Surprisingly, when the alarm clock went off at 5:00 a.m. on Friday morning, DH and I were raring to go. We got right up, hopped in the shower, and DH started packing while I gathered all of the essentials (Fish Extender stuff, passports, hotel documents, etc.). After we were done packing, we woke up The Big at 6:00 a.m. singing Happy Disney Day throughout the house and, when she made it into our bedroom, we surprised her with a care package containing sand toys and other fun stuff (coloring books, crayons, puzzles, bubbles, glow sticks, candy, etc.).
We actually hit the road at 6:45 a.m. and, after sitting in Atlanta traffic for about an hour, were officially headed to Orlando via I-75 south. Our travels were uneventful except that, as we crossed into Florida, I realized that I had forgotten to pack The Bigs formal, semi-formal, and princess dresses
dresses that I had painstakingly shopped for months before our cruise! Now, as I tend to do, I completely overreacted, and told DH that I was quite sure that we were going to be kicked out of the dining rooms because The Big didnt have proper attire. So, in an effort to appease me, we stopped at an outlet mall over the Florida line and attempted to find something suitable. We found one semi-formal (and Im using the term semi-formal very loosely) dress in her size and, uber-aware that time was tick-tock-ticking away, we went ahead and bought it with the hope that we would be able to find something more formal as we got closer to Orlando. However, once we got onto the toll road, we actually rounded the Disney gateway quicker than I expected, so that plan went out the window. I swear, every single time we go to Disney, Mapquest takes us a different way!! Anyway, because we had already crossed into the Disney complex, we decided that wed try shopping in the morning on our way to the Port.
Now, being that we are new DVC members and this trip was our first stay at our DVC home at Bay Lake Tower (a/k/a BLT), I cant even begin to express how darn excited we were about staying there. Can I just tell you guys that seeing the Welcome Home sign at BLT just took my breath away and even made me a little bit teary. We arrived right on schedule (just after 3:00 p.m.), checked in with no problem, and eagerly made our way up to our 9th floor room (which was supposed to be a Bay Lake view room). With great anticipation, DH and I opened the door and were so thrilled with what we saw. The décor was gorgeous, and we totally knew that we had made the right decision by buying into BLT. I was a bit disappointed with the view, though, in that I thought that wed have a straight-on view of Bay Lake (hence spending the extra points for a lake view), but, since we were heading out shortly for
MNSSHP, I knew that we werent going to have any time to spend on the balcony anyway.
Anyway, here's our "lake view" - looking straight ahead:
And looking waaaayyy to the left:
And looking right:
We decided that, since we had a couple minutes before we could get our tickets for the Halloween Party, we would eat an early dinner at the Contemporary. We ate at the Contempo, and split a flatbread pizza, chicken caesar salad, and chicken nuggets. We also got a cupcake which looked like it was going to be the best cupcake *ever* but it turned out to be a flop, unfortunately (the rest of the meal was good, though).
We got to MK after a short monorail ride, and got our Party tickets with no problems. Since we were really doing MNSSHP as a last-minute treat for The Big, we let her pick what we would do. She picked Splash Mountain (no big surprise here she loves, loves, loves Splash Mountain).
We had about a 10 minute wait and, after plunging down the big drop (which my Big has refused to experience any other way other than with her hands up since she was 4), I look over at my laughing Big and notice that her nose is bleeding a little bit. Are you FREAKIN' KIDDING ME???
We got to the restroom, got her cleaned up, and
she wanted to ride Splash Mountain again. So, we went for a second time, and then a third (no more nose bleeding, thankfully). We were all soaked by this point, but, of course, having a blast. We then decided to change the pace a little bit and hit Big Thunder Mountain Railroad. Since the queue line was empty when our train pulled back in, we actually got to stay on and ride a second time. Woot-woot - - gotta love Disney in September LOL!
Then, we rode the Jungle Cruise and, as we pulled back in, we noticed that the CMs were starting to set up the candy stations, so we just kind of mulled around waiting for the party to begin.
Needless to say, trick-or-treating at the Magic Kingdom is awesome! We got handfuls of candy at each station. Another priority, though, was to see if we could get the villains autographs for our scrapbook, so we wanted to make sure that we attended the first villains mixer. No dice on the autograph seeking, but The Big did get some face time with one of her favorite characters in the world
Jafar.
After that, since we knew that we were out of luck with getting any villain signatures, we just strolled around, rode a few things (Buzz, Peter Pan, Its A Small World, Haunted Mansion), and took in the sights until it was time for HalloWishes.
We ended up watching HalloWishes from the Rose Garden (not an ideal picture-taking spot), but Im going to cheat a little bit and insert some pictures that I took of HalloWishes last year at MNSSHP, right on Main Street. It was nice, though, to *not* watch a major event through my cameras viewfinder, and HalloWishes really is an incredible fireworks display, perhaps even better than Wishes.
After the fireworks, we made another candy run, and decided that we were ready to start making our way back to BLT. After a short monorail ride back, and an even shorter walk across the skyway bridge, we were again at our lovely DVC home. Of course, we couldnt finish the night until we took a tally of all of our candy.
It was ridiculous how much candy we ended up with. We ended up throwing away an entire bagful of non-desirables and *still* ended up with an entire bag of sugary candy and an entire bag of chocolaty candy. Not bad for a nights haul.
I have heard of many many getting sick from the shot and that is exactly what it does, but apparantly it will be the only time she will be sick with the flu for the rest of the season! 
Going to be weird if another cruise comes along without these peeps. I can honestly say you all had a important role in making it the experience it was. For instance, I still crack up thinking about Karens K (don't know if you want his name online? Privacy above all) simply trying to shoot us down at the Prom. Lounge. Or playing Jenga as smart as he did. 
He was perfectly in his element, and none of you bothered him one iota! 
It would be great to do one of these days!
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But, alls well that ends well - - we ended up returning them and got The Big some cute winter clothes, so it actually ended up being a good thing given that it's been in the 40s this week. 
