Guilting my sister back to the World

[tarak]

I was completely cranky-pants about the work trip until I got to sit down and have those chips with a glass of wine. It was the last few days of the school year and a bit of a crazy time to have to be out of town.

 

[JoshAndEvsMom]

Oh man, i'm so behind! Your trip to Hershey Park looks fun!

Nice FastPass selections! (Shhhh... I cry at Wishes too!) I had to lol at your comment about Pecos Bills. Eric acts like it's the world's finest restaurant and MUST eat there... please can we try something else?

Woah, those chips look dee-licious. Wine & chips sounds like a perfectly acceptable Dinner to me! Yum!

 

[tarak]

Oh man, i'm so behind! Your trip to Hershey Park looks fun!

Nice FastPass selections! (Shhhh... I cry at Wishes too!) I had to lol at your comment about Pecos Bills. Eric acts like it's the world's finest restaurant and MUST eat there... please can we try something else?

Woah, those chips look dee-licious. Wine & chips sounds like a perfectly acceptable Dinner to me! Yum!

My husband loves Pecos Bills. I have no clue why. I'm taking this trip as an opportunity to branch out.

 

[tarak]

Random mini-trip part two. This one actually has Disney characters in it. Sort of.

For Amara's birthday, I got her tickets to see Wicked on Broadway. She'd been to NYC before when we met up with friends who were in town, but she'd never seen a show. So we drove up early on a Saturday morning, parked at Secaucus Junction, and took the train into the city. We had a few hours to kill, so we took our time getting to the theatre. For the uninitiated, there are people who dress up as various characters, hoping you'll want a photo so they can demand some sort of payment. Someone dressed as Spiderman tried to high-five Amara who just said, "Yeah, no." It was pretty funny. We saw these folks from a safe distance. I'm not sure who that blue dude is - Elmo with a dye job?



We also saw an elderly lady dressed as Elsa. Her "head" wasn't on at the time, so it was pretty easy to peg her as a senior citizen. Times Square is a wacky place, even at noon. The trash cans at Penn Station amused me endlessly, for some reason.



We also spent another afternoon at Hershey Park, where Aria danced to the Electric Slide with Mr. Rolo. It was like the wedding reception of my nightmares.

 

[JoshAndEvsMom]

OMG I'm dying laughing! Between Blue Elmo chatting up Olaf to Aria & Rolo living happily ever after, I think you might just break the Disboards!

 

[tarak]

OMG I'm dying laughing! Between Blue Elmo chatting up Olaf to Aria & Rolo living happily ever after, I think you might just break the Disboards!

All the characters at Hershey Park creep me out a bit. Aria was a big fan of the Peppermint Patty, too. Just weird. My son, who is allergic to peanuts, always acts like the Reeses Peanut Butter Cup is trying to kill him. Dude, he's not really made of peanut butter.

 

[tarak]

Random side trip part three.

My in-laws have a place at the beach in Ocean City, NJ. We honestly could go there much more often than we do, but we just don't for some reason. Last summer, I had Amara, Aria, and Amara's best friend in the car with me when we drove down. Halfway there, the Schuylkill turned into a parking lot with the traffic (it's known to locals as the Sure Kill). I bailed on the Sure Kill and took surface streets through some seriously dodgy parts of Philly. After about half-an-hour of that, Aria started wailing. We couldn't even figure out what she wanted. Amara and her friend started shoving double-stuffed Oreos at her, hoping she'd stop crying. And she did. Right up to the point where she projectile-vomited double-stuffed Oreos all over herself and the middle row of my Ford Flex. It happened in possibly the least desirable section of Philly for anyone who needs to pull over and clean up a toddler. Needless to say, the older girls did what they could with a pack of wipes and we finally got the chance to clean Aria up when we were safely on the Jersey side of the Ben Franklin Bridge. Amara's friend is no longer able to eat double-stuffed Oreos as a result of this experience.

So this year. No barfing, which was good. Liam, our son, almost drowned, which was pretty much horrible. Amara, who was with him at the time, was beside herself for the rest of the night, saying over and over how she almost killed her brother. It wasn't that close a thing - we were watching and my husband ran right out to get him when we thought he was over his head. I tried and got swamped by a wave because I am many things, but David Hasselhoff I am not.

Other than that, it was actually a really nice weekend. It was almost cold, though, considering it was the fourth of July.


This was the beach on the third. It was about ten in the morning and 66 degrees.


Aria did finally fulfill her dream to become a mermaid. Alas, we had no pink sand for her. She seems to have recovered well.

We might try to make it back there the first weekend in August, but I'm okay if we don't. This weekend will the first where we don't have any absolute plans we have to worry about.

 

[JoshAndEvsMom]

Uugh. Car seat throw up is the worst! I remember when Josh was a toddler we were driving across the state to Seattle. He slept through most of the 5 hr drive then woke up right as we hit downtown traffic... then immediately barfed! Eric pulled off the freeway at the first exit we came to which landed us in the "bad" part of downtown. We had to clean him up in the dodgiest McDonald's you've ever seen. Glad you didn't have to deal with it this time!

The beach looks beautiful! 66 does sound a tad chilly, especially since we've had temps in the 100's! It's HOT here!

 

[tarak]

I really shouldn't complain, but the older I get, the more I like it really hot. They don't turn on the AC in the dojang until it's at least 95. It's usually much cooler outside than in, but I really don't mind. Besides, I'm exercising. To a point, I expect to be a little bit miserable. But I grew up in the deserts of Southern California. Everyone here will talk about how "at least it's a dry heat." When it's 115, it doesn't really matter that there is no humidity. It's really freaking hot.

 

[tarak]

These are my exciting pre-trip activities over the last few days. And yes, I'm stretching the definition of the word "exciting."

Called WDW reservations to ask that they skip that second batch of magic bands. Honestly, we don't need two sets. I asked my sister if she wanted a second color, besides orange. She said she just wanted orange. Okay. It's silly to get two of them. I have a whole pile I'm bringing with to recycle at the resort. I've deactivated the ones we'll never use again (ie: the ones that don't have Olaf, Elsa, or Anna on them). My husband just wants grey. I'm tempted to get a set of all-grey bands for our January trip and watch my kids' heads explode. I wish they had an easy way to decline the magic band shipments from the MDE site or app. I guess they don't plan for the crazed folks like us who go back all the time...

I finally figured out exactly what it means to have early-bird check-in for Southwest. I thought I had to sign on 36 hours ahead of our flight and check-in. But I guess SW does it all for me. Which is good because 36 hours before we leave, I will be sweating like a pig, taking my blue belt test for karate, and trying not to humiliate myself.

Amara is all excited that we can pick our breakfasts for BOG in a couple of days. I think she's been googling reviews of BOG breakfast ever since. She was briefly interested in the cronut, but I suggested she get ready for it by waiting until a day where the forecast includes 90+ degree heat and 90% humidity, consuming a bag of sugar cubes, then walking around the block fifty times. She wisely decided to focus on the other options.

I did make some plans for our January trip. We're spending three days at US (probably staying at Portofino Bay, but that's subject to change). Then we have five nights at AKV. I booked points through the broker that isn't David's. I've used both and had a great experience with each. What won me to one versus the other is not having to pay the entire cost of the trip at the time of booking. So we have a 2BR villa booked in mid-January. I also have airfare taken care of. Through some great stroke of luck, I just happened to be looking for airfare on Kayak for Jan 16-24, shortly after JetBlue added non-stop flights from BWI to Orlando. I got six round-trip fares for just over $1000. That's not much more than I paid for three for the August trip. So while my CC bill was pretty horrifying this past month, I did get a lot of things paid for in one fell swoop. I'm really hoping there's some sort of special for mid-January at the Universal resorts because the prices right now are pretty scary.

 

[tarak]

Well, so much for one surprise...

I was driving home from some random errand today and we were listening to the Disney channel on Pandora. Something from Frozen was playing, can't remember which song. I commented that I'd made a FP reservation for the sing-a-long. Then said, "I'm not sure how many of the songs Maddy will know, but hopefully..." At that point, Amra squeaked out, "Maddy's coming! I knew it!" I just started cursing myself. Cursing, apologizing for cursing, cursing, apologizing for cursing. You get the picture. So that cat is completely out of the bag. I did say there was no guarantee, because something could come up. But it won't be the huge surprise I was hoping for. Ah, well. It's not the end of the world...

 

[Li Li]

Hi, followed you from your comment on my PTR to your PTR! So funny to see references to local restaurants. So, just some random thoughts...

I think Ariel's M&G in MK she is a mermaid, so no legs for Aria to be concerned with.

Also, MDE now has an option to decline magic bands! I saw it last night when I was logged on.

Your plans look great!

 

[tarak]

Hi, followed you from your comment on my PTR to your PTR! So funny to see references to local restaurants. So, just some random thoughts...

I think Ariel's M&G in MK she is a mermaid, so no legs for Aria to be concerned with.

Also, MDE now has an option to decline magic bands! I saw it last night when I was logged on.

Your plans look great!

Hi!

I think they added the feature to decline future bands the day after I called. LOL. Glad it can be done now. Amara plans to reuse her Elsa band. I suspect I'll get hit up for some other special band while we're there. We'll see. It's silly what I'll splurge on and what I get cheap about when I'm at Disney.

I made the ADRs for our January trip this morning. It's weird to be planning the second trip when we haven't taken the first. I got a dinner reservation for BOG and then have the H&V breakfast scheduled. That's it so far. I was only really worried about BOG. My oldest especially loves eating there. I'll probably add an ADR for the Biergarten and Toyko Dining. Half of us love sushi and the other half are good with edamame and hibachi chicken. We had a fantastic view of the lake the last time we ate there. I also want to add Boma for dinner. Probably the night we check in.

Otherwise, I'm just trying to madly get everything done at work before I go on vacation. Things are mad at my office. We've been down one attorney for two years now and I can only assume they're not replacing her. I'll check my email at night when the kids are in bed, but I'm not going to be doing more than that while I'm on vacation.

 

[tarak]

Well, I guess our trip has officially started. I'm currently sitting in my hotel room bathroom at the BWI Marriott, hoping I don't wake up my kids. It's just after three in the morning. I'd say I'm excited about the trip and can't sleep, but most likely it's due to security knocking on a door down the hall every thirty minutes. I've not heard anything other than the guy claiming to be security, so I don't know what's going on. At this point, the only sleep I've gotten came with a dream that included a horrible TSA experience where my toddler turned into a kitten while sitting in her stroller. Think a kid can be hard to handle at the airport? Try keeping track of a kitten. At one point, the TSA agent asked me if I'd hosted some trashy dating show back in the 90s. I never did, by the way.

 

[NJlauren]

Trip time!!!!! Yeah! Can't wait to hear all about it when you get back

 

[tarak]

Today is our first full day. We had an 8:40 ADR for BOG. The plan was just to have a leisurely stroll through the park before breakfast, not get in and out so we could go on the mine train. Aria is too short to ride it. We were more leisurely than I hoped, so we were about five minutes late for breakfast. It was decent. I got the open faced egg sandwich and Amara got the eggs Florentine. Amara loved her eggs. We gave Aria the ham and some of the bread from the bread basket. My sandwich was good, but not hot, so that was disappointing. Aria wanted to know when she could meet the Beast. I said he had to run errands and wouldn't be back any time soon. Glad I got that dinner ADR for January...

We went on the Little Mermaid ride. I swear, it's like they ran over budget and cut the ride short. On the other hand, maybe they didn't want the toddler set traumatized by a reenactment of Ursula's impaled on the ship's prow. After that we went to meet Ariel. We had a FP, but the standby line was only ten minutes. So we switched that to pooh.

I really wonder if they should rethink that seashell bra of Ariel's. Aria just stared at it, totally fascinated. Then she reached up to grab and, presumably, squeeze. Ariel has to be used to that. She just intercepted without missing a beat.

Aria is the first kid of mine who believed that the character she was meeting was the real deal. The other kids were either older, or just never thought it was anyone but a person in a costume. I know there are people who don't get taking a young kid to Disney when he/she won't really remember it. But I will always remember seeing her meet Anna and Elsa, and being beside herself with excitement. And chatting with Sleeping Beauty and telling her all about how she was going to grow a mermaid tail and swim with Ariel some day. And even if she doesn't remember it, in that moment, she was over the moon.

 

[Li Li]

Sounds like a great first day! Sorry about the lukewarm breakfast sandwich. I'd like to try BOG for breakfast but that price tag is somewhat putting me off. But I'll probably do it eventually.

Have fun!

 

[JoshAndEvsMom]

I missed your departure date!! Well, I'm glad you're there and having a fabulous time!

I really wonder if they should rethink that seashell bra of Ariel's. Aria just stared at it, totally fascinated. Then she reached up to grab and, presumably, squeeze. Ariel has to be used to that. She just intercepted without missing a beat.

Not sure if it actually played out the same way it did in my head but if it's anywhere close, this is hilarious!

Aria is the first kid of mine who believed that the character she was meeting was the real deal. The other kids were either older, or just never thought it was anyone but a person in a costume. I know there are people who don't get taking a young kid to Disney when he/she won't really remember it. But I will always remember seeing her meet Anna and Elsa, and being beside herself with excitement. And chatting with Sleeping Beauty and telling her all about how she was going to grow a mermaid tail and swim with Ariel some day. And even if she doesn't remember it, in that moment, she was over the moon.

I will NEVER forget the look on Josh's face when he met Buzz Lightyear for the first time! It's doesn't matter to me if he remembers it... I remember it! And it was magical! It's so awesome that you get to live this with Aria!!

I hope the rest of your trip is wonderful and full of Pixie dust!!

 

[tarak]

Sounds like a great first day! Sorry about the lukewarm breakfast sandwich. I'd like to try BOG for breakfast but that price tag is somewhat putting me off. But I'll probably do it eventually.

Have fun!

It was nice being in the parks early, but I agree, the price tag is a bit much. My older daughter absolutely loved her Eggs Florentine. So if I ever give it another try, I'll get that. If it were table service, I'd have sent the meal back, to be honest. My toddler was only interested in meeting the Beast, so it was just a tease for her. I said he was running errands for the day.

I missed your departure date!! Well, I'm glad you're there and having a fabulous time!


Not sure if it actually played out the same way it did in my head but if it's anywhere close, this is hilarious!



I will NEVER forget the look on Josh's face when he met Buzz Lightyear for the first time! It's doesn't matter to me if he remembers it... I remember it! And it was magical! It's so awesome that you get to live this with Aria!!

I hope the rest of your trip is wonderful and full of Pixie dust!!

I suspect it was just as you imagine.

We ran into Buzz, too. We'd just finished the Buzz ride and he walked up. There were maybe three families in front of us. I think Aria was as excited to see him as she was to see the princesses.

I wanted to give a brief review of our room at the WL. We had a deluxe room booked, since we had a party of five. We stayed there three nights, then moved to the BC for the next four nights. Honestly, I didn't feel like we had that much more room at the WL. It was partly because of the dark furnishings and theme. We had one room with a wardrobe, dresser (TV on top), and two queen beds. The wardrobe had an odor that I can only describe as old cheese. The room was fine, as long as those doors were shut. Open? I was looking for a brick of rotting Roquefort. I never found it. We didn't need the storage, so I just kept the doors shut. We were in room 2000. The good parts - we could walk down the stairs right outside our room and be at the pool in seconds, or at the boat dock in less than a minute. The bad - the AC unit was pretty loud. And the balcony was enclosed by a stone wall that was at least four feet tall. The lobby is gorgeous and the CMs were all great. It just wasn't a good fit. I don't know if that was due to the lodge itself, or the split stay (I realized I don't like them at all). Once we moved to the Beach Club, it was like night and day. The trip wasn't perfect, but I was happier at the BC.

Concierge was a mixed bag. We've stayed CL at the Poly, the YC, AKL, and WL. AKL is by far my favorite. WL comes in second. Poly is third, with YC coming in last. I'll just post brief thoughts about each.

AKL. The CMs are fantastic. Wayne (I don't know if he's still there or not), is just the epitome of what you expect in a Disney Cast Member. On one tip with my son, he noticed that we had started to pin trade, but didn't have many pins (I honestly didn't know how the whole thing worked). He let Liam pick one to start his collection. He always had little treats for my kids and just seemed to go out of his way. The food was more our style (we eat a lot of Indian food, for example, so anything with unusual spices was really appreciated). I think the way the lounge is set up is better. The kids would eat breakfast and watch cartoons and get to know the other kids. Adults were able to sit in the space next to them, with a TV devoted to news, usually, have a space of there own, but still keep an eye on things. With the WL, the seating is really spread out. We never had the chance to chat with other families at the end of the day like we did at AKL. But the offerings were varied from night to night, and the cobbler was fabulous. The Poly was just okay. The food was good, but the CMs are in a separate area, so you don't really interact with them much (at least that was our experience). And the food hoarding was by far the worst at the Poly. YC comes in last because the lounge is just cramped. I know it's due for a refurb, so I hope that's improved. The food was the most generic, too. And they've instituted the CM-led drinking. I never had a CM question whether I should have another glass of wine. But I can see how some might be uncomfortable with that. The one point where the YC got points was the lounge had a fridge stocked with soda and water that was available at all times. So if I wanted a bottle of water or a can of soda when I came back at night, I could grab one.

I'm at the point where I don't know if CL makes sense for us any more. The older our kids get, the less likely we'll be around during the cocktail hour. While the amount of food is fine (we tend to be big eaters at breakfast and then have a light lunch and dinner, so appetizers are just fine), if we're not there to enjoy it, it's just not worth the price of admission.

 

[luvpoohandcompany]

Finally catching up here. Life just been crazy busy. I've had a wedding (my daughter's), a new kitchen fitted (love it but OMG no idea where anything is anymore LOL), a funeral (my uncle) and my mum's Alzheimer's has progressed rapidly since July and at the minute we are searching for suitable respite care until we figure out what next! So yeah busy but settling down and glad to get caught up and hear you're having fun