Trip Report That Disney Swing- February 2014 trip report

And we are back! OK, well, we have been back for a few days but I have been flat laid out from the trip so I am just now starting this. Honestly, I am still in bed but I can type and rest, right?

Now, before I start I want to give a few words of warning. I am not going to pull punches with this report. I have always been a pixie dust fan but I still have opinions and whether they agree with yours or not, well, they are mine. So yeah, that's that. And now, let us begin.

Sunday, February 23rd, 2014
The plan was to head out at 6 am so that we could arrive at downtown Disney but 7 pm. At 6:30 am we were still at home with my hubby constantly remembering last minute things. Finally I just said, "Hey, it's your friend. If you wanna make him wait then fine." We left at about 6:45.

Check out those trip buckets!

These are some seriously sleepy kids!

Kid you not- we stopped 5 times in the first 2 hours of the trip! Bathroom breaks, snack breaks, gas fill ups, etc. Eventually we hit the Georgia line!

Looks like I was traveling with 4 of the 7 dwarfs- dopey, grumpy, sleepy and doc.

@sweetpee_1993 The inside of the Georgia welcome center made me think of you!

A few more hours down the road and we were finally to ATL. We both love and hate Atlanta. We love it because it means we are about 4 hours into our travels down to Florida and hate it because, well- have you ever driven in Atlanta? It's crowded with people who feel the need to go 90 in a 55 and tourists afraid to go 45 in a 55.

At least we get to use the HOV lane! By the way, Atlanta is the only city I know of where the interstate's seem to get clogged with church traffic!

At least the travel buckets were doing their jobs!

 

[UberPlannerMom]

February 23rd, 2014 continued...
Atlanta also turned out to be our last bit of nice driving weather. The sunshine may have left the sky but we still had wind in our sails. Haha!

The required Florida welcome center stop!

This is new since our last drive down

Eleven and a half hours after we left we finally arrived. I tried to take a sign picture but it was still raining so boo! At this point we were late. Who can guess how late we were? Anyone? Anyone? Yeah- about 45 minutes late. Hmmm.... I wonder why that happened?? Hubby's buddy had already signed us in for dinner at Raglan Road but it was a 2 hour wait. It took me all of about 2 minutes to see that they were not going to want to leave the bar during the wait. For Hubby and I that would be fine. We can talk for 2 hours. For an 8 year and a 2 year old that was not going to fly. The boys needed the potty anyway so away the two oldest boys and I went in search of a bathroom. We ended up spending about an hour at T-rex with them playing in the bone dig area.

We followed that up by wandering toward World of Disney, which of course meant passing by the lego store.

This is one of those things I know I will always regret not buying him. He LOVED them!

After a while I got a text from Hubby telling me that he couldn't handle the 1 year old any longer so back we trudged toward Raglan Road.

 

[UberPlannerMom]

We only had about 10 minutes left to wait to get a table. Thank goodness. We were seated outside of the immediate area of the stage but with a party of 7 there are limited tables available. We got the appetizer d'lirrah to start and then hubby and his buddy got shepherd's pie and we wives got fish and chips. Boogie got shrimp from the kids menu and the babies just shared.

I didn't got to try one of the scallops in the appetizer so I can't say anything about those but the sausages were yummy, the wings were sweet and next time we go I will be making a meal out of the little ribs included in that appetizer. My fish and chips were ok. (I have tried twice now to upload a picture of it but it's just not working for some reason!) They were just standard fish and chips. I didn't want to get anything too adventurous since I was sharing with the babies so... oh well, I guess. Hubby let me snag a bite of his shepherds pie and it was good. Still nothing at the table beats those ribs!

I have more to say but since the pics have gone kaput on me I guess I will wait til later!

 

[UberPlannerMom]

ok, what in the world... they show as attached files but not where I can put them in.... ugh...

 

[UberPlannerMom]

The dancing didn't commence until after we had finished eating. I gave Boogie the camera and told him he could take some pictures (these are all from his pov) from where ever he could see. By the end of the show I was holding both babies up over the pony wall so they could watch. All of the kids were upset about the show being over and Boogie was supremely disappointed that they didn't include any kids this time around. Overall we enjoyed our dinner at Raglan Road. The tab came to about $160 which is doable for a place like Raglan Road. If we get to go back again it will be with a reservation, and hopefully at a time when the kids are asked to participate.

After dinner we parted company with hubby's friends and headed to our one night hotel, Champion's World Resort. I got the night for somewhere around $40 so we didn't expect much but since we were only staying for about 7 hours all we wanted was something free of bedbugs and grossness. Champion's World was clean enough for our short purposes. Would I ever consider this place to be a spa type resort? Absolutely not. Would I go back for a one night stop over. Definitely. They were nice enough at the front desk. The room was bigger than at Disney's value resorts and it was relatively clean.

The big boys barely made it to the bed before passing out! (Kinsey was very tired from having a meltdown about leaving downtown Disney. He thought: 1. downtown Disney was his vacation destination 2. we were leaving leaving! Poor fella!) The baby however... Well, we tried to do that first night without his white noise machine in the room. He did not like trying to sleep without the pitterpat of raindrops! Eventually we all drifted off for a few hours of sleep.

I'll try to post Monday sometime tomorrow.

 

[UberPlannerMom]

Aww, love the trip buckets! Great report.

Thanks! They are always helpful on those long trips!

 

[FlaggNL]

Great report Love to see the rest!

 

[sissa216]

I love the buckets too! I've been starting to gather idea and supplies for something similar for trips too.

 

[UberPlannerMom]

Great report Love to see the rest!

Thanks! I'm going to try to start Monday right now!

I love the buckets too! I've been starting to gather idea and supplies for something similar for trips too.

I usually use reusable shopping bags since they fold up if the kids use everything up but I couldn't pass up the sand buckets for a florida trip. My favorite place to get stuff for the trip bags in dollar tree, love dollar tree!

 

[UberPlannerMom]

Monday, February 24th, 2014
The plan for today- get up at 5:30 am, get kids up at 6 am, leave at 6:45 am, arrive at pop at 7 am, make it to rope drop at Hollywood studios. Here's how it really went!

Hubby turned the alarm off at 5:30 without waking me up. At 6:05 I woke up on my own wondering where the alarm was. Immediately got ready and got the kids up and ready. Hubby was still messing with the electronics... Grrr. We didn't leave the hotel until 7:30. Oh and this is how we all felt that morning-

We finally hit the road and I immediately had to start figuring out how to shave a few minutes here and there so we could still make rope drop. See, Boogie REALLY wanted to do Jedi training academy and that requires racing to sign ups right at rope drop. I tried to explain that to Hubby but true to his form, he did not believe me. We always have these issues the first day of a trip. I tell him what you all have reported and he decides I must be being dramatic and he doesn't need to listen. Then, his plan blows up because I wasn't being a drama queen and he listens to my input the rest of the trip. It's our pattern! Anyway, I decided that instead of checking in and then getting the bags to drop off at bell services we would bring the bags in with us to check in and immediately leave them with bell services. (We needed the room in the van for the ECV)

Finally see this sign! Bright spot in the morning!

Funny story here- Because we made a left turn to go into Pop there was a pole in picture. Hubby, who was driving, said that as he turned he would take a bunch of pictures and that would avoid the pole. This was the best of the result... we both got a good giggle out of that!

It was 8 am when we got to the check in desk at Pop. And guess what? Our room was ready. My whole bell services thing is blown right out the water. We were in the 80's section so we had quite a hike but away we went. With every step I could see my plans of rope drop falling away. Hubby insisted on setting up the room before we headed out. That, of course, officially killed any hope of getting to rope drop but hey- how awesome is it to get back to the room after a long first day and not have to set things up? Lemons from lemonade. It's all good.

While hubby set up the room I took the 8 year old and the 2 year old to pick up the ECV and our resort mugs. The ECV pick up went relatively well. Note to any future people picking up ECVs- don't bring a 2 year old with you. The blocks and hula hoops, etc. will definitely distract them! Haha! The mug pick up went not quite as well. It was one of only 2 magic band hiccups that we had over the week. It really only took about 5 minutes to take care of and was really more of an issue with user error from the cashier than an error with the magic bands. It kind of made me wonder how often the issues people report are user error as opposed to real issues with the magic bands.

We finally headed off to Hollywood Studios. The park had been open a full hour before we managed to get there. That fact did not dampen Kinsey's reaction to being there!

Boogie was pretty excited as well!

 

[UberPlannerMom]

Monday, February 24th, 2014 continued...
So there we are, finally at a park, albeit over an hour later than intended. We still tried to sign Boogie up for Jedi training academy. Just as I feared all the slots had been filled. It was disappointing for Boogie but started Hubby down the path of realization that we always have to walk together. So, I guess it was good news, bad news. A quick check of the time indicated that it was time for our tower of terror fastpasses. As we headed toward the tower I began to feel guilty. This trip was intended to be for Kinsey and the very first ride was one he couldn't ride! So... we made a stop along the way!
That's right. We stopped by Starring Rolls. I sent Hubby and Kinsey in to pick something to keep him distracted. It was only about 10:30 in the morning so I was expecting a cinnamon roll or something similar but they came back with a chocolate peanut butter cupcake. AND the cast member had given Kinsey a Mickey cookie for being a good boy in line. Sweet, ehh?

Finally, I felt ok about hitting up everyone's favorite drop. Hubby and Boogie went first and grabbed a ride swap fastpass for me.
I think they liked it!

Unfortunately I didn't get to use the fastpass because right as I was going to enter the line a group of at least 100 people jumped in the fastpass line. We ran into his group quite a few times during our trip. I don't think it was a tour group because there was a decided lack of flags, matching shirts and chanting. Oh well.

We checked the line for Rock n' roller coaster but it was at about an hour so we moved on. After a little huddle we decided to head towards the animation courtyard before making any decisions. Once we got there we decided to test Kinsey's affection for characters. We were concerned because at chuck E cheese he wasn't a huge hugger of that mouse. But hey- always worth a try, right?

On our way to see some characters

 

[UberPlannerMom]

Monday, February 24th, 2014 continued...

Brad was a fan!

At first Will just stood back and admired but after the group shots...

BINGO! He discovered he loves the characters!

 

[UberPlannerMom]

Monday, February 24th, 2014 continued...
So, obviously we decide we are going to wait in this teeny tiny line to see Minnie Mouse. And then it happened. Kinsey went full two year old. For the first time he was introduced to his autograph book. He couldn't understand that the book was for the characters to sign and not for him to do artwork of the characters in. Immediately he wanted to color in it and immediately his 8 year old brother began yelling at him about it. So, Kinsey did what 2 year olds do- he screamed and cried. Before I could figure out how to calm everything down the door attendant told Kinsey it was his turn to see Minnie Mouse. This is the result.

Apparently Minnie makes everything all better. He seriously ran in and threw himself into her arms. It was so precious.

Of course Minnie couldn't ignore Brad either!

And there we go- Minnie fixed it all. Can I get this girl to come home with me please?

After seeing how much Kinsey loved Minnie we just had to wait out the line for Mickey. It went much quicker than it appeared it would.

Kinsey now had the hang of the whole characters sign thing.

Brad just wanted to stare at the big mouse!

 

[Mommy2cooper]

<3 I loved this!

 

[UberPlannerMom]

Monday, February 24th, 2014 continued...
At this point we had spent most of our morning just getting a few character autographs. So, what do you think we did next? Why, we got a few more autographs! You know we couldn't just walk by Frozone and Mr. Incredible. It could hurt their feelings!

Frozone really seemed to like the boys autograph books.

Mr. Incredible isn't scary to Kinsey!

 

[UberPlannerMom]

Monday, February 24th, 2014 continued...
After our visit with some mighty friendly superheros it was time for lunch with Kinsey's version of a superhero- Doc McStuffins at Hollywood and Vine!
We scooted on over and I had Boogie sign us in. That may have been the funniest interaction I have ever heard at Disney World. The cast member was shocked at this 8 year old coming up and taking care of business. We like to train our kids to be confident in those situations so we always give them opportunities. Anyway, the cast member cracked me up with her bewilderment.
Finally we were called in and seated. I went up with Boogie and Kinsey and got the food for them, Brad and myself. Funny thing is that the really full plate was for the 2 year old! Wowzas! Disney was really making him work up an appetite!
First to our table was Doc McStuffins

Check out just how full those plates are!

Next up was Sophia the first.

While Sophia was at the table one of the dances for the characters and kids began. Kinsey didn't even hesitate.

By the end of the dance Kinsey was holding Handy Manny's hand. He loved this bit of the lunch so much that he could tell when the next one was before anyone else at the table had any clue!

I didn't take a lot of food pictures of the buffets. Frankly, I don't feel like pictures do buffet food justice because it just doesn't get the pretty plate treatment. I did, however, take a picture of everyone's favorite things at this lunch. Kinsey loved that silly little marshmallow. I loved the chicken and meatballs. Boogie loved the dried fruits dipped in chocolate. Brad was wild for the rice. Hubby loved that little sugar free cheesecake with blueberries. Everyone liked the red velvet cake.

Check out that happy, messy baby!

 

[UberPlannerMom]

Monday, February 24th, 2014 continued...
The rain had started up by the time we were finished with lunch so we got to try out the stroller cover I brought with us. In the past we have always just covered the stroller with a poncho. We figured a cover is a cover, right? Wrong!

See those little vent holes? They kept out the rain (obviously they would be an issue in a torrential downpour but otherwise...) but let in air. How many times have you seen a baby sleep in the stroller with it covered with a poncho? Hubby and I both feel like this was the best pretrip purchase we made and would completely recommend it to anyone out there!

So, now we have full bellies, it's raining and the baby is passed out. What to do? For us, it was wander around for a bit. We tried to hit up great movie ride but the line was oddly out the door. I love this ride but not enough for that line!

In our wanderings we ran across this guy!

We followed up our time with the green army man but using our fastpasses for Toy Story Midway Mania. Kinsey loved it! Actually, even little Brad loved it! That makes it official, our whole family loves it. Now, I will admit that the line for this is often outrageously long BUT I think that is because it appeals to whole lot of people. Add in that it is one of the few rides inside of Hollywood Studios and the wait seems explanatory. We refuse to wait in a super long line for it but I will always feel ok about using one of my fastpasses for it.

We had a while before our final fastpasses so we decided to check on Mike and Sulley (they were on break) and then to head over to see the Muppets. Along the way we ran into Lightening McQueen and Mater (the line was way too long) and two funny fellows.

Waiting in line

Kinsey took one look at this picture and joyfully shouted, "it's my butt!"

This was the one character interaction that Boogie really wanted

They were both pretty happy to see Phineas and Ferb!

 

[Disneydreamer23]

Can't wait for more

 

[UberPlannerMom]

Monday, February 24th, 2014 continued...
After Phineas and Ferb we continued our trek to the Muppets.

Of course, true to form, someone needed a bathroom break before we made it there and it wasn't the 2 year old! So while they took a break Kinsey and I had some fun at the fountain.

Kinsey really only tolerated the Muppets. He is convinced that they are a Mama show Boogie enjoyed it though and Brad used it as a time to rest. Our next stop was the Honey I shrunk the kids playset.

Check out our photbomber!

We stayed at the playground (with my ECV charging in the nearby restaurant area) until it closed. Even then Kinsey didn't want to leave and once again I had a two year old having a hissy fit in the middle of Disney. This kid is seriously the sweetest and most demonic kid at varying times. While he was screaming Boogie was singing in the post rain...

We went over and visited McQueen... Kinsey was screaming even in the line, until I gave him a cookie to keep his mouth busy.

At least he cheered up a bit then. This is where the pictures end for the day but not where the day ends by any means.

Our final fastpass for the day was for Star Tours. We were really excited to get to ride it since it was our first chance to ride since the update. We did the rider swap thing again( which was totally our best friend this trip!) and that meant Boogie got to ride it twice. I went first with Boogie and then it was Hubby's turn. When Boogie and I got off the ride Hubby was waiting in the gift shop with the babies. He had promised Kinsey this star wars nerf type gun he wanted and left me to take care of that. I waited til they were back from their tour before paying (because I was checking to see if there was anything else anyone wanted that was going to put me over that $50 mark so I could get my 10% off with my Disney card.) I had a cast member helping me decide on a gift or two for some people and chatting with the boys. He had to check out a guest eventually and we decided we had everything we needed so we followed him over to his spot to check out after the people he had walked over to check out. As we are standing there waiting this woman and her kid just start pushing in front of me. Her kid even thought she was being brazen because even he said to her, "is she going in front of us?" When she openly admitted she was just going to go next I was so frickin startled. Seriously, what is wrong with people? We actually ended up having words over it(after I had gone ahead and gotten into another line so I wouldn't have to deal with her horrible self.) My hubby came over to get into it and I just told him not to bother. The bottom line here though is that some people are awful no matter where you are.

At that point it was about time for the first showing of fantasmic so we began racing over. Yes, I was going fast in my little scooter but not any faster than my 8 year old and my hubby pushing a double stroller could keep up with. And then this older woman backed into my scooter. Seriously, she apparently wanted to look at something toward the top of a building and she backed up into the side of my scooter. And then her husband got snarky at me. I just ignored it and continued on but we missed the first showing anyway. My Disney buzz was starting to wear off from dealing with these cranky people. Seriously, if you are going to be big crank balls go rest. Why should the adults have as many tantrums as the 2 year old?

We used the hour and half between the first and second showings to see voyage of the little mermaid. I love that show but Brad was not a fan At least Kinsey seemed to like it.

Next stop was fantasmic again. This time we made it, but we almost lost eachother! No one warns you about the issues of being in an ecv and having a stroller. Because I was in the ecv the cast members had me go one way while they had my husband go up this series of ramps to park the stroller in a different direction. I thought I was waiting for him at the bottom of the ramp. Apparently there are two ramps back down and I picked the wrong one. It was just crazy! I am so glad we eventually found eachother for the show because he had the headphones for Kinsey and I had Kinsey. It could have been bad!

Those headphones were amazing! They muted the bangs enough that Kinsey actually went to sleep during the show! For a kid who screams and cries when he hears fireworks outside and he is in the house, that is just amazing! The headphones rank right up there with the rain cover! It was just wow! Fantasmic was wonderful, by the way. I can see what people are saying about the projections being shabby but everything else is just wonderful. I love that show so much.

After that it was time to head "home" to Pop.

 

[UberPlannerMom]

Monday, February 24th, 2014- the downswing
That should have been the end of the day. It very much wasn't. When we got back to pop we realized that we were all starving since we had only eaten once that day. We headed over to everything pop. Now, my scooter had been acting funny (it would stop and then slam forward really fast at random intervals) most of the day so my back was in a ton of pain but we had to eat so we struggled on up. I just wanted to eat and get to bed.

Pork shank and potatoes- a little dry but overall yummy.

French bread pizza and salad- Hubby said it was good

tie dye cheesecake and worms in dirt- tasted surprisingly like cheesecake. I was worried about the amount of food coloring but really I couldn't taste it too much. The worms in dirt is pretty standard.

Anyway, after our food we headed back to the room. I took my shoes off went to walk to the bed when I stepped in a puddle. Immediately I got onto the kids about spilling their drinks and they swore it wasn't them. I sent Boogie to shower and he calls out, "why is there water over here?" Uh oh...

Hubby went to check it out and discovered water running down the walls. It was gross. I grabbed the phone to call the front desk and- dun, dun, dun- it didn't work. I seriously had to haul my cookies all the way to the front desk at 11 pm to talk to them about the room. I told them about both the water and the phone. They never even acknowledged that the phone not working was an issue and said they would give us a new room. The woman told me to have my hubby pack everything back up and she would have bell services come in 10 minutes to move everything.

I went back, took the kids to the new room and started bathing them while hubby waited at the old room. After an hour with no sign of bell services we started just really getting mad. After 75 minutes I called (at least the new rooms phone worked) and asked what was going on. They transferred me to bell services who never answered the phone. Now, obviously I need to go up to the desk again but I can't leave the 8, 2 and 1 year olds alone in the room and they have no clean clothes or jammies even to get into to go up to the main building with me in. I was livid.

I dug around in the diaper bag and found some old ugliness for the babies to wear up and had to have Boogie wear his bathing suit but eventually we made our way up there. I went back to the same woman and she just took me over to bell services. No kidding- they tried to blow her off. Said they were going to be busy unloading a bus that was pulling up, they couldn't spare anyone. Huh? You have to be kidding. They did eventually decide they should send someone with us. Do you know what their excuse was as to why they hadn't shown up? They wrote down the wrong room number and when they saw that that room didn't need moved they just let it go. The front desk woman said she would leave a note for the manager. We never heard anything about any note being left.

I kid you not- it was 2:30 am before my poor kids got to bed. 2:30 am!!!!!! What a way to start a trip! And, by the way, in case you didn't notice- all of this meant we missed rope drop for nothing!