Sun,Fun and Mickey Mouse Our 2 week vacation About This Page:

[joyjoy]

I really look forward to each of your updates - it sounds like ya'll had a very special trip. Your pics are great - your little princess is just about the cutest thing ever.

Now - am I crazy or did that Alice at CRT look just like Katie Couric? [img]images/icons/confused.gif[/img]

[Mauimouse]

Some very beautiful pictures of your daughter and all the characters. I really am enjoying reading your trip report. Thanks for sharing with us.

[goofy4goofy]

Thanks for sharing your wonderful trip report with us! The pictures are beautiful!!! I can't wait to read more!!!!

[angelina]

I thought she looked familiar [img]images/icons/wink.gif[/img]

[Colexis Mom]

Great trip report!! I'm enjoying all the pictures, your daughter is precious. Can't wait for more [img]images/icons/grin.gif[/img] [img]images/icons/grin.gif[/img] .

[Carrousel Lover]

I have really enjoyed reading your trip report and your daughter is just so sweet. I really love the photos. I also have to thank you because I've gotten some great feedback and ideas from you for our next trip. I've been hesitant about some rides/shows in the past (AK for little ones & MGM's Fantasmic) but now I'm reevaluating for our DD.

[angelina]

Thanks for all the replies. I haven't been able to write anymore because DD is sick [img]images/icons/frown.gif[/img] So hopefully during her nap today I can get in another installment.

[ProChristo]

So sorry DD isn't feeling well. I am enjoying your report tremendously. We don't have kiddies yet, but DH has said that he wouldn't want to take them till they were 4 or so, when they would remember it. It looks to me like your little one is having a great time, so maybe I can change his mind on that one. I love all the pictures, too. Can't wait to read more!

[angelina]

More Day 6
I just have to put this photo in, because it's one of my favorites. This is on TTA, when DD and I went by ourselves. As you can see she was just kicking back and enjoying the ride (and her popcorn [img]graemlins/yuma.gif[/img] )

In my last installment I forgot about meeting Belle, or as my husband and I now call it, the pushy, rude parents character greeting experience. They cancelled Cinderella's Surprise Celebration, at least three shows that we know of, because of technical difficulties. So instead they had all sorts of characters out in front of the castle. Well we had already seen most of them but when DD saw Belle she got so excited, we decided to go see her. It was chaos! All the other characters had nice orderly lines, no pushing, no shoving, no rudeness. But not Belle, she had people just swarmed around her. Her chaperone was there and she kept telling people to back up and not get in each other's pictures. Even Belle herself asked people to give her some space. DH and I just stood back and watched. The people were like animals. They were shoving their kids in front of other kids, even though it was not their turn. Yelling at their kids, "Jimmy get up there! Just move that other kid" I felt so bad for Belle, and her chaperone was just standing there doing nothing. We stood on the outside of it all for fear that DD would get crushed. Even she could sense what was going on. She was so excited to see Belle, and when she finally got up there, she was so nervous because of all the commotion. We would have left but Belle, who had obviously noticed us patiently waiting, called DD over for a picture.
It's just sad that parents act like that, especially in front of their kids. This was the only time we had an experience like this with the characters. Every other character had a great chaperone, who kept everyone in line.
More Day 6 Coming up

[rebecca c.]

Love your trip report! Super details. Can't wait to hear more. Hope DH is feeling better! [img]images/icons/grin.gif[/img]

[tikibird]

Love that TTA picture - perfectly reflects what TTA is about - just sitting back and chillin' [img]images/icons/grin.gif[/img]

Next, please!

[angelina]

More Day 6
So after leaving MK we headed to DD. It was packed! We kept wondering were all the crowds were, well they were here. So rather than try and fight our way through the crowds we decided to have some lunch. So we headed to Fulton's. We've stopped at Fulton's on every one of of our trips. But we weren't sure we were going to go this time, because on our last trip we had such a horrible experience with our server. She kept trying to get us to buy the most expensive entrees and when we didn't she was rude to us for the rest of the meal. But anyway, that's another story. But after posting a question about Fulton's on the boards there were mostly positive comments so I was convinced to give Fulton's another try. We really love seafood and let's face it, in MN by the time seafood gets here it's been frozen for quite a while. So when we go to FL we eat as much of it as we can. We really wanted to have some stone crab claws, and Fulton's had always had great ones in the past. Our plan was just to have an appetizer and drink at Fulton's and then have an appetizer at one of the other DD restaurants later. So we sat in the Stone Crab Lounge (what Fulton's calls their lounge). We had a beautiful table by the window and a very nice server. But we were so disappointed to learn that they didn't have stone crabs. Apparently El Nino had been affecting the crop this year and the quality they were getting was not up to their standards, so they had stopped ordering them. So we had the steamed seafood appetizer, which had shrimp and king crab claws. DD had some spaghetti. DH had a Bloody Mary which was very yummy, it even came with a shrimp garnish. I had a margarita which was also very good. Overall, we had a great experience at Fulton's and I'm glad we gave it another try. Now that we were refueled it was time to shop. We made lots of purchases in the World of Disney store using our Disney Club discount. We bought two snowglobes bringing our total number of snowglobes at home to 15. This is such a great store, we always find so many wonderful things to buy here. And of course there are lots of great places to take pictures.

DD loved the new Once upon a Toy store, especially the build your own Mr. Potato Head. And once again we saw the monorail set

and once again DH looked at it with longing in his eyes. DH and DD stayed in Once Upon a Toy while I headed into the Marketplace. I found some great things at the Christmas store and bought some clothes, but what I was really interested in was the scrapbook store. I was disappointed to see that it was all the same items we had been seeing at all of the parks. I just wasn't that impressed by it. I think the Disney papers and stickers made by Sandylion that you can find at just about any scrapbook store are much cuter.
So I rejoined my family and we headed to PI.
At this point it started to rain. It wasn't a monsoon but it was coming down pretty hard so we ducked in and out of stores buying more things along the way. We made a stop in Bongo's during the heaviest rain. We had eaten here years ago when they first opened and DH wasn't impressed, but I liked it. While we waited out the storm DH had a beer and I had a mojito, a yummy Cuban drink with rum, simple syrup and crushed mint. The rain did stop and so we headed back outside. We finished touring on the Westside and then walked all the way back to our car which was parked outside of Lego Land. By the time we reached our car DD was asleep. We were pretty hungry again so we headed to Jungle Jim's in Buena Vista Crossroads.
We discovered this restaurant years ago in Church Street Station, then we found out there was one in Buena Vista Crossroads we tried it and we like it even better than the one in Church Street. The decor is very tropical, there's even a pond and a waterfall inside the restaurant. They also have a beautiful patio, with an outdoor bar and live music. The food is so good and the portions are huge. They also have really fabulous tutti-fruitty girlie drinks [img]graemlins/yuma.gif[/img] You know the kind your DH never wants to order but then always ends up drinking yours [img]images/icons/wink.gif[/img] So we put DD in her stroller, laid the seat down and covered her with a blanket and she slept while we ate. I had a Grape Ape, which is a purple cocktail and DH had a beer. For entrees we both had chicken sandwiches. Mine was called Fertility Inferno it had pepper cheese, hot sauce, buffalo wing sauce, jalapenos, cream cheese, sour cream, lettuce, pickles and tomatos. Definitely not healthy, but soooo good, and spicy (I love spicy food) DH had the Peanut Butter Bet with peanut butter, bacon, cheddar cheese, pickles, lettuce and tomato. It sounds gross but it's really good and if you don't like it, they'll pay for it. Well, after we thoroughly stuffed ourselves we headed back to the MK to see Spectro Magic.
Up Next: Spectro Magic and the rain clears out MK

[angelina]

More Day 6: Spectro Magic and a rainy MK
So we headed back to MK to catch Spectro Magic. Tonight there were two scheduled shows 7 pm and 9 pm. When we got to MK at around 6:00 it was raining but people were lined up anyway, waiting for SM. Both DH and I thought there was no way they were going to do the parade in all this rain. So we decided to get some rides in and hope they would do the 9 pm SM.
We headed to Tomorrowland and everyone was standing under shelters and awnings, not going anywhere. But we weren't going to let a little rain stop us. After all, you do dry off [img]images/icons/wink.gif[/img] So we headed to Buzz Lightyear and waited less than 15 minutes. DD went crazy on this ride. She controlled the car and even managed to get 500 points! I can't even get that high. She just loved it. DH and I got stuck on this ride once for 15 minutes, it was interesting [img]graemlins/ukid.gif[/img] When we stepped back outside it was still raining, but we didn't care. We heard they had cancelled the 7 pm SM and that really cleared out the park. I guess nobody wanted to wait around in the rain to see if they would do the 9 pm parade but us [img]images/icons/grin.gif[/img]
We headed over to Liberty Square and did The Hall of Presidents. DH had never seen this attraction before and I hadn't been to it since I was a kid. We both really wanted to see George W. Bush's speech. This attraction is so impressive. The President's themselves are amazing. DH kept pointing out the little movements each one did, it was so cool. During the movie portion of the show we had a pretty funny moment. One of the pictures had a field with cows in it and DD said, very loudly, when she saw this picture "MOOOOO". Luckily everyone in the audience (there were only about 20 people) found it as funny as we did [img]images/icons/grin.gif[/img] DH and I kept saying to eachother, that voice sounds so familar. Does anybody know who some of the voices are? Just curious.
Next we headed over to Adventureland, where we rode Pirates of the Carribbean. There was absolutely no wait and our boat was less than half full. DD was a little scared at first, but she liked the pirate ships shooting cannons at each other. DH doesn't like the message of this ride, the burning of the town and selling of the women. I tend to aggree, this ride could use a little updating, but it is a classic.
Next we rode The Magic Carpets of Aladdin. Again there was no wait. This was our first time on this ride and we all really liked it. Again DD loved controlling our car. She would bring us up, down, up, down, up, down. It was like being on ToT again. This ride goes so much higher than Dumbo, you get a great view. As an added bonus we got to see the fireworks while we were riding. What a great seat!
Then we hit The Enchanted Tiki Room. OK everyone together now, "In the tiki, tiki, tiki, tiki, tiki room..." I can never get that song out of my head. But that's ok, because it's a great song, and a great show. Here's to hoping it stays in your head all day [img]images/icons/grin.gif[/img]
We walked around a little bit in a mad search for 800 speed film and finally found some in Frontierland, It was about 8:45 and the rain had let up so we decided to stake out a spot for SM. We headed over to the entrance to Liberty Square. There was no one lined up for the parade, it was unbelievable. So we chose a spot outside of Sleepy Hollow and DD enjoyed a brownie while we waited. Eventually, people did start showing up. But not that many. When SM started a lot of the floats had to be pulled by tugs. We thought maybe it was because of the rain. Also, a lot of the floats were missing, again because of the rain I guess. But we enjoyed the parade anyway. DD was waving to everybody and clapping away. Don't you wish we could all enjoy everything through the eyes of a child. Actually, I think when you're at Disney you kind of do [img]images/icons/smile.gif[/img]

At the end of the day it didn't matter that we were a little wet. What mattered was seeing the joy on our little girl's face as she waved to Mickey Mouse. After all, water's only temporary. Memories are forever.
We headed back to POFQ, put on some dry, warm clothes and went to sleep.
Up Next: Day Seven Chef Mickey's and Typhoon Lagoon

[chezp]

This is a great trip report with some really beautiful photos. I'm so glad your patience paid off and they put on the later show of Spectromagic.

Cheryl

[tikibird]

Originally posted by angelina:
Then we hit The Enchanted Tiki Room. OK everyone together now, "In the tiki, tiki, tiki, tiki, tiki room..." I can never get that song out of my head. But that's ok, because it's a great song, and a great show. Here's to hoping it stays in your head all day [img]images/icons/grin.gif[/img]

<font size="2" face="Comic Sans MS, Arial">Okay, you just made my day! [img]images/icons/grin.gif[/img]

Sounds like you were wise to weather out the rain - the MK seemed pretty desserted! Glad you had a great evening, and looking forward to your next post! [img]images/icons/grin.gif[/img]