The Many Adventures of The John Family- January 2010 (better late than never)

[ktjohn]

I've been lurking fairly silently on this board for several years. Most of my Disney parks knowledge has come from you guys. Therefore, I feel like I should “give back” to the Dis community and post a trip report to show my gratitude! Granted our trip happened this past January, so I'm not going remember every minute of every day in chronological order. Bear with me, and I'll give you the highlights of our trip

The John Family consists of Me (Katie), my DH (Brett), and my 2 DD’s (Noelle-6 and Kylie-4).

You never actually see me in the parks… if you passed by me, you’d probably see a very large camera with arms and legs attached to it. My husband would be the one cracking jokes that I can’t help but laugh at (and then I get annoyed, because my camera shook with laughter and made my picture blurry!). Noelle and Kylie would be the children tagging along and wailing that “Mommy takes pictures every 2 feet!!! Someone needs to stop her!” Apparently all that whining didn’t help, because I took over 2500 pictures on this trip. I know… it’s a disease. I can’t help myself. My husband has learned to accept and embrace it. My children… not so much. But I swear they will thank me later in life!! I promise I won’t post all 2500 pictures in this trip report (although it’s tempting for sure).

This was our second trip to Disney together. We went in Feb. 2009, and it was such an incredibly magical trip that we decided to come back again this year. Granted, I have been to Disney many times in my youth, but it’s an entirely new experience to come back as an adult and a parent. Most notable difference… it’s my own hard earned money being spent… which causes a wee bit of hyperventilation from time to time! HA!

We stayed off-site this year in a rental house, because my father was in Orlando for 2 weeks and offered to let us stay with him for free. Free is something you cannot beat. We scraped together $1800 to pay for everything else.

The most effective way to stay within a budget in Disney World is to define the budget and the game plan in advance and then pinky swear on it. And mean it. No half-hearted pinky swearing allowed. Here’s what Brett and I solemnly swore to each other as we pulled out of our driveway and headed down the highway towards the swirling vortex that is the magical Disney money trap. There would be 3 nights dining out, 1 character breakfast, and 5 nights eating dinner at the rental house. We packed lunches to bring to the parks and let the kids indulge in one Mickey Mouse ice cream each.

I also agreed to let my big kid (Brett) indulge in something gooey and artery clogging at the Main Street Bakery.

In return, he bought me some coffee a few times when I felt I could go no further without an infusion of caffeine (he’s so good to me!).

We agreed on a $$ amount to buy each other a gift or two. And the kids saved their Christmas and Birthday money from relatives to buy their own souvenirs.

We told them from the beginning of the trip that if they wanted something, we would take a picture of it on Daddy’s cell phone. On the last day of that particular park, they would scroll through the pictures and decide what they MOST wanted. This was the game plan. It took determination and willpower. But we did it! We paid for the whole trip in cash and stuck to the budget victoriously. The only time I felt slightly deprived was when I saw those big Mickey “balloon in a balloon” on Main St. I had wanted one SO BAD as a child, and thought to myself, “Hey! Here’s my chance to live vicariously through my children!” But after asking about the price and nearly gagging, it all became very crystal clear to me why I never got one as a child… and why my own children wouldn’t be getting one.

Why did we do Disney on such a tight budget? A. Because we’re not very wealthy, and B. because this year marks our 10th wedding anniversary. Brett and I are going back to Disney in September for a romantic week without the kids! (Someone hold me down before I hit the ceiling with anticipation). We are saving most of our pennies for that trip. I can’t even wait!!! Anyway, in order to do 2 Disney trips in one year, it took a lot of saving and strategizing and budgeting.

Here are the highlights from our 3 days in the Magic Kingdom:

There is nothing quite like watching your child’s eyes light up when they first see the castle. It’s a precious moment in life. Have your camera ready!

It seems to be turning into a tradition on the first day that we run to the Emporium for autograph books and then walk excitedly to Dumbo. Why do we have to ride Dumbo first? I honestly don’t know. My kids haven’t even seen the movie yet, and the ride is painfully short!! It’s a mystery why Dumbo has to be first… but sometimes you can’t explain family traditions. They just are. And we like them that way. Since our trips have either been the last week of Jan. or the first week of Feb., the parks are very quiet. Unfortunately, Dumbo is always our longest wait (apparently we’re not the only ones with weird family traditions). We walk on to most every other ride (I love Feb!) or get a fast pass.

Since our kids are 6 and 4, we spent a good chunk of our time in Fantasyland and Toontown Fair. When there are no lines for the Barnstormer, how can you resist going on it again and again??! And so we did… many times.

We also went on the teacups repeatedly.

It’s my very favorite ride… when I was 8, my Dad took me on the teacups and spun me so fast I couldn’t walk off. We have VHS home video evidence of this classic moment in the life of me! I love nostalgia I wish I could spin Noelle and Kylie that fast, but my poor weakling arms can’t do it. And Brett flat out refuses to go on rides that spin. That’s ok… I don’t like rides that go upside down, which is his favorite kind of ride. Together we complete each other!

Noelle was a year older this time and therefore decided she was not scared of anything. She asked if we could go on Pirates of the Caribbean. I had my doubts, but I thought it might be refreshing to get out of Toontown for a little while. She informed Kylie that nothing in Disney was real, so there was nothing to be afraid of (I don’t know who told her nothing was real… I will smack them upside the head when I find out the culprit!). We ran down the dark halls of Pirates (because there were no lines), and climbed into the boat. As we floated past the skeletons in the dark, Noelle started whimpering, “This was a bad idea. This was a very bad idea!” Nice. Too late, Princess!! Brett held both girls, and we talked jovially to them for the duration of the ride (our tone of voice seems to affect their level of fear). At the end of the ride, Noelle jumped out and announced, “That was great! Let’s do it again!!” Oh brother…

Kylie adores the Dreams Come True show at the castle. She sits there with sparkling eyes and a dreamy smile.

While Noelle is our little Mexican jumping bean, Kylie is our quintessential princess. Sleeping Beauty is her absolute favorite princess. We saw the Dreams Come True show on our first day at MK. However, it rained for part of our last day, so they cancelled the show. Instead, they had the performers come out and greet everybody.

Kylie was SOOOO excited to finally meet Prince Phillip. She has asked every princess we’ve ever met, “Where is your man??!” Seriously, Disney. Where are the princes?? Anyway, meeting Prince Phillip was a highlight for her little romantic heart.

At Storytime with Belle, Kylie was chosen to participate as one half of Lumiere. As you can see, she took her job VERY seriously…

When meeting Belle, Kylie got tired and flopped down on the bench. Belle thought that was very funny and called her The Little Sleeping Beauty!

It is also a MUST for the girls to go wake up Tinkerbell and get sprinkled with pixie dust. Free entertainment! Who can pass up free?? The unfortunate backlash to this was that Kylie wanted to know why we weren't flying?! I guess we were sprinkled with some defective dust.

True confessions time! Every time we watch Wishes, I cry. It's so special. I work so hard all year to save up every last penny to make these trips happen, and as I stand there watching the look of perfect delight and amazement on my little girls' faces, I know that it was all worth it. Plus, I cry because the Wishes song is so darn inspirational (don't get me started... let's move right along).

We did most everything you can do in the Magic Kingdom over the span of 3 days, but those were our most memorable highlights. I'll be back later with highlights from Epcot, HS, and AK. Stay tuned!

 

[Queenofallthings]

GREAT START!!!

Your pictures are beautiful and I can't wait to hear more. We were there end of January beginning of February and it was freezing...but hey, we were at our happy place so we didn't care!

 

[ktjohn]

Epcot is my FAVORITE park. Hands down. It’s been my favorite park since I was 8 (I must have been a strange kid, because most kids tend to get bored there). Here are the highlights from our 2 days in Epcot.

Brett leads the charge when it comes to hunting down characters. Every Daddy has a special way of connecting with his children, and Brett bonds with his little girls by joining them in the chase to find as many characters as possible in a day. He gets more excited than they do! It makes me smile and love him even more.

In January, there aren’t many people waiting in line to see characters, so we can hunt them down in every country of the World Showcase in record time.

It’s Brett’s job to sniff out the characters wherever they may be. Then I’m in charge of photography. I will spare you the eyeball cramps from scrolling through every single character sighting picture (there are many). But here’s Piglet… I hear Piglet is a rare sighting. True?? Yes? No? I don’t know… but the kids were pretty stoked to see Piglet.

This is about how busy it was in Epcot when we were there…

No, seriously. It was so quiet!

The weather in January was pretty cool, but our drama queen Noelle insisted on using her new fan from China and declared it to be a hot hot day.

Last year the girls were pretty scared to climb into Bruce’s teethy mouth. This year they were more agreeable to the whole idea…

Brett can’t understand why people always smile happily while being eaten by a giant Disney shark. He decided to give me a more realistic impression of being eaten by a shark…

Soarin’ is Kylie’s favorite ride. She calls it “The Kite Ride.” I kind of thought she would be scared of it the first time, but she adores it.

We spent almost a whole day in the World Showcase making these masks and getting the charm from EVERY country. Kylie colored a little chunk of her mask in each country, which is why it looks like modern art. Noelle just drew a pretty landscape on her face

On our second day in Epcot, we went to the Askerhaus Princess breakfast. In an effort to be totally honest, I have to say I was disappointed. I hate having to be honest, because I love everything Disney and would prefer never to have anything negative to say. But I was really sad that the princess barely spent more than a minute with us (even though it wasn't very busy). The waitress rushed us through our breakfast and kept coming over to ask if we were all set and gave us the bill immediately. We paid a pretty penny for this experience (which was even more painful knowing what a tight budget we were on and how I really squeezed this breakfast into the budget to make it happen). I was also a bit sad that the princesses didn’t “look” authentic. They looked like girls with wigs (and with no facial resemblance either). They also didn’t act in character at all. Of course, I say all this in hopes you’ll take it with a grain of salt. My 6 and 4 year old daughters were thrilled. They have no concept of what it cost, and they are not as picky about “acting” and “authenticity.” Their happy faces helped calm the pang of disappointment rising in my chest that morning.

I love Epcot at night most of all. It is so gorgeous and almost surreal.

Illuminations is especially beautiful. But I’m a little bit of a critic and still prefer the laser light show Epcot used to do back in 1987 when I was 8. I still watch it on my Dad’s VHS home video. The laser dancing ice skater is really imprinted in my childhood memories, and the big spinning earth-mobile thingy they have now is just not as awesome to me. But oh well. I still love it.

I swear this tree leaned over to sneak into my shot and said, “Hi, Mom!”

Those were the highlights from Epcot. We didn’t do any drinking, shopping, shows, or wild rides (Test Track, Mission Space, etc…) during this trip. We’re saving all that “adult fun” for our anniversary Mommy/Daddy trip in September (peel me off the ceiling. I’m beginning to hyperventilate with excitement again!).

 

[ktjohn]

We had never been to Animal Kingdom before. It didn’t exist when I was growing up, and during our trip last year, we never made it there. This year we were excited to finally try it out.

Expedition Everest is the biggest roller coaster Noelle has ever been on. I was nervous that she’d be traumatized. Brett went on with her, and she came off the ride on cloud 9. She loved, loved, loved it!

Kylie, on the other hand, was too short. Poor Kylie! She told everybody she met that she was too short.

I made it up to her by taking her on the TriceraTop Spin.

The Nemo show was very cool. I was like a big kid with my jaw hanging and my eyes sparkling with wonder. Totally awesome!

Camp Minnie Mickey was notably sweet and relaxing. We just stood there for such a long time watching the creek. I’m pretty sure the atmosphere any other time of year would probably not be as lazy and calm.

The girls were happy to see Miss Bunny (who they call Mrs. Thumper).

We got front row seats to the Lion King show!

The show was really amazing…

The best part was that Noelle got to be in the celebration!

What made it extra special was that she had really wanted to be in Storytime with Belle at the Magic Kingdom. When Kylie was chosen instead, Noelle sat quietly for a moment looking sad. You could see the internal struggle written on her face. Then she leaned over to me and said, “I’m so proud of my little sister. She’s going to do a great job!” I was so proud of her for not whining about it!! My heart melted. When she was invited into the Lion King celebration a few days later, it was like a thrilling reward to her. Of course I had to remind both girls that many kids never get picked ever, so they should not take it for granted!

We spent a good amount of time at the Conservation Station (I think that’s what it was called).

On our first trip in 2009, we met almost every princess except Pocahontas. Brett and the girls were on a mission to find her this year to complete their autograph book. And find her they did!

Another True Confessions time!! I am a big, big fan of llamas and alpacas. I think they are downright hilarious. We used to live near a llama farm when I was growing up, and when my husband and I were first married, we would drive by that farm on our way to work every morning. He would promise to buy me a llama and swore it was in the mail on its way to me (every day). During a trip to the Mall Of America once, he actually bought me a stuffed Llama that we named Kronk (haha). Every marriage has little inside jokes like that. Llamas are ours.

So you can imagine my complete hysteria and delight when we FOUND ONE AT THE PETTING STATION!! EEEK!!! We named him “Mr. The Llama,” and I think I took about 80 pictures of it.

I know. I’m strange. Love me for who I am

The kids were not too sure about petting and brushing the sheep. They were a bit intimidated. But they gave it a shot.

I thought the parade at the end of the day was extremely interesting and very well designed!

We never did make it to so many things at the Animal Kingdom (because Noelle just had to go on Everest so many times!). When Brett and I go back in September, we’ll definitely be prioritizing the safari and the flights of wonder! I heard great things about both from some friends who were there at the same time.

 

[ktjohn]

Hollywood Studios will just NEVER be Hollywood Studios to me. I’ll probably call it MGM till the day I die, and my grandkids will wonder what the heck I’m talking about. Oh well. I’m stubborn like that.

We spent one day here, but we packed a lot into that day! (I'll just give you the highlights)

When you have small children, you make an immediate detour for Playhouse Disney. ASAP! Gotta keep the restless natives happy, you know!

To my surprise and a little pang of sadness, Noelle wasn’t as excited about it this year. I think she’s slowly growing out of Playhouse Disney (I’m going to start sobbing and getting all emotional. My baby is growing up). At least Kylie was still happy to get up and dance and chase bubbles and autumn leaves!

The Tower of Terror is one of Brett’s favorite rides. Every time it’s mentioned in conversation, he hearkens back to the days of yore when he was on his high school senior band trip to Disney and rode it over and over again all afternoon with no lines, no waiting. I’ve heard the story many (many) times, but it still makes me smile to hear him tell it so passionately.

Now, just FYI... I have a fear of elevators. Seriously. I have reoccurring nightmares of being in falling elevators. But when you love somebody, you’ll go on the Tower of Terror with them (at least that’s what I’m told). So I did. And my legs were shaking for about 3 hours after.

The Beauty and the Beast show is one of our family’s favorites! I don’t think we ever get tired of it!

And I’ve decided it’s my new mission in life to learn how to kick this high.

Kylie is in love with “Lightning The Queen”

Noelle used to be in love with them until the engine revved while she was standing there and scared the crap out of her! Hee hee hee.

This Jedi master was hilarious and entertaining. We stood there for awhile after going on Star Tours and watched his show.

Brett really is a big kid who makes me laugh. He stood in line with a several little boys and waited till it was his turn to get his picture taken. Haha!

We got to meet Dug and the other Up characters. That was a blast. They danced with us and spent plenty of time with us.

This is Brett and Dug sensing a “SQUIRREL!” nearby

Noelle informed us that when she grows up, she’s going to be Mrs. Incredible in Disney World and live in the castle, and she will come to our table when we visit. Haha! A girl with a vision!

You guys will probably start breathing into a brown paper bag when I say this, but we did not immediately run to Toy Story Mania. I keep reading on these boards about people racing to get fast passes and all the fast passes running out. I hear about 2-3 hour wait times. I’m glad I didn’t know about all this when we went. I would have stressed out. We just meandered over there, got a fast pass, and came back a few hours later (ahhh… the glorious calm of going in late January).

The ride was fantastic! We were not disappointed at all.

Kylie was totally focused and “on mission.”

I, personally, was thrilled to meet Eeyore. We are both melodramatic and understand each other.

My kids were SOOO happy to be at Fantasmic.

Fantasmic is always a highlight. But please, People! Don’t wave light up wands or spinny things in the air. There are people behind you trying to see! (Ok, that was me on my soapbox for a moment. This is me composing myself again…)

Leaving Disney is always bittersweet. So sad, but so many great memories. Kylie said goodbye to the castle on the monorail as many times as she could before it was completely out of view and gone until the next trip.

Goodnight, Disney. Thanks for the memories…

(Hope you enjoyed the trip report! I’ll be reporting back after our Mommy/Daddy trip in September!)

 

[ktjohn]

GREAT START!!!

Your pictures are beautiful and I can't wait to hear more. We were there end of January beginning of February and it was freezing...but hey, we were at our happy place so we didn't care!

Thanks!!!

I don't mind the freezing, actually. We can cover more ground in the cool weather and spend a whole day in the park without slowing down or getting tired. The heat and blazing sun slows us down, and we take lots of breaks.