So that's why you packed 10 pairs of underwear!!! A Surprise trip Nov. 13

[BridgetR3]

I am in Southeast Texas we actually postponed our trip for 2 years but I'm (im)patiently waiting.

Ahhh, cool!!! We travel to Beaumont about once a month to eat at Saltgrass because I love their steaks so next time we are driving there, I'll wave the whole time just in case I pass you!


And in case I miss you on the way there, I'll all the way home too!! lol....

 

[Deesknee]

Hi .Bridget so sorry I was so behind! Caught up now!!! Awesome job as usual. I'm loving it! As I've said before your boys are so cute. Love that ds7 enjoyed SM . We moms tend to worry, but from the look of Dad in that picture I guess Dads worry a little too. Which IMO is good to know. Lol

Can't wait to read the update on your dining experience.

 

[BridgetR3]

Hi .Bridget so sorry I was so behind! Caught up now!!! Awesome job as usual. I'm loving it! As I've said before your boys are so cute. Love that ds7 enjoyed SM . We moms tend to worry, but from the look of Dad in that picture I guess Dads worry a little too. Which IMO is good to know. Lol

Can't wait to read the update on your dining experience.

Oh Dee, believe me when I say, I understand completely. Life gets in the way of all our Disboard and Disney time!

Thanks!! I'm enjoying reliving it as well. So many things I run across in the pictures that I had already forgotten about. Glad DH was nervous for once and held DS7 in his seat!

 

[ravensterling3]

I was so glad that we didn't get snow/ice stuff. In dec we had about 4 days of that stuff. Your dh sound like mine, I tell him stuff then later on he asked me why we didn't do that. So on this next trip he has to help plan some of it.

 

[BridgetR3]

I was so glad that we didn't get snow/ice stuff. In dec we had about 4 days of that stuff. Your dh sound like mine, I tell him stuff then later on he asked me why we didn't do that. So on this next trip he has to help plan some of it.

We still have snice (snow/ice as we call it) on our roof in the creases. The kids were excited that we were the last house on our street to lose it all. Are ya'll in the new forecast for Tuesday? We now have a 50% chance of SNOW on Tuesday. I live this far south for a reason!!! Geez.....

Oh that DH of mine is crazy like that and he wants NONE of the planning as well as none of the discussing so I have to play mind reader. Sometimes I'm good at it and sometimes well like for this trip I'm not so good.

 

[BridgetR3]

So when we first walked up to the Japanese pavillion, these guys were performing.



We hung out for a while watching them. They are really good.

Then we set off to look through the Japan pavilion since we've only seen the places that the Kimpossible quest takes you.



First off, a hidden Mickey in the drain



Beautiful koi



Their Christmas tree

Then way in the back, way way back there, in a place we had never been, there was an exhibit that I think was new (maybe?) about anime'. The boys really enjoyed it because they saw some of the characters they knew through video games, movies and Pokemon? playing cards.



FINALLY it was time for dinner so we checked in and were seated fairly quickly at .....



She stopped and posed for me!! It was so cute!



We were seated with a sweet but VERY quiet family and we are a LOUD family so I think we ummm....may have embarrassed/aggravated them a bit but hey, it's Disney.



Even he posed for me! YAY!! lol....



YUMMY!!!



We enjoyed the food at Teppan Edo but the portions are indeed small. Also our grill at home does more of a show than Disney does so the kids were disappointed in that.



The noodles that will feed the whole table...



And he started building our volcano.....



...but it wasn't tall enough so he added more onions.....



....and more.....




until he finally deemed it tall enough!!



Prepping the volcano...



...and there she blows at which point DS7 turns to us and says, "That's it??" Ummm oops!!! Sorry, Mr. Grillman, he's used to fire. I quickly shushed him and we moved on.



My plate - yum yum!!! I was surprised that they do not cook the rice in front of you but instead bring it in from the back.

I LOVED the food but can honestly say that we probably won't go back because it's so much $$$$ for a lot less than we are used to at home. The kiddos were not impressed with ANY of it except the origami cranes they got on the way out. We still have those!!

So we left the restaurant and realized that because it took so long we might have missed the last boat across. Instead of going back to Capt. Redbeard's side, we decided it was best just to stay on this side and see if we could possibly make the last boat trip of the night. As we rounded the turn we saw that there were people in line for the boats. Surely if the gate isn't closed we haven't missed the last boat right? So we rush to get in line.

While waiting we visited with a sweet mom and her two teenage sons. DS7 was teaching them all about Disneyworld and what they needed to see. He told them that it snows on Main Street at Magic Kingdom and that we were headed to ride some rides at the front of the park before we headed home. She said that she was sorry to hear that we were headed home tonight to which DS replied, "Oh no not THAT house. Right now we are living at Animal Kingdom Lodge." rofl.....and at that point the line got to moving and we got separated. I hope those people realize we don't live at AKL.

Since we were talking and not paying any attention at all, we all hopped on the boat and sat down before DS11 hollers, "MOM, it's Capt. Redbeard!!!" Sure enough, he had been reassigned while we were at dinner and now we were on his boat.



Not so good pic of the Capt. but you get the idea. We told him how much we had enjoyed his boat rides this summer. He was amazed that we would remember him. We enjoyed a nice peaceful ride with Capt. and ended up in FutureWorld ready to play for a bit.

So where are we heading??

 

[BridgetR3]

When I last finished writing we were leaving dinner at Teppan Edo and heading over to Future World to get in a few rides before heading home.



I love the colors of this fountain.

We decided to ride Figment first! We love Figment! After the ride, we played around in the dump area.



I spent WAY too much time playing this. Six tries later and I still didn't "win".



I've never stopped and watched the kids play here so I'm not sure what the point is. Remember, I was playing Simon.....lol....



but they both seem to love it.

After we left Figment we decided to try to ride Soarin since it was about 8:30 but we knew that the line was probably long. We walked over to the land and sure enough, the line had a long wait so we decided to ride Living with the Land instead and come back to Soarin closer to 9.



We must have gotten on the speed boat.... please excuse my wonderful picture skills. We enjoyed our ride and I stopped trying to take bad pictures so that I could just enjoy the ride with the boys. After riding LWTL, we decided to ride Soarin standby since it was close to 9. The line was still about 40 minutes long but the wait wasn't too bad. We did enjoy playing the "game" on the wall although our people were boring and would not work together to keep the balloon up.



No dancing while you hang-glide on Soarin.



No clue what I was photographing here but it turned out really cool.....sorta....in a terrible picture kind of way.

With that, we headed out. Soon we were home -


The gorgeous lobby!



A picture from the bridge on the way to our room

We let one of the boys use their magic bands on the door. It didn't work and I panicked. I tried mine and with no problems our door opened right up. The boys ran ahead in the room while we put the backpack down and we heard DS11 holler, "MOM, Come see this!!!!!"

Hmmmm.....did he find an animal outside? Inside?? What was it??
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It was a miniature desserts tray from the front desk as their "I'm sorry" for our room fiasco the day before. Now I know that I wasn't really happy with what happened but I was never ugly or demanding with the front desk. They had already given me $100 credit to "make up for" what had happened and now this??? Crazy!

With that we ate a few desserts, took baths and went straight to bed with visions of Lilo and Stitch dancing in our heads.

 

[mickeystoontown]

I was behind a few updates but am all caught up. Isn't this weather as crazy as can be? We got a few flakes of snow and that's it dang it!

I had to giggle a little (okay a lot) when you said okay we're country people. That's soooo something that we'd say!

Well shoot! I hate to hear that Teppan Edo was good but the portions were small. Maybe us country folks are used to eating until we are stuffed to the gills. I know that we do.

 

[BridgetR3]

I was behind a few updates but am all caught up. Isn't this weather as crazy as can be? We got a few flakes of snow and that's it dang it!

I had to giggle a little (okay a lot) when you said okay we're country people. That's soooo something that we'd say!

Well shoot! I hate to hear that Teppan Edo was good but the portions were small. Maybe us country folks are used to eating until we are stuffed to the gills. I know that we do.

Hello ma'am!!! This weather is crazy!!! I was not excited about going to school today because it was bitterly cold and supposed to rain but it snowed instead and we had a wonderful time when I walked my children to enrichment. I allowed them to go play in the flakes that were falling from the sky and you would have sworn that I had given them a million bucks. They were laughing, squealing, screaming and NONE of it was reaching the ground. It lets you know how often we see snow! With that said, I'm so over winter and all of its mess. It has "snowed" here three times in three weeks and I'm beyond done with the cold. I'm ready for shorts, flip flops, and DISNEY!!!!

Yes, we are country people! I don't even remember what I was describing when I said that - I'll have to go back and look but seriously we are not refined or cultured, we are just country folk. We do like to eat a LOT so that may very well be the problem with Teppan Edo. I'm the only one in my family who really enjoys veggies so they only had the meat and noodles to eat which wasn't much. I was not hungry but not really full either.

Maybe we will see ya'll around Disney this year....

 

[ZehnJahren]

Wow that's really cool of them to give you those AKL desserts!!

I was hoping to see a picture of your captain, since you pointed him out in my picture at IG, but it's just a second picture of noodles!

I miss the old JIA dump playground. It was so much better than that sad thing they have now - though it does seem like you had some fun there. Is Capt EO still there...???

 

[BridgetR3]

Wow that's really cool of them to give you those AKL desserts!!

I was hoping to see a picture of your captain, since you pointed him out in my picture at IG, but it's just a second picture of noodles!

I miss the old JIA dump playground. It was so much better than that sad thing they have now - though it does seem like you had some fun there. Is Capt EO still there...???

The AKL desserts were great. The giraffe and sign were solid chocolate and oh so good!

see that's what you get in one of these high quality TR's!!! Ahh poor Captain Redbeard!! I fixed that photo and put this one in its place....



Terrible pic of Captain but at least you can see his face. He is hilarious!

We enjoy the dump area but it may be because we don't know any different. Our first ever trip to the world was in 2011 so we are newbies. I think Captain EO is still there but we have never been in there so I'm not sure.

Thanks for reading along!

 

[BridgetR3]

So we were up bright and early on this our second full day in the world because we had a special breakfast to go to. If you've read my summer TR you may remember that my boys were suddenly in love with Lilo who is only found at Typhoon Lagoon and O'hana. Well since Tropical Storm Andrea hit during our trip it cancelled our Typhoon Lagoon day and of course, O'hana was all booked. SO.....we hopped online in the middle of our summer vacation to make reservations for O'hana for this trip. Today was the big day!!!

Our resort seemed very far from almost all of the parks which was discouraging after staying SO close this summer that we could walk to Epcot in 5 minutes. Just to see how far it really was to MK, I timed our trip. We walked out of our hotel at 8:01 a.m. and boarded a bus at 8:08 a.m. So far we are having really good buses!! We arrived at MK at 8:30 a.m. so 22 minutes on the bus. Honestly it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be but it was still pretty long.

We hopped off the bus and onto the monorail.



They both look a little sleepy!



And so do we!



Best Mickey Christmas wreath EVER!!!

Soon we were at the Poly and of course, we were VERY early. DH would rather be super early than have anyone wait on us which is noble except for the fact that often we are 30-45 minutes early. Today we were a little over an hour early because we weren't sure how fast the buses and monorails would be and they were faster than we expected! We went to see if there was a line to check in and there was no one in line so we decided to just look around for a while until it was closer to our turn.

In the little "store" next to the check in desk, DS7 found some Stitch hands that he instantly "needed" and I found a cool book that I wanted. We agreed to purchase both and I walked them to the counter. I told the lady that we were staying at AKL - Jambo and asked if she could have them shipped there for us like they do in the parks. Thankfully I asked before I paid because she says, "SURE, it will be there in 5-6 days." 5-6 days??? Seriously?? How do the parks get it there overnight but resort to resort is 5-6 days? I thanked her but told her that we would not be purchasing the items here and she let me know that most of the parks would have the same merchandise. Yes, thank you!! DS7 started crying the biggest crocodile tears for his Stitch hands and we almost never made it out of the store. He was so upset which made the lady feel bad although it wasn't her fault. We finally convinced him to leave.

Yep still WAY too early so we went to look around the resort. This is DS11's favorite resort. He really wants to stay here on one of our trips.



Orchids on the Christmas tree



What a dark picture spot. My awesome photography skills shown here!



We were not in a hurry so why not try again?



I love how every Christmas tree at every resort/park/place is decorated to the theme of the resort/park/place.



Now that's a nice picture!! One out of 100 isn't a bad statistic right??



Woohoo!! I almost look professional in this one with the way the rocks look!!

Well it was still too early so we headed outside to enjoy the warmth on this beautiful day!



My three men crossing the "troll bridge"....what? Ya mean you can't see three? Look closely.....Yep there he is in the middle.



DS11 says that one day he will be able to swim here. He loves this pool even more than SAB.



Look at the water in this picture!! Love how it looks in the morning sun.



The flowers were gorgeous!



DVC construction is starting (and much further along now I'm sure)



It kind of takes away from the lovely beach feel.



Grand Floridian DVC is open and I checked it out later in the week.



It makes the resort look HUGE!






The boys played on a hammock while we waited...remember we were VERY EARLY!!!



I posted this picture on my facebook page that morning and lots of people back home replied with comments about how cold it was at home. I laughed and told them that we were enjoying the warmth and sunshine.



And with that we went to check in!!! FINALLY!!

Our meal and thoughts in the next update!

 

[teekathepony]

When we go to a breakfast at another resort we often find ourselves super early too, we're like your DH and like to be early, especially when relying on the busses!
Wow, 5-6 days for resort to resort shipping? Crazy! Poor DS7!
(Believe it or not, for a professional photographer 1 out of 100 is actually pretty good! What you don't see from photographers would surprise you )
Ooooh, Aaaah! Look at that pool! And that beach! And those hammocks! (*Wendy looks up out the door at the snowstorm coming down and cries* )

 

[BridgetR3]

When we go to a breakfast at another resort we often find ourselves super early too, we're like your DH and like to be early, especially when relying on the busses!
Wow, 5-6 days for resort to resort shipping? Crazy! Poor DS7!
(Believe it or not, for a professional photographer 1 out of 100 is actually pretty good! What you don't see from photographers would surprise you )
Ooooh, Aaaah! Look at that pool! And that beach! And those hammocks! (*Wendy looks up out the door at the snowstorm coming down and cries* )

Yep we allotted WAY too much time for transportation!!

Yes 5-6 days - How do people get their purchases to the resorts?? I guess they just carry them!

I wish we were on the beach or at the pool today. This winter has been so long!!!! I need Disney NOW!

 

[BridgetR3]

Finally, it was ADR time and we were checked in quickly. The photo line was LONG but we hopped in it as we were told even though we knew we would not be buying a picture.

We were stopped right next to the Christmas tree as there was a REALLY large party ahead of us made of 3-4 different families and they were each taking an individual family photo as well as a LARGE group photo. So I busied myself with taking pictures.....





That's about the best one I got. Most of the others you definitely don't want to see!

Soon it was our turn for pictures and we were seated about 10 minutes later. As soon as we were seated our "cousin" came to bring drinks. Oh my goodness, I LOVE LOVE LOVE that juice. Could they bottle it and send it to my house?



I was not fast enough on my picture taking. The boys devoured our fruit tray except for honeydew melon which they don't eat. I was lucky enough to get a piece or two for myself! Notice the clean plate in the background. Yep he didn't even use a plate.....he would grab the fruit with either his fingers or fork and it would go straight to his mouth. Now, that's a little country.



Soon our "buffet" arrived and I must say that I LOVED the fact that the buffet came to us so that we didn't risk missing out on the characters. Everything was delicious!!



After a while DH says, "Look a smiley face" and we all turned to see that his raisins (from the bread?) and his bacon did indeed make a smiley face. This isn't a guy who makes smiley faces at home but Disney makes him into a totally different person.

Finally after we had all finished eating, the characters arrived!!! Maybe we just eat fast but they seemed to take a long time to get to your table here.



Stitch was first!!



I told Stitch that he was DS7's favorite character although DS7 was suddenly shy!!



So Stitch reached down and hugged him.



The windows in the back made for awful photos!! They were so excited to see Lilo. I made sure that she knew that we had to reserve this meal JUST for her (since you can't meet her anywhere else except Typhoon Lagoon).



DS7 was really friendly with her so maybe he was just shy around Stitch. Speaking of Stitch, notice him in the background? The characters were so close together that it was hard to move around to visit with and hug them. The little couple right next to DS11 was SOOOO cute. The girl was so excited to see each character. They did not have children with them but we enjoyed watching their excitement.



Stitch got upset because Lilo got in front of him in the order! It was cute!



But she came back and hugged him to show that she was sorry.





Then Mickey dropped by to see if we like our breakfast. Poor Mickey, I didn't mean to cut off his ears.



Say Cheese!!!



Notice the cute couple in the background again. They were having a blast with the characters. I hope my boys are like that when they are older. We may have to get older but we never have to grow up. Disney can always be magical right?



Love how Pluto signs the book on his nose.



A blurry ta-da!!!! And with that we were off.....to our next stop of the day.



I loved their open kitchen look. Do they use this only at night?



DH needed to stop at the restroom so we decided to take a picture with this guy.



I know it's dark but I think it's cute!

After DH joined us, we decided to take the stairs down to the first floor. We noticed some ladies dancing in the lobby so we stopped to watch.



It took me a second or two to realize that they were not all ladies. Brave guy in the crowd.



Photos of the waterfalls that I'm glad I was able to take one last time (I hear this is all changing.....makes me sad.....)

And with that we were off to wait for a bus to Animal Kingdom...

 

[deedee2177]

All caught up!! Your boys are so cute...er I mean handsome! Not sure if they would appreciate being called cute

 

[BridgetR3]

All caught up!! Your boys are so cute...er I mean handsome! Not sure if they would appreciate being called cute

Thanks for reading along!! They don't mind being called cute. Now maybe in a year or two that might change! lol.....

 

[BridgetR3]

After enjoying our breakfast at O’hana, we were ready for a park!! We exited the Poly and headed for their bus stop which was FULL, like really really full. Knowing that people headed to Magic Kingdom would ride the monorail and maybe even people headed to Epcot as well, I began to get worried. Where were all these people going? Was the monorail broken? Nope, we saw them traveling overhead. Soon a Downtown Disney bus approached and only one couple got on. The rest of us waited and waited………..and waited……and oh another bus!! This time it was Hollywood Studios and a whole 5 people got on. We waited another 15 minutes (this made 30 minutes total) and finally an Animal Kingdom bus turned in. As it turned in, people everywhere stood up and started to move toward the line. People who were way back at the entrance to the Poly began to run for the bus. It was insane and a lot busier than our AK stops. More and more people were packing in and I began to get worried about being trampled just trying to get on the bus. Finally we were able to move onto the bus and as we did, the driver pointed at me and said, “She will be the last one on this bus. Another bus will have to come for the rest of you later.” I turn around and see poor DH with a look of shock on his face not sure what to do. I told the bus driver that he was with us and the driver gave us two options – our whole family get off the bus or somehow get DH behind the yellow line on a completely full squished as sardines bus. Well DH is not a small guy but we were desperate and next thing I knew we were smashing ourselves behind that yellow line and holding on for dear life. I have never been on a bus so full in all of my times at Disney even those late at night times when we are all trying to get back to the resort.
So our first stop was of course NOT Animal Kingdom. It was actually Blizzard Beach and people were actually trying to get off the bus to go there so we had to unload a lot of the people standing out onto the sidewalk in order to get the other people off. I made sure to get back on the bus immediately after they got off because I was not willing to wait for another bus after this whole time. Finally we were on our way to Animal Kingdom.
When we were able to get off the bus at AK, we headed towards the entrance with the mass of people that were on the bus with us.

I saw this in the sky. I think the first word was “Love” maybe. I had never seen the skywriter at Disney before so I thought it was kind of neat. The family walking next to us had the opposite feelings as us and were appalled that Disney would allow someone to write in the sky about God above the parks. I’m not sure they can control that but who knows…..



But Mom, the sun is too bright!!!



Animal Kingdom Christmas tree



Again, I love how the ornaments and decorations match the place that you are at. Neat Disney touches…



The required pic of the Animal Kingdom sign. You can still see the writing in the sky although it’s fading away.
We had picked late FP+ options for Animal Kingdom knowing we had a late breakfast. This is the one perk of FP+ in my opinion. You can sleep in IF you only really want to ride your three reserved rides. We actually had reserved two rides and a show with our FP+ because being cooler we weren’t really wanting to get soaked on Kali which would normally be our third family ride.

Love the tree of life!
We decided to take it slow and enjoy all the things that we can’t enjoy in the summer when it’s 100 degrees outside. We stopped often along the paths for the boys to complete assignments in their Wilderness Explorer books.

One of the first assignments was to learn about the tagged flamingos. We received our “badge” and headed to do something that we had never experienced before.

It was in Africa! Where were we going?


Is this picture a good enough hint? I loved how the “luggage” was on top of the train. We were headed to Rafiki’s Planet Watch and the Conservation Station.

 

[teekathepony]

Oh man, what an awful Ride on the bus! I hate when everyone around is going the same place you are, glad you guys all got on!
Pretty sure (though admittedly not 100% sure) disney has no control over the sky above them. I think if they did you'd see something along the lines of "have a magical day" up there. Lol
Animal kingdom is so beautiful! And that's one really good thing about FP+ too -- you can slow down and enjoy the oasis because you're not running for a safari FP!

Sent from my iPad using DISBoards

 

[BridgetR3]

Oh man, what an awful Ride on the bus! I hate when everyone around is going the same place you are, glad you guys all got on!
Pretty sure (though admittedly not 100% sure) disney has no control over the sky above them. I think if they did you'd see something along the lines of "have a magical day" up there. Lol
Animal kingdom is so beautiful! And that's one really good thing about FP+ too -- you can slow down and enjoy the oasis because you're not running for a safari FP!

Sent from my iPad using DISBoards

The sky writer did not bother my family at all but it sure bothered the family walking up to the entrance beside us. I am sure that they have no control over it unless they had restricted air space or something.

Yes that is the ONE thing we like about FP+ that on days like our Animal Kingdom day we can relax/sleep in/go to a waterpark/take it easy because we really only need three or so rides there. I do not like the tiers though!! I'm in the midst of planning our summer trip and whew those tiers are causing me all kinds of problems!!