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Trip Report It feels like the first time... Feels like the very first time *completed*
- Thread starter DryerLintFan
- Start date
Matt and Kelly
Well-Known Member
Loved your report. Thanks for sharing with us. Each time you go A will get a little more adventurous and will be willing to do more of the rides.
ELeigh
Well-Known Member
I’m late to this party but just read your whole report. So sad that A was afraid of the rides but it gives you a reason to go back when she’s a little older!
We are staying at AOA for our next trip and I second guessed it for a few after reading this but I think I am going to stick with it, similar to your “princess theme” we are going to be focusing on little mermaid because both of my kids are obsessed so I think it will really make the trip to be in the Ariel room and I have read that AOA has some of the best luck with buses (something that was a huge pain on my last trip)
We are staying at AOA for our next trip and I second guessed it for a few after reading this but I think I am going to stick with it, similar to your “princess theme” we are going to be focusing on little mermaid because both of my kids are obsessed so I think it will really make the trip to be in the Ariel room and I have read that AOA has some of the best luck with buses (something that was a huge pain on my last trip)
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ELeigh
Well-Known Member
Luckily I almost never have trouble sleeping but hopefully we don’t have he same bed frame issues. I am so excited to see the kids reactions to the mermaid room!
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gdisneyfans
Well-Known Member
QUOTE="dryerlintfan, post: 8011733, member: 115999"]
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A is absolutely adorable and I literally laughed out loud (laughing because of the sheer adorableness of her) on so many of her quotes! I don't know which is my favorite!! It was so sweet too how she thought to wish them all a Merry Christmas!
I love the photo of A with Ariel - almost like they are trying to pose the same!
And the part where she screamed "Hi Tinkerbell" - on our trip when our daughter was 4, Snow White was her favorite princess. We were at Fantasmic!, the part where the princesses come out on their separate boats (I have this on video), I can hear her screaming - "Hi Snow White" multiple, multiple times and then we have a shot of her waving as hard as she could to Snow White so she could see her Ugh, each time I watch that part, I literally am a blubbering mess. They grow up so darn fast so to have these memories of when they are small, this trip report is going to be something you can look back on and remember all of the great interactions she had with the Princesses and when she gets older, she'll giggle at herself reading how she was growing up.
On those early trips, that's all we'd do too - meet the Princesses (we were in line once where we were meeting Snow White, Cinderella and Prince Charming - she wanted nothing to do with him and bypassed him and went right to Cinderella
), ride anything not in the dark and pretty much lived at the pool, so I know the feeling! But wouldn't trade those times for anything My daughter is 15 now; has her temps and is the big High School....she no longer wants to do any character interactions and only wants to ride the "big stuff" - and those trips are fun too.
You are a great writer too - thanks for the report!!!
Belle went off to her dinner with the beast and A immediately crumpled into a puddle of tears. She had forgotten to wish Belle a Merry Christmas
She would later tell some random lady on the bus that she was so happy to hug Minnie but she couldn't hug holiday Minnieshe also mentioned how she thought Daisy and Minnie had a cold because they couldn't talk, so they must be sick.
Oh my goodness, I'm a pile of mush right now
A is absolutely adorable and I literally laughed out loud (laughing because of the sheer adorableness of her) on so many of her quotes! I don't know which is my favorite!! It was so sweet too how she thought to wish them all a Merry Christmas!I love the photo of A with Ariel - almost like they are trying to pose the same!
And the part where she screamed "Hi Tinkerbell" - on our trip when our daughter was 4, Snow White was her favorite princess. We were at Fantasmic!, the part where the princesses come out on their separate boats (I have this on video), I can hear her screaming - "Hi Snow White" multiple, multiple times and then we have a shot of her waving as hard as she could to Snow White so she could see her
Ugh, each time I watch that part, I literally am a blubbering mess. They grow up so darn fast so to have these memories of when they are small, this trip report is going to be something you can look back on and remember all of the great interactions she had with the Princesses and when she gets older, she'll giggle at herself reading how she was growing up. On those early trips, that's all we'd do too - meet the Princesses (we were in line once where we were meeting Snow White, Cinderella and Prince Charming - she wanted nothing to do with him and bypassed him and went right to Cinderella
), ride anything not in the dark and pretty much lived at the pool, so I know the feeling! But wouldn't trade those times for anything My daughter is 15 now; has her temps and is the big High School....she no longer wants to do any character interactions and only wants to ride the "big stuff" - and those trips are fun too. You are a great writer too - thanks for the report!!!
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fractal
Well-Known Member
If you've ever thought to yourself, "self, nobody is crazy or stupid enough to go to Walt Disney World for the very first time, during Christmas week, with a two year old", then have I got a story for you
If you missed my long winded pre-trip, you can find it here: https://forums.wdwmagic.com/threads/i-ordered-a-tomboy-but-got-a-disney-princess-instead.927435/
I'll start with my favorite photopass photo from the trip
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That's me, my daughter A who is two months shy of three, and my husband D
What: the first ever trip to Disney World for all three of us!
When and where: December 24-28 at the Art of Animation resort
So buckle in for a wild ride of meltdowns and magic...
great pic!
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12in12
Well-Known Member
I do like the meet and greets, but like you I never know what to say. It can get a bit awkward
Uncle Lupe
Well-Known Member
I haven't been on here regularly in a while so I'll have to read to catch-up. I need to get my TR started and did indeed have some fun character interactions. Looking forward to reading.
GCTales
Well-Known Member
I logged on this morning and realized that you should have completed your trip by now (Duh, it was in December!)
So I hunted it down and I glad I did!
Binge read all of it...
Your daughter is so cute!!
My biggest fear for the twins is the ride meltdown. I have seen more experienced Disney parents handle it much more poorly than you did.... You did a amazing job!
One of the reasons I love Disney is the cast members and watching them interact with the kids.
I hope my poor future attempts at a PTR and TR are half as enjoyable to read.
So I hunted it down and I glad I did!
Binge read all of it...
Your daughter is so cute!!
My biggest fear for the twins is the ride meltdown. I have seen more experienced Disney parents handle it much more poorly than you did.... You did a amazing job!
One of the reasons I love Disney is the cast members and watching them interact with the kids.
I hope my poor future attempts at a PTR and TR are half as enjoyable to read.
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fractal
Well-Known Member
Day three - Magic Kingdom night
I hadn't received the gift card for skipping the mousekeeping so we stopped by the front desk. The guy at the front desk was very helpful but condescending. He very pointedly told me that he has to keep reminding guests they need to check all their email folders and that his computer clearly showed that the gift card was emailed, so I must not have been thorough. Sure enough, it was in my promotional folder, but I could have done without the lecture. I applied it to our room charges and we went out to catch the bus.
A Magic Kingdom bus was pulling away just as we came out the doors, but there were three wheelchairs at the bus stop so I was sure they'd be sending another bus soon. Sure enough, one of those double long buses with the accordion middle sections came around the corner less than two minutes later!!
This time, when the bus dropped us off, it stopped at a resort bus stop instead of at the front gates. It hadn't even occurred to us that afternoon buses didn't drop you off right at the gate like the rope drop ones
We got to the park around 3:15 pm and breezed through security. As we walked in, we were being corralled by cast members who were laying tape on the ground. I was initially really confused, but then I remembered that Mickey's Merry Christmastime parade was about to come through, and we were just in time to catch it!!
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I'll spare you all the parade pictures, but A was so excited to see so many of her favorite characters!! She would later tell some random lady on the bus that she was so happy to hug Minnie but she couldn't hug holiday Minnie
Anyway, the parade was really cute! When it ended, though, the square looked like this
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Originally, the three fastpasses I had scheduled for this night we're Pirates, the Jingle Cruise, and 7DMT. When we figured out A was afraid of the dark rides on day one, I switched the Pirates fastpass out. When A freaked out on the Frozen boat, I switched out the Jingle Cruise fastpass (even though I was really looking forward to it). One of those switches was for Tinkerbell. With how absolutely obsessed A was with her Tinkerbell shoes, I knew we needed to take a trip to Pixie Hollow, and I had found a fastpass for when we first got to the park.
Unfortunately, Tinkerbell would be unavailable until well after our fastpass window, so we were given another anytime anywhere fastpass. We made our way up main street and caught a couple photopass photographers
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And took a couple pictures of the insane crowds
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And took a couple selfies (D is surprisingly terrible at taking selfies. I'm sure you can pick out which one is his
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We made our way around to the backside of the castle. The crowds didn't seem that bad. I mean, they look freaking TERRIBLE, but it wasn't hard to navigate through them. When we got to the back of the castle, we had some time before our reservation. I wanted to take A into Castle Couture to get pixie dusted, or maybe hit Philharmagic, but A just wanted to sit there and blow her bubbles, so that's what we did
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While we were sitting there, I saw a woman with a really adorable sleeping baby in an old fashioned white Versace pram!! I couldn't help myself, I had to look it up online
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It reminded me of that ridiculously expensive Cinderella carriage stroller rental you could get for MK: adorable, but shocking price tag
People watching was making me really hungry, so I was happy when the time came to check in at Cinderella's Royal Table
$4200 for a stroller? And I thought cameras were expensive!
fractal
Well-Known Member
Day three - Magic Kingdom night continued
Based on reviews, trip reports, and food blogs, I went into Cinderella's Royal Table with extremely low expectations. I had read the food was meh, the portions were tiny so you left starving, the princesses took forever to come out and then rushed through your table, and the whole ordeal ate up 90-120 minutes of valuable park time. But hey, going into this trip we had no idea if we'd ever be back again, so why not go for the whole shebang?!
After checking in, we were led inside the castle to a royal chamber where Cinderella was meeting her guests.
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I was really impressed by something that happened here..... There was only one other family who was waiting for their table, so when they left it was just us, Cinderella, the photographer, and a cast member. Cinderella had already met with us, so her obligation to us was over. Another cast member came in and started having a casual conversation with her....... And she didn't break character. He had asked her what she did with her family for Christmas, like you'd ask a friend or a co-worker, and she answered something about the castle and the prince and a fifty foot Christmas tree. I'm sure that was annoying for the cast member who asked
The moment we walked into the dining room, trumpets started playing!! We thought "wow! What a royal treatment!" But really it was for Aurora, who entered at the same time as us
I was so excited because we got exactly the three princesses I'd hoped we would get, and we had perfect timing in that all the princesses started their circulation right when we got there so we wouldn't have to wait on anyone! I was leaning over to tell D how great our timing was, when princess Jasmine came in! We got a bonus princess!!
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Hey smile for the camera, A...
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No, A,... Give me a pretty smile....
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Can we talk about Aurora for a minute....? The young lady who was our Aurora was a saint. An absolute saint. A was on princess overload an had a hard time concentrating on just the princess at our table because three others were so nearby. So when A grabbed her pocket pets to show Aurora, we just rolled our eyes, apologized to Aurora, and prepared to just roll with it.
Guys. Aurora played with A and her "little forest friends" for over five minutes. She knelt down by our table, and played with our kid.
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This woman created so much magic for A, who now grabs one of the kitties away from me and says "no mommy, you can't play with this kitty, she's Aurora's kitty..."
And the timing was so perfect, that when she walked away from our table, it was time for food,...
OMG - heart melting.
Uncle Lupe
Well-Known Member
Love that lantern Phototpass pic. Had no idea about that one.Day three - Magic Kingdom night continued
It pained me so greatly to give up our fastpasses for the Jingle Cruise. @amjt660 really sold me on this ride and I was looking forward to both the holiday overlay and the nighttime run. My favorite jokes are corny dad jokes. Like, tonight at Christmas dinner with the in-laws, they were discussing making their own buttermilk and I chimed in with, "were watching our weight, so we've started making margerine milk..." The Jungle Cruise was made for people like me.
But I didn't want to waste another fastpass for another toddler freak out, so after the boat fiasco at Epcot I changed our Jungle Cruise fastpass to Rapunzel and Tiana. I know we've already seen them, but I thought ending the trip with A's favorite princess would be a high note for her.
So we head out of the castle and it's just a quick hop over to Princess Fairytale Hall, which is great because the crowds behind the castle are intense and chaotic. I'm excited at this point because we're early enough to hit the fastpass and then hop around the castle for the Frozen stage show. We step up to the queue and I'm about to scan in for our fastpass when I notice that my husband, who was right behind me only a second ago, is nowhere to be seen. There's no D, anywhere,... Just a million strangers milling around, going this way and that. I'm trying not to panic, reminding myself that D knows where we were going, we've been there before, he knows the plan and he'll meet us at the Hall. I check my phone and I have no signal. Okay,... Maybe he went to the stroller parking, even though we don't need our stroller. I scan stroller parking behind the carousel and don't see him, and I don't see the stroller, either. I check my phone again, and I have a tiny amount of signal so I dial his number.
Relief flooded over me when he picked up, and then annoyance. He said he had told me he was getting the stroller and then peeled off, thinking I was right behind him, but he had parked in a different stroller parking before dinner and now he didn't know where he was or where we were. He could see the castle and the carousel, but all the other buildings looked the same to him and very much different in the dark and the mass of humanity than it did the morning we visited Rapunzel before.
People stop to stare at me as I'm yelling at him on the phone (yeah, that person who caused a scene.... It was me....) to just walk around the freaking carousel until he sees us (it's round!! If you walk around it you'll find us eventually!!), because we're standing right out front of the hall. And he did, THREE times. The area was so swamped with people going this way and that, that the first two times around he didn't see us and we didn't see him. Finally we find each other, ten minutes later, which means we would for sure miss the Frozen Holiday Wish show. I was so frustrated, I couldn't even talk to him except to say very sternly that he scared the crap out of me and next time he needs to physically touch me before peeling off to make sure I got the message. This is how they trained us in the Army, but I guess they didn't train them like that in the Marines
We're waiting in line, now, both adults hugging each other and trying to calm down, when A finds a friend: a little girl who turned four today, wearing a Tiana dress and talking excitedly about seeing "Tatiana". You would think they would have a lot to talk about, based on all that, but instead.... A tells the little girl that her mommy is so mad at her daddy, and the little girl starts telling A about the time her mommy was mad at her daddy for forgetting milk and her mom and I are just getting more and more embarrassedkids are the worst
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The little snitch is telling Tiana again that I didn't paint her nails before the trip....
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She was so excited that her and Rapunzel were both wearing the same dress, that she forgot to tell Rapunzel about her Tinkerbell shoes. When she was saying goodbye to Tiana, she suddenly remembered this, and ran back to Rapunzel to tell her. Thankfully Rapunzel was about to go on break, so there were no other guests over there getting photobombed by her.
From there we grabbed the stroller and "kitted up" for nighttime. We put on our Christmas bulb light up necklaces, and outfitted the stroller with some glow and the dark bracelets. I had bought a bunch more glow in the dark jewelry, too, but none of it had survived the baggage handlers. We looked at each other and laughed. We looked ridiculous, but we certainly were not going to miss each other in a crowd, now!! We strapped A into the stroller and headed for the Rapunzel bathrooms. Halfway there, D says,... Hey if you see a bathroom let me know, and I reply "we're actually going to a bathroom for our next attraction"
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The bathrooms were pretty, and A loved seeing all the paintings that Rapunzel did on the walls and the ceilings, but the real reason we hoofed it over here was for the Tangled lantern photopass.
Because this was a busy and tiny courtyard, this photopass stop had two extra cast members who were in charge of keeping the little area they were talking photos in clear. When it was our turn we knelt down by the lantern and were so focused on the photographer that we didn't see the scooter about to run me over. One of the crowd wrangling cast members did, though, and would later save A from a scooter too.
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It was 7:00 pm now, and we had twenty minutes before our 7DMT fastpass window opened. I told D we could walk around and maybe try to find a snack cart, or we could brave the crowds all the way back to main street to see if Tinkerbell was up and running yet. He chose Tinkerbell, so into The crowds we went once more.
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