MAGICal Christmas 2008 - December 20, 2008

[cgcw]

Lissa & family

From the other Cindy who's married to the other Gary

 

[nzdisneymom]

No she is older than that Cindy D. I told her I was jealous this year she gets to celebrate at WDW and next year on a cruise while matt and I work on our B-days.

Lissa

Well, since you're 30, I knew she had to be a bit older than 40 but her spirit is definitely younger I know that DCL can do a lot of really cool special things for b'days. What day is her actual b'day?

 

[ShannonR]

Welcome Lissa and family! I am so glad to see some posts! Cindy, you must be so excited to be leaving for your cruise tomorrow! Have a great Thanksgiving! I will be working on Thanksgiving (as I do EVERY year ) It's okay, though, because it means I get Christmas Eve off Even though I work Christmas Day, I work nights, so by the time I go into work, all the festivities are done, so I really only want Christmas Eve off so we can track Santa on the computer (have any of you ever done that? It is SOOO neat for the kids ) Mine look forward to it every year and it is quite realistic, too.

We just recently had a cold front come through some we are down to the 70-80 degree temperature range during the day and 60 at night Winter coats all around (We are originally from Michigan, remember?)

Well, I start a stretch of 5 nights in a row tonight , then one night off, then Thanksgiving night, then three off. The holidays always mess up your schedule and when you work nights, your rhythm as well. Oh well, the tree goes up next Friday. Anyone go shopping next Friday? My husband would do all our Christmas shopping via the internet if I would let him. What is the fun in that

Have a good weekend everyone and a great cruise to you, Cindy!!!!

Shannon

 

[nzdisneymom]

Shannon - we track Santa with NORAD every year - the kids love to do it. It also gets them in bed at a reasonable time on Christmas Eve.

Cindy - have a fabulous cruise - I can't wait to read about it and see pictures! If you do any "live from..." be sure to post a link over here. I'm feelin' the need for a vicarious vacation!

 

[tinkerbell_29]

Hope everybody had a wonderful Thanksgiving. Busy planning for Christmas at WDW. We are doing an event through gifts of a lifetime for my mom. It will be the first time we have ever been able to surprise her.

Cindy D. her actually b-day is on Dec. 17th but because of school and work schedules we never get to celebrate it until the 22nd.

Lissa

 

[ShannonR]

Hi everyone! I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving! and Cindy, I hope your cruise was a blast! I would have given my right arm to be anywhere but where but where I was We had lady come in ten minutes into the shift who lost her baby and what worse is she was 32 weeks, had tried 8 years for that baby and feeling really guilty about the entire situation. It REALLY makes you grateful, THANKFUL for what you have! I felt so bad for her all night and left the hospital so depressed Friday morning What a horrible way to start the holiday season.

Well enough of the sad stuff! On to better things. Did anyone venture out on Black Friday? A couple of the nurses left work early to get into that madness. I went once and vowed never again!! I try to have most of our shopping done by the beginning of December, but never really succeed

I am so excited it's getting closer and closer to that one year mark!! My best friend just had open heart surgery to repair a ASD that she was born with that finally was becoming symptomatic so I am taking her to see Enchanted today for a pick-me-up!

Well, I have to sign off for now and get ready for the movies! Hope everyone has a great Sunday!

Shannon

 

[cgcw]

We are back and had a wonderful time. I see us sailing on Royal Caribbean again in the future. We loved the ship - it's much bigger than the Wonder. I can't wait until our youngest is tall enough to go on the flowrider, then we'll try the Freedom of the Seas. We had almost perfect weather - a bit windy a couple of days - but warm and not humid. Talk about a reality check coming back to 30-some degrees.

Shannon, as exciting as your job can be, it must be heartbreaking when someone loses a child. One extreme to another in emotions. Hopefully that doesn't happen very often - not that it makes it any easier.

I have never been a black Friday shopper. Much to crazy out there for me. I do a lot of shopping for Christmas online. That way it gets delivered here, usually when the kids are in school and I can shop when it's easiest for me. I can't believe that Christmas is on the horizon already.

This cruise is going to be here before we know it!

 

[nzdisneymom]

Cindy - welcome back from your cruise. We are considering trying out Royal Caribbean as well to give us some additional destinations, so I'd love to see any photos you have if you are putting them anywhere online.

We had a busy Thanksgiving weekend and the best part was thinking about how THIS TIME NEXT YEAR we'll be in full-cruise-mode! And maybe it will still be a secret from my kids. DH doesn't think I'll make it

And to keep me entertained, I've been scrolling through the DCL Pictures of the Day thread to see those holiday-decoration shots from folks who are cruising this year.

 

[dvcChrisVWL]

Howdy, all!!! I am Amy's husband (DH of alikat for all you hardcore DISers!). Starting to look forward to planning the cruise. Hmmm... while we are in the holiday spirits, I need to think of some holiday door magnets. Or I can do like we have done in the past and do the mad scramble the night before...

Did anyone else catch the Mickey's Very Merry Christmas Party? I don't think I will be willing to pay extra $$ for it in the future. We already have passes, I can see the castle another time. Most of the floats (if not all) were from the normal parade - just put to general Christmas music. The fireworks were nice, but mot much more special than normal nightly fireworks - again, put to general Christmas music. Big Bonus: free cookies, apple juice/cider and hot chocolate. Can only down so much of that!

I think I like sticking to Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party - I would pay extra to go to that one every year! I would like to try a Pirate and Princess Party some time... Anyone been to that one yet?

 

[alikat99]

Hey honey - nice to see you posting here on our Christmas cruise thread!!

Hey everyone - I've been MAJORly MIA lately!! Things have been crazy with work & the girls. And now, we're planning our anniversary trip to WDW in 2 weeks!!

 

[tinkerbell_29]

Hi everyone,
Been busy busy with finalizing plans for our upcoming WDW trip at christmas. We are doing an event with gifts of a lifetime for my mom's B-day while we are down there and are excited by that. We were disappointed by the itinerary released for 2009. We really wanted to go bakc to Europe. Maybe we will do another cruise line or do an adventures by disney trip. Hope everyone is well and is having a wonderful Christmas season.

Lissa

 

[ShannonR]

Hi everyone! I hope everyone is doing well! I am up roaming the halls of my house in the middle of the night (die hard night nurse, remember) so I can't sleep at night and thought I would check in and see if anyone had posted.

Lissa and Amy: I hope you guys have a wonderful trip with your respective families to WDW for Christmas It has been years since we have been there at Christmas time . I want to go to WDW for Halloween next year because Melissa will be 4 1/2 years old and maybe old enough to enjoy it .

We are all go, no quit with baseball right now. Mitchell is 100% into sports with baseball and basketball being his favorites, so this year he decided to give up the rest (football, soccer, golf...) and concentrate on those two year round. So, he is on three, YES THREE different baseball teams right now (two regular and a select, elite team coached by former major leaguer Ted Ford). We literally spend every night at the baseball field. Thank God for two things: Rick is an at home dad AND our 14 year old daughter has no ambitions in life but to talk on the phone to her friends so we can focus on Mitchell right now! The baby stays home with Morgan or goes with us to the field (depending on her mood at the time AND the time of the game. Last night's was at 8:00pm ) Basketball starts next month and I am not quite sure how we are going to manage all the practices, games, tournaments(the elite team travels) and homework. Our saving grace is that Mitchell is an excellent student in GT with academics just coming to him naturally,no studying, no trying, it's just there and allows for him to be liberal with his sports .

Well I will sign off for now and wish everyone a great weekend! I will spend mine at the ball field!

Shannon

 

[alikat99]

Hi everyone,
Been busy busy with finalizing plans for our upcoming WDW trip at christmas. We are doing an event with gifts of a lifetime for my mom's B-day while we are down there and are excited by that. We were disappointed by the itinerary released for 2009. We really wanted to go bakc to Europe. Maybe we will do another cruise line or do an adventures by disney trip. Hope everyone is well and is having a wonderful Christmas season.

Lissa

Hey Lissa - When will you be at WDW??? We're going the 18th - 22nd.

 

[DisneyZell]

Hello everyone! It's been awhile since we last posted, so I thought I would see what is going on. It was interesting to hear that dvcChirsVWL did not like Mickey's Very Merry Christmas Party. We were planning on going to that next year before the cruise, but now I'm not sure if we should. Last year we went to MNSSHP and loved it, so we thought the Christmas party would be similar. What is it that you don't like about it? If anyone else has any opinions about it I would love to hear them. If we don't do that, we may just have to spend the whole day at the parks! I was comparing prices for our cruise from when we booked until now and I can't believe our category has gone up $1200! I am so glad we booked the day they announced the dates. Of course we also had the 10% on-board booking discount, so that helped too. Here at our house we are busy with sports as well. Connor (5 year old) has soccer while Nick (9 year old) has basketball and flag football. It seems like all I do is go from practice to practice. But they love it and it keeps them busy, so that is good.

Well, that's about it from here. As I look out the window and see snow and ice, I just cannot wait for this cruise to happen. I really miss the sunshine and warm weather!

 

[tinkerbell_29]

Amy we are going 20th-27th staying at the Grand Floridian. We booked this before we were DVC members and decided not to change it. We are going to the Christmas party on the 21st. I hope we enjoy because we have heard good and bad about it. It is cold here today only got up to 33. I'm praying for warm weather while were down there.

Lissa

 

[Diana Lyn]

I'll chime in on the subject of MVMCP, I was actually with Amy and Chris when they went. I agree, I don't think it was worth $150+ for our family of four to go, especially with a 4 year old and 3 year old who were pretty much done by 8:30. I have to admit, it hurt to pay that much for them knowing full well they wouldn't make it to midnight. We're passholders too, so we could have gone to the MK and seen all the lights and decorations any day. From what I understand, they do the Twas the Night Before Christmas Show that I thought was special to MVMCP on Saturdays during park hours anyway. That was the only thing we really had time to see besides the parade and fireworks and even then the girls were wiped and we were packed like sardine, so we cut out after like 10 mins. The lines for the characters were way too long to get pics with them in their holiday outfits and we spent a lot of time waiting for the fireworks and parade because it was so crowded you had to stake out a spot. But we were with friends, so we still had a great time.



Last night we went to Epcot for dinner at the Garden Grill and to see the Candlelight Processional. Monique Coleman was the narrator and my daughters are HUGE High School Musical Fans. The show was beautful and I was so happy we went. After dinner we walked around World Showcase and listened to the Christmas stories of Mexico, Norway and Germany before getting in line. We did the 8:15 show and walked out and took a spot on the bridge to watch Illuminations with the special holiday ending. Amazing. I have to say, last night at Epcot was way better for us than MVMCP and it didn't cost us anything extra (besides dinner) to go there.

 

[DisneyZell]

Thanks, Diana Lyn, for the input. Were the lines for the rides crowded? I don't care about the characters, since we will get them in their holiday gear on board, so we would be going for the rides. That was one of the great things about MNSSHP...the lines were so short and we even went on a day that they were sold out. I'm just wondering if the crowds would be the same or more for the Christmas party.

 

[cgcw]

I kind of have to disagree with my friends regarding MVMCP. We enjoy going because the crowds are usually so much less than during the regular park hours. We went this year (guess with who?? ) because we had one night to spend in the parks. I didn't mind spending the extra $$'s because I knew my kids would have fun on the rides. We don't do parade and if we see the fireworks, it's usually because we see them on the run, not that we take the time to actually sit and watch them. Especially this year, I wanted to make sure that my DS7 was able to ride Space Mountain as I heard it's going to be changed/revamped. Whether that's true or not, it's one of his favorites and right now, we don't know when our next WDW trip will be.

We didn't make it very long as we had a big week on the cruise and I had enough of my DS7's attitude for the night. We left just as the fireworks were starting. But we were able to ride most of what we wanted to ride without much of a wait. Being we were in a big group, that made it even more fun!

Maybe I would feel differently if we had spent a week down in WDW or if we were going to spend a couple more days doing the parks. Part of my opinion is based on being at WDW for just that one night.

I guess that's what makes the world go around, we all can do the same thing and have different opinions of it. I do think if it's something you haven't done before, it's worth giving it some thought.

 

[Diana Lyn]

I guess that's what makes the world go around, we all can do the same thing and have different opinions of it. I do think if it's something you haven't done before, it's worth giving it some thought.

Well I guess we can't be friends anymore. I'm only friends with people who agree with me.

 

[alikat99]

Hello everyone! It's been awhile since we last posted, so I thought I would see what is going on. It was interesting to hear that dvcChirsVWL did not like Mickey's Very Merry Christmas Party. We were planning on going to that next year before the cruise, but now I'm not sure if we should. Last year we went to MNSSHP and loved it, so we thought the Christmas party would be similar. What is it that you don't like about it? If anyone else has any opinions about it I would love to hear them. If we don't do that, we may just have to spend the whole day at the parks! I was comparing prices for our cruise from when we booked until now and I can't believe our category has gone up $1200! I am so glad we booked the day they announced the dates. Of course we also had the 10% on-board booking discount, so that helped too. Here at our house we are busy with sports as well. Connor (5 year old) has soccer while Nick (9 year old) has basketball and flag football. It seems like all I do is go from practice to practice. But they love it and it keeps them busy, so that is good.

Well, that's about it from here. As I look out the window and see snow and ice, I just cannot wait for this cruise to happen. I really miss the sunshine and warm weather!

Without a doubt, I'm glad that we did MVMCP at least once. We've been talking about it for years, and I'm glad that we were able to do it with friends, that's for sure! I'm sure that we'll do it again when the girls are up for staying up that late. It's just not that worth it when you have really young children that fall asleep before the fireworks. But, as for ride lines, they were all pretty short that we went on.