The financially irresponsible WDW trip! [June 25th: p.45, posts 668 & 669]

[slotzkin]

I love it when I click on your TR and there is an update. I even giggle like an idiot. The main street picture was cool. I can't wait for the rest. I must say I don't mind quantity at all and the quality is always good.

I agree!!! I LOVE the long reports and am laugh out loud addicted..Please don't change..you are so funny if I were you I would start a subscription website of your trip reports!!!

 

[HappyCamperToo]

Loved the video! Alice and DH (and you) sound just as I'd imagined. How about posting another bit with all your children's voices--love to hear them!

 

[DebIreland]

jonslola - Thanks!! Glad I could give you a laugh!! So you started your own TR?!! Excellent. Can't wait to check it out!!

puggymom - Thanks so much! Yes, the lights were wonderful. We debated for a long time coming up to our trip whether or not to spend the money on MNSSHP and I am so glad we did!! Next chapter very soon... I'm ahead of myself for once!

Ricky's Girl - Thanks for the kind words Susie! Phew! Glad you clarified about your name in your sig! I was getting quite cross with myself for not noticing it before. lol!!!

disneyaddicted - Aw, thanks!!! The next chapter is done and waiting to be posted!!

Jake & Crew - So sweet, thanks! I've been over to your TR and I *love* it!!!!!!! The suspense is killing me. Will the folder turn up? Is it gone forever? Can't wait to read more! For anyone wondering what I'm talking about, check it out here!!!!

DisneyJo - I dunno about my accent. Born and reared here. Our accents in the far South of Ireland are quite flat and probably not as obvious as other parts. LOL@your friend. A neighbour of mine spent one weekend in London and came back sounding like Ross Kemp! My eldest brother was dating a girl for a long time from Kent. She was so great. She'd come over and visit regularly. I was only around 11 or 12 at the time so when they split up I was soooo upset cause she was like a big sister to me. Beautiful accent she had.

Shark - ROFL @ taxi/bus sprint training! Oh yes, we had the usual pile of stuff in tow, including stroller. I'm sure we're exactly the kind of guests The Boardwalk dreamed of when they built the resort!!

slotzkin - Yay!! Welcome! And thank you *so* much for the compliments. Wow!! Start a subscription site? Then I'd have to spend a fortune subscribing myself just to make the numbers look good. Or I'd probably mess it up and start crediting people's accounts instead of debiting. Hope you stick around!

Sue - Hey!! We posted at the same time! Oh yes, I'll see what other clips I have! Thanks a million for the nice comments.

 

[Lovemy3babes]

Deb, I love the photos! The castle one is my favorite. Very neat looking!!

 

[twob4him]

Wow I missed a lot..I posted yesterday at 6:30 pm and came on today and there's an installment and 1/2 plus lots of other posts. Gee, I really should cut out sleeping and just Dis for 8 hours.


Now the taxi thing...I would do that....really I would...I can just see it now! I am glad you were laughing about it....oh man
Wow, what a cool pic of the colored buildings on Main Street but the castle looks so bare without all of the gold that was on it last summer.
I loved the video. How cute!
I wonder why the cards werent working?

You all look great dressed up! Can't wait to hear what happened next!

 

[ProudMommyof2]

subscribing!

 

[DebIreland]

Lovemy3babes - Aw, thanks Kelli. You got any more trips planned? I'm seriously missing WDW these days.

twob4him - Thanks a million Cathy! The castle did look bare but appropriately barren and spooky for Halloween! Glad you could relate to the taxi thing Oh, as for the cards, I don't know but I've read a lot of other posts about theirs not working. It gets really annoying after a while.

ProudMommyof2 - Welcome!

 

[DebIreland]

Part 22: Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party (contd.)...

(Still) DAY 8 - Tuesday, October 31st, 2006

So we made our way over to Liberty Square to do Haunted Mansion and to just generally check everything out. It felt weird (but in a good way) to be in MK in the dark - much darker than a normal night I mean. On our way to HM Garth asked if we could do some trick or treating at one of the Trick or Treat stations near Liberty Square but the lines were unbelievably long so I asked him to be patient, that we'd do it later. He was disappointed cause he was so excited about "trick or treating in America" (bless him!) but he agreed to leave it a while.

So DH took the boys to Haunted Mansion and I had a quick peek in the Christmas Shop with Alice. Beeeeeauuuuutiful!! My inclination was to cordon off the whole store with yellow police tape, giving me sufficient time to hoarde every item on the shelves into a basket and buy the lot before anyone else got their hands on it. But thank the Lord that by now I was keeping a tight hold of the finances - therefore I bought nothing. When we were done browsing, we went back and waited for the boys who were only a few minutes including queueing time and then it was my turn to go with them while DH looked after Alice.

Always true to form, I managed to veer too far left while walking up to the standby line and ended up behind a large group of people who were just basically meeting up to discuss their plans or whatever. There was me standing behind them waiting to be entertained. Garth and Wayne had just followed me [I guess understandably thinking their 37 year old mother knew where she was going] but then Garth clicked that we were in the wrong place - "Mom what are we doing here? The line's way over there." I muttered something about not being perfect and Mom's can't always be right [or even sometimes] and we made our way to the entrance - 5 minutes standby!

It was a lot of fun. The boys were a bit scared I think because naturally the Halloween atmosphere added a lot to the intensity of HM!!!

I have noticed that the boys are scared by theming (yeti, ghosts) which doesn't bother me in the least, whereas I am petrified of drops and speed which they take in their stride. At the end of the day they are children with active, powerful imaginations that only the innocence of childhood blesses us with. So HM scared them a teeny bit but in a fun kinda way!

On the way out I dropped my camera and, it being so dark, I got stepped on trying to pick up the batteries

[naturally Wayne's eyes were doing 360 degree rolls at this point as he tried to figure out if he had enough spending money left to pay for a mother/son divorce]. Thankfully the camera was okay and we re-joined DH and Alice - who was complaining like mad that her dress was opening at the back (the silly velcro tabs that just wouldn't stick). DH was trying his best to tie it but she said "you do it all wrong Daddy, stop it now, mommy do it proply". Which, whilst sweet, is actually totally inaccurate. Having been a mom to boys for 10 years before Alice came along, and with no sisters to learn from, I don't think I'll ever truly grasp the world of girls, adorable and wonderful and all as that world is. So I tried in vein to tie the dress but it opened again after two seconds. I tried telling her it was okay, that it didn't matter, but she was having a fit about it! We somehow got past that crisis and made our way back through Liberty Square and decided to hit Toontown so we could do the Alice Cooper (er, in Wonderland ) trick or treat trail towards Tomorrowland. [Seriously, imagine an Alice Cooper trick or treat trail???? ]

Wow! MK is such a different place in the dark. We couldn't for the life of us find Toontown. Okay, I just typed that and realised how totally and utterly moronic it must sound.

I mean it's a whole huge section of MK and we simply couldn't find it. But it was so dark and crowded. We kept coming across Cinderella's Carousel and I couldn't figure out why it had been moved out of Fantasyland. Then we'd see the Teacups and it was honestly like an episode of Twilight Zone as we constantly passed the same things, going around in circles. We stopped to consult the map for the 100th time, did Alice's dress up again for the 20th time [Wayne makes a quick call to his divorce lawyer offering to pay more for a quick clean break] and then Garth takes charge, studies the map and said "it's this way". I kept saying "no that's impossible, we're heading south and Toontown is north, at the top of MK". I was still saying this as the words "Toontown" appeared before me in massive neon lettering and then I just muttered something like "how was I supposed to know?" and we joined the top of the Alice trail.

Wayne said he was worried that he no longer looked like Alice Cooper and he now just looked "stupid with melted face paint". I did a quick touch up, reassured him that his face paint was perfect again [side note: weeks later, upon perusing our photos, he told me I had lied, ] and we were on our way at last. I asked Wayne if he was okay in the leather jacket and pants and reminded him again that I had shorts and t-shirt in my bag but no, like a real trooper, he was determined to see the night out as Alice Cooper.

I was hoping Alice (er, baby Alice that is, not rock star Alice) would get out of the stroller and enjoy the Alice in Wonderland theming on this pathway (they have Tweedledee and Tweedledum and the giant King of Hearts) but she wasn't bothered about any of it. Along the way they had various barrels of goodies with CMs handing out treats and we got quite a bit of loot.

So we arrive into Tomorrowland as planned and decided that this would be a good time to get food. We had tried Cosmic Rays on our first trip and didn't like it but as it was near we thought we'd give it another go and I'm glad we did! We got the nicest veggie burgers with the best 'fixins' of the whole trip!!! Every time Alice sat down the dress became undone so she had a huge meltdown in there but thankfully it passed quickly and the people around us were kind enough to smile and not judge.

The CS credit here was a definite 'bargain' with good portions and a lovely brownie for dessert! Having said that we seemed to be accumulating brownies at a frightening rate but still, I was loving it! I'm not one to say no to an already-paid-for dessert. After a quick bathroom stop we made our way over to the front of the Crystal Palace to grab a spot to watch the fireworks.

Passing the castle again en route...

And what a spot it was! Fantastic!!!! We spread the ponchos on the ground, sat down, finished our drinks, stuffed ourselves with brownies (marginally depleting our supplies!) and watched in awe as Hallowishes lit up the sky! INcredible. Now, Alice, poor thing, was very frightened by the noise and blocked her ears for the whole show. My heart went out to her and I felt so bad for her - she was just 2 after all and I did wonder if it was all too much and if we were taking her good nature for granted by maybe pushing her a bit too much. But this night was an exception really and we wouldn't ordinarily be out that late. I cuddled her in close and gently put my hands over her ears. Between bangs, cracks and booms she would smile, look up at the sky and say "aaaah", "ooooh" and "oh Mommy, it's so pretty" but then quickly bury her head in my lap again as the next one went off. And then it was over and much-deserved applause followed. So Hallowishes gets 10 out of 10. If you get the chance to see it, absolutely do!!

A couple of (poor quality) photos...

Now it was time to make our way back over to Liberty Square for the parade and to meet up with Mike (from the TGM forums) and his wife.

Continued soon.... thanks again for reading.

 

[nts4wdw]

Thanks for the new installment! I'm so enjoying Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween party vicariously thru you!!

 

[DebIreland]

Lynn - What a co-incidence! I was just catching up with your TR as you typed a response to mine!! I tend to read TRs on my laptop while I'm sitting down relaxing and write posts on my desktop (as the laptop is sooooo slow) so I was just copying some of your TR over to the laptop. Looking forward to reading the ones I missed.
Thanks!

 

[tigger536]

Too funny about the back and forth between the bus and taxi! Sounds exactly like something I would do! LOL!

And thanks for the great description of MNSSHP! I've always wanted to do it! We just booked a trip during free dining...and since we are going for 9 days, will be getting APs...so what does that mean in the world of Fuzzy Disney Math (thanks V! )? Why, another trip of course! So a quickie weekend for MNSSHP it is! (Oct 5, the DIS meet, actually! )

So hearing your review I totally want to be there NOW! Thank you!

Love your report! Fantastic as usual!

 

[jonslola]

I loved reliving the Hallowishes fireworks with you! Didn't you love the music that went along with it? I asked a CM if I could buy the soundtrack and she said no. I sure wish I could, it would go great with my Fantasmic! soundrack, takes me back every time I listen to it Anyway, loved the installment, can't wait for the next one!

 

[twob4him]

Wowowowowowowowow.....what cool pics!!! The castle in purple is my favorite and the Hallowishes looked excellent! Another great installment! Really enjoyed it...funny about Wayne and Garth rolling their eyeballs at mom something my kids would do.
"You're embarrassing me mom"...I hear it all the time! Oh well...its our little way of getting them out of the nest at 18....right? !!!

So anyways, can't wait for more!

 

[DisneyJo]

Deb, another great installment, I would love to do MNSSHP one day but we're getting to do the P&PP in August so that's pretty close! Alice is so cute with the fireworks, my DD used to do that too. And Garth wanting a divorce

So what treats did you get?

 

[Lovemy3babes]

Alright! Another installment. No Deb, probably not going back anytime soon. I'm so bummed out. But it would be totally financially irresponsible of us.

 

[disneyaddicted]

Trick or treating in Disney. What an awesome experience! Here they do trick or treating at our mall (we always went) and none of the townships would have theirs on the same day. some would be the friday before halloween or the saturday after, a few were right on halloween, one year we went 3 times (we are entitled to free candy) but I am sure the kids would have traded in three nights trick or treating around here, for even a few hours at Disney.

I liked the pictures, it looked pretty crowded though. Did they do anything extra at the haunted mansion?

another great update.

 

[Born 2B a Princess]

Subscribing

 

[slotzkin]

You had me laughing out loud as usual Deb. Every time I chuckled my DH looked over at me like I was a total nutcase Very much looking forward to the next installment.

 

[preschoolmom]

Alice is a doll, and the boys did great with their costumes.

I actually LOL'd at the fight over Stitch (reminded me So of my own family growing up!) and the caption under your DD's picture about the Godfather. That is monitor replacing kind of humor!

 

[Nicole786]

another 30 for me today! 370/600