think you will be good! Although you should def get your butts up and there for rope drop! You can do it! You'll only be there a few days, do ittttt!

Ps glad the girlies liked their treats!

 

[Denovagirl]

Party day plans sound very reasonable! I've seen others with far more ambitious lists that get it all done so you should be good! I know how you feel on characters... I want to do them but then again waiting when I could be doing other things sucks! Lol...

I want to try the monsters dance party for sure and maybe the toy story one too of the girls are still up. When I ask Olivia her priorities are RIDES and CANDY! Lol... Mine are the parade and fireworks. I think the hubs is that waffle...teehee

I can't wait to hear your plans for the 27th!!!

 

[disneyseniors]

so you can put a face with this PTR, here's us last fall, rich, lori, hannah (6) and madison (4).....lost in a corn maze, i believe!

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and again at our DDs trunk or treat. of course i did a Disney theme!

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DH has been to Disney 3 times. the girls have been twice and i have been 4 times. this will be rich's 4th trip, 3rd for the girls and 5th for me. we all like different things; the girls love the characters, i love the rides, and rich loves the animation classes and learning about Walt and Pixar....but we all LOVE going!


WHERE?

i have made one decision. i picked our resort! we are going to stay at Caribbean Beach Resort. can't wait to try out one of those hammocks!

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we were going to stay here last time, but then the rates for a royal room at port orleans riverside were so good, i couldn't resist giving them a try. we really loved staying at POR, but we want to try something different, so CBR it is! i am going to request a room in the Jamaica section. i'm excited to try this resort out! the pictures remind me of our honeymoon in Hawaii and look so relaxing and peaceful!

even though i think the pirate rooms look so fun, we are going to stick with a regular, standard view room. to make this trip more doable, i am trying to save as much money as possible. besides, since this trip will be so short, we won't be spending a lot of time in the room anyway.


WHEN?

one decision i haven't made is a firm date yet. we have several options and I priced them all out. they are pretty much the same amount for all of the dates, which is nice!

first is September 18-20/21. this is a good date because hannah would only miss one day of school since there's no school on the 19. also, projected dates for Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party say there should be a party that Friday night. the bad part is that my in laws 50th wedding anniversary is the 19, so there may be a party in the works for that weekend. if so, we absolutely can NOT do this weekend.

next would be September 25-27/28. our anniversary is on the 25th. it'd be fun to be there on our actual special day, but not really a necessity, of course. there should be a MNSSHP. the bad part is hannah would miss two days of school.

another choice would be October 16-18/19. this choice is good because again, hannah wouldn't miss any school due to two days off for teacher in services or something. there's a MNSSHP. the rates are the same. the bad parts are that it's farther away and, i am sort of hoping for free dining which i know is offered quite regularly in September, but i don't know if that happens much in October. like i said, trying to save some money and free dining is pretty tempting.

we could also do the first two weekends in October, but hannah would miss school those weeks too. if she's going to miss, i'd rather she miss in September when school is just starting.

i really want to do the 18-20, but am pretty sure that's not going to end up as a choice. i'm leaning towards the 25-27 so we can hopefully get free dining and be there on our actual anniversary. hannah will miss school, but....i can live with that! bad parenting moment?

the other thing.....does anyone know the answer to this? do you have to stay a certain number of nights to qualify for free dining? this was our plan--leave as early as we can Thursday morning. stay Thursday night and Friday night and leave sometime on Saturday. but, then i got to thinking that there might be a minimum number of nights you have to stay to get free dining? if that's so (and it's something we can swing, like 3 nights minimum) we might have to consider either staying Saturday night and leaving at the crack of dawn on sunday or just throwing out free dining hopes.

if we have to skip out on free dining (or any discount due to not staying enough nights?), i might think about changing our resort to one of the all stars to save a little more money. we stayed at all stars movies on the girls first trip. it was fine, but we had some complaints. if we stayed there, i'd probably pay for a preferred room to be closer to things. i guess i should price that out and not pin all our hopes on CBR quite yet.


WHAT?

some things we would like to do this trip....

mickey's not so scary halloween party

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pirate adventures for the girls at CBR

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hoop de doo musical review

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FINALLY see some fireworks!

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ok, that's about it for today. thanks for letting me get some thoughts out of my head!

oh! and, if you saw the title of this PTR--it's definitely more elated than gassy!

We are going in November 2014 to CBR for the first time too, so please share how your trip went at CBR. We are a little apprehensive due to some bad remarks/reviews on CBR on other websites. So will be interested to know how it went from one Disney fanatic to another

 

[ZehnJahren]

You're so detailed with your plans! Mine are basically "go to MK, ride x, x, and x on FP+, ride other stuff we see, the end."

Why not do the Speedway? Especially if the little ones want to! There's only so long that a kid wants to ride the Speedway; I think I stopped wanting to around 10. After awhile it looks like a baby ride to them. Now, maybe you start riding again when you're an adult.....

I'd FP+ ETWB. I hear that line is one of the worst ones in the park. You could always use your FP+ for ETWB, 7DMT, and AE, and then get your 4th FP+ for Splash. There's always FP+ left for it because it has such a high capacity - when Brer Fox and Brer Bear aren't causing a commotion downstream....

What is this party waffle of which you speak, and where do you get it!?!?