The Rebel Forces Were Strong But The Smith's Are Stronger TR-7/20 FINAL THOUGHTS

[SOUTHERNtinkerBELLE]

Yay!!! I'm so excited that you decided to go to Ireland! You are going to have such a great time!

 

[Jennifer48]

WOOHOO IRELAND!

 

[praisehisname]

Definitely dancing with you! Can't wait to see the pics!

 

[jenb1023]

I am finally back in DISland and happy to be reading the details of the trip!

Woo-hoo for Ireland!

 

[2xcited2sleep]

Late to the party but happy to be here.

Congratulations on Ireland! That will be an amazing trip!!

Loving your WDW trip. Too bad about the delay. I don't know how you functioned on that little sleep. I am apparently not a good DIS'er b/c I do let sleep get in the way. In fact, I have never EVER been at a park for rope drop.

The Star Wars dress is AMAZING!

Looking forward to more and off to see the surprise trip video you mentioned. Love Disney surprises!!

 

[Queenofallthings]

Came across your TR this morning and am thoroughly enjoying it.

So sorry you were so delayed, but so impressed that you made rope drop! That SW dress is adorable...so many talented people on these boards.

Can't wait for more

 

[twob4him]

Wow...congrats on your Ireland trip!!! Sounds fabulous!!!!

 

[goofy's_gurl]

Yay for Ireland!!!

 

[Tnkrbelle565]

Yay!!! I'm so excited that you decided to go to Ireland! You are going to have such a great time!

I think we will!!! Some much needed adult only time

WOOHOO IRELAND!

thank you!

Definitely dancing with you! Can't wait to see the pics!

I am SOOOO excited to have a good camera for this trip

I am finally back in DISland and happy to be reading the details of the trip!

Woo-hoo for Ireland!

welcome back

Late to the party but happy to be here.

Congratulations on Ireland! That will be an amazing trip!!

Loving your WDW trip. Too bad about the delay. I don't know how you functioned on that little sleep. I am apparently not a good DIS'er b/c I do let sleep get in the way. In fact, I have never EVER been at a park for rope drop.

The Star Wars dress is AMAZING!

Looking forward to more and off to see the surprise trip video you mentioned. Love Disney surprises!!

Never late! As I mentioned, if Stacy wasn't there...we wouldn't have made as many rope drops as we did!

Did you get to see the surprise video?

Came across your TR this morning and am thoroughly enjoying it.

So sorry you were so delayed, but so impressed that you made rope drop! That SW dress is adorable...so many talented people on these boards.

Can't wait for more

Thanks for reading!

Wow...congrats on your Ireland trip!!! Sounds fabulous!!!!

Yay for Ireland!!!

Thank you both!!!

NOW...on to the TR!

 

[mkleinbe]

NOW...on to the TR!

 

[Tnkrbelle565]

When I left you (ages ago...I know!) we were at the turnstiles hoping that we could accomplish our "rope drop plan" Randy had run back to the ticket booth to let me know that "another one of your friends is here" Turns out he was referring to Jessica- who was there with her son, her friend, and her friend's daughter.

We got through the turnstiles and headed straight into the massive crowd...yes this was still a good 45 minutes until rope drop. Now here was the plan. We gave Randy all of the tickets to get TSM fastpasses. Then all the mommies to the kids over near Echo Lake to get ready to run to Jedi training. At SWW they do Jedi Training differently. Actually minus the running it is much more efficient. You get in line, get a ticket for a certain show and return 20 minutes before your show time. Every kid gets to do it (provided that we are at rope drop and can run fast )

Meanwhile our kids were getting might antsy to get into the park. 1) Aisling didn't have much sleep 2) we don't do rope drop and 3) we had never seen crowds like this. While we were waiting, CMs and random strangers kept coming over to check out their outfits. One man even asked for pics! There was some kind of CM training going on and the trainer took the kids a couple of times to show the trainees. Aisling did her best twirling for them to show off (she eats up this kind of thing!!!)

FINALLY it was 9am and we all ran in our separate directions. Randy being by himself flew! 4 Mommies with 5 kiddos were a little slower but we did make it to Jedi Academy sign ups. And thus was our first LONG line wait of the weekend. The kids were NOT loving it. I had to have a little word with my Jedi that this weekend was going to be VERY busy, we were going to have to wait in a lot of lines, and she was going to have to get used to it or go back to the hotel. I know that I was being a little firm with a baby who had gotten 5 hours sleep but firmness avoids meltdowns with Aisling for the most part.

We ended up getting into the 2:15 show. Yup, at the park an hour early and still didn't get in until 2:15. But again, the way they did it, we got to go off and enjoy the parks instead of waiting around for a show. So off to enjoy we did.

At this point, Randy had rejoined us with the FPs for TSM (Thankfully we did this because by 10am they were out of the day)

Next we decided to head over to Star Tours. The wait time was 40-45 minutes. NOPE. Next to the ride was the line for CP30 and Leia so we decided to wait for them instead. We ended up waiting 20-30 minutes. It also brought up something that I didn't know about SWW and didn't particularly love. THe characters only have 4-5 different meeting spots and then rotate. So you can wait all that time and not have the character you we waiting for. It's very frustrating. We got up to the front of the line just as C3PO left. In his place, Luke Skywalker came out so the kids were ok with that!

Now here is the funny story. When I made the autograph books for the kids...I forgot a couple of characters. Luckily I put in blank pages. One of the characters was Luke! OOOPPPSS Well he gets the autograph book and keeps looking for his page. I tried pulling him aside to explain (and apologize) but he kept going! The funnier part was that I had put Darth Vader and Anakin Skywalker in the book (he was out last year but wasn't out this year). Luke started teasing the kids that his dad got TWO pages and he got none!!! It was really funny and it made our grumpy hot kids much happier!

There are a bunch of PP pics of this that I'll add later on

Pics/autographs done, we headed out to check out the other character lines. They were all insane. The handlers were telling us that most we around the 2 hour wait mark

We did see an Ewok along the way (apparently Ewoks have names...this one is Wicket I believe)

I conferred with the adults and make a decision to let the kids sit in some AC for awhile (it was in the 90s with 98% humidity...the kids needed it). So off to the Great Movie Ride we went. We got the cowboy which was a nice change. We'd been getting the gangster for the past couple of trips

The ride did the trick and cooled our babies off for a few minutes. We came out and they were putting the ropes out for the parades (turns out they were actually putting them out for HSM3 and THEN the SW parade but) there were still empty seats on the curb and with the crowds the way they were, I KNEW we better move it fast or we weren't getting a front row spot.

Where did we end up sitting????

Did we get a nice shady spot?????

Was Aisling still awake?????

 

[mkleinbe]

The lines were INSANE! I totally agree. We went on Saturday (morning EMH=dumb idea...). The one autograph we didn't get last year that we were set on for this year was Darth, but we just weren't going to wait 2 hours. :

Too funny that Luke kept looking for his page.

 

[disneycruisegal]

These SSWE sound fun and I think I'd love to go just to see everthing someday....but those lines sound absolutly crazy. I don't know if I'd be up to it. I try and enjoy the parks when their a little less crowded. Although, what am I talking about, I'm going Easter week next year.

 

[Tnkrbelle565]

The lines were INSANE! I totally agree. We went on Saturday (morning EMH=dumb idea...). The one autograph we didn't get last year that we were set on for this year was Darth, but we just weren't going to wait 2 hours. :

Too funny that Luke kept looking for his page.

Our EMH hours experience is coming up!

 

[Tnkrbelle565]

These SSWE sound fun and I think I'd love to go just to see everthing someday....but those lines sound absolutly crazy. I don't know if I'd be up to it. I try and enjoy the parks when their a little less crowded. Although, what am I talking about, I'm going Easter week next year.

Good luck!!! I was post some crowd pic of MK later on that may have you rethinking that idea

 

[Lady Lallie]

You are brave, brave souls! I would have had a meltdown, lines and heat, EEK!

 

[Tnkrbelle565]

You are brave, brave souls! I would have had a meltdown, lines and heat, EEK!

Get ready for the heat!!! The weather was very similar to September However the lack of lines will make up for it.

 

[Lady Lallie]

Get ready for the heat!!! The weather was very similar to September However the lack of lines will make up for it.

I'm not looking forward to running/walking in that heat come October. Blech. I do love those lack of lines though. When I went in May last year, I thought the heat was worse than when I went in September. Maybe I just have selective memory.

 

[Tnkrbelle565]

I'm not looking forward to running/walking in that heat come October. Blech. I do love those lack of lines though. When I went in May last year, I thought the heat was worse than when I went in September. Maybe I just have selective memory.

Have you gone in October before? The lines were longer in October than in Sept. but still weren't bad (other than at Food and Wine) In terms of the heat, it's hit or miss. The week before I went they need coats! We were sweating to death the following week.

 

[praisehisname]

Yikes! I will do my best to avoid DHS on SWW!!!