Our Pink Christmas Trip Updated 4/23 About This Page:

[chezp]

Congrats to your sister!

Great photos from the safari!

[JKnott17]

Originally Posted by brandy_mel

Then we did something we should have done in the first place, we looked in the basket under the stroller and there it was! We’re not morning people either.

Sounds exactly like something my DH and I would do, especially early in the morning Glad you did eventually find the bag!

Originally Posted by brandy_mel

William liked to walk a lot, so we weren’t always able to walk at the speeds I would have liked. Bethany would then convince him to hold her hand.

So adorable, but I can totally understand how much that must have slowed you down!

Originally Posted by brandy_mel

[Shane even told me exactly when he shows up, but I must not be looking in the right spot, obviously. I’m expecting him to be right there in your face, but is he off to the side? I promise next time, I will keep my eyes wide open and look all around me.[/FONT]

I might be wrong, but I think that the Yeti is actually broken, which is why you didn't notice him, so your not crazy He's still there, I remeber seeing him in November, but there is no light shining on him and I don't think he moved or did anything as we rode by.


Great pics of the safari too, you got to see so many animals!

[PrincessSharon]

Congrats to your sister! Great safari pics! And William holding Bethany's hand is too cute!

[KMB733]

Great pictures from the Safari!!!

Congrats to your sister on her engagement

[disneydreamer33]

Congrats to your sister! Have fun with the planning.
I have been twice @ Christmas and still have not seen the CP. One of these days. Glad William made it through.
Two safaris back to back, cool!
I know what you mean about the schedule. I have said it for the past two trips that we have been enough now, that we can stop & enjoy & savor everything. But it never works.

[brandy_mel]

I have a new update ready to go, but photobucket hasn't been working for a week. I just can't post it without pictures; it's Bethany BBB appointment. Anybody else having issues? The home page is very messed up on photobucket and I can't even log in.

[Cam22]

The homepage looks fine for me and I have had no problems loading pictures. Not sure why it's not working for you though.

[JKnott17]

Originally Posted by Cam22

The homepage looks fine for me and I have had no problems loading pictures. Not sure why it's not working for you though.

It's working fine for me too, sorry you're having problems!

[FitMom]

Really enjoying your TR! Hope photobucket is running smoothly soon, can't wait to read more... love all your pics!

[brandy_mel]

Yay!! I figured out the photobucket issue. We changed the settings on our internet filter and that was the problem. It only took me a week and half to figure it out. So we're back in business.



Friday, December 2nd – Princess Makeover Day
Part 2

It was now almost 11:30 and I really wanted to get to the 11:45 show of Nemo. Going to that show would make lunchtime a little tight on time, but I thought we could do it. I really wanted to get that show in that day. The kids had some snacks, and I figured we could give William some more snacks to help keep him quiet during the show. We parked the strollers. William needed more juice and Bethany had to go potty and William needed a diaper change. So I took the kids to the nearby restroom and Shane headed back to Dinoland to look for apple juice. Wouldn’t you know, they had apple juice right by the merchandise cart when you come out of Nemo. I tried called Shane, but didn’t get a response. My parents and DUncle had gone into the theater to grab seats and my DAunt, DCuz, and little cuz went to the restroom with us. I got both kids squared away and William was ready to head out, so I told my DAunt and DCuz we would meet them in there. I managed to find where everyone was sitting and we got settled in. Some more time went by and they closed the doors, I was getting nervous for my DAunt and DCuz. I texted my DCuz to let her know where we sitting. Right before the show started, they made it in and we all settled down to watch.

I had a hard time taking pictures at this show last trip with our point and shoot camera. Happily, I was able to get some decent shots with my new camera.



I love this scene. Every mom could use an extra arm no matter how many she has. ;-)






Bethany liked the show a lot. And William paid attention off and on. He got squirmy at some parts and threw his juice down into the row in front us several times. But he wasn’t so bad that we had to take him out, which I guess says something. My mom and DCuz had never seen this show and they both really enjoyed it a lot. I think it’s my favorite stage show at WDW. Our family really enjoys it. On our last trip we bought the CD and listened to it so much that we wore it out. So that was on the list of souvenirs to bring home.

We came out of the show, and didn’t stop to get the CD. As we were leaving the building we got separated from my DAunt and DUncle. They were in front of us somewhere, and we didn’t have Bethany with us. We assumed she was with them, and so we were looking for them on our way out and completely forgot about the CD. When I remembered later, I wasn’t concerned because we had another morning scheduled back at AK, or so I thought. We caught up to them, and Bethany was with them. After a big sigh of relief, I directed everyone to Flame Tree BBQ. We needed to get eating so we could make it to Bethany’s BBB appointment.

Shane took the kids to get settled and I got in line to order for us. I was watching the clock and figuring out how much time we needed for everything, and we were okay. But the one think I forgot to factor in was the food lines. I should have known since it was right around noon, but I guess the January crowds have really spoiled me.

I finally got up there to order and got our food. Shane and I both had the pork sandwich and we split the baked chicken meal for the kids. Without the dining plan our meal would have come to $37.65. I went off with a heavy tray looking for everyone. For some reason I turned to right and started looking through the tables that way. I almost always go to left because the travel books say that most people go towards the right. But I figured my family would fall into the category of just following the crowd, so that’s why I went that way. I looked and looked, and the tray was getting really heavy. I finally put it down and was getting ready to call them, when I spotted them under a covered area. As I was coming up my mom wondered what took me so long. I told her that I went the other way and walked all the way around, because by this time I was on the other side of the seating area. Then she told me that I told her to always go to left and so they did. Classic over-thinking on my part.

The food was good, but we didn’t have much time to enjoy it. Mom, Bethany, and I ate quickly and headed on our way. Shane and William were going back to the hotel for a nap, and my DF was going to join us at the MK in a little bit. I can’t remember what the rest of my family was going to do. They decided not to eat dinner with us at Akershus in Norway since they were only on the QS DP. I think they were heading to HS to see the Osborne lights that night.

It was now 1:00 and Bethany’s appointment was at 2:00. As we were walking out of AK I hear Bethany say, “Princess makeover, here we come!” She was very excited. We boarded a bus for the TTC. The bus was fairly empty with about 15 – 20 people on it. And everyone was pretty quiet. Everyone except for Bethany that is. She started singing. She wasn’t trying to be loud or show off, but her little voice just has a way of carrying. She starts singing songs to the tune of Baa Baa Black Sheep with her own words. She sang one song about Epcot. And then another song called “Purple”. It was quite the appropriate title since every single word in the song was the word purple. I hoped that she wasn’t annoying people around us, but I saw a few people trying to hide smiles and not burst out laughing. If should would have known how many people were actually paying attention to her, she would have turned shy and stopped singing immediately.

After our melodious bus ride, we got to the TTC and boarded a monorail. I wanted to know how we were doing on time, so I went to grab my phone out of my bag, and it wasn’t there. I checked every pocket and bag and it wasn’t there. Talk about a sinking feeling in your stomach. The last place I remembered having it was at the Nemo show. But I made sure when we got up to leave that I checked the bench and floor to see if we left anything behind. I used my mom’s phone to call Shane, but he was in the middle of William meltdown and couldn’t talk. I told him I lost my phone and to call me back. My dad was still at AK so we called him next. He was just walking out of the park, but he turned back around to go check at the Nemo show first, then lost and found. As I’m waiting this out, my mind immediately goes to work case scenario. It wouldn’t be so bad while my parents were here because we could share phones, but after they left, Shane and I really each needed a phone to stay in contact with each other whenever we split up.

We arrived at the MK with 15 minutes until Bethany’s appointment. We stopped at the bathroom by Casey’s to change her into her princess dress. While we were there, Shane called and said that he found my phone in the diaper bag. What a relief! I must have thrown it in there without thinking. We called Dad and told him and then we hurried to the back of the Castle and BBB. With all this stress happening I totally forgot to take in the surroundings. They were shooting the Christmas parade today, and I hadn’t even paid any attention.

We checked Bethany in and waited less than 5 minutes. She didn’t even have time to look at the brochure to pick out her hairstyle. I just kind of gently directed her towards the one I liked.

She got settled in her chair and her Fairy Godmother got to work.


Her Fairy Godmother wanted to know where we were from. Bethany told her Illinois, and then she wanted to know how we got there. Bethany was pretty much in awe of the whole thing and didn’t really answer her. So she asked the princess if she arrived by horse. Bethany smiled and said no. Then she asked if we got there by flying carpet. Bethany smiled at this too and said no, eventually she told her we flew on airplane.

Bethany was in heaven and loved being fussed over.


She got to pick out which eye shadow colors she wanted, and of course, she picked the darkest two.



She got her dousing of pixie dust, which I mistakenly referred to as glitter. The Fairy Godmother quickly corrected me.



And then it was time for the big reveal.


She didn’t say anything she just sat and stared. I think she was amazed.

I love this picture the PP photographer got.



One last smile for her mommy.



I went to pay and realized that Shane still had our rewards card. Whoops! I guess that was just more souvenir money left on the rewards card. I put the total on our credit card, I’ve got to earn points for the next trip somehow, right? We did the Crown package for Bethany, which is the middle package. She got hair, make-up, and nails. She also got a goodie bag with the comb they used, her make-up palette, two nail polishes, the crown in her hair, and a Mickey clip in the back. I’m sure if you bought all of that stuff individually, it would be at least half of the cost, which including tax, was 58.53. When the BBB first opened I thought that would be something I would never want my daughter to do. I didn’t like the idea of putting a bunch of makeup on a little girl. But I think it was very tasteful and it was such an enjoyable experience. We had such a good time, I wanted to book it again before the end of our trip, but I didn’t. However, this will be on our must-do list every trip until she loses interest or is too old. It’s so worth it.

We went outside and took a couple of photos out there.

These were some of the props they were using for the Christmas Parade taping.



As we came out of the castle we noticed someone was performing in front of the castle as a parade of the Christmas Parade. We finally overhead someone else say that it was Jennifer Hudson.

Our view from the backside of the castle. I like Jennifer Hudson and thought it would be fun to watch her for a little bit, but before we did that I got distracted. Lady Tremaine, Anastasia, and Drizella were out for a meet and greet. We had never met these three, but I had heard so many good things about them on the boards, I knew we couldn’t miss them. I had been feeding Bethany lines about things she could tell the characters, but she wasn’t remembering. I told her to tell the stepsisters to be nice to Cinderella. As we got closer, I reminded her again and she said that she didn’t want to tell them because it might hurt their feelings.

I wondered how they be towards a little girl especially a little girl in a princess dress. They really aren’t very nice in the movie. But when it was our turn, they were very nice to Bethany and asked her about her dress. She told them her grandma made it then pointed out my DM. That set off Drizella and she started putting in her dress order right then and there.


My mom asked if she wanted a Belle dress too, and she scoffed at that idea and told her she wanted a green dress with a collar like her mom’s. She kept going on and on with dress details. Then my mom asked if she wanted a red cape trimmed in white. Immediately she said, “No I don’t look good in red.” She added on more details about her dress and ended with fringe. She wanted lots and lots of fringe.

They posed for a great pic.

I love their grimaces. Their faces in the picture before us were hilarious.

As we were walking away, I told them to be nice to Cinderella. WHOA! They didn’t like that. They shot back with, “You tell her to be nice to us first.” “She shut us out of her castle. Just look.” They had the castle blocked off to through traffic because of the parade taping. They were too funny. This is another character encounter that is well worth the wait.

While we were waiting in line for the meet and greet, some fireworks had gone off as a part of Jennifer Hudson’s performance. We made our way to the front of the castle to check it all out. She had sang through “Go Tell it on the Mountain” one time and was getting ready to do a second take.


The audience handler guy was giving instructions and he told the audience that they had a harder job this time because they had to react to fireworks like last time, but they weren’t going to shoot any off. They wouldn't let us take strollers up close, so Mom and Bethany waited while I wondered closer for some better shots.



I even took some video. I hope this works.


It was very neat to see everything in action.


And her song ended up being the grand finale to the parade. Surprisingly the park wasn’t too crowded. But Bethany was getting restless and we wanted to spend some time in Epcot before our dinner reservation with the princesses. We met up with my dad again, and started leaving the park. My DM had to make a stop at the restroom before we left which gave Bethany the perfect opportunity to pose for some pictures.



She told me she was hungry, so I stopped at the popcorn cart on our way out, and grabbed a popcorn for her. I believe that was the second popcorn of the trip so far. She started munching on that stuff right away. Being a princess works up an appetite. Imagine my surprise when we got to Epcot and I noticed she ate ¾ of the box!!

We walked over to the monorail, where the silver one came for us.

I’m pretty sure none of us guessed silver.

While on the monorail we had a nice talk with couple who was asking Bethany about her makeover and which princess she was. They were intrigued by the whole BBB thing and said they didn’t have stuff like that when their twin girls were little. They were such a nice couple and one of the great things about WDW. You just strike up conversations with complete strangers and it’s no big deal.

Up Next: An evening at Epcot made perfect with our princess dinner.

[abubbles77]

Bethany look beautiful in her princess makeover. So glad she enjoyed it.

[Cam22]

Bethany looks so beautiful as a princess!

[JKnott17]

You got some great pics at the Nemo show, glad you were able to fit it in! We've yet to see it, but it's definitely on the list for next trip. I the story of Bethany singing on the bus, too cute! Sounds like something my youngest, Abby, would do. She loves to randomly bust out into song and dance when we're out, but only when she thinks no one is watching. Even I have to pretend to ignore her, if she catches me watching, she gets all shy and stops

Bethany made a beautiful Belle, glad you all enjoyed the BBB!

[ilovedisney247]

Bethany looks fabulous as a princess! I'm glad you had time to enjoy the step sisters--they are such a hoot!

[Colexis Mom]

Great pictures from the Nemo show! Sorry about your phone! And love Bethany's makeover! The picture of her with the ugly stepsisters and step-mother is priceless! And how cool to see Jennifer Hudson!