Taking Little Miss to Meet the Mouse! ~ A May 2015 PTR ~ Trip Report Link Posted!!

[Gracefulskinny]

First Draft Itinerary Mapped Out


So after a week or so of pouring over park hours and crowd calendars I am pretty sure I have our general itinerary nailed down. We will have park hoppers this trip and as you can see I have scheduled things to make the most of them. Our current plan is to have 1 rest day for every 2 park days.

The overall plan for park days is to Rope Drop until 2pm and then go back to POR for naps and rest from about 3-5 and plan on hitting up the evening park at about 6pm then stay until we feel like it. Our evenings will be a lot less structured then our mornings.

Give me a shout if you end up with plans that overlap ours. Let me know if you see something in here that may need adjusting.


5/6-Wednesday
This is Arrival Day. The plan is to wake up early and hit the road and arrive in the early –mid afternoon time frame. We will then grab lunch in DTD before coming back to our resort for naps and then heading out for our dinner ADR and hopefully making it back to our resort by 10ish.


5/7-Thursday
This is our first park day and I had quickly decided that regardless of what the crowd calendars said we would be starting off at the Magic Kingdom. We went somewhere else first last trip and there is just something missing when we do that. So MK will be our Morning Park this day. Our goal is not only to Rope Drop but make it in time to see the Welcome Show. We’ve never seen it.

Our Evening Park will be Epcot. It’s by far our second favorite park and with all of the normal food options plus the flower and garden food booths it’s the perfect spot to hit for our first evening in the parks.


5/8-Friday
Seeing as we will have been to both MK and Epcot the day before, our morning park this day is Hollywood Studios. As of right now we are strongly leaning toward hitting up the Hollywood and Vine Play ‘n Dine Breakfast pre park opening but I keep waffling back and forth on this one and who knows whether we’ll keep it in the plans or not.

Our Evening Park this day will be Magic Kingdom. Without a doubt we will be staying for Wishes because it’s my favorite fireworks show ever and I can never get enough.


5/9-Saturday
This is our first rest day. We will be spending the morning and afternoon sleeping in and swimming at the pool. We will then head over to fort wilderness to explore and enjoy the late Hoop De Doo Dinner show.


5/10-Sunday
This is Mother’s day. We will be spending the Morning at Epcot. If Little Miss has not reached the 40” mark before the trip then we will probably take our time getting over there this particular morning.

Our Evening Park is where the important stuff happens this day. Seeing as it will be Mother’s day, what other park could I find myself in but Magic Kingdom? We will be saving our FPs for this evening and will lock in a FP for Wishes. As long as I get that and a dole whip I will count myself a happy Mommy.


5/11-Monday
Our Morning Park will be Animal Kingdom. We don’t plan on spending much time there and won’t be wasting our FPs here. We are not big fans of AK and almost skipped it altogether, but with Park hoppers we can pop in to do just the things we want and then get out of there. We will be sure to Hit up the Safari and Everest for Daddy and then make our way over to Hollywood Studios which will also be our evening park. We will probably skip Fantasmic as the videos we have seen from it do not impress either DH or I and there are better things we can be doing with that large chunk of time. If the Jedi Mickey Dinner gets released like it did last year we may consider going but the $50+ per head price is a little steep for a character meal so we aren’t sold on the idea as a must do.


5/12-Tuesday
This is our second rest day. We will again spend the day sleeping in and swimming at the pool. We will then head over to the Poly for dinner at Ohana.


5/13-Wednesday
Our Morning Park this day will be Magic Kingdom with plans for a pre park opening breakfast at Crystal Palace.

Our Evening Park will be Epcot. Once again to take advantage of the wonderful food options there. If we haven’t caught it before this night we will be sure to stay for Illuminations.

5/14- Thursday
This day is currently plans for an almost repeat of yesterday and I have it planned this way to give me the best chance at Anna and Elsa, and Seven Dwarfs Mine Train FPs. So we will Rope Drop MK and hit up Epcot in the evening (maybe).


5/15- Friday
This is Departure Day. Current plan is to take things easy and hit up DTD one last time before hitting the road whenever we feel up to it. If DH changes his mind about not wanting to miss Star Wars Weekends between now and then we will add a day on to our tickets and hit up Hollywood Studios one last time before hitting the road. ​

 

[KatMark]

Joining in and saving my spot. I'll be back tomorrow to catch up.

 

[Gracefulskinny]

Joining in and saving my spot. I'll be back tomorrow to catch up.

Thanks for joining in!

 

[KatMark]

Okay, I'm caught up (not sure I'll remember everything).

Your daughter is beautiful.

We have never stayed at POR. When we stayed at a moderate, we always stayed at the Coronado Springs Resort. However, I always told my husband if we couldn't get Coronado, the only other moderate I would stay at is POR-Riverside. We've walked around it and loved the atmosphere.

I personally couldn't handle NOT staying on site. Too many things you can't take advantage of...Magical Express, Extra Magic Hours, making FP+ selection earlier, etc.

I like a lot of your restaurant choices. Personally, we were NOT fans of Ohana at all and won't be back. I strongly recommend Crystal Palace for an early morning breakfast and we LOVE Kona...a must do every trip for both of those.

I love your movie nights.

And I love what you with DD's stuffed toy...very clever.

Oh and I am there part of your days.

 

[Gracefulskinny]

Okay, I'm caught up (not sure I'll remember everything).

That was fast!

Your daughter is beautiful.

Thank you!

We have never stayed at POR. When we stayed at a moderate, we always stayed at the Coronado Springs Resort. However, I always told my husband if we couldn't get Coronado, the only other moderate I would stay at is POR-Riverside. We've walked around it and loved the atmosphere.

Not sure DH and I would like Coronado. We haven't been over there but it sounds too conventionish and buisnessy for us.

I personally couldn't handle NOT staying on site. Too many things you can't take advantage of...Magical Express, Extra Magic Hours, making FP+ selection earlier, etc.

Yeah, thats what it came down to really. When I first calculated it there was almost $900 difference. With that kind of difference I felt obligated to at least consider the option. But I quickly realized that after the parking fees for wdw, parking fees for the hotel itself, the extra gas expense of driving around that savings of $900 quickly dwindled down to $600 or less and at that point the added stress of driving ourselves plus missing out on all the perks of on site I just felt that WDW still wins out. We would miss the magic of staying on site too much and the price difference wasn't enough to make a difference.

I like a lot of your restaurant choices. Personally, we were NOT fans of Ohana at all and won't be back. I strongly recommend Crystal Palace for an early morning breakfast and we LOVE Kona...a must do every trip for both of those.

I'm starting to really look forward to Crystal Palace this time if only for the pre park entry pictures alone. I think at least for this trip we have decided to cut Kona from the list. While it would be tempting we really want to be sure that we take advantage of our rest days and sleep in.

I love your movie nights.

Thank you. I've gotten a little behind on posting updates about them. I've got one to post in the next day or so and we are having one tonight for Tangled.

And I love what you with DD's stuffed toy...very clever.

Thank you. I can't believe that it worked out so well.

Oh and I am there part of your days.

I think I saw that over on the Facebook group! We will have to keep an eye out for each other if our plans mesh well.

 

[KatMark]

Not sure DH and I would like Coronado. We haven't been over there but it sounds too conventionish and buisnessy for us.

That's what we like about it (the GF, Yacht Club, Boardwalk, Contemporary and Dolphin are also convention resorts). You usually only see the business people as they are on their way to a meeting and at the end of the day leaving their meeting or if having a cocktail party. It keeps the buses and pools empty. But it's not for everyone.

 

[specialkk77]

Hi! Just wanted to say how much I admired your skills with the Lambie emergency.

I am not a mom, but that gave me inspiration if I ever have a child with a stuffed toy crisis!

Also, we might end up in the same parks a couple days. I don't have my itinerary nailed down yet (getting close!) but I guess anything is possible!

 

[Gracefulskinny]

Hi! Just wanted to say how much I admired your skills with the Lambie emergency.

I am not a mom, but that gave me inspiration if I ever have a child with a stuffed toy crisis!

Also, we might end up in the same parks a couple days. I don't have my itinerary nailed down yet (getting close!) but I guess anything is possible!

Hi! Thanks for reading!

Thank you. I have to say I have never been more grateful for Doc McStuffins then I was that Night. Word of advice... when the future kid attaches to a lovey buy extras while you still can. We paid quiet the mark up for the replacements.

 

[Gracefulskinny]

In case I had any lingering thoughts to consider staying off site....

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news...abana-bay-beach-universal-20141028-story.html




On site it is!

 

[Gracefulskinny]

Disney Family Movie Night: The Little Mermaid


There wasn’t much to this Family Night. We had attempted movie nights a few times since the toy story one and we have found that we don’t always make it to getting the movie done. What we ended up doing this time was the meal and the coloring sheet one night and then due to a meltdown we saved the movie for another day.


For our dinner we had:

The Stuffed Mermaid Bras were stuffed shells. The Star Fish were pieces of garlic bread cut into star shapes. The seaweed salad was going to be either a regular salad or some nori {sushi grade seaweed} but it turns out that both had gone bad and had been thrown out without my knowledge.

We never made it to dessert this night because Little Miss started her meltdown at the dinner table, but we were planning on serving some of the leftover cream puffs from the Toy Story Night as the Pirate’s Gold.

We ended up watching the movie two days later when both Little Miss and I came down with the same bad cold that seems to be going around. Sadly, Little Miss didn’t seem that impressed with it. Though she did enjoy dancing to the songs.

The next movie on our agenda to hit is Tangled. I was going to do it this past weekend but then the pasta noodles I swore I bought disappeared. (I am getting tired of this happening on Movie nights! ) I'm a little stumped on ideas for the desert for tangled night so ideas would be helpful.

​

 

[rachael95]

Disney Family Movie Night: The Little Mermaid


I'm a little stumped on ideas for the desert for tangled night so ideas would be helpful.

​

[/SIZE]

There's a great German hole-in-the wall restaurant in Gatlinburg we like called Poyner's Pomme Frites. One of their desserts is ice cream spaghetti. They take vanilla ice cream and run it through a pasta machine. Maybe you could do something like that for dessert - but make it cut off hair.

 

[Gracefulskinny]

There's a great German hole-in-the wall restaurant in Gatlinburg we like called Poyner's Pomme Frites. One of their desserts is ice cream spaghetti. They take vanilla ice cream and run it through a pasta machine. Maybe you could do something like that for dessert - but make it cut off hair.

Great idea but we are having her hair for dinner. I think I may not do a dessert.

 

[KatMark]

I love your movie night...and one of my all-time favorite movies too.

 

[Gracefulskinny]

I love your movie night...and one of my all-time favorite movies too.

Its one of mine as well. I have to say, I was a tab bummed when she wasn't as thrilled with it as much as I hoped.

 

[ksl5f123]

Hi! I just hopped over here from your post on the theme night thread on the family board. We love doing movie theme nights too!

Just a thought if you change your mind about dessert for Tangled, if you put a cupcake in an ice cream cone (the cake cone type) it looks a lot like Rapunzel's tower. Very cute!

 

[Gracefulskinny]

Just a thought if you change your mind about dessert for Tangled, if you put a cupcake in an ice cream cone (the cake cone type) it looks a lot like Rapunzel's tower. Very cute!

Oohh that is a good one. But We'll probably be eating halloween candy for a while.

 

[Gracefulskinny]

Finalizing ADRs

Before we get to the actual update, I just wanted to share. I may be biased but I think I ended up with the cutest Snow While ever on Halloween.

And for the record… Little Miss has this whole Trick or Treat thing DOWN PACKED! And she totally used her cuteness to score extra candy! She also has shown me that she has quiet the endurance for walking. We only called it quits a bit early because it was starting to rain and with DD and I both shaking off the last bit of our colds still we decided that 2 Mickey Head Trick or Treat buckets full was enough candy for one Halloween. Now to get her to understand that it’s all over for the year.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Now on to the Actual Update!~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~



My ADR day is quickly approaching so I guess that means it’s time to make up my mind and keep it made. . Here is the list of ADRs that we’ve decided to nail down.

We strongly waffled over a Kona breakfast, a Boma Breakfast, and a Le Cellier Dinner but after looking at our schedules we really want to do our best not to push ourselves and with plans to spend evenings in the parks and catch the night time entertainment along with Rope Dropping we will need our rest days to truly rest and recover from our park days.

Most we are 100% sure we are keeping there are one or two that we (aka Me) keep waffling over and just when I am sure I am decided one way I swing over and start leaning the other way. So without Further adu:



-1900 Park Fare Dinner {arrival night hopefully around the 7:30 time frame}

-Hollywood and Vine Play and Dine Pre Park opening breakfast

-Hoop De Do Revue- 8:30 showing

- The Plaza Dinner (Hopefully around 7ish) {Not sure about this one at all. We may just stick with QS instead.}

-Ohana Dinner (hopefully around the 7:30 time Frame)

-Crystal Palace Pre Park Opening Breakfast


Once we are there we may decide to shoot for a few day of reservations around the world showcase but we don’t want to lock ourselves into anything now. With so many options we won’t be heartbroken if we have to eat qs and F&G food booths.
​

 

[Gracefulskinny]

ADR Day!!!



Good Morning Everyone!

Its ADR day for me! Which means I’ve been up WAY….. before the sun.

I had a bit of dread going into this morning because I’ve heard so much about My Disney Experience acting up and causing issues. I prepared myself for a major headache. Turns out it wasn’t that bad. I made sure last night to have a credit card on file saved and it took literally 10 minutes. To lock them in. I had to go 20 minutes later for one reservation and 10 minutes earlier on another but other than that I got everything I was shooting for. The final result:

-5/6- 1900 Park Fare Dinner
-5/8- Hollywood and Vine Breakfast
-5/9- Hoop De Doo Revue
-5/10- The Plaza Dinner
-5/11-Rose and Crown Dinner {hopefully catch the fireworks from table}
-5/12- Ohana Dinner
-5/13 Crystal Palace pre Park Breakfast


Now off to go be active mommy for the day! Good thing my kid still naps! ​

 

[KatMark]

that you got everything you wanted and only a couple not quite at the time you wanted. Have a great weekend.

 

[Gracefulskinny]

I'm pretty excited myself. You have a great weekend as well.