So, this update is coming to you a bit later than I planned! After watching Laura show some symptoms of a possible ear infection this weekend, I ended up taking her to Urgent Care this afternoon (her Doctor wanted her seen today, but had nothing available until Friday).
Unfortunately, we were right, she has another ear infection and is back on antibiotics...for the fourth time since January. We can't get in to see the ENT until after we get back from Disney, so we have to get her through this one before we leave...hopefully it's her last. I feel so terrible for her. Gosh I hate seeing her sick
But, she's in bed now, sleeping peacefully, and we can do no more for her tonight.
So...
Day 2-To the Contemporary and our first park!
Plans for September 18th! Our first full day in the World!
After what I'm hoping will be a good night's sleep, we'll wake up and get ready. Mom and I will probably get up about 6:30-7:00 and probably go for a walk around the resort...Mom has done this for as long as I can remember, but I started joining her a few trips ago. It's turned into a nice tradition. While we're gone, Buzzy, Dad, and John will start getting up and around.
I'll have John text me when Laura wakes up and we'll head back to the room, if we're not already back, that is.
Now, we are not generally rope drop people...we like our leisurely vacation mornings. But, we do like to get to the parks at a decent hour. If we're at a park by 10:00am, we're happy!
This day; however, we'll want to get a bit of an earlier start since we've got to get over to the Contemporary before we hit the parks.
So, once everyone is dressed and ready to go, we'll head down to check out, and leave our luggage to be transferred over for us. Then we'll go get some breakfast in the food court!
When we've eaten our fill, we will say good-bye to Art of Animation, and catch a bus over to the Magic Kingdom. Here we will either walk or take the monorail to the Contemporary. I really want to walk from Magic Kingdom, but I know Dad will not want. I have this thing where I like my first ride on the monorail to be TO the Magic Kingdom...I know that may be weird, but it's just this little quirk I have. So, if no one else wants to, I'll walk with Laura to the Contemporary and then meet everyone else in the lobby. I'm hoping we'll be at check-in there by 9:00am-9:30am at the latest. That's the time I've given IPO, so we're really gonna shoot for it!
Love walking into this:
I'll check us in and get our keys to the world. We've chosen to forgo the Magic Bands this trip.
If our room is ready (that's a BIG if), we'll go and make sure we have a crib and a refrigeratorI got a letter in the mail Saturday saying we may not have one, but when I emailed IPO about requesting one because of Laura and the need to have milk on hand during the night, they emailed back saying all the Club Level rooms have them. So, hopefully everything is good to go!
THEN, we will head to the Concourse and take the monorail to the wonderful Magic Kingdom!
We'll disembark and head into the park!
We will first take that Magical walk down Main Street USA. I'll get totally teary eyed, like I do every trip. Only this year, will be even more special as I'll get to experience it with Laura for the first time. Oh it's going to be so amazing!
Of course there will be a few pictures in front of the castle:
This was John's first trip, in 2005! We had just graduated High School and Buzzy was going into 10th grade! She makes me laugh in this picture! (I found a few pictures from that trip...I don't have digital copies of them, but was able to take a picture of the pictures and upload them!)
And then we'll walk through the castle and into Fantasyland!
Our first ride has previously been:
So that will more than likely be our first this trip, as well! Laura will definitely love this!
After that, we don't have set plans...it'll depend on wait times and what everyone wants to do at the moment. We're pretty much play it by ear park-goers and it's always worked for us...we just don't stress out about it!
So, keeping that in mind, these plans are based on the way we've seen the park before. These are no way set in stone, but I did take a quick look at the map before writing this and it makes sense this way, so we'll see. Again, it's always worked for us...that may or may not be true this time, but then we'll change things accordingly.
Once we're done on the Carousel we'll head to:
Then we'll move onto The Mad Tea Party
My Dad is particularly excited for this! When Laura and I were in PA in May, this is all he could talk about! He cannot wait to take Laura on for the first timebut not spin very fast, of course. Mom and John will sit this one out...Mom can't do anything that spins and John just does not like tea cups of any kind.
2008 ride!
After our ride in 2008! He's so excited
We'll head over to the new Story Book Circus area after we've spun ourselves silly! Buzzy's favorite Disney movie is Dumbo...she and Nunna used to watch it every single day when she was little. I'm not exaggerating, either. Every. Single. Day. Laura has not seen the movie yet, but one of her favorite books is Dumbo. She loves to look at all the pictures while I read it. So, I'm pretty sure she'll enjoy this new area quite a bit!
We will ride Dumbo and then see what time it is...we may be able to meet/greet the characters over at Pete's Silly Sideshow. If not, then we'll continue on through New Fantasyland.
Our next stop will be the new Little Mermaid ride!
At this point we'll more than likely be ready to eat lunch. If everyone is in agreement, we'll attempt to have lunch at Be Our Guest depending on the line. Are the lines still crazy here? Or has it settled down since the opening?
For the sake of the flow of this PTR, we'll assume we got in to Be Our Guest for lunch.
After we're done with lunch, we'll see about trying Enchanted Tales With Belle. I am not sure this is something Laura would really be interested in...has anyone done this that can give me a little more info on whether you think a 14month old would like it? Is it something we might consider just skipping and try when she's a bit older? Thoughts on this?
Once we're finished in New Fantasyland, we'll continue on to the rest of Fantasyland including.
We actually really like Small World, even if the song is then stuck in our heads for the following month!
As long as the line isn't an hour...we've gotten lucky at least once a trip where the wait time is pretty manageable, so I'm not worried if we miss it the first day!
I know my Mom and Buzzy really enjoy this, so I'll sit it out with Laura and possibly take her back on the Carousel or Small World or walk through a few shops while everyone else is inside. I enjoy the show, but I'm okay sitting it out as well. I think last time John was there, he and I didn't get to see it, so he'll definitely go in!
To be completely honest, I'm actually looking forward to possibly having this alone time with Laura. I've been dreaming about taking her to Disney since before she was born and she only gets one first trip! I want to really savor that. Even though she won't remember it, I will, and it's very special to me to be able to share this experience with her.
So, that will bring us to the end of Fantasyland....from there we'll move onto Liberty Square.
Here we have
A personal favorite
I'm a little nervous about taking Laura on this....She's still at the stage where she's not scared by a whole lot, but I really just don't know. If we do take her through, we'll skip the stretching roomthat's possible, right? I thought I read here on the DIS that you can do that...I think she'd be fine on the ride itself, but the lights going out and everything in that room might just be too much for her.
Anyone have any thoughts or experiences with little ones and the Haunted Mansion? If she doesn't ride it's not a big deal, but if we can all go on at once, that's a plus!
Something we may or may not go through is the Hall of Presidents...we did it last trip for the first time since the 90s, I believe (so LONG time), and we liked it. I think Laura will just be bored...so that will be one for another time...
OR if everyone else wants to go in (John hasn't seen it), I'll take Laura over to
because I know this is not a favorite of anyone else.
Laura on the other hand, LOVES the Country Bears. We have the
Disneyland Sing Along DVD and she thinks the Country Bear Song is the best thing ever...she just lights up when it comes on and dances along! So, Jamboree it is!
I'll have the rest of our group meet Laura and I outside Country Bears and I'm hoping by this time it'll be right around 3:00pm so we can catch the Parade! We'll find a spot to watch and then I'll go in search of the amazingness that is the Frontierland turkey leg! These are still sold there right? We'll then settle in to share a couple turkey legs and watch the Parade!!
When the parade is over, we'll head further into Frontierland. This is where we'll probably get a Fastpass for Splash Mountain or Thunder Mountain depending how long the lines are. Last trip, neither Mom nor Dad rode either of these, but if I remember correctly it was because Mom wasn't feeling well and Dad stayed with her while Buzzy and I rode. If they want to ride this year, we'll utilize Rider Swap.
After we're done on these two mountains, we'll stroll toward Adventureland! Unfortunately, we won't be able to see
the back side of water this trip since Jungle Cruise will be closed for refurbishment, but we'll still go on
and The Magic Carpets of Aladdin.
We'll go into the Tiki Room (I'm SO excited they changed this back to the original!) as we leave Adventureland! I'm not sure about the Treehouse. John is not a fan of heights, so he will definitely not being going up. It's not something I HAVE to do and Dad doesn't go up either, so it'd just be Mom, Buzzy, and I. It'll be up to them if we do it or not.
We'll then cross in front of the Castle and over to Tomorrowland! I love Tomorrowland. Love. It! I think it's my favorite of the lands. I just have so many fond memories there. Once there, we'll check the line for Space Mountain and grab a fastpass if there's any left or we'll catch it another night. I'm not worried. We'll then ride the Wed Way (aka. Tomorrowland Transit Authority)!
Everyone will probably be hungry again when we are done, depending what time it is. We will probably eat at:
We seem to end up here for dinner the first night just about every trip!
Funny story! The year John was with us, he got a chicken sandwich there, ate it and never said anything about it. At the end of the meal, Mom asked him how it was. He said it was okay, but would have been better if it wasn't so dry, or if they provided mayo or lettuce, or something....
We all just pointed behind him to the GIANT condiment bar....I still can't figure out how he missed it! We walked by it at least three times as everyone decided what they were ordering! Haha! He jokes about this ALL the time, too. If something in a restaurant needs ketchup or mayo, he'll make a big deal about looking around and asking if he's just missing the condiments!
After dinner, we'll finish up with some Tomorrowland attractions including:
One of our favorites!
I'm not sure what time it will be, but it'll probably be getting close to time to find a decent spot for Wishes. This night they are at 8:00pm, so we'll start looking for a spot probably between 7:00-7:30pm.
I love Wishes...and I'm pretty sure I'll get all teary-eyed...like I do every time. I hear Jiminy Cricket come over those loud speakers and I'm a blubbering fool. I'm really hoping Laura's okay with the fireworks...I'm hoping the music will help any fear that could be induced by the sound of the fireworks themselves. If she's not handling it well, I'll just take her back into one of the Main Street shops until they're over.
I'm not ready to just say we'll go to the room and watch from the balcony, because I think as long as she's not afraid of the noise, she will be in total awe of the whole show and enjoy it. So, I'm willing to try them out and see how it goes, but am still nervous.
We'll look for a spot around the closest shops to the castle...at least that's what I'm hoping, so I can duck into one if necessary without having to wind through a ton of people trying to enjoy the show.
Once the fireworks are finished, we'll start heading out of the park...I'm sure we'll stop in a few shops on the way.
We'll get on the monorail and head home. Since the park closes at 9:00pm this night, we'll get to enjoy some desserts in the Club Level lounge! Yum!
After Laura's in bed, we'll hang out in the lounge for a bit.
John and I are considering bringing our baby monitor with us. We have a Tommee Tippee with the camera and it's got a 1000ft range on it. If our room is close enough to the lounge, it'll be great, because we can hang out in there until she falls asleep and still be able to keep an eye on her. If it works, great, if not that's okay, we'll come up with something. This is where I will miss the family suite. But, we'll make do, I'm sure.
I've been looking into some white noise generator apps that I can put on my phone as well for Laura at night. We really aren't a quiet family, no matter how hard we try! Usually the harder I try to be quiet, the noisier I am-I get this from Mom!
We have a cool-mist vaporizer in her room here at home that runs constantly, and it's a great source of white noise for her. Its not loud at all, but it does dull the sounds in the rest of the house, which is really helpful. Hoping something like that may help at night in the room. Anyone have any tips for sharing a hotel room with a sleeping 1 year old?
So, after we've had some desserts, we'll retire to the room for the night, and try to get some sleep!
I will mention, that if our room isn't ready upon check-in, we'll run back to the Contemporary to settle into the room briefly once it is. Hopefully, our luggage is there around the same time, so we can unpack quickly before going back to the park. This may change how we see the park, but I won't know until we're there and doing it!! Also, hopefully, Laura naps in her stroller during the day...we'll see how that goes and adjust accordingly!
Have a great night everyone!
Up next, Day 3-MGM-(aka Disney's Hollywood Studios)! Yes, I still call it MGM. It will always be MGM to me!
Just didn't get those free moments I thought I would!
Anyone else love those things? (As a side noteJohn and I were grocery shopping in the Commissary a couple weeks ago and they were selling packs of the Biscoff cookies!!! I can't remember how many was in the pack (20 maybe?), but they were just as good as those they give in-flight! It was lovely to enjoy some of that deliciousness with my morning coffee!) 
As mentioned many posts ago, we were able to book an Atrium Club Level Theme Park View Room using the 40% Military room only discount! 
I think your trip sounds amazing, though!!
