We weren't SUPPOSED to plan a Disney trip this year!! Oct 23-30 *TR to come soon!*

[t_daniels]

I like how you have your pins displayed... Mine just sit in a bag.

Me too!

Oh, you should read my Beauty and the Beast story from our last trip! Here's the link if you're interested

Just curious, do you do any of the WDW roller coasters? I was scared to death of RnRC, but after I went on it, I personally thought it was one of the more mild ones at WDW. You don't even notice you're going upside down (seriously). If you don't mind FAST, I personally think it's relatively tame for a roller coaster. Just my 2 cents!
e too!

Mom (the author!) outside Writer's stop:

DH relaxing inside Writer's Stop:

Love that story! Also, I'm trying Writers stop this next trip I take! I'm with you on rnrc...I rode it in high school. I was terrified of coasters. But the music helped!

 

[teekathepony]

Hello! I'm joining in! I wasn't supposed to be doing a Disney trip this year either. It's not easy to resist, is it?

 

[kdka421]

We only have a few pins...but I need to do this!

I highly recommend it, it looks great, and it's super easy

Love that story! Also, I'm trying Writers stop this next trip I take! I'm with you on rnrc...I rode it in high school. I was terrified of coasters. But the music helped!

Thanks And thanks also for joining in my PTR! I appreciate it

Hello! I'm joining in! I wasn't supposed to be doing a Disney trip this year either. It's not easy to resist, is it?

Hello and thanks to you as well for joining in!!
It's SO hard to resist the pulls of Disney! We insisted we weren't going again this year, and then I just couldn't stop thinking about it! But we're NOT going to go again next year!

 

[silverhaze269]

Well, it's just my 2 cents -- but I personally think Everest is a more-intense coaster than RnRC. (I know plenty of people disagree) If you can get up the nerve to handle EE, I don't think you'll have any problem with RnRC. That said -- I was freaking out before RnRC, I definitely almost chickened out last second. BUT - it was nowhere near as intense as I thought it would be. It's weird because RnRC is definitely "in the dark" like you said, but you can SEE so much stuff (I had no idea about how it was decorated on the inside) it doesn't FEEL like the dark. The blacklight effect is super cool.

Maybe I will give it a shot... I don't think I could get my fiance on it, so it would be a big jump for me, but I may give it a shot.

Hey all!

I just posted this on another DISer's PTR, since something there reminded me of it...but I wanted to share it with all of my readers here as well.


My father-daughter dance at my wedding was to "When She Loved Me" from Toy Story 2.

My dad actually wrote up a magazine article about it, if you want to read it, here: http://www.guideposts.org/stories-faith/father-gives-away-bride-father-daughter-story

5 years later, still brings a tear to my eye! I love my dad!

Totally brought a tear to my eye too (or maybe a few)! I can't help thinking that's going to be me in less than 3 months, and I can only imagine that's exactly how my dad feels. I am going to be a complete and utter mess at my wedding, I have no idea how my makeup will stay on

 

[kdka421]

Maybe I will give it a shot... I don't think I could get my fiance on it, so it would be a big jump for me, but I may give it a shot.

Totally brought a tear to my eye too (or maybe a few)! I can't help thinking that's going to be me in less than 3 months, and I can only imagine that's exactly how my dad feels. I am going to be a complete and utter mess at my wedding, I have no idea how my makeup will stay on

Good luck It's worth it...but I know it took me at least 3 trips to get up the nerve to go myself!

Thanks...I love the story, and of course it's a wonderful memory. Weddings are such a beautiful thing! You must be so excited that yours is coming up so quickly!

 

[kdka421]

Wow, we had a super busy weekend, time flew by, and all of a sudden we're in the 70s...down to 78 days!

I have a mini-TR for you from the weekend...hope you enjoy!

Hubby and I took a day trip to NYC on Saturday. We live about 3 hours North from the city, so it's real easy to get in/out for the day. Our last trip into the city we took the regular Amtrak train, which is very nice and convenient. This time, however, we opted to take the Megabus, which we hadn't taken before. (Of course there was the Megabus fatal accident 2 days before our trip, but I was at least comforted by the fact that a bus blowing a tire is basically unpreventable, it wasn't due to driver stupidity, lol) So I wasn't really sure what to expect from the Megabus, being super low-cost low-budget transportation, but all in all we were quite pleased by it. Total cost was only $28.50 total for the two of us, round trip. Leg room was no different than the train, wifi didn't work consistently but no big deal. My biggest concern was delays/traffic...but getting down we got in only about 30 minutes late, and getting home we got in about 10 minutes early.

So our plans for the day were only 2 things, since the latest Megabus train left NYC at 5:40, we couldn't fit in too much. But our plans were:

1. Lunch at Jean Georges. As I've said in my PTR, hubby and I are both foodies, and we LOVE fancy meals. We've been to a fair number of 5-star/5-diamond restaurants, but this was our first time at a 3-Michelin star restaurant. Lunch was out of this world fantastic. Our reservation was for 11:45, and we barely made it out of there at 1:45 (not due to slow service, just due to eating a ton of food!). I can't say enough good things about this restaurant. Our waitress was attentive, each and every dish was just perfectly composed...each dish looked beautiful, but I wish I could explain just how perfect everything tasted.

This is what I ordered (and Aaron's choices were equally fantastic):
-Foie gras with strawberry granola, balsamic vinegar, sorrel
-Warm asparagus salad with hollandaise, truffle vinaigrette, avocado
-Confit of suckling pig with summer corn, smoked bacon marmalade
-Dessert: A celebration of cherry. Cherry creme brulee, cherries jubilee with champagne foam, cherry gelato, and a deconstructed Black Forest Cake. (compliments of the house!)

2. Matinee production of Harvey starring Jim Parsons (Sheldon, Big Bang Theory). I LOVE the theater. My husband, not so much. I particularly like musicals, and I've seen a number of them on Broadway. I've also dragged Aaron to his fair share. So after our last trip to NYC, which involved a musical, he requested that next time we try a play. Strangely, I realized I'd never seen a play on Broadway. So when we saw that Jim Parsons was going to be doing a show, we jumped on the opportunity. And I'm so glad we did.

We both loved the performance. Jim Parsons was absolutely outstanding in the lead role, but the supporting cast was just fantastic as well. Co-stars included Charles Kimbrough and Jessica Hecht. We missed our opportunity to meet Jim Parsons after the show, but we did get Charles Kimbrough's autograph:

So, that was the end of our whirlwind trip to NYC. We had a blast...and can't wait to go back again!

 

[smile4stamps]

Your meal sounds fantastic!! My hubby and I both LOVE foie!! Its disappointing that WDW restaurants don't serve foie!! I'm also a huge fan of suckling pig!! Yummy!!

 

[silverhaze269]

I love NYC I haven't been since 2008, and I miss it so much! I'm hoping that we'll be able to get back next year (well, my fiance has only ever been to Disney World outside of Canada, so it would be her first time there).

 

[Chelley00]

I love Jim Parsons. I'm so jealous you are so close to NYC. DH hates big cities, so when we go, he spends most of his time whining about traffic and too many people

 

[kdka421]

Your meal sounds fantastic!! My hubby and I both LOVE foie!! Its disappointing that WDW restaurants don't serve foie!! I'm also a huge fan of suckling pig!! Yummy!!

I absolutely love foie gras! I can't pass it up anywhere. I don't think I'd ever had suckling pig before, and that was surprisingly my favorite dish of the day (although they were all wonderful).

I love NYC I haven't been since 2008, and I miss it so much! I'm hoping that we'll be able to get back next year (well, my fiance has only ever been to Disney World outside of Canada, so it would be her first time there).

NYC is so awesome! I hope you two are able to take a trip soon! I know how exciting it is to visit new places.

I love Jim Parsons. I'm so jealous you are so close to NYC. DH hates big cities, so when we go, he spends most of his time whining about traffic and too many people

Jim Parsons is so awesome! This was a great roll for him, and yet it was different enough so you didn't really think of him as "Sheldon".
I know we're really lucky to be close to NYC. When we were living in VA the last 5 years, I missed being so close, so it's nice to be close again. And there are so many convenient and easy ways to get into the city (the last thing I want to do is drive, deal with the traffic and parking, yuck).

 

[kdka421]

Some changes/misc notes:

I think I overlooked some EMHs when doing my initial plans - and I made my plans without taking EMHs into account, but weirdly we ended up at the EMH park every day of our trip except one. We don't really mind that, and we appreciate the extra time in the parks. It's just going to make for some reallllly long days. We will have 3 morning EMH days, 3 evening EMH days, plus MNSSHP which goes until midnight (and MK has EMH that morning. Yikes)

We have one other tentative change to our plans, which we won't finalize until the day-of. I have been concerned about our lack of time at the food & wine festival. So, we made tentative alternative plans in case on our first afternoon there we realize that we need more time at the festival.

So, if we enjoy our F&W lunch on Day 2, and decide that we want to have F&W dinner instead of our scheduled ADR at Rose & Crown, then we'll (obviously) cancel our Rose & Crown plans. That frees up an extra Table Service credit....but we don't really have a spare meal slot to slide that into. So instead, if we do cancel Rose & Crown, we're going to replace our Day 7 meal at The Wave with dinner at Narcoossee's that night. I've already swapped out the ADR at The Wave for one at Narcoossee's, since I think we'd have an easier time walking into The Wave if we decided to stick with those plans. So as of now, I'm guessing that we probably will stick with the alternative plans, and that makes me really excited! That means we'll end up with 3 signature dinners, and only 1 regular table service dinner. It's a weird way to use our credits, to be sure (and not the most cost-effective, which doesn't really matter since it's all "free")...but I'm really excited at the opportunity to try 3 more of Disney's signature restaurants. We'll now be trying Flying Fish, Yachtsman Steakhouse, and Narcoossee's.

 

[silverhaze269]

^ Sounds good to me!

 

[kdka421]

Oops, it's been a few days since I've updated! We're now at 71 days! Wow, that's almost in the 60s!

I wasn't sure at first what to update about this time, but it just came to me -- Disney movies! Aaron and I have been on a kick lately of watching a ton of Disney movies. We're lucky that my Dad has a huge collection we can borrow from, and then I've been finding the others on Netflix.

So, here are some mini-reviews of the Disney movies we've watched most recently. They range from classics to much more obscure.

101 Dalmatians (original animated version): An obvious classic, we just re-watched this one yesterday. Nothing bad to say about this. An interesting note is when they were doing the Twilight Bark scene, we recognized a number of dog-characters that were literally pulled right out of a few other movies we've watched recently, including Lady and the Tramp. Funny to see the reuse of characters.

Polyanna: A somewhat obscure live action film. I believe this was Hayley Mills' first film, done before The Parent Trap. I'd never seen this one before, Aaron had. It was cute, but pretty slow moving, and very low on plot points.

Frank and Ollie: A documentary about 2 of Disney's original animators, both worked on many of the first classic animated films. This was a first for both of us, and since we really enjoy Disney history, we both really enjoyed it. Very cute look at their lives and past, and a bit of Disney Studios' history.

The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad: I'd seen this before, but not in a long time, and Aaron had not - and was eager to see it to give a little insight onto the now-gone Mr. Toad's Wild Ride which he never got a chance to experience. The film is 2 short stories which each have/had a small tie in at WDW - the Ichabod story involves the Headless Horsemen (who is in the MNSSHP parade), and obviously Mr. Toad used to have a ride. These were very cute (albeit slightly strange) and fun to watch again.

Tangled: One of the newer Disney films, we just watched this for the first time, however. I thought Rapunzel was an adorable character, and I enjoyed the storyline. However, I was less than thrilled by the music. I also thought it got off to a slow start. But I can see why Rapunzel is so popular.

The Happiest Millionaire: A very obscure live action film. My dad loves the movie, but he's strange like that I'm not sure if I've seen the whole movie in one sitting, but I've seen a good chunk of it in bits and pieces, including most/all of the songs. It's totally weird; the second song is about how the family alligator bit the dad on his finger, and how he could have died! Anyway, Aaron tried to watch this the other day, and maybe got about a half-hour into it before turning it off. He hopes to try again later...

We've also recently watched - The Aristocats, The Sword in the Stone, Lady and the Tramp. All good classic animation!


Coming via Netflix today is a documentary called Waking Sleeping Beauty, about the Disney studios in the 80s and 90s. Never seen that before, and looking forward to it.

Do you have any obscure family favorites to recommend??

 

[teekathepony]

I had actually posted in my own PTR about obscure or old classic Disney movies to watch and got a few great responses including...
Fantasia
The Sword in the Stone
Oliver & Company
The Rescuers
Mary Poppins

 

[kdka421]

Just a real quick update to say that we finally bought our special event tickets today!

Today was the first day you could buy the F&W Festival tickets, so this morning I hopped online to purchase our tickets for the Party for the Senses on 10/27. We just decided to do general admission, so I was able to get those online rather than having to call. We also have decided not to do any of the smaller seminars/etc, since we're already doing the party plus we'll be tasting at the booths.

Since I was already spending money... I decided to buy our MNSSHP tickets today as well! If I could somehow guarantee that the tickets wouldn't sell out, I would have waited to buy them until that week when I'd seen the weather forecast, but since there is always a chance of selling out especially that close to Halloween, I knew I needed to buy them ahead of time for my peace of mind. So we now have our MNSSHP tickets for 10/25.

Anyone else going to be there on either of these dates??

 

[smile4stamps]

Yeah for booking PFTS!! I will be there a week earlier! I think you get Robert Irvine at yours though!!!!

I had to call for my reservations as they couldn't be booked online. Thankfully I had a good experience doing it!!

 

[kdka421]

I had actually posted in my own PTR about obscure or old classic Disney movies to watch and got a few great responses including...
Fantasia
The Sword in the Stone
Oliver & Company
The Rescuers
Mary Poppins

Thanks for your suggestions! Other than Sword in the Stone (which we just watched), we were planning to watch Fantasia soon, and I haven't seen any of the others recently either.

Yeah for booking PFTS!! I will be there a week earlier! I think you get Robert Irvine at yours though!!!!

I had to call for my reservations as they couldn't be booked online. Thankfully I had a good experience doing it!!

Yay! I am so excited for our first PFTS! Yes I do think Robert Irvine is going to be at ours -- I actually am not really familiar with who he is, until I started hearing everyone talk about him, haha; I've done a little research now. Pretty neat! The whole lineup for the event sounds great, but I think it's hard to go wrong no matter which day you're going to be there!

 

[lbuzz52]

jumping over from the FB group!

I'm married to a chef too- do you ever get to enjoy his food? people ask me that all the time - when he is actually home at night, the last thing he wants to do is cook LOL

we had a great CBR experience last trip. i have a few pics in my old TR in my siggie.

we also had a great experience at Flying Fish last trip. Amazing in both food and service. We would go back in a heartbeat.

 

[kdka421]

jumping over from the FB group!

I'm married to a chef too- do you ever get to enjoy his food? people ask me that all the time - when he is actually home at night, the last thing he wants to do is cook LOL

we had a great CBR experience last trip. i have a few pics in my old TR in my siggie.

we also had a great experience at Flying Fish last trip. Amazing in both food and service. We would go back in a heartbeat.

Hello! Thanks for joining in!

My hubby isn't actually a chef, he was a waiter at the restaurant where he was working at. However, that said - he is indeed a fabulous cook. He learned from his dad, and he is very talented, I'm always impressed at the way he can throw things together (whereas I have to follow a recipe to have a shot at it tasting right!) Those years he was working at the restaurant, he definitely didn't want to cook much. But right now he's back in school, getting his Masters Degree, so he's home all day, and does almost all of the cooking. I'm very blessed!

Thanks for pointing me to your old trip report, I've just started to skim through it. I'm glad you guys loved CBR. I do know we'll make the most of it if that's where we wind up, but I'm still going to keep checking to see if CSR opens up. I just know it seems to be more our style. I see you guys are staying at POR royal rooms! The first trip DH and I did together we stayed in POR, and we'd go there again in a heartbeat as well. Those royal rooms look beautiful!

Glad you guys loved Flying Fish too! I'm just SO excited for all our signature dinners. They all sound so wonderful. What ADRs are you most excited about this upcoming trip??

 

[smile4stamps]

Kate. NOt only would I keep checking for a different resort but I'd also just look for a general room reservation at CBR. The Pirate rooms are a ways from everything. In fact the only rooms I would try and stay away from, and this is just from the bus ride. They seem quite a ways out there! Hopefully something will come up for you!