Suzy and Perla Skip the Lines Again: From roughing it to the lap of luxury

[estherhead]

Around this area was little boxes to teach you about flowers and perfumes. You smelled them and guessed which was the perfume and which was the flower/vanilla/etc. I thought it was really easy. Buzz & Mulan had a kid at science fair do almost the exact same thing and I was shocked to see her results that a huge majority of people couldn't tell? Who mistakes a real lemon for fake lemon smell? Who?

Guess our family has good sniffers. Total side story: Donald and Mulan were just at the mall and there is a new line of perfumes based on places. Mulan put one on and Donald took one sniff and said, "You smell like the Norway pavilion." Sure enough, it was called Norway.

So there ya go.

We then did the French Kidcot. I've never had good success in the French Kidcot. I know for a fact that people in every country around the world love kids. And we have a family friend from France who loves our kids and is extremely personable. So what's up French pavilion? Where's our friendly Kidcot person?

I always find good deals in this store and have a clip with Monet lilies on it that I LOVE that I got for $3.00 in here on clearance. But sadly, there weren't super deals anywhere this time. Guess that's what I get going in peak times this time.

Right across the bridge into England there are darling gardens on both sides.

But this evening this is the one that caught our attention.

Hook and Croc have gained new fame, as you well know, in the preschool set and Boo kept turning and looking at Donald and I, "I killed TickTock yesterday, remember?"

Lots of peoples:

Little did I know this would be the last time I ever heard British Invasion. Thanks for the good times, guys...

The girls and I headed over to do the Britain Kidcot (there is a door facing the British Invasion that enters the toy shop right where the Kidcot is) and the lady says, "Pooh is coming." WooHOO!!!! Score. No one was in this store despite the crowds outside. Again, the crowd here was older this evening. Obviously, I texted Suzy pronto. "Get over here!"

Awwww, look at these pictures! Just look at them! And Jack-Jack has just as amazing shots. Winnie the Pooh is how you do a bear, Disney World. Listen up! You take an adorable, huggly bear, that everyone knows about since birth, put him in movies, give him an amazing theme song that everyone knows, give him a ride, make him relevant and the kind of bear that teaches preschoolers life lessons, give him amazing quotes and fabulous friends, and then make his character costume amazingly fluffy and wonderful.

I'm not saying, I'm just saying. To the Disney executives. There is already a wonderful bear available in Epcot Center.

Just look at this, will you look? Here Jack has just gotten a giant Pooh hug while McQueen gets a Piglet hug. Pooh was on his knees to be Jack's height so Buzz drops to his knees too. It was a great moment!

Happiness!

Did you notice the pin McQueen has on? This comes with the Passport. No one cared about it but Boo and McQueen so they mainly wore them. It's a nice perk for 4-8 year olds. Ariel was just a bit too old at 9.

Photopass amazing picture alert!

OK, I'm gonna do a little sell job for a minute for all of you loyal Disboarders who aren't as familiar with Disney World itself as you are the Disney World portrayed on these boards.

Just like any where in life, the Disboards are populated with people who are extreme. And extremists are vocal. So their voices are a lot stronger than the moderates and obviously stronger than the lurkers. Here are the things that I have discovered are WAY better in person than the Disboards makes them seem:

Photopass: On the Disboards Photopass photographers are terrible. They are impossible to find. They are outrageously expensive. And they lose your photos left and right. You can have them take 800 pictures only to discover one in your actual account. And only idiots use them instead of lugging around their Nikon d80 and 20 lenses.

In reality: Photopass photographers are everywhere. And they are almost always awesome. Some of them better than others, but as a rule great. We've only ever had one picture lost that I know of. One of Buzz fighting a super imposed Darth Vader. You can pre-buy a CD for $99.00 where they will put every single picture and edit taken. If you split it with another family: $50.00. They will take pictures with your point and shoot too. They crouch down, they take pictures as your kids walk up to the characters, they take any pictures you suggest and will suggest ideas if you don't have any. If you are happy with a point and shoot camera, you'll love Photopass. If you take professional looking pictures with a $1000.00 camera, you won't.

Disboards Healthy Disney Food: There are two extremists under this category. A) How DARE WDW offer carrots and grapes instead of fries and try to give us stupid whole wheat buns. B) WDW is trying to kill us with meat, milk, lard, and other unacceptable, unnatural, definitely not organic foods for which there are no coupons.

In Reality: You will find BOTH grapes, sliced pineapple, salads, grilled meats, and other VERY healthy (tho not organic) things all over WDW. Literally, around every corner. You will also be amazed at the wide variety of funnel cakes, chicken tenders, cupcakes as large as your head.

Disboards restaurants: Before free DDP eating at WDW was a delight. Now you might as well lick the cement and call it dinner. And the servers USED to care deeply, but now that the DDP exists, they spit on every plate.

In reality: Disney is trying to cut costs. Food is getting more expensive and it is cheaper to streamline. If you normally eat out at places like Applebee's when you want to be fancy and Burger King on a regular basis, you'll be wowed by 75% of the places. If you've ever eaten at a famous chef's restaurant, you really should stick to signature places. I doubt this is because of the DDP. I'm quite sure it's because running financially sound restaurants in this economy is almost impossible. As for service, we've had good, we've had bad. Mostly good. Exact same ratio as in the non-Disney world. I work in customer service. It is NOT an easy gig. People are very cranky and fickle. And lots more people than you think don't tip.

Foodies write the food reviews on here. I've written a few myself. And I'm a moderate foodie. We can't be trusted. Because we know food really well, have very good palates, and can cook, well, if we chose to, professionally. I have indeed catered events as well as run a successful bakery. I absolutely cannot be trusted to give you a non-biased review based on standards which you probably won't need met.

Look at menus, see what looks good to your family, look at the food pictures thread, and make your decisions based on that. Not on what some foodie McGrumpy Pants has to say.

Finally:
Disboards Crowds: There are CROWDS EVERYWHERE! We could not move. We spent the entire time standing in 240 minute lines in 200 degree weather. And they need to change TSM and absolutely everything about lines and FP's and EMH so that my family, who likes to tour between 11 a.m. and 5 p.m. only, doesn't have to stand in a single line at all.

In reality: Why are you on the Disboards if you are not going to listen to our advice? Go away.

Of COURSE it's crowded and 100 degrees. It's the number one tourist spot in the WORLD and you chose to go July 4th. To Florida. If you want to wear the lime green you must follow one of the cardinal rules:

Rule #1) Go at rope drop. 30 minutes early, already breakfasted, already suntanned up, touching the rope. Ride slow loading rides till 11 a.m. Then see air conditioned shows until it's super hot. Then go home. Get FP's, get FP's, get FP's the entire morning. Come back for the night time entertainment and to use your FP's.

Rule #2) If you cannot awaken in the a.m. (really, you should follow rule #1.) Stay onsite always. Stay in bed till 11am. Swim until 1 p.m., eating lunch at your resort CS. Head over to the park at 2 p.m. Shop and eat ice cream leisurely as you collect FP's and enjoy the air conditioned shows. When people go off to eat dinner, you start riding rides, the ones like Pirates to start with that generally always have small lines. Eat dinner at 8 p.m. when most diners are gone. Then stay until 3 a.m. for evening EMH. By 1 a.m. no one will be there and for two blissful, cool hours you will have the park all to yourselves with relaxed, young, happy CM's.

Those are the rules. Break them on one of the 40 busy weeks at WDW each year and I'm sorry, I'll need your lime green Mickey head back.

My final chapter in this series will be totally dedicated to our super weird Test Track experience. Stay tuned.

 

[houseful of boys]

I have no idea what Suzy & Milo were doing so I'll just leave that blank.

Mostly, before dinner, I was placating Milo about leaving him standing with a stroller abandoned in Italy for 30 minutes. He was a little steamed. So we just wandered around before our ADR's. Wandered the streets of Morroco and I seem to remember a LONG potty break as well, Perla.

As Perla has mentioned, we had gone to Marrakesh once several years ago and Milo loved it. But no one else really had enjoyed. So this year we had one evening free in World Showcase and I told him that we would go anywhere he wanted. He picked Morroco. I'm always game for most everything so I made the ADR. Well, the food has declined since our last visit here. Everything was actually BLAND. I had the lamb and McQueen had the Chicken and I have no idea what Milo had. It was all unimpressive. The belly dancer was cool but it was not enough to make up for the food. Notice Jack Jack in the picture of the belly dancer. He kept lifting his shirt up and dancing around. It was hilarious.

And Perla, You and I didn't get a drink in Italy.

 

[estherhead]

First off, I forgot about something we did. So this is MOSTLY dedicated to Test Track with a tiny diversion first.

I'm sure we drank in England if you are keeping track. Not me. I don't care too much for the UK island's beverages. But the men. The men.

After beverages were in hand and most likely drunk, we sailed across the Atlantic ocean.

Here, again, we lost Donald. I really have no idea where he was going. We all turned to go see O Canada! which is clearly marked. He passed this and entered the area which clearly says, Le Cellier. I'm sure he'll have some defense of this. But the truth is, he went a different way than us because we all read and follow signage.

We LOVE O Canada. It's my ring tone for Milo. And since we work together and he calls me like 2-3 times a work day I get to hear it a lot. Which makes me smile.

We were almost the only people in the waiting room which I hate. Because that means we just missed the last show. We went ahead and sat on the benches and proceeded to play on our phones. Only to discover that we needed the extra time to deal with gushing blood. Wait for it...

Scared ya, didn't I? Just a tooth. McQueen was SOOOO happy to have the drama and excitement of losing a tooth in WDW. All night he kept saying, "I can't BELIEVE I lost a tooth at WDW." It's the little things that please people. The little things.

Shortly after this happened, and really it didn't bleed that much but it did make the time fly, we were ushered in to the theater. I'm not sure exactly what happened in here but I know my family had a grand time and Charming and Buzz hung out with us. Jack-Jack was not happy being in that room with those people and Suzy and Milo really tried everything to calm him. So they just didn't have the same level of enjoyment as the rest of us. Charming, Donald, myself, and others from time to time, belted out the final song with gusto. Surprisingly, not many know the words to this song. It's a good song.

Milo even loves changing the words to apply to other things. It really is a useful, multi-dimensional song. Canada, O Canada, your a lifetime of wonder....

I left smiling. And really wishing Canada wasn't so gigantic to make it absolutely impossible to see even a fraction of the things they show you in the movie.

From here we headed to Test Track. I split for a moment to again take someone to the potty, the one behind the store closest to Test Track. It's normally easy to get to by going to the right of the store but the Tink thing threw me off and I thought it was a dead end. Turns out I could have still gone that way but instead I went through the store dodging people with my stroller.

By the time we got to Test Track it was 8:20ish. And Jack-Jack had been measured and accepted. However it was soooo close we still weren't sure he'd be allowed on when we got to the top. I had put Boo in her tall sandals this day. They proved kind of dangerous as they were a little too big so I didn't have her wear them again. Maybe her feet will have grown a bit in June.

There was a bit of discussion as the CM said that even the FP line was 20 minutes. Since some of our troop hadn't slept much we adults discussed skipping it because Charming was about to fall over. But it's kinda hard to get FP's, measure a kid, walk up to the FP line and then turn around and tell your kids they can't ride. Sorta kills their magical mood.

We did the only proper thing, showed our FP's and hopped in line.

Well, maybe some parents would say the proper thing was to get their kids to bed on time. But I didn't say we were responsible parents. That's asking WAY too much at WDW. We check our "parental handbooks" at the door when we enter Disney property and all of the "no soda before noon, you have to eat your veggies, you have to be in bed by 9 p.m.," type rules listed in it are immediately forgotten when the handbook isn't in hand. It's true. I swear.

The line proved to be much shorter than we had been led to believe and it was literally just a quick walk and we were walking into Bay #2 to start our briefing on being Crash Test Dummies.

You may have noticed in the MANY photos I have of this day that we are in bright blue shirts. No? Didn't notice? Well, everyone at Epcot did. With our Sorcerer Mickey hat, Goofy ears, blue shirts, and loud mostly singing voices, we were a bit of a not to be missed spectacle.

There are 11 of us too. Our numbers don't hurt our visibility factor.

The 11 of us are ushered with other happy FPers into room number 2. Which is smack dab between room number 1 and 3. Just in case you were wondering. I've never really noticed this before, but it's the truth. So I am at the very front of the room, right in front of the t.v. Most of my party is to my left sprinkled amongst the other guests. Donald and Boo are to my direct right, Milo is the furthest from me on my left. The men are flanking us. Perhaps the knew we were about to do battle and instinctively took a formation. Perhaps it was coincidence.

The movie begins and we are about 30 seconds into it when all of the sudden to my left is a light in an otherwise dark movie room. So I look. And then the doors automatically open. This causes Milo, McQueen, and another half a family to be thrust into Room 3's group of people whose doors had also opened (at the proper point, the end of their movie.)

Well, once half of the families are merged into other families this caused our entire little room 2 to exit our room. Merging, fairly successfully, into room 3's families. Except larger groups, like ours, were no longer together but instead mixed up.

As families yelled "Marco" "Polo!" trying to find each other, we were blissfully aware that all would be fine for us and we could stay put, not panic, and still ride as a complete unit. Because other families are not as clever as ours, they were not wearing matching t-shirts. So you couldn't tell who belonged to whom. But everyone knew who we belonged to. Milo and Donald.

As our happy little merged group moved forward, laughing at the ridiculousness of it all, the people arranging cars arranged us and before long many of the people from rooms 2 & 3 were riding, some as complete family units, others just went with it and rode with the parts of their families that got to the front at the same time.

Milo was pretty far up in this group and because he is not always aware of where he is in relation to where we are when asked how many were in his party he said, "11". Which was mostly accurate. Except at the time only he & McQueen were actually together. The rest of us were intermingled with the rest of the crowd. Because we were matching the guy arranging car groups immediately came up with a plan of action and sent Milo to the end where he would send us as we got to the front, one by one. Everyone seemed to understand this and accept the fairness of it as we, who were behind them, would not be line cutting, and yet our party could ride together.

Everyone, that is, except the woman directly in front of me. Who a) was a panicker and b) was not very smart. She had been panicking from the very moment we merged, which was odd because her family was altogether.

She starts yelling at the CM (we were like still 15 people back from the front) "That's not fair! His family is behind him. You can't make us wait for all of them to ride!"

The CM was working his tushy off and trying to ignore her because not a soul standing behind her had made a single move to pass her by.

But she would. not. shut. up. Her head was swiveling back and forth and her eyes were wild.

At this moment a female, also with a tone of panic, voice comes over the intercom and says, "Will the people from Viewing Room 2 please return to Room 2 and continue watching your movie immediately? Return Immediately Room 2 viewers."

What? The Room 2 viewers have already started riding, are completely mixed up with the Room 3ers and NOW the Room 1ers are BEHIND all of the mayhem. The entire ride would have had to be stopped, families ushered off through secret doorways and back into Room 2 for this genius plan to work. Literally, every single person ignored her. It was as if she had not spoken. Including all the CMs who were doing practical, intelligent things to solve the issue.

So crazy woman gets to the front and Milo is still standing to the side and the CM says to her, "How many?" She says, "3" and he says, "Rows 1 and 2" and she says, "But that's not fair. That man shouldn't get to ride before me." This CM was wonderful and was obeying his Disney Customer Training to an absolute fault and he patiently said, "You will ride before him." As she walked away, she said a swear word plenty loud enough for him to hear. (And all the other kids including her own 7-8 year old son.)

His reply? He turned right to me and said without a single change in inflection in his pleasant voice, "Please join your party in Row 7."

I bow in wonderment to his awesomeness.

And then we were in our car. Yes, Jack-Jack DID make it on much to our delight!

Boo was a bit tentative around every corner and since there had been tension in the boarding process she was even more tense.

We tried to calm her, but we did NOT warn her of the speed. No need to freak the poor thing out.

Here her inner dialogue, I imagine, is thus,
"This is kind of fun. But I'm not sure. Oooo, it's hot. Is that scary? We're going, we're stopping. I'm not sure I'm scared or enjoying myself."

Here is her face as we reach 60 mph in the pitch dark. Her inner dialogue here is, "I hate my parents."

(Did you notice her McQueen badge? This is the one she got for doing the Race Around the World at the Kidcot stations.)

And Jack-Jack felt the same way.

We only make them do such things for their own good. I swear. Plus, without a parent handbook, who is there to judge us?

As we left Test Track the "The lights are about to dim, enjoy Illuminations" announcement was made. Boo does NOT like fireworks so I rushed my family out the doors before they started.

Two final notes before we move on:

First, not having to use baby swap and instead riding things together was SUPER AWESOME! I've said for years baby swap is wonderful. And I mean it. But it is even better to not need to use it.

Second, it was confessed to me later that McQueen all by himself leaned on the door to Viewing Room 2 and when the doors flung open was the first to walk out. Meaning that unbeknownst to me, we actually caused that entire chaotic debacle. Whoops!

Note to all of you, and believe you me, we made a note to ourselves. Keep children ages 6-12 who have to lean on any thing or person near them at all times (do your kids do this? lean on you annoyingly constantly?) AWAY from Test Track viewing room doors. I'm sure due to fire laws, this causes the doors to fly open. And really causes a big, big mess.

This lovely evening ended with Donald and my only fight of the week. It all started out quite fine. He wanted to ride the tram so we got in line. I knew this was kind of a bad idea because we were the only people in the line which usually means you just missed it and with Illuminations just starting, not many trams would be by. This proved true and we waited a good 10 minutes. The CM watching over this area was chatty. But we were tired and it was kind of cranky chatty about negative things said in a happy CM way. Honestly, he wasn't my favorite person and I just wanted away from him and said to Donald, "Let's walk." He said, "I'm too tired to walk."

So we waited.

The tram came and we collapsed into it. It drove out of the tram area and then about 10 feet and stopped and the driver said, "You are now at Minnie." Or whatever. And Donald says, "Get out." And I say, "But our van is still FOREVER away." And he says, "No it's right here" while pushing me out. And I say, "We're past those trees." And he says, "GET OUT OF THE TRAM. This is US!" So I got out. Literally, the CM who had talked to us for the last 10 minutes was still in shouting distance and we had parked at Epcot after noon, remember?

So we walked. And walked. Watching the tram. As we passed the grove of trees with another 1/4 mile to go the tram stopped right next to our van. No one got off. Sigh.
I tried hard to remember that Donald was tired. Dog tired. He'd been up till 3 a.m. Awake at 8 a.m. Took the kids swimming. And walked the entire way around Epcot. And it really doesn't help to pour salt in wounds, he is smart enough to know that he was an idiot and should have listened to me. But I'm not perfect, ya know. Plus, the kids aren't perfect. So though we tried to not complain, there was a bit of grumbling on this walk.

And he can't follow signs. Plus, he doesn't listen that well when tired. I can't remember the exact series of turn arounds and confusion but he got madder and madder and started yelling at me. "But YOU SAID TURN LEFT!" "Yes, I said the next left. You whipped us left into a dirt turnaround that isn't a real road." "But you said Peacock Pass and this is FrontierWay!" while he whipped us into a bus stop and whirrled us around with me shouting as my head hit the window, "It doesn't matter, they both lead to the same place!" It was awful. He was soooo mean. And I just keep chanting as my inner dialogue "He's exhausted. He's exhausted. He's exhausted." I would have fallen completely silent as that is always the best policy when someone is super duper tired. Except he couldn't find the way home. And every direction I said was wrong, well, not really, but you know what I mean.

By the time we got back to the campground I was toast. He went to shower and blow off steam and I blew up my air mattresses again and complained to Suzy. She had thought we'd stayed in the park and ridden Spaceship Earth. That's how delayed we were behind them.

He took two Benedryl and decided to sleep on the rug in a sleeping bag. He said he slept like a rock and absolutely loved it. Next time we'll do what Suzy and Milo did and get him his own single air mattress.

I read in my bed, listening to the snoring people in the tent with me. The only thing that happened of interest this night (that I remember) is I heard an owl. Oh, and Charming coughed ALL night. Literally. He was scary. And at one point I almost went woke him up to make him take some Robutussin but I was afraid it wasn't the right medicine with bronchitis so instead I waited till morning and asked Suzy first. But that is a story for tomorrow's report.

 

[knitster]

OK, I'm gonna do a little sell job for a minute for all of you loyal Disboarders who aren't as familiar with Disney World itself as you are the Disney World portrayed on these boards.

Just like any where in life, the Disboards are populated with people who are extreme. And extremists are vocal. So their voices are a lot stronger than the moderates and obviously stronger than the lurkers. Here are the things that I have discovered are WAY better in person than the Disboards makes them seem:

Photopass: On the Disboards Photopass photographers are terrible. They are impossible to find. They are outrageously expensive. And they lose your photos left and right. You can have them take 800 pictures only to discover one in your actual account. And only idiots use them instead of lugging around their Nikon d80 and 20 lenses.

In reality: Photopass photographers are everywhere. And they are almost always awesome. Some of them better than others, but as a rule great. We've only ever had one picture lost that I know of. One of Buzz fighting a super imposed Darth Vader. You can pre-buy a CD for $99.00 where they will put every single picture and edit taken. If you split it with another family: $50.00. They will take pictures with your point and shoot too. They crouch down, they take pictures as your kids walk up to the characters, they take any pictures you suggest and will suggest ideas if you don't have any. If you are happy with a point and shoot camera, you'll love Photopass. If you take professional looking pictures with a $1000.00 camera, you won't.

Disboards Healthy Disney Food: There are two extremists under this category. A) How DARE WDW offer carrots and grapes instead of fries and try to give us stupid whole wheat buns. B) WDW is trying to kill us with meat, milk, lard, and other unacceptable, unnatural, definitely not organic foods for which there are no coupons.

In Reality: You will find BOTH grapes, sliced pineapple, salads, grilled meats, and other VERY healthy (tho not organic) things all over WDW. Literally, around every corner. You will also be amazed at the wide variety of funnel cakes, chicken tenders, cupcakes as large as your head.

Disboards restaurants: Before free DDP eating at WDW was a delight. Now you might as well lick the cement and call it dinner. And the servers USED to care deeply, but now that the DDP exists, they spit on every plate.

In reality: Disney is trying to cut costs. Food is getting more expensive and it is cheaper to streamline. If you normally eat out at places like Applebee's when you want to be fancy and Burger King on a regular basis, you'll be wowed by 75% of the places. If you've ever eaten at a famous chef's restaurant, you really should stick to signature places. I doubt this is because of the DDP. I'm quite sure it's because running financially sound restaurants in this economy is almost impossible. As for service, we've had good, we've had bad. Mostly good. Exact same ratio as in the non-Disney world. I work in customer service. It is NOT an easy gig. People are very cranky and fickle. And lots more people than you think don't tip.

Foodies write the food reviews on here. I've written a few myself. And I'm a moderate foodie. We can't be trusted. Because we know food really well, have very good palates, and can cook, well, if we chose to, professionally. I have indeed catered events as well as run a successful bakery. I absolutely cannot be trusted to give you a non-biased review based on standards which you probably won't need met.

Look at menus, see what looks good to your family, look at the food pictures thread, and make your decisions based on that. Not on what some foodie McGrumpy Pants has to say.

Finally:
Disboards Crowds: There are CROWDS EVERYWHERE! We could not move. We spent the entire time standing in 240 minute lines in 200 degree weather. And they need to change TSM and absolutely everything about lines and FP's and EMH so that my family, who likes to tour between 11 a.m. and 5 p.m. only, doesn't have to stand in a single line at all.

In reality: Why are you on the Disboards if you are not going to listen to our advice? Go away.

Of COURSE it's crowded and 100 degrees. It's the number one tourist spot in the WORLD and you chose to go July 4th. To Florida. If you want to wear the lime green you must follow one of the cardinal rules:

Rule #1) Go at rope drop. 30 minutes early, already breakfasted, already suntanned up, touching the rope. Ride slow loading rides till 11 a.m. Then see air conditioned shows until it's super hot. Then go home. Get FP's, get FP's, get FP's the entire morning. Come back for the night time entertainment and to use your FP's.

Rule #2) If you cannot awaken in the a.m. (really, you should follow rule #1.) Stay onsite always. Stay in bed till 11am. Swim until 1 p.m., eating lunch at your resort CS. Head over to the park at 2 p.m. Shop and eat ice cream leisurely as you collect FP's and enjoy the air conditioned shows. When people go off to eat dinner, you start riding rides, the ones like Pirates to start with that generally always have small lines. Eat dinner at 8 p.m. when most diners are gone. Then stay until 3 a.m. for evening EMH. By 1 a.m. no one will be there and for two blissful, cool hours you will have the park all to yourselves with relaxed, young, happy CM's.

Those are the rules. Break them on one of the 40 busy weeks at WDW each year and I'm sorry, I'll need your lime green Mickey head back.

THANK YOU!!!! We're leaving for our very first Disney vacation in 12 hours and this really puts my mind at ease about some things!

 

[estherhead]

Suzy wanted me to add a bonus picture. Buzz, as you all know, has Asperger's which one of the issues is not being aware of things that are socially "known" instinctively to everyone else. This instinct is turned off in his head. Any social skills that most people can just pick up as they grow older must be taught to him. This, of course, is not possible as there are way too many social situations than a mom can prepare for.

So here's one for you. There is a cool garden maze of shrubbery and in the center of it is a beautiful gazebo. But on this day, there is a band playing in the gazebo and 200 people watching them. Thus making it an inappropriate time to do the shrubbery maze.

Most kids of 10 would probably be able to pick up on this. And as a mom, how do you prepare for this? Where does this come up in your every day life? And once the kid is doing the maze do you yourself run up and down the shrubbery rows to catch him and make and even bigger spectacle?

Here is Suzy's answer.

You not only let him go but let his brothers follow him. And wish desperately that you were not in matching blue tshirts right at this moment.

My answer was, "Who are those embarrassing children? Sure glad we're not with them. Who'd like to go watch this from the toy store stoop far, far away from these crazy people?" And the Perla clan was off.

 

[estherhead]

THANK YOU!!!! We're leaving for our very first Disney vacation in 12 hours and this really puts my mind at ease about some things!

Oh good! Perfect timing for my little speech.

A little tip just for you that you probably know, baby centers are air conditioned and lovely. If your older kids are having a blast but you are hot and tired, just pop in to one and let the baby crawl about while you get cooled back down. And send dad off to ride with the bigger kids.

Have an absolutely magical, magical time!!!!!!! And don't forget, ice cream turns frowns upside down.

 

[houseful of boys]

By the time we got back to the campground I was toast. He went to shower and blow off steam and I blew up my air mattresses again and complained to Suzy. She had thought we'd stayed in the park and ridden Spaceship Earth. That's how delayed we were behind them.

Poor Donald. He came home and before he fell into the floor and went to bed he worked hard at covering all of our food in plastic bins (remember the bagels??). This was very sweet and responsible of him. However, Perla and I hadn't stayed up til 3am the night before and we had just walked all the way around world showcase and out to the parking lot. And although you may have been keeping track of some of the beverage choices we made....it had been a long time since we had had any snacks. So Perla and I were on a mission to dig out the chocolate. And Donald was trying to secure all food away from critters. Anyway, it was the last straw. He said we were on our own with the food and headed to the shower. And Perla and I sat in our screen house with our chocolate chatting about the guys.

You not only let him go but let his brothers follow him. And wish desperately that you were not in matching blue tshirts right at this moment.

Funny thing about this is the other two boys (ages 7 and 3) knew that it was inappropriate to wander around in front of and behind the stage during a performance. This picture was taken after Buzz had been back and forth a few times and the show was winding down. I bent down and gave McQueen a knowing look and said, "You can go ahead."

Having an Aspie is a wonderful thing. I could have become one of those uptight moms who likes to control everything and everyone, sure that the "perfect family" is possible and necessary. I'm naturally one of those people. But from the moment Buzz was born, I've had to learn to let that go. I'm almost 40, I have 4 boys, and one has an "unseen syndrome." I've done my share of crying and getting dirty, disapproving looks (when Buzz was younger especially) and this is where I am today.............Take me as I am. Take my family as they are. Here are the questions I ask myself. Is anyone in danger? Is anyone disturbing another person? (invading personal space, inappropriate touching, making loud noise when not appropriate, etc.). Is there anything ethically or morally wrong with the behavior? If the answer to those questions is no, then so be it. I work hard at raising responsible, moral children. Do they sometimes wander through a maze in front of 200 people watching British Invasion? yep Do I get embarrassed at times? Yes, lots of times. But that's my issue and if other people think I'm a horrible mom, that's their issue.

OK, enough of the soap boxes. What is with us Perla???? People did not come to our trip report to get life lessons thrown at them.We must try to stay on track.

 

[estherhead]

Do I get embarrassed at times? Yes, lots of times. But that's my issue and if other people think I'm a horrible mom, that's their issue.

OK, enough of the soap boxes. What is with us Perla???? People did not come to our trip report to get life lessons thrown at them.We must try to stay on track.

For years when Buzz was little and I had Mulan and Ariel (who are only 16 months apart) Suzy and I were totally immersed in baby/toddler/preschool world. We did not stop our lives, instead we continued traveling, going to plays and theaters, going to church, going to special events, etc. And then, like now, we did everything together. I just refused to become a recluse because I had decided to have kids and they hadn't come out of the womb quiet and well behaved. Because of this people from a different school of thought really didn't like us much.

Through those years I always wanted to wear a little badge that said, "I'm doing the best I can."

Hard as it was, I think it's made Suzy and I more understanding and less judgmental. So many times in my every day life I've wanted to hand a "I'm doing the best I can." badges out. Like, for example, to the Test Track car group maker guy. He needed one of those badges. Leave him alone, lady! He's doing the best he can! So sorry he can't meet your ridiculous standards.

Or the mom with the screaming kid in the Disney show. Yeah, sometimes they are a brat. But sometimes, the kid isn't a brat. They are just sick, or exhausted, or got hurt, or hungry, or whatever. You don't the story. And the poor mom. She deserves a badge. "I'm doing the best I can."

Ok, ok. Enough of this "Dear Mouse Moms" advice column. I'm on my way to load more pictures.

Next up is ANIMAL KINGDOM!!!!

 

[estherhead]

I awoke at 6:50 naturally this day. This is the time I get up every week day to get the girls ready for school so it didn't surprise me at all that once we had settled into our living arrangements my eyes popped open at the correct time. I have a very strong internal clock. This is great when I'm in the eastern time zone. It's really awful when we go to California or Europe.

This was the first night I hadn't had to use my key card in the middle of the night to use the potty. So I was a bit surprised by how chilly it was outside my blankies. On my way out I turned on our little heater, dashed to the potty, washed my face, and ran back and hopped into my still warm bed again. I had switched allergy medicine from what I had been using and it was SOOO much better. I could breath!

Suzy and I texted for a bit about the day/night before. She and I can make each other laugh right out loud with our texts and this morning we had a lot of amusements. From the Test Track craziness to poor Milo being stranded in Italy to Donald riding the tram 10 feet, a good night's sleep made the humor oh, so very obvious.

By 7:15 we were all awake and Suzy was in the shower. I had no desire whatsoever to leave my very warm and toasty tent. But I did brave the chill to get the coffee started. Then I hopped back into the tent (Unzip, zip. Unzip, zip. Unzip, zip. Unzip, zip. Don't ya love camping?) and laid out the clothing on my bed, got dressed myself, collected all the hair stuff and finally put on my makeup in the dark. I realize this is a mistake, however my tent was WARM!

Donald was laying on the carpet and to start with I had to keep stepping over him. I finally insisted he move onto the air mattress which made things MUCH easier. While this activity was going on in my tent in Suzy's tent a little voice was saying OVER and OVER and OVER, "Mom!" It was Jack-Jack. I kept saying, "Jack, she'll be right back." Because Milo was over there and McQueen was over there I saw no real reason for him to come to my tent. But he just would not stop calling for her.

In the third tent, Charming was still hacking up a lung. So I also grabbed the medicine bucket and put all the stuff I thought might help him on top.

By 7:45 or so it was warm enough for me to venture out of our tent. I got coffee (we always bring good coffee with us, so this was wonderful) and set-up my hair station in the food tent. I LOVED the new food tent set-up. Each girl took their turn. They mostly ate our very healthy breakfast of Pop-Tarts and applesauce while I did their hair.

I was also awaiting Charming's return from the bathhouse. But he was taking forever. This turned out to be because some weirdo guy had cornered him in the Comfort Station and talked his ear off. He was like an 18 year old comic book nut strange person and talked Charming's ear off about random travels. Charming is so nice he couldn't bring himself to just walk away and the guy could not understand "I'm not really interested in talking to you anymore" said in a gentle way.

Not exactly sure how he got away, but he did eventually.

When Milo emerged from the Comfort Station, he was not matching us! He was wearing his very special Milton/Disney shirt. Milo is an authority on John Milton. And I don't mean the same kind of authority that the freak teenager who talked to Charming was about comic books. I mean an actual, published, respected, gives lectures at fancy colleges, authority. Perhaps, even, the current authority. Like, of the world. To say we are proud would be a bizarre understatement.

But just the same, we wanted him to match us. But since none of us wanted to wear his shirt and match him, he won and got to wear his special shirt. It really is cool. I had made it for him for no reason at all except I knew he'd like it. And I like him. So I made it and he wore it.

We were supposed to leave at 8. But the medicine giving and sunblock putting on took FOREVER. Boo's eye was BRIGHT red and she was terrified of the sunblock (with good reason.) And McQueen was still being a freak about it. McQueen, WHAT is your problem with the sunblock? It was a big enough issue, this McQueen/sunblock thing, that I have a picture of Suzy combing his hair. The sunblock thing had just ended and you can see that everyone has stopped to look at them and see what the commotion is about.

The other thing about this picture is it kind of looks like Suzy is doing a tick check. Which I thought of because today I had a tick on me and made all the girls let me do a tick check before getting in the van. Which made me wonder why Suzy and I never did a single tick check while camping at the Fort. They have ticks in Florida. We've had ticks on us before at WDW. If you stay at the Fort, don't follow our bad example: do tick checks!

Here, Donald is giving Mulan money for her and Ariel so that if the big kids decided to separate from us they would have some spending cash. But I'm including it because look how cute Mulan's hair is. Yeah, I'm getting better. And we also hung our clothes between our site and the CS to give us more privacy. Unlike on Survivor, no one stole our swim trunks.

When all was said and done, we left our campsite at 8:20. I was sure this would be plenty of time but Suzy was totally stressing out.

Donald almost turned into AKL until I yelled, "No!!!" Whew. That was a close one. We may have actually turned in and turned around by the time he listened to me. I can't remember. The turning around is just a blur to me.

As we entered the AK parking lot we got a SWEET parking spot right next to the tram. It was awesome. I love when you get a little mojo boost that way. The majority of us hopped on the waiting tram but Milo and I pushed the strollers. Milo saying, "We have never ridden the tram at AK, why now?" Uhm, because we walked 20 miles each of our first two days here? We really were pretty close, but why walk if you don't have to?

Suzy's fears of us being late proved true as even though we were through bag check and the turnstiles by 8:50 there were no awaiting people as they had decided to open the park early. Oh No! We're behind the pack!

Here we are looking concerned:

Ok, we don't look at all concerned. At AK being 5 minutes behind the pack isn't that big of a deal.

As soon as we all gathered after the ticketing, we split. Suzy went to get EE FP's with Jack-Jack and I went to Chester and Hester's to see if face painting opens first thing. Last year, if you read that, we let the girls get their faces painted and we loved it. From the moment we started planning this trip Boo would say to anyone who would listen, included strangers at the grocery store, "I'm going to Disney World and then I'll be a jaguar!" I loved this because they would look at me for a translation, assuming they hadn't understood. To which I would say, "It's true. We leave in 2 months." I love baffling strangers.

Everyone else headed to Dinosaur while Boo and I dashed. Would it be open? If it wasn't our entire time line would be messed up. And it wasn't information the Disboards had, for some reason. So there was no choice but to just check it out on arrival.

So I dashed. I'd say I got to Chester and Hesters' at 8:55. Definitely before the official opening time.

And what did I find? A guy setting up! I said, "Can we go now or do you need more time." And he said, "Hop on up!" He had been painting his own face (they all have painted faces, as advertisement, I'm assuming) so he looks kinda freaky because it was very unfinished. Boo picked a different style this time.

A VERY happy tiger:

The painter guy was really fast and Boo was really cooperative so lickety split, she was done. And Suzy and Jack were back. It really, really, really couldn't have been more perfect.

Off to Triceratop Spin!

While we were spinning inside a dinosaur, the rest of the clan was trying to escape from dinosaurs:

Suzy went to use the restroom and I took Jack and Boo to the Boneyard. We figured it'd be fun to get in there before there were any other kids.

But, evidently, Disney World doesn't want to man a place that no one is in. So it was closed. So we trudged sadly back over to the restroom area. There is a little store next to it so we went in there and were easily able to entertain ourselves.

There were these little packages of toys in here, kind of like squinky size, but Disney characters. We would have bought them because they were awesome. Except the characters in each baggie were a mystery. And they were too expensive to waste getting a baggie of ones you don't want. I looked at them a long time trying to do the math and figure out the odds of getting what I wanted. But the family was there within minutes so I left and decided to do the math when I had more time in a store. But I never saw them again? I still would kind of like some.

In this picture, if you can look behind the cuteness that is Boo, is the store that had the little baggies of tiny characters. Next to it is the bathrooms for Chester and Hester's.

Winnie the Pooh is always out when the park opens. And he never has a line this early. We had already met him the day before, but who can resist a Pooh without a line?

Pooh loved Tiger Boo:

And look at this little guy!

The above is what happens when two phenomenal huggers meet each other.

This is Jack-Jack saying, "Will you come home with me?" He never wants to leave any character. Since he lives completely in a fantasy world they seem way more normal than people who aren't dressed up like characters.

So we were leisurely walking, looking for Photopass photographers, on our way to Camp Minnie Mickey.

It's TIP TIME!!!!!

If you have kids (or you yourself) who would like to meet Mickey and friends AK is THE place to do it. We have an absolute fail proof way to meet all the fab five and bonus characters every time, no matter how busy WDW is, with almost no wait. And without sacrificing the precious first hour of riding slow loading rides.

K. You get to AK at rope drop. Do just what we did. Get EE FP's. Ride Dinosaur. Little ones who will be scared ride Triceratop Spin. Meet Pooh.

Then be at Camp Minnie Mickey no later, and I mean NO LATER, than 9:58 a.m. Do NOT be lured by the CM's into the first showing of FOTLK. Ignore them!!!! Stand in line for Mickey. He won't be out yet but there should be at least one or two families in front of you. Send the parent not waiting to get KS FP's. If you really did get your EE FP at 9:00 a.m. you should easily be able to get a KS FP by 10:00-10:30 a.m.

At 10 a.m. sharp, Mickey comes out. Meet him. Then follow the families in front of you as you work your way down the fab five. The goal is (and it's easy to achieve when there are no lines) to be done with all of them and the bonus Forest Friends (Pocohantas, her racoon, Thumper, etc.) by 10:25. 10:25 is when FOTLK lets out for the first time. And from that moment on Camp Minnie Mickey is never the same.

But you can escape all the mayhem! Just get there at 9:58. I swear, you will NOT be sorry.

And now I leave you with a bonus Photopass picture of just some of the people we were about to meet. Our pictures coming up in the next chapter:

Come back to see how awesome this area is from 10:00-10:30 on any given day.

 

[justakrazymom]

Best trip report ever! I am going back thru and making a file of all your tips/rules in fact..lol.. we are traveling in August with a group about twice the size of yours. we have 3 families, 14 kids from 3-17 and 7 adults..one family is yearly trip family, one has been 3 times and we are the novices simply because it's been 10 years ( and 3 kids) since I was last at the world!

I can't wait to read the rest of the journey!

 

[estherhead]

Best trip report ever! I am going back thru and making a file of all your tips/rules in fact..lol.. we are traveling in August with a group about twice the size of yours. we have 3 families, 14 kids from 3-17 and 7 adults..one family is yearly trip family, one has been 3 times and we are the novices simply because it's been 10 years ( and 3 kids) since I was last at the world!

I can't wait to read the rest of the journey!

Thanks! I found most of the great tips we originally started following on TR's. Following people through actual days at WDW seems so much more helpful then people giving tips and others disputing. I like to find TR where the people seem similar to me. Like, I very rarely read solo threads even though some of the writers are amazing because I simply can't relate to that kind of freedom!

You are gonna have a blast! We've discovered traveling with multiple families/couples that the trick is to do things together and things apart. Some families like to tour together and eat apart (like us.) Others meet for meals but tour separately.

In your case I would recommend splitting from time to time not by family unit but by age group.

This was our first trip doing that and it was very nice to let the big kids stay up till 3 am while the little ones slept. And later at Epcot the kids 9 & up did Innovations while the rest of us ate at Akershus. We got to have a relaxing meal, it was cheaper, and we didn't have to do Innovations. Triple score!

 

[justakrazymom]

we are doing a good mix.. we have 3 days we are not eating with the rest ( one of which even my own group is splitting up), then the last 2 days of the trip we are down to 17 people as one family is leaving before us, and myself and the other family actually are getting to Orlando a day before the other family..lol..

Since my best friend and her family go 1-2 times a year and my younger 3 have never been, I have no intention to touring with them much. 7 of the 10 days we will be in the same parks, 3 we won't be. I am certain once we've been to each park once if the older kids wanna go on their own ( we have a 14,two 16 and 3 17 year olds) they will. I have a very different agenda than someone who has gone yearly or more for the last 17 years..LOL

I agree..I tend to not read solo or couple reports.. even some family ones ( those with much younger kiddo's than mine). I was drawn to yours because ofd the blending of families like we will do and the kids ages ( we will also have an almost 4,almost 6 ,6,7, 7.5, 9,10 and 11 year old..lol). I must say that there is an aspie kiddo drew me too.. my nephew is an aspie and an expert on certain things as well...lol

 

[estherhead]

When we take the first picture in this series we are at the very beginning of the walkway to Camp Minnie Mickey. Winnie the Pooh is over toward Dinosaur.

It was 9:45 a.m. when we met Stitch. The Photopass photographer first wanted to get a close-up of Boo.

I forgot to mention in the face painting section that if you have a girl with bangs it's good to bring a clip to clip the bangs back. Because of last year I was aware of this and brought one along. You can see it here.

I'm not sure what was going on here with the Suzy clan as I have no notes on it, but I seem to recall some confusion with them behind me while these photos were being taken. Boo loves Stitch, however, ever since September when he was the first character to break the "I hate characters" spell with her.

As you can see, she and Stitch are on very good terms:

Once we were done, Jack went up to get his hug and McQueen seemed ready to hug this day as well, which is good because there were many hugs in our future!

Suzy, what is going on here? McQueen looks grumpy, Buzz mildly amused, and is Jack-Jack still belly dancing?

Directly next to this is this fun photo opt. What do you think real fish would think of a scuba tiger?

I don't have any photos of the boys in this area and I have all of Suzy's pictures so there must be none. Was this part of the confusion? We also had sent Milo at this point to get our new FP's. He needed more coffee and didn't have a strong desire to meet a zillion characters. We could get new FP's at 10:10 so he'd only have 15 minutes to burn. Not too hard in a WDW park.

The most interesting part of this photo is that Charming is in it. Hmmm. You don't often see him in character photos. Why would you think he chose to be in this photo?

Perhaps Charming wanted to meet this character for the same reason Donald was interested. Ah, Pocohantas. The Disney World version of Vegas Showgirls.

We all started out in the same line. But through conversation and all the kids having an opinion about this and an opinion about that, and then Minnie came out first and there wasn't a line at all, we split families right from the beginning. In the end, this was a good idea. Our Minnie pictures are only so-so and I'm only including one:

Meanwhile, Mickey had arrived and it was Jack-Jack's turn. The Mickey Photopass photographer is the BEST. We've gotten her many times as she is the normal AK Mickey Photopass photographer. I told her, when it was our turn, that I have quite a few photos of her too which kind of embarrassed her.

Meanwhile, in Africa, Milo was enjoying his time away from us.

We had all spied some bunnies but the line at Mickey had died down to nothing so we decided to hop to meet him before hopping over to the bunnies. There wasn't really a line for Thumper. It was more just one family would get done with the other characters and then fill in with meeting him and his bride.

The boys were perhaps the first of the day.

I'm going to stop there for a moment. This will take several chapters as there are a LOT of pictures this hour.

 

[estherhead]

we are doing a good mix.. we have 3 days we are not eating with the rest ( one of which even my own group is splitting up), then the last 2 days of the trip we are down to 17 people as one family is leaving before us, and myself and the other family actually are getting to Orlando a day before the other family..lol..

Since my best friend and her family go 1-2 times a year and my younger 3 have never been, I have no intention to touring with them much. 7 of the 10 days we will be in the same parks, 3 we won't be. I am certain once we've been to each park once if the older kids wanna go on their own ( we have a 14,two 16 and 3 17 year olds) they will. I have a very different agenda than someone who has gone yearly or more for the last 17 years..LOL

I agree..I tend to not read solo or couple reports.. even some family ones ( those with much younger kiddo's than mine). I was drawn to yours because ofd the blending of families like we will do and the kids ages ( we will also have an almost 4,almost 6 ,6,7, 7.5, 9,10 and 11 year old..lol). I must say that there is an aspie kiddo drew me too.. my nephew is an aspie and an expert on certain things as well...lol

Yes, definitely put your young one's needs before any of the rest of the party. Though you might be surprised that the others all want to follow you around as the enjoyment of watching Disney World through new, young eyes is amazing.

Is the aspie nephew one who goes to Disney World often? Buzz is one of the main reasons we started going so often. We then fell in love with it, of course, but Buzz started it all.

 

[justakrazymom]

Unfortunetly my nephew isn't going..my sister and her husband are not the types to take their kids to Disney.. I would love to take him.. but they live in MI and we live in MA..

It would be rather awesome if my best friend and her krew ( they have 7 kids) will join us once in awhile..that would be kinda cool!

 

[estherhead]

Unfortunetly my nephew isn't going..my sister and her husband are not the types to take their kids to Disney.. I would love to take him.. but they live in MI and we live in MA..

It would be rather awesome if my best friend and her krew ( they have 7 kids) will join us once in awhile..that would be kinda cool!

Sometimes in our modern world it seems almost cheaper to just meet family at a vacation spot versus spending the money to take a vacation AND visit family, ya know? Here's hoping your pictures and stories from this year will convince them. Renting a house is a great/cheap way to travel with family!

 

[justakrazymom]

yeah.. I don't think it will ever happen.. my BIL doesn't like Disney..oh well.. my best friends on the other hand.. I am glad to have them to go with!! Oh now I am reading all your previous trip reports..I love love love em!

 

[preschoolmom]

Through those years I always wanted to wear a little badge that said, "I'm doing the best I can."

Hard as it was, I think it's made Suzy and I more understanding and less judgmental. So many times in my every day life I've wanted to hand a "I'm doing the best I can." badges out. Like, for example, to the Test Track car group maker guy. He needed one of those badges. Leave him alone, lady! He's doing the best he can! So sorry he can't meet your ridiculous standards.

Or the mom with the screaming kid in the Disney show. Yeah, sometimes they are a brat. But sometimes, the kid isn't a brat. They are just sick, or exhausted, or got hurt, or hungry, or whatever. You don't the story. And the poor mom. She deserves a badge. "I'm doing the best I can."

LOVE THIS! Wouldn't the world be a better place if they handed these out? Maybe in the hospital when the child is born?

My three are 13 months apart, and my son is on the autism spectrum. There have been many a day I could have used a badge like that Even some days in Disney World.

This is the second of your reports I've read. I need to go back and read some more! I read all of this in one shot last night (stayed up until 1:00 am), and then I was too pumped about going to Disney to sleep

You're a great writer. You keep it real, you have great advice/tips, and your chapters are just the right length with the right picture/writing ratio!

 

[houseful of boys]

I'm not sure what was going on here with the Suzy clan as I have no notes on it, but I seem to recall some confusion with them behind me while these photos were being taken

Honestly, I just remember my big kids not caring in the least whether or not they got their picture taken with Stitch. I think being 13, 10, and 7 yr old boys - the characters are take them or leave them. And at this moment it was a leave them .

BUT Pocohantas was a "Take Them" for Charming. You notice how he didn't even wait for the little kids to get "their time" first.

 

[estherhead]

LOVE THIS! Wouldn't the world be a better place if they handed these out? Maybe in the hospital when the child is born?

My three are 13 months apart, and my son is on the autism spectrum. There have been many a day I could have used a badge like that Even some days in Disney World.

This is the second of your reports I've read. I need to go back and read some more! I read all of this in one shot last night (stayed up until 1:00 am), and then I was too pumped about going to Disney to sleep

You're a great writer. You keep it real, you have great advice/tips, and your chapters are just the right length with the right picture/writing ratio!

Thanks! Sorry for messing with your sleep. Sounds like your toddler years were intense! Our next WDW trip is SOON! I'm so busy I forget about it constantly and every once in awhile when I'm writing my TR it comes sweeping over me that we get to go again really soon and then I'm nauseous (nauseous for me is a good sign of excitement, I'm a weirdo, I know.)

Wish I had a badge for you. There are so many times it would come in handy!

Honestly, I just remember my big kids not caring in the least whether or not they got their picture taken with Stitch. I think being 13, 10, and 7 yr old boys - the characters are take them or leave them. And at this moment it was a leave them .

BUT Pocohantas was a "Take Them" for Charming. You notice how he didn't even wait for the little kids to get "their time" first.

Perhaps that was it. Perhaps they were annoyed that Boo wanted to meet Stitch. Plus, I bet you guys met Lilo in November at the Poly & my girls have never met her that I know of.

Sigh. Stay tuned for Donald taking over our fairy meet and great completely. He was sooo excited. And he was also the most pumped about it later, hoping that the Photopass pictures of him and Vidia turned out good enough for him to frame on his desk at work. I wonder if he knows they are make believe fairies and that he turns 37 next week?