Newsies' Pumpkin-Spiced Trip Report! - Our MNSSHP, MM August '19 Adventure! *DR link 1/27*

[Newsies]

I love your outfit for the party!
Looks like a fun meet, and great pictures!

Thank you, I had such a fun time!

I love the pumpkin back pack, so cute!!

Thank you!

We met Jack and Sally in 2016 and really enjoyed the meet.

I love the new setting, where do they meet now?

They're a lot of fun! They currently have a room at Town Square Theatre for their MNSSHP greet!

That was a hot and crowded night

It was so disgustingly sweaty!

I agree 100%! We love making up background stories too! Disney, are you reading this???

Totally agree!!

Love it!! I struggle with Loungefly bags, too, as far as being unsure of how much I'll use them. But this one is so cute.

IT'S SO CUTE and I wore it this weekend so I'm definitely glad I made the purchase this time!!

Love love love these photos! And you got out with plenty of time before the party even started!

Seriously I can't tell you in words how absolutely adorable your outfit was. The cutest thing. Ever.

I LOVE YOU

Love your MNSSHP outfit!

They've really stepped up the decorations for Jack & Sally since they first started meeting. Love it!

Thank you!! The new space looks great!!

Finally catching up! 1900PF for breakfast has been on my radar for a while, but DH isn't really into character meals. I might have to walk him into it because your meal looked fantastic!!

Your MNSSHP outfit is so cute!! Love the tutu skirt!!

I highly recommend 1900PF!

Thank you so much, I loved my tutu!!

Just 1 tube???

Just one THIS time... but I definitely picked up more later!

I'm glad that it worked out well and you got more use out of it!

It was one of the smarter Disney purchases I've made!

Sounds like it was a fun meet. It's too bad that it takes a 2 hour wait followed by a somewhat rushed interaction though.

It was definitely fun, even if the wait was kind of crazy!

Still so jealous you met them! Love the pictures! Dan and I decided to try to wait for them at our second party and the line was quoted at 3 HOURS. That wasn't happening lol someday though!

It is definitely NOT the most fun wait, but the pictures were great and I love talking to them!

Love your new bag and Halloween outfit!!! They go perfect together!!! And how cool that you were able to meeting them!!! My family is willing to wait in line for characters...

Thank you so much!!! I have to meet the character like that without my family because they definitely will not wait, lol!

Better late than never, but I'm following along!

I'm seriously *loving* your TR so far! If I may ask, how do you edit your photos? They're all lovely!

Thank you so much for following along, I really appreciate it! You are too kind! I edit my photos with Adobe Lightroom, with a preset I purchased on Etsy!

I think we could be best friends...just sayin'!

I DEFINITELY agree!!!! Let's be best friends!!!

Your outfit is so cute! It sounds like the party got off to a great start!

Thank you so much! It was a fun start to the party!!

It's always so great to come across something you've missed for years! I hope you enjoyed your crackers.

Great MNNSHP costume! It looks light, airy and fun - just perfect for a party in humidity! The pumpkin bag was the perfect addition!

That's a really long wait for a character meet, but I agree that it makes more sense to wait before the party than during the party. I'm glad you enjoyed the meet!

The Mickey crackers were SO GOOD! I really did miss them!

Thank you so much-- I definitely kept the heat and humidity in mind when building my MNSSHP outfit!

It's a long wait, but Jack & Sally were worth it!!

Oops, fell behind on my reading. Such a cute costume and love the bag!

Jack and Sally are the very favorites of my eldest grand Will, my niece loves them too!

Thank you so much!! Jack and Sally were so much fun!

 

[Newsies]

"Donald! You're Pumpkin-Spiced!"
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After we watched the Flag Retreat, it was time to head to the Mickey's Not-So-Scary Halloween Party Bypass to grab some pictures and candy!

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If you're heading to MNSSHP, you HAVE to stop for all of the cute photo ops over here in the bypass by Tony's Town Square!

Our first stop was with the Mickey Jack-O-Lantern prop!

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I was a LITTLE excited!

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Then we stopped for a frame op, but, uh... the shadows proved to be a little problematic.

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Finally, we stopped at the inflatable pumpkin... ornament... thing...

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When we were finished with pics, we went under the arch and grabbed our first bag of candy! When you go through this arch, you'll find a group of CMs distributing the treat bags for you to go trick-or-treating with, AND they give you a starter pack of candy! Do NOT forget to grab this starter pack because it has the BEST AND COOLEST candy of the evening! There was stuff I had never even heard of in there, like birthday-cake flavored Three Musketeers and these weird Starbursts!

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We had a while to kill before the party, so we hopped in the standby line for Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin. I think we waited 15 minutes. Here are the pics from that, ft. the only person who ever looks like they're ever having fun at any point in time ever, My Father:

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When that was over, we still had about 45 minutes until the party started so I decided that I NEEDED the Pumpkin Spice Milkshake from Auntie Gravity's! I tried the cookie butter version of this milkshake back in November and I didn't like it, but as a pumpkin spice fan... I had to give it another shot!

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I am SO glad I tried this! It really was as delicious as everyone said it was. It tasted just like pumpkin pie filling mixed with vanilla ice cream, and the house-made marshmallow was so fresh and light!

We took our shake and headed over to the Donald & Daisy M&G area in Storybook Circus so that we could meet them when the party started. We got there about 25 minutes before the set started and we were the 5th or 6th family in line for them.

Band photo!

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They came out as soon as the party started to meet their adoring fans!

Soon enough it was our turn. I ran up to Donald and said, "Donald! You're Pumpkin-Spiced!"

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He was so excited to see my pumpkin-themed costume! He and Daisy spent SUCH a long time with us. Daisy kept pointing out all the details in her beautiful princess outfit and Donald kept poking my pumpkin backpack.

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As you can see, Grace and I met them while mom and dad hung back. This was kind of a theme: mom and dad were very hesitant to go up to most characters and interact with them this trip, which is something that was kind of surprising to me, since they've always been happy to walk up to them and start talking. But every time, the characters would insist later on that mom and dad joined us for a photo and they interacted with them, and I really appreciate the Parks entertainment department for that. The characters and attendants are so amazing and inclusive, it makes my heart swell. Not to be cheesy, and I know I've said this like eight times since I announced my next program, but I'm sincerely grateful I get to make magic with WDW entertainment this Spring!

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Like I said, they spent a long time with us before they sent us on our way, which I so appreciated! These two rocked and I highly recommend them if you're looking for characters to pose with at the party!

(Click here to continue!)​

 

[dolewhipdreams]

I was a LITTLE excited!

SO. CUTE.

Finally, we stopped at the inflatable pumpkin... ornament... thing...

Your family is the most precious. I want them on post cards, in ads, sitting on my couch when I come home. All of it.

birthday-cake flavored Three Musketeers

Um WHAT? How was it??

ft. the only person who ever looks like they're ever having fun at any point in time ever, My Father:

And your mom looks downright miserable. A pretty bad case of the Zurgs I would say.

It tasted just like pumpkin pie filling mixed with vanilla ice cream, and the house-made marshmallow was so fresh and light!

Band photo!

Okay I saw this and for some reason expected a photo of a band. Like a rock band. Or the four of you in a way that looks band-ish.

but the wristbands were cool too

These two rocked and I highly recommend them if you're looking for characters to pose with at the party!

YES! Love me some Halloween Daisy & Donald. We stan. (Is that how you use it? I'm out of touch with the young lingo these days)

 

[SimplyGoofy]

It sounds like a great start to the party! Your Photopass photos are great (even if a few have some goofy lighting) and your meet with Donald and Daisy sounded awesome!

I'm also glad you enjoyed your Pumpkin Spiced Milkshake! It looked very good (and very orange!).

 

[missangelalexis]

Love all the PP pics and the meet with Donald & Daisy sounds like it was so fun!

 

[VeronicaMarie]

Love love your costume! The milkshake looks amazing <3 I am glad it was just as delicious as it sounds. Loved all your PP pics during the bypass, I think its great that you and your family take some time to enjoy the atmosphere of the start of the party!

Donald and Daisy, so sweet!

 

[the2ndstar2theright]

Love love love your costume and all these pics! You guys look like you're having the best time!

Also, Princess Daisy may just be my new favorite thing.

 

[jrmint427]

If you're heading to MNSSHP, you HAVE to stop for all of the cute photo ops over here in the bypass by Tony's Town Square!

We missed this and I’m so sad that we didn’t get the photo opportunities! Thankful we still got the awesome candy bag when we picked up our wrist bands.

Soon enough it was our turn. I ran up to Donald and said, "Donald! You're Pumpkin-Spiced!"

Too cute! I love your coordination with Donald.

But every time, the characters would insist later on that mom and dad joined us for a photo and they interacted with them, and I really appreciate the Parks entertainment department for that.

This is great to hear! With every character we met, I would ask the grandparents (my parents) to jump in with us and always worried I was annoying the handlers and photographers by taking too long. But I love having all the family pictures.

 

[disneyAndi14]

I love all your pictures walking into the party. We got there a little later this year.

How fun of a meet with Donald and Daisy!

I’m like your parents I hang in the back and then get in the picture at the end, haha! I love to get a picture with the characters!

 

[afwdwfan]

hen we were finished with pics, we went under the arch and grabbed our first bag of candy! When you go through this arch, you'll find a group of CMs distributing the treat bags for you to go trick-or-treating with, AND they give you a starter pack of candy! Do NOT forget to grab this starter pack because it has the BEST AND COOLEST candy of the evening! There was stuff I had never even heard of in there, like birthday-cake flavored Three Musketeers and these weird Starbursts!

Cool! So were these interesting candies good?

We had a while to kill before the party, so we hopped in the standby line for Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin. I think we waited 15 minutes. Here are the pics from that, ft. the only person who ever looks like they're ever having fun at any point in time ever, My Father:

Everybody almost always look super serious or bored in those pictures. He was living it up!

But every time, the characters would insist later on that mom and dad joined us for a photo and they interacted with them, and I really appreciate the Parks entertainment department for that. The characters and attendants are so amazing and inclusive, it makes my heart swell. Not to be cheesy, and I know I've said this like eight times since I announced my next program, but I'm sincerely grateful I get to make magic with WDW entertainment this Spring!

That's great!

 

[Newsies]

Your family is the most precious. I want them on post cards, in ads, sitting on my couch when I come home. All of it.

AHHHHH WE LOVE YOU!!!!

Um WHAT? How was it??

Okay, it was VERY misleading! There were sprinkles on the packaging, so I thought there would be sprinkles in the candy but there were NO sprinkles in there. It also kinda tasted just like a normal 3 Musketeers? I was sad.

Okay I saw this and for some reason expected a photo of a band. Like a rock band. Or the four of you in a way that looks band-ish.

but the wristbands were cool too

NEXT YEAR'S HALLOWEEN COSTUME: HAUNTED ROCK BAND

YES! Love me some Halloween Daisy & Donald. We stan. (Is that how you use it? I'm out of touch with the young lingo these days)

That is EXACTLY how you use it!!! Good job!!!!

It sounds like a great start to the party! Your Photopass photos are great (even if a few have some goofy lighting) and your meet with Donald and Daisy sounded awesome!

It really was an amazing start to the evening!

I'm also glad you enjoyed your Pumpkin Spiced Milkshake! It looked very good (and very orange!).

I promise part of the orange is from the filters I used! It was orange in real life, but it didn't have the neon, fluorescent glow it does in the pics!

Love all the PP pics and the meet with Donald & Daisy sounds like it was so fun!

They were so much fun to talk to!!

Love love your costume! The milkshake looks amazing <3 I am glad it was just as delicious as it sounds. Loved all your PP pics during the bypass, I think its great that you and your family take some time to enjoy the atmosphere of the start of the party!

Thank you so much! We really did try to drink up as much atmosphere as possible-- my family was very excited for their first party!

Love love love your costume and all these pics! You guys look like you're having the best time!

Thank you so much!!

Also, Princess Daisy may just be my new favorite thing.

SHE IS SOOOO PERFECT! Did you know she made that costume herself??? She told us so! So talented.

We missed this and I’m so sad that we didn’t get the photo opportunities! Thankful we still got the awesome candy bag when we picked up our wrist bands.

As long as you got the candy, that's the main thing!!

Too cute! I love your coordination with Donald.

I made sure to meet him so that we could have a coordinated pumpkin pal pic!

This is great to hear! With every character we met, I would ask the grandparents (my parents) to jump in with us and always worried I was annoying the handlers and photographers by taking too long. But I love having all the family pictures.

Family pictures are the best! I think this is a pretty common scenario for the parks at character meet & greets, and Disney was super welcoming and encouraging when it came time for my parents to step in!

I love all your pictures walking into the party. We got there a little later this year.

How fun of a meet with Donald and Daisy!

I’m like your parents I hang in the back and then get in the picture at the end, haha! I love to get a picture with the characters!

Donald and Daisy were so much fun! Character pictures are the best!

Cool! So were these interesting candies good?

Some of them were really great! There was a Snickers with crunchie rice-krispy like stuff in there, and that one was really delicious.

 

[Tink2Day]

You have such a cute family! Love how your Dad really gets into everything....

That shake looks soooooo good.

 

[dwonderz]

Loveeeee the photos - and your costume (especially appreciate the glitter ... strongly believe you can never have too much!).

 

[ariane37]

Do NOT forget to grab this starter pack because it has the BEST AND COOLEST candy of the evening! There was stuff I had never even heard of in there, like birthday-cake flavored Three Musketeers and these weird Starbursts!

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I agree! Did the party on the 24th and I got a birthday cake flavored Three Musketeers and a confetti Twix. I was a happy girl lol!

 

[Newsies]

You have such a cute family! Love how your Dad really gets into everything....

That shake looks soooooo good.

Dad gets SO into the character M&Gs!

It was such a good shake!!

Loveeeee the photos - and your costume (especially appreciate the glitter ... strongly believe you can never have too much!).

Thank you so much!!! I couldn't agree more... glitter makes everything 1000% better!

I agree! Did the party on the 24th and I got a birthday cake flavored Three Musketeers and a confetti Twix. I was a happy girl lol!

YASSSS they were the best of the candy offerings for MNSSHP!

 

[Newsies]

Breezing Through the Rest of MNSSHP​

I can't believe it's been almost a month since I last updated this TR! Totally my bad. I've been putting it off partly because the rest of the evening at MNSSHP was... well, not amazing, so I'm just gonna post some photos, run through the rest of the night, and then head into Wednesday.

After we met Donald and Daisy, we were at a crossroad. The rest of the family wanted to trick or treat and I really wanted to do Space Mountain while it was "Deep Space Mountain." Deep Space Mountain was the Halloween overlay that they gave Space Mountain for MNSSHP, and everyone said it was amazing. It's essentially Space Mountain with the lights turned completely off so you can't see anything in front of you, and there's a spooky intergalactic themed soundtrack to accompany it. I went to Space and told the family I'd meet them in Fantasyland. The line for Deep Space was posted at 20 minutes, but I breezed through it in about 10!

Deep Space was AMAZING! The best overlay of the party! I was scared, but in a fun way-- Space Mountain somehow gets more jarring when you can't see anything in front of you! I can't recommend it enough!

When I came out of Space, the family was getting off of Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh, so I zoomed over there. I met them at the exit and we saw Cruella De Vil... who was being attended by my friend Javier!!! She is so much fun, and she interacts with guests.

We decided to head to the Philharmagic treat trail stop after that. The line looked so long, but I think we were in and out of there in under 5 minutes. At the end of Philharmagic, they were playing a game in the Philhar gift shop where they had a board with photos of every Disney Villain. If you could name all of them, you got a prize. I won, the prize was a lollipop!

We went to Haunted Mansion after that. It was crazy over there, as you could imagine.

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We waited maybe 25 minutes for Mansion. Madame Leota was out front greeting guests, so we stopped to see her.

Then we waited in probably the longest line of the evening, which was 40 minutes or so to get photos with the lantern outside of Haunted Mansion.

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This is where the evening very much fell apart.

When we finished the photos, the first Boo to You Parade was just starting to come down Liberty Square. So we were essentially locked in, and we had to fight crowds, "swimming upstream" on the bridge to the far side of Liberty Square next to the lake (river? bayou?) until we reached the entrance to Big Thunder Mountain Railroad. There, mom wanted a popcorn bucket of a Haunted Mansion ghost and I really wanted the Mickey pumpkin balloon bucket, so we got that.

There was a lot of tension in the family for a little while here, which ends up happening every year. I had no idea what to do at that point because I knew this party was going to be crowded, but I was absolutely not prepared for it being wall-to-wall. This was worse than the one and only Christmas party I've ever been to, which I assured my family it wouldn't be like. At the end of the day, mom and dad set really unrealistic expectations for this party to begin with-- they wanted every single party treat, wanted to see the fireworks show and parade, wanted to do every ride and hit every treat trail station. I tried to curb their expectations by letting them know that we weren't going to be able to do all that, but they were both like, "oh we don't care about how crowded it is, we just want to be there." At this point in the evening, mom was very frustrated with me because I had been leading my family through the crowds to get the popcorn bucket she wanted, but she also had to go to the bathroom and didn't want to walk that far. The way she interpreted the situation was that she thought I was just doing whatever I wanted to do and not listening to her need to use the bathroom. So we got the bucket, she asked me, "what's next?" and I told her, "I don't know." Which I genuinely didn't know what to do-- everything was at an hour long wait and they wanted to see the fireworks in 40 minutes but didn't want to waste time sitting and and doing nothing. She screamed, "I HAVE to use the bathroom!" and stormed off from us, heading towards the rest of Frontierland.

It was really upsetting. I started crying, dad had no idea what was happening and frankly, I wasn't sure what had happened either, so that was basically the end of the evening for me.

Mom eventually texted us that she was at Peco's, so we went over there and had dinner. Everybody got a cheeseburger, Mom pretended nothing had happened, so I tried to reason with myself and say that maybe she wasn't as mad as I originally thought she was.

After dinner, we all went to watch the fireworks from the Liberty Square bridge. The new show this year was really cute-- I loved HalloWishes, but this new show was a lot better than I thought it would be. Mom and Grace went to Sleepy Hallow refreshments so Grace could get the headless horseman pumpkin cheesecake, which everyone took a bite of and decided they didn't like.

We made our way back to Main St. USA. Mom, Dad, and Grace really wanted to see the 11:15 Parade, but I was exhausted, so I said I was going to buy a party shirt and head back to the hotel. I grabbed a shirt and got in line, which was about 20 minutes long, and then checked out. As I was heading out of the Emporium, I noticed they had the Rose Gold Crocs that I really wanted!!! I gasped and grabbed a pair for myself, knowing that I had a $50 Disney gift card that I could put towards it and this was the one thing I really wanted (pics are in the next update!) I normally wear a size 8, but they only had a size 7 here. I can sometimes fit into 7s, so I grabbed a pair and told myself I'd come back the next morning for 8s and do a return if they had them in stock.

With that, I headed towards the front of the park. The headless horseman was about to come by, and I had never seen him, so I stopped just to see him go by and then went back to the Grand Floridian. I showered, got the glitter off somehow, changed into my pajamas, and went to sleep before the rest of the family made it back.

The night ended on a little bit of a sour note, but I promise the rest of the trip went really well, including the next morning when we headed off to Hollywood Studios!

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[sahu]

So sorry that your MNSSHP didn’t go that great! Unrealistic plans can definitely make the night harder for everyone. Hope the trip got better and it didn’t sour it too much!

 

[SimplyGoofy]

It's tough when everyone has different expectations - I feel like there's at least one big disagreement or misunderstanding on every trip! I'm glad you enjoyed the rest of your party experience and you have better experiences to come.

 

[Newsies]

So sorry that your MNSSHP didn’t go that great! Unrealistic plans can definitely make the night harder for everyone. Hope the trip got better and it didn’t sour it too much!

It's okay, we had a lot of other really great memories this trip, so the party wasn't too big of a loss!

It's tough when everyone has different expectations - I feel like there's at least one big disagreement or misunderstanding on every trip! I'm glad you enjoyed the rest of your party experience and you have better experiences to come.

I could not agree with you more!!! Differing and unchecked expectations seem to be at the center of a lot of disagreements. But we had a LOT more good than bad this trip, so everything turned out right at the end.

 

[rdkeim]

Sorry the night didn't end on a high note. It does sound like there were some unrealistic expectations. Even at a not so crowded party, it would probably be hard to accomplish all that. I am disappointed that Disney is over-selling tickets to these parties. Maybe if enough people complain, something may change? Glad your next day went well!