Will I be Herding Cats Again?* **** COMPLETED *****

[mom2mek]

Photopass pictures!

I'm not going to re-insert these back into the report since I haven't gotten that far with the darn thing!

Here you go!


First Family at Character Connection! (Look how huge Goofy is....compare him to Minnie....he was GIGANTIC!!!!)

Zoomed in on Mickey & Minnie & the kids!

The big cheese:

Pluto!

Minnie (she was so little - not that much bigger than the kids!)

Donald:

Last but not least...the Gigantic Goofy!

(Poor Katie...her line of sight is right at an odd place on the Goofster!)

Sara

 

[kaysmommie]

Love the photopass pics especially the group one. Your kids are adorable as always and I love that picture of you hugging Mickey .

 

[DisneyJo]

Congratulations .

I would love to see what you wrote in your essay. Mine was probably just like everyone else's. So glad to see a Disser with lots of post get picked .

Thankyou so much, I'll do some kind of TR when I get back with my essay answers in too

Congratulations Jo! (I am insanely jealous!) I am happy for you! (Although, still insanely jealous!)

Thanks so much I still don't feel as though it's real!


Sorry for the hijack Sara, BTW have you noticed both our tickers are identical!!!!!!

Photopass pictures!

I just love this one, how great to have all the characters together

 

[mom2mek]

Love the photopass pics especially the group one. Your kids are adorable as always and I love that picture of you hugging Mickey .

Thanks Nichole! It was a great way to start our day!

Thankyou so much, I'll do some kind of TR when I get back with my essay answers in too

Thanks so much I still don't feel as though it's real!


Sorry for the hijack Sara, BTW have you noticed both our tickers are identical!!!!!!

Hey!!! Am I on the Disney Mom's Panel and don't know about it? That would be great!

Hey, maybe we could meet...I will be there with all girls (who are also moms, LOL)...I will PM you to see if there are any overlaps with our schedules...you being all busy with "moms panel" stuff and all

Sara

 

[Poohtigeey]

Sara! Those are great! Love the one w/ you too! Poor little Katie looks squished imbetween Emily and Donald! (Has he always been crosseyed?) And yikes on Goofy!LOL! You're off to a good Photopass start. Sure wish I could read more....

 

[mkluvsmickey]

I'll do it! (Do ya trust me?)

"I took a trip with weird internet friends...." could be my title!

Hey!



Great pictures Sara! I also love the one with you and Mickey!

 

[lovebuzzandwoody]

Very funny!



I'm so hurt.

I'm sorry. Can we still be friends?



LOVE the photopass pics! So cute! I love that Michael would let Minnie near him... my boys ~ not so much.

 

[anl]

Your pictures turned out so good! Can't wait to see more...and read more.

 

[princessjv]

I'll do it! (Do ya trust me?)

"I took a trip with weird internet friends...." could be my title!

Okay, wait a minute. Then you need to add... crazy enough to do MVMCP with stranger internet friend.

___________________________

I am all caught up. I do apologize for getting behind on my reading. Love that the surprise went well. Love, love, LOVE that everyone is listening to YOU!!! You go girl! I was getting mad at the computer last time I read your TR, Okay, so did you make those customs or buy them? My TINK has customs for most of her trip. Not made. bought... cause this princess does not sew.


BTW- I leave in 2 weeks from today!!!

 

[OhioDisneyLover]

Love the photo pass pictures!!!!

 

[mom2mek]

Sara! Those are great! Love the one w/ you too! Poor little Katie looks squished imbetween Emily and Donald! (Has he always been crosseyed?) And yikes on Goofy!LOL! You're off to a good Photopass start. Sure wish I could read more....

Thanks Monica! I hadn't noticed that about Donald either - I guess he is! Maybe that's why he is always so grumpy! That Goofy was huge...seriously....and Minnie was so appropriately short! I hope to have Coral Reef portion up soon...

Hey!



Great pictures Sara! I also love the one with you and Mickey!

Thanks Michelle!

I'm sorry. Can we still be friends?



LOVE the photopass pics! So cute! I love that Michael would let Minnie near him... my boys ~ not so much.

I'll still be your creepy, imaginary, internet friend Nicole! As far as Michael and Minnie...well...he just goes with the flow...at least with the "animal" characters...you will see later how he reacts to "real" girls at the dinner with Cinderella! I'll eventually get to it! LOL!

Your pictures turned out so good! Can't wait to see more...and read more.

Thanks! I hope to have more posted today!

I am all caught up. I do apologize for getting behind on my reading. Love that the surprise went well. Love, love, LOVE that everyone is listening to YOU!!! You go girl! I was getting mad at the computer last time I read your TR, Okay, so did you make those customs or buy them? My TINK has customs for most of her trip. Not made. bought... cause this princess does not sew.


BTW- I leave in 2 weeks from today!!!

Ha! No, I do not sew Jen...not even a button! It's pathetic actually! I got them on ebay for about $20! I had a couple more (Emily only wore one other one and Katie wore two). It's fun to dress them up now while they will still (sort of in Emily's case) LET ME!

Love the photo pass pictures!!!!

Thanks!


Sara

 

[mom2mek]

Day 2 - EPCOT
Part 5 - Will my first surprise go off without a hitch?

When I last left off, we were heading out of The Land and over to The Coral Reef for our 11:30 lunch ADR. Shawn snapped a few pics of the gorgeous Epcot grounds!

Inside the restaurant, there was a bigger-than-I-expected line and about 5 people working behind the counter. However, the people behind the counter weren't really doing anything to help the people in line and they all looked a little frustrated. When I got my way to the front, no one would help me! I just stood there for what seemed like 5 minutes trying to catch someone’s glance and looking around like “is this the right place to check in”?

Ugh!

Why is it always this way when you have a group of people with you who all think you know what you are doing and you just want everything to go smoothly. I told the rest of my family to go ahead and find a seat while I finished checking us in, but they just stayed there. Ugh again. I really wanted them to not be around so that when I checked in I could verify the menus and diver I had set up for Shawn for our anniversary.

Eventually, the lady looked up and acknowledged my existence and we were checked in and given our buzzer. I led my "cats" over to the benches and we took a seat. I tried casually walking back up there to the front over the next few minutes in hopes of catching someone's eye and having them check on the surprise, but they seemed very disorganized this afternoon for whatever reason. I did see at one point a group of Disney CMs in their "official" clothes, coming out of the restaurant and looking all serious, so I don't know if there was some big-wig there and they were all scrambling to make sure that particular group was being handled properly. I don't know.

While we were sitting and waiting, Michael decided to take some pics of us with his new disposable camera (still not developed). A gentleman sitting next to us offered to take a group picture with my step-dad's camera, and here is how that turned out:

What do ya think?

Guess the settings on the camera were off a bit, huh?


Here's a slightly better shot of my MIL and the kids:

After about 10 minutes, the buzzer went off, but this time I just told them to keep sitting right there since we would be walking that way anyway. Phew - they listened this time! Guess sitting on the benches felt pretty good at that point! I went up to the desk to turn in my buzzer, and mentioned that I was supposed to have personalized menus along with a diver in the tank during our meal.

The guy was standing there with all the regular menus in his hand, and looked at me like I had 3 heads. I said that I had arranged for this a while back and dealt with Debbi via email. He looked behind the counter and said he wasn't showing anything. Huh? He asked another CM, who pulled out a big stack of what I can only assume were personalized menus, and started looking through them! Again, nothing....Arghhhh!

By now, my group was beginning to wonder what was taking so long, and I feared they would come to investigate. Finally, they looked again....and there they were!

Phew!

Ok.....”follow me”, he said.

He led us down to the bottom level and over to where there was an empty booth on the right hand side of the bottom level (not right up against the tank, but it was fine)...but then he stopped and turned to me and said...Oh, wait a minute...you were supposed to have the tables over here (pointing to the left next to the tank where some other people were already sitting) and he turned around and walked away, telling me to he would be right back.

Ugh...now everyone was wondering why we couldn't just sit at the big empty booth right there. (Correction...this was mostly the men who were wondering). My step-dad likes to be the one in charge when we are going out to eat....you know what I mean....and he was about to just tell the host guy that the booth was fine, when the guy came back and asked if sitting at the booth would be ok? Um...yeah!

Finally, we plopped ourselves down for our meal, and the host handed out the regular menus and gave Shawn and I our "different" menus. Shawn opened his menu and was really surprised! It really turned out well, and I think Debbi did a great job. Here is a picture of the menu, albeit a little blurry:

We passed it around to his MIL, and to my parents who were sitting on the other side of the big booth and didn't notice that we had been given different menus. They were all impressed. Michael couldn't figure out how they knew we were having an anniversary (albeit about 2 weeks early) or how they got our pictures to put on there, but they thought it was pretty cool that they (the kids) were "on" the menu! LOL!

Here are some pics taken while we were waiting for our food:

Ok, so on to the lunch. Our waitress came by and took our drink orders...Mom, Step-dad, Shawn, and myself all ordered up a delicious Mojito (it was so refreshing after being out in the humidity).

(Pop Pop had his mojito by now and was feeling pretty relaxed...LOL...actually Katie was really tired and laid her head down on Grandmommy, so Pop Pop did the same...Awwww)

For our entrees, my Mom and I both got the Blackened Catfish – with pepper jack cheese grits, Shawn got the Grilled Mahi Mahi served with rice, my MIL got the Pan-Seared Tilapia with a green bean salad, and my Step-dad got the Grilled NY Strip Steak with potatoes au gratin. Sorry, I did not take pics!

Everyone enjoyed their food, but Shawn thought that my catfish was superior to his mahi-mahi and wished he had ordered it instead. He still loved his dish though. Emily and Katie both got the kids pizza while Michael got the macaroni with marinara sauce. He liked it, but he tried both Shawn's and MIL's fish dishes and liked those better, so he kept swiping bites off both of their plates.

We were all enjoying our meal when the diver showed up with the sign. Now, when I arranged this I just told her about the anniversary part; however she mentioned that on the ADR it was noted that we were celebrating Katie’s birthday as well. So she asked if I wanted anything about that on the sign as well. So the diver held up the sign and it read:

Happy 12th Anniversary!
Happy Birthday Katie!
We love you!

(again, sorry it's blurry)


Everyone around us clapped and the diver threw the shells up as confetti in the tank! Everyone was very surprised. Katie said that Mickey must have told the diver, since she saw Mickey that morning and Mickey knew that it was her birthday since he pointed to her birthday button! LOL!

Our waitress brought us anniversary buttons since we weren’t wearing any (I just got the bday button for Katie that morning since it wasn’t really our anniversary for a couple more weeks) and told us she would have a special dessert for us. The kids all ordered the make your own sundaes, my MIL ordered the Crème Brulee, and my Step-dad ordered a make-it-yourself-sundae as well!

Desserts took a while to come out for some reason, but when they did they were great! Here is a picture of our special Anniversary dessert – the champagne flute was solid chocolate, the banner was chocolate, the piece with the hearts on it was white chocolate, and the little pie crust was filled with melted chocolate for the strawberries. It was all very, very good.

Blurry pic my mom took:

They brought Katie’s sundae out with a candle in it and we all sang to her. (It was her first of many birthday celebrations…)

Bellies full, we paid the bill (20% off using the Tables in Wonderland card – woo-hoo – that was a hefty amount especially when you consider the drinks ordered…) and we headed out to use the restrooms. I checked the time and it was about 1:30, so I thought we should probably forego our Test Track ride in order to get back to the house for the grocery delivery that was scheduled for between 2 and 4. Drat! It was looking like rain for later in the day and I knew they shut down Test Track quite often due to rain, but I didn’t want to be late for our delivery.

As I was sitting in the bathroom (yes I just said that) my cell phone started ringing and I started scrambling around in the stall to open my purse and get to it before it went to voice mail. Unfortunately, I didn’t get to it in time, so I had to call back…it was Carlos from Garden Grocer…UGH! I called the # back but this time, I got his voicemail.

I met back up with the group and we started out of the Coral Reef, as I tried calling him again. This time I got him. He was getting ready to deliver the order so I told him we were still at the park, could he delay it till 2:30. Sure, no problem! Woo-hoo! I told the group we were going to try for Test Track before heading back to the house afterall!

Off to Test Track…how will Katie do on her first “fast” ride and will we make it to Carlos on time?

 

[DisneyJo]

Hey!!! Am I on the Disney Mom's Panel and don't know about it? That would be great!

I'm so glad you managed to keep the menus and diver a surprise, so cute. And your dessert sounds yummy!

Hope Katie loves TT

 

[mom2mek]

I'm so glad you managed to keep the menus and diver a surprise, so cute. And your dessert sounds yummy!

Hope Katie loves TT

Thanks Jo! I was happy it all worked out! The dessert was really good, but I still haven't tried the Chocolate Wave...maybe in December!

Sara

 

[princessjv]

What a wonderful meal! I am glad the surprise went off without a hitch. Between you and Michelle... I'm HUNGRY! Seriously.

Happy 12 Anniversary! We celebrated 10 years on the 9th of Oct.

btw.. how on earth did you get those customs for such a great price??

 

[mom2mek]

What a wonderful meal! I am glad the surprise went off without a hitch. Between you and Michelle... I'm HUNGRY! Seriously.

Happy 12 Anniversary! We celebrated 10 years on the 9th of Oct.

btw.. how on earth did you get those customs for such a great price??

Thanks Jen! The 9th was when we were actually AT Coral Reef! (Our anniversary is the 26th)....weird!

I'm sure you already have your stuff for Tink, but the ebay seller store name is Baby Twinkle Star and she has great stuff, really affordable too! (The girls also wore an orange Minnie mouse outfit on our last day that was made by the same girl - I think it was $24.99)!

Sara

 

[mkluvsmickey]

I'm so glad your surprises worked out so perfectly! I was nervous there for a moment.

Love the picture the guy took for you! Looks like one I would take!

I cannot wait to try Coral Reef! That chocolate flute looks awesome!

I love Shawn's pictures of the Epcot scenery too - they are great!

 

[mom2mek]

I'm so glad your surprises worked out so perfectly! I was nervous there for a moment.

Love the picture the guy took for you! Looks like one I would take!

I cannot wait to try Coral Reef! That chocolate flute looks awesome!

I love Shawn's pictures of the Epcot scenery too - they are great!

Thanks Michelle! I think you will love the Coral Reef! My only disappointment with the "free" dessert, is I really wanted to have the Chocolate Wave and I felt like a pig ordering another dessert as she made a point of telling me the "special" one was enough for two!

Sara

 

[mkluvsmickey]

Thanks Michelle! I think you will love the Coral Reef! My only disappointment with the "free" dessert, is I really wanted to have the Chocolate Wave and I felt like a pig ordering another dessert as she made a point of telling me the "special" one was enough for two!

Sara

Well, you will have to get the chocolate wave for sure next month - after all, it's included in our package.

 

[kaysmommie]

Great update as usual. Now I'm annoyed because my NY strip didn't come with potatoes Au Gratin it came with some nasty red skin potatoes. I was so looking forward to the Au Gratin potaotes again this year too.

Anyway the menu's are too cute, glad they found them. The diver is the best though, isn't it . I hope your not late for your grocery delivery .