Lisa and Jason's DFTW TR, Sept 2nd, 2007: UK Pavilion & Living Seas

Lisa... Great TR so far and the photos are just great. I never thought about taking a picture of the screen after we ride a ride! I will have to remember it for my trip in 25 days! I can not wait to read more!
 
It is so much fun reading about your trip!

Can't wait to hear about the wedding!!

Thank you!! I'm getting there... though I'm leaving today to drive to the Outer Banks, NC, where I won't have internet access for a week, so it'll be a little while longer... :(

Looks like a fun day!

It really was a good day in the AK. I'm looking forward to going back again sometime when it won't be as rushed. I'd like to look around more AND see the Lion King show! I've heard it's really good. I LOVED the Lion King on Broadway!! It was one of the coolest shows I've ever seen. :thumbsup2

Lisa... Great TR so far and the photos are just great. I never thought about taking a picture of the screen after we ride a ride! I will have to remember it for my trip in 25 days! I can not wait to read more!

Thank you!! The one thing about taking the screen pic is that you have to remember it right away when you get off the ride. They definitely don't like you to do it, so if you're fumbling to get your camera out of a bag and turn it on, you'll feel like you're doing something wrong. It's much better if you can just snap a quick picture and be on your way. I wanted to try without the flash, too, to see whether that would eliminate the glare, but never thought of it in time. :confused3
 
Pre-Rehearsal Dinner Preparations

As we walk into the Wilderness Lodge, I realize the construction walls are down!! The lobby is back to be perfect again, just in time for the arrival of most of our guests. I’m sooo happy about this!! :) Back in our room, Jason really wants to take a shower, but I persuade him that we should take care of gifts first. We call my parents to ask for their room number (again. For some reason, I could never remember anybody’s room number this whole trip.) Dad says mom’s in the shower, but I figure she’ll be done soon. She’s always quick!

Well, mom’s still in the bathroom getting ready when we arrive, so we just give dad his gift: a Swiss Army watch. He loves it (though he’s so happy about us getting married, since he LOVES Jason, that I’m sure he would have loved any gift we gave him.) When mom comes out (fully dressed and ready to go), we show her dad’s watch and then give her a necklace and matching earrings for her gift. They’re perfect for her and “very Lisa”, so I know she’ll always think of me/us when she wears them. She says they go perfectly with what she’s wearing the next day, and she’s very happy with her gift. I was glad that we were able to give them their gifts privately like that. It was just a nice, quiet moment.

I also saw that their gift basket had been delivered by Disney Floral. On the way out of the room I commented on that and Jason said, I know, they thanked me for it today at breakfast. I had been worried about gifts getting delivered so I teasingly scolded him for not telling me! I asked about his parents’ gift basket, and he confirmed that they had received theirs as well. Good! One less thing to worry about.

Then we walked down the hall to find his parents’/sister’s rooms. (They were adjoining, which worked really well for them.) We spotted Jason’s mom’s scooter in the hallway—it definitely made it easier to find their room! When we arrived, I felt a little bad at first, since Jason’s sister was trying to get the kids to take naps (or at least quiet, rest time.) But our FG was excited to see us, and he gave her her “flower girl gift”: a Sorcerer My Pal Mickey. I think she was a little too young to really understand it, but she was still happy with the gift. And Jason’s sister was excited about the idea that it could help them find characters. (I don’t think Pal Mickey got much actual use this trip, though. There was just too much going on.)

Back in our room, Jason took the first shower. It’s fixed now! I started re-packing and organizing things, since we needed to change rooms the next morning, and we weren’t going to have any time later since it was going to be a late night! Then I showered and got ready for dinner. No time for a nap :(. Actually, I was rushing a bit to get ready in time. (Well, actually, we were rushing to get to the lobby a few minutes early, since to us, “on time” means getting there a little early. :) ) We were supposed to meet at 4:15, and we were probably there by 10 after.

Now, our families have never met each other. (We’ve only been dating for a little over a year.) So there were lots of introductions to be made. Eventually, we have everybody except for the oldest of my three brothers, Chuck and his girlfriend. While we’re waiting, one of my oldest friends arrives with her 3-year-old daughter, so she got to meet everybody. It was definitely fun to have so many friends and family staying in the same hotel, so people just ran into each other like that!

We gave Chuck a call, and he said they were running late and would be down to the lobby in about 2 minutes. Maybe 10 minutes later, they arrived. (Turns out they stayed too long at the Magic Kingdom, only just got back. His girlfriend got showered, dressed, and ready, complete with make-up, in just 15 minutes!!) More introductions. Were still doing fine on time. Our reservations were for 5:15 at the Hollywood Brown Derby, in MGM, and it was still only 4:25.

Up next: our Rehearsal Dinner…
 
Rehearsal Dinner at MGM

Now I have to confess here. I have what is probably one of the worst sets of “rehearsal dinner pictures” in the history of rehearsal dinners. I have only 4 altogether, yes 4. I know, pathetic. :(

First, the riding on the bus picture. You can see the backs of my parents, then the back of Chuck and his girlfriend Rebecca, then my brother Andy (looking out the window), and then the back of my third brother, Theo. Exciting, huh?
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As soon as we entered MGM, Jason’s sister wanted to get a photopass picture of her family in front of the hat. Now I could see that the road was cleared and there were people lined up on the sides for a parade, but I guess nobody else noticed. We were walking straight down the center of the street. I started moving towards the right, towards the Brown Derby. Jason’s sisters family posed for their pictures in the center. But then the parade (or “pep rally”, I suppose) really was coming right at them. Most of our group was ushered to the left/opposite side of the road. It was a pretty funny sight from where we were: Jason’s family almost getting run over by a parade.

Eventually, they caught up with us. Even with the delays, we still checked in at the Brown Derby, with our whole group, at 5:00, 15 minutes early for our ADR. Now Jason had made this reservation nearly 6 months ago and told them it was for our rehearsal dinner. We were a party of 14 plus baby, When Jason checked in, I was surprised they didn’t say anything about it being our rehearsal dinner. After we waited for about 15 minutes, I suggested to Jason that he tell him why we were there. He did, which was good ‘cause they didn’t seem to know it was a rehearsal dinner. I figured that would make it more likely for us to get seated all at one table.

Now, a bunch of other people were seated while we were waiting, even a large party of about 10 who came in after us. Jason was getting pretty impatient!
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Here’s another one of our 4 quality photos:
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That reminds me that it had started raining again. Jason’s sister kept taking our FG outside, to make the wait more bearable. But she really couldn’t walk around too much, because of the rain.

And here’s the last exciting picture, of all of us still waiting:
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In total, we waited about 40-45 minutes to get seated. But at least we were all at one table! It was a long one, right in the center area of the restaurant. Now, I wish I could say that after that long wait, the rest of the meal went smoothly. It didn’t. It was one of the worst meals we’ve ever had at Disney, in terms of service. It took about 15 minutes for the waiter to even start to take our orders. (So in total, it took an hour from the time we entered the restaurant to place our orders.) Jason’s sister was smart, though, and ordered a kid’s meal for our FG the moment we were seated. So she actually got her meal before most of us had gotten our drinks.

We ordered a few bottles of wine for the table. And waited and waited for our food. When it finally came, everything was good. But by then, people were waiting for drink re-fills. (Even just water.) I really think they should have dedicated a waiter to our table, since this one certainly couldn’t handle our table in addition to any others he had. He was completely overwhelmed. I think my frustration with the dinner is why I just totally forgot about taking pictures. It just wasn’t a particularly festive meal. I was so surprised by the experience, since we had had such a wonderful meal there back in March, when we visited for our planning session. This one was the complete opposite.

We finished up with desserts and coffee. (More worms-in-dirt for our FG!) Afterwards, we tried to talk the “grown ups” into coming out to Jelly Rolls with us, but everybody said they were too tired. (It was already 8pm!!) So it was just my brothers, their girlfriends, Jason, and me who went off to the Boardwalk…
 

Jelly Rolls!

So, the plan was to meet up at Jelly Rolls at 8pm. Lots of friends and family had told us they were likely coming, but we had no way of knowing how many actually would. We were running late after our rehearsal dinner and weren’t able to get good directions from anybody at MGM as we were leaving. It probably would have been smart to take the boat, but instead we walked. So we were late, it was raining very lightly, I was wearing (typical for me) 3 1/2 heels, and I was still a little grumpy from dinner. A couple friends called while we were walking, and I assured them we’d be there soon.

When we arrived at about 8:30, we were still the first ones there. I spotted a few tables up front and we grabbed them. Some people went off to get drinks, and a waiter came over to ask us how many were in our party. I said, “I don’t know. Maybe 20 or 30??” He told us we wouldn’t all be able to sit together, but I wasn’t worried. I figured we’d deal with it later. As it turned out, there were only about a dozen of us (so I felt a little silly about the 20-30.) Oh, well. No way to know :)

Now, for once I have the opposite problem: TONS of pictures!!! We had SO much fun at Jelly Rolls. Perhaps a little too much fun... I don’t think we were a very “Disney appropriate” group. We were probably pretty close to getting thrown out through much of the night. There were always CM watching us very closely. Which really surprised me. I just assumed that since it was a dueling piano bar, and one of the few places at Disney that’s 21+, that rowdiness would be welcomed. I mean, they still allow smoking there! And most piano bars love groups like ours: wedding parties, bachelorette parties, etc. I thought that if anything, we would get made fun of a lot. I didn’t at all expect it to be such a “wholesome” place.

In the beginning, the piano players were teasing us a bit, asking where we were from, making fun of our requests for Country Music, that sort of thing. (We just said Texas! Since saying Texas/New Jersey/California/New York/Arkansas seemed unnecessarily complicated.) But as the night went on, and the shots kept coming, and we all got drunker, they started just trying to pretend like we weren’t even there. I probably would have felt bad about it (annoying the piano players with our rowdiness and maybe aggravating some of the other patrons), but I was having too much fun to care too much. And besides, it’s a piano bar!!

O.K., enough description… Here are some pictures that probably tell the story better:
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View of the stage from our up-front seats:
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The happy couple, working on a few Miller Lites:
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Cute picture of another happy couple. My youngest brother Andy and his girlfriend Krystal:
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Chuck, my oldest brother (2 years younger than me), being Chuck:
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My (middle) brother Theo, being his charming self:
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Quite the ladies man (with Krystal, and my friend Tasha, from Arkansas):
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One thing I learned this trip is that Krystal goes into “cheering mode” when she gets drunk. (BTW, I totally love this girl and hope that she’s my FSIL!!)
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I must be drunk, if I’m singing! (I’m totally tone-deaf, so I usually don’t subject friends to my awful voice ;) )
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Neither Tasha nor Chuck’s girlfriend, Rebecca, is doing too well at this point:
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Little funny story about Chuck and Rebecca here. Rebecca drank a LOT at dinner. Maybe she was nervous about the big, family dinner. Who knows. And then she continued at Jelly Rolls. At one point, Chuck and Rebecca disappear for a really long time, and somebody reports that they’re in the bathroom together. Uh, oh. This is definitely not “Disney appropriate.” But as Chuck tells the story, they went out for some air, and then got something chocolatey (not sure what) to eat. Next thing he knows, Rebecca’s got chocolate smeared all up and down her arms. So he has to take her to the bathroom to get her cleaned up. (So it wasn’t that scandalous after all!) Anyway, she didn’t last too much longer after that, and Chuck had to take her back to the WL. Back to the pictures…

I just love this picture, for some reason:
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And another:
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O.K., let the rowdiness begin. Krystal trying to get Theo to dance while Andy looks/laughs on:
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The Disney staff was NOT happy about the dancing:
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Actually, I think it was the dancing they minded most. Nobody else was dancing. Everybody was just sitting quietly and politely watching the show. Sure, there was a good deal of singing, but no other group was being nearly as loud as us.

Well, we did actually make it through the night. I think we left at about 1:30am. We all piled into several taxis and made it home safely. We felt badly for poor Tasha, though. She was really, really drunk and was staying with her mom :shock: So we just sort of walked her to her door and pushed her inside. I wouldn’t have wanted to come back to my mom in that condition! :sad2:
 
Hi Lisa

I just got caught up with your TR.

I had no idea you could get pictures of the screen on those rides. I had read that the picture always comes out blurred, so I didn't bother. I will definitely have to try it next time.

When you were at WCC, did they involve you in any games or anything? We chose not to go here as Steven is quite shy and I knew he wouldn't want to get involved in anything that would embarrass him.

So you went on Primeval Whirl. I heard that this was a ride that could cause motion sickness in people that didn't even suffer motion sickness. I ended up not going on it as I didn't want to bring up my lunch.

Looking forward to reading more
 
Hi Lisa

I just got caught up with your TR.

I had no idea you could get pictures of the screen on those rides. I had read that the picture always comes out blurred, so I didn't bother. I will definitely have to try it next time.

When you were at WCC, did they involve you in any games or anything? We chose not to go here as Steven is quite shy and I knew he wouldn't want to get involved in anything that would embarrass him.

So you went on Primeval Whirl. I heard that this was a ride that could cause motion sickness in people that didn't even suffer motion sickness. I ended up not going on it as I didn't want to bring up my lunch.

Looking forward to reading more

Hey Summer! Don't waste time reading my TR when you've still got plenty to write for your own! :goodvibes :laughing:

The first time at WCC, they asked our 3-year-old FG to sing a song, so she was up there singing with one of the CMs while other children ran around the room with horses. She loves that sort of attention, though, so it was fine. They didn't ask any of the adults to do anything. Of course, we didn't have pins or wedding ears or anything on... We went back a second time, after the wedding, with Just Married pins, and they did have us do something. It didn't embarrass us at all, but Steven might have not liked it...

I definitely wouldn't want to go on Primeval Whirl with a hangover! It does spin you a bit. But it didn't bother me that day. It definitely wasn't as bad as I remember the Tea Cups being, but it's been YEARS since I've done that ride! I thought PW was mostly just goofy and fun. Mostly sharp, abrupt turns with a little spinning. I was cracking up throughout most of the ride.

Again, thanks for reading but get back to your own!! :rolleyes:
 
Sounds like you all had a blast at Jelly Rolls. I am thinking that I might have to try that place out when we go to Disney. Should be a fun thing to do!!! Thanks for sharing your experience and Here's hoping no one was TOO hungover.
 
I'm still loving the TR. I want more :) Looks like a great time!!
 
i LOVE jelly rolls! we used to go there all the time as cast members!!! sometimes i'll hear billy joel on the radio (not often in houston) and it'll take me back!!!
 




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