"It's a Small Town" and "Slow Pass" - 3 days in Disney 1/2012

[dara00]

After we met Vidia, we moved on to Tinkerbell. She was really cute and my kids enjoyed her. Simon was not so sure about who these characters were just yet, so he was standing a bit off to the side, while the bigger two went straight up to Tinkerbell. She asked them about him and then proceeded to pretend to have a starring contest with him!

She said Simon won, which Gabbie found quite funny! She then showed them a little snail that was part of the decor - I think she said his name was Shelly - and said that Simon should try a starring contest with him! (or her?) Sadly we didn't get a picture of Shelly.

Next up - we go on a ride!

 

[DsnyMama]

I'm in! We've been once in January before (2008) and will be going again next January! I love January TR's!

 

[Mrs. Sojourner]

I love the story/pics about your little guy's staring contest with Tink; too cute!

 

[dara00]

I'm in! We've been once in January before (2008) and will be going again next January! I love January TR's!

Thanks for joining in! We had great weather for January!

I love the story/pics about your little guy's staring contest with Tink; too cute!

Thanks! It all happened really quickly, I'm glad we got the pictures to remember it with!

 

[dara00]

The kids and I left Pixie Hollow at approximately 9:35 AM. So far, we've met two fairies while Dave is still off riding Space Mountain. Our next goal was to meet some princesses. (Our overall plan was character greetings while collecting fast passes in the morning and rides in the afternoon.) So we started off through Adventureland, not sure if we would find Ariel or Jasmine first.

We came upon the Magic Carpet ride and Gabbie showed us that Jasmine was actually riding! The kids wanted to go on too, so we parked the stroller and got in line. Keeping in mind that Dumbo was closed, I thought this was a great first ride for us! The CM at the line told us where Jasmine's meet and greet area was and said she would be there soon. Soon it was our turn to go on!

Simon was super excited!

Gabbie and Zachary sat in front of Simon and me. I tried to explain how to make the carpet go up and down, but they basically kept pushing the lever up, then down, then up again over and over, so it was kind of jerky, until I told them just to let us stay up!

Simon didn't want to get off! Zachary also said right away he wanted to do it again.

As we exited the ride, we headed straight for Jasmine's line. There was probably about one family in front of us and soon it was our turn to meet her. Apparently Dave had called my cell phone twice and I didn't hear it, but somehow he found us, so he joined us just as it was our turn! (it was now approximately 9:50 AM).

There was no photopass near Jasmine, and Aladdin was missing as well! (One of our autograph cards that we didn't get to use was the one for Aladdin).

I asked Jasmine where Aladdin was and she told us a story about a magic carpet race with Genie and how she had won the race, but Aladdin hadn't arrived yet! I am curious if he was also missing at that morning's opening show!

Simon cracks me up in this picture!

It was time to secure another fast pass, so we headed out towards Splash Mountain!

 

[Moodyzblu]

Love the pics of the kids on the Carpet Ride !!

What a great family pic (even though Aladdin was off racing) .. it's a nice pic of your family and Jasmine.

 

[dara00]

Love the pics of the kids on the Carpet Ride !!

What a great family pic (even though Aladdin was off racing) .. it's a nice pic of your family and Jasmine.

Thanks, I like them too!

Yeah that family pic is pretty good, but stay tuned for some that I like even more!

 

[dara00]

We headed over to Splash Mountain to get fast passes for later. There was basically no line for it at that time (10 AM), but it was still pretty chilly out, so we figured waiting till later would be better. We did stop for a measurement on my shorty 4.5 year old!

From there, we asked how to find Woody and Jessie and after we walked the wrong way, we finally found it. They weren't out just yet but were on their way out (10:10 AM) and we were first in line!

We are big Toy Story fans, esp. Zachary, so we were all very excited. The kids had their Jessie and Woody dolls out. They were also wearing Toy Story shirts which their human CM's pointed out. Jessie pointed to Buzz on Zachary's shirt and made a heart sign. Awwww.

Simon was still a bit unsure.

My favorite family photo:

From there it was back through Adventureland to find Ariel. We were still right on target with our plan and were meeting Ariel and Eric at 10:20 AM.

Not sure if you've noticed in any previous pictures, but Zachary and Simon both had their names on their shirts. A lot of people were calling Zachary by name and later on Dave asked me where on his shirt his name was! (It is kinda obvious...) So anyway, Ariel pretended to try to guess his name, which he thought was pretty funny. Eric made a comment about being awful at guessing names and hadn't been able to guess Ariel's when he met her.

Next, Ariel pointed out Simon's pacifier clip and called it a great collection! It was really cute.

I love these photos of the kids and the family too!

Next on our time schedule was the 11 AM dance party at the hub, but we had more time, so we headed for Fantasyland!

 

[OziJo]

Your photos are gorgeous!!! It's pouring rain here in Sydney and between my photos and yours I'm missing the beautiful weather we had In Orlando and Hawaii.

 

[DsnyMama]

Love the update! Love the pics with Woody & Jessie!!

 

[dara00]

Your photos are gorgeous!!! It's pouring rain here in Sydney and between my photos and yours I'm missing the beautiful weather we had In Orlando and Hawaii.

thanks! yeah we had great weather in florida. luckily here in kansas city we are having 60 degree weather (Fahrenheit!) in january!

Love the update! Love the pics with Woody & Jessie!!

thanks! I love Woody and Jessie, they are so fun!

 

[Mrs. Sojourner]

It looks like you had some wonderful character interaction...and in record time! The crowds must have been pretty low? You got some really great photos too. I love the family one with Woody & Jessie!

P.S. I heart Keens.

 

[dara00]

It looks like you had some wonderful character interaction...and in record time! The crowds must have been pretty low? You got some really great photos too. I love the family one with Woody & Jessie!

P.S. I heart Keens.

yeah we were doing great time wise! The crowds picked up later on but I can't complain!

Thanks on the photos - I love that one too!

We love our keens too. Not sure if you noticed, but myself and the two big kids all have them. I got them for less than $25 per pair in December and knew they'd be perfect for the trip! Someone actually stopped me in a ride line later in the week and commented on how much she loves Keens!

 

[dara00]

After our super character meet and greets, we headed towards Fantasyland to get another fast pass and get on a ride before the parade / dance party at 11. On the way we passed through the hub. We had some photopass pictures done but I don't really like them. There are a lot of people in the background for some reason. Anyway, here are the ones I took:

Please note the pigeon on Walt's head!

Passing through the castle:

And we arrived at the ride we wanted:

This photo was taken at 9:37 AM and the first one I took on the ride was at 9:40. Nice. Now I know you've all seen countless Small World pictures, but I'll just share a few!

These were Gabbie's favorite - they say "ooh la la!" and she kept saying that during the trip!

Not sure what they're looking at...

I guess I should interject here with the story behind the first part of my trip title - "It's a Small Town." I really don't know when it started, but Zachary started calling this ride "Small Town." It's Gabbie's favorite ride, and when we asked Zachary what his favorite ride was he would say "Small Town!" It was just really cute and I had to quote him here!

At the end of the ride Simon looked like he was about to fall asleep! I guess he found it relaxing. On our way back to the hub, we almost got in the Fairy Godmother's line but decided to hold off, as it was already 11 AM!

Next up - the Move It Shake It Celebrate It Parade!

 

[Moodyzblu]

Great pics !

Love the kids shirts ! SO cute !

 

[dara00]

Great pics !

Love the kids shirts ! SO cute !

I love the shirts too. I'm glad we got them!

 

[dara00]

We arrived in the hub just as the Move It Shake It Celebrate It Parade was arriving. This was a cute and high energy parade which we enjoyed seeing.

Chip and Dale came down near us to dance.

I thought the kids would rather dance near Woody and Jessie, but Gabbie wasn't interested and Dave tried to get Zachary close but it didn't really work, so we moved on. Next in the plan was meeting more characters! As we headed down Main Street, the kids wanted balloons so I told them they could have a picture of the balloons! Not a very good one though.

I also took a picture of this cute shop window:

and this pretend shop window:

Can you tell whose line we were getting into? As a hint, we also got our fast passes for Mickey and the Princesses while waiting!

 

[dara00]

Well since no one feels like guessing, I'll just tell you! We were in line for Mary Poppins! It was an interesting meet and greet - I don't think she liked me very much!

We had two goals when meeting Mary - show her Gabbie's Mary doll and get her to say Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious backwards. Showing the doll was easy enough - Gabbie was holding it! Mary commented that you don't see many dolls of her around, and I explained that Gabbie got her at Mary's show on Broadway.

Mary said this was Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious, so I right away said "can you say that backwards?" I got this look from her:

as she said "why yes, you can say it backwards..." and I interrupted her with "can YOU say it backwards??" That's the part I don't think she liked. So she continued, "Yes, you can say it backwards two ways. You can say it backwards by syllable like I do which is Dociousaliexpilisticfragicalirepus, and in my show I say it backwards by letter, which is Suoicodilaipxecitsiligarfilacrepus!" I got those spellings from wikipedia! So this Mary can say it both ways! Impressive. Also note in the above picture that Gabbie's doll Mary has a similar umbrella to character Mary - Mary touched them together which was cute.

At this point, it was 11:30 AM, and my original plan was to watch the castle show at 11:40 - but there is no castle show at 11:40! Actually before we left I read that there was no castle show Monday at all, which turned out not to be true, but in any case, I moved that to our day 2 plan and it all worked out in the end.

We headed through the middle of the square to get this picture:

Simon had fallen asleep:

and while we were in line for our next meet and greet I ran into City Hall to get him that pin! I think there's supposed to be somewhere you can get pins where they'll write your name and the date on them, but I didn't know about that.

Anyway, we waited in a short line for Pooh and Tigger and met them at 11:45.

From there, the kids and Dave jumped onto a horse drawn streetcar (trolley?) while I walked with the stroller.

I walked through the stores and had to snap a few photos! I'm sure they'd be better if I had a better camera...

Since Simon was sleeping, we decided to hold off on lunch for a bit longer and get onto Splash Mountain!

 

[MelMel11]

Count me in!! Great pictures!!

 

[Moodyzblu]

Wow .. I'm impressed by Mary. I can't even read it backwards .. never mind SAY it !

Great pics !