Trip Report The Many Adventures of the Figaro Family in Florida

We are back! It's going to take me a little bit of time to organize the photos and my thoughts but I thought I'd at least get this trip report started. For anyone who wants to get to know us, you can read my pre-trip report "Everybody's Got a Laughing Place (and I can't wait to get to mine!)"
Quick re-rundown of the family: Me (Jo), my husband James, daughter Maddie (13), son Xander (10).
This was the longest vacation our family of four has ever taken together. Ten nights total in three different hotel rooms. It was a lot of togetherness but I think we all handled it pretty well, aside from various late night awakenings from loud snoring(James and Xander) and my daughter Maddie's sleep talking. I'm sure she does this at home too, but we don't hear her in her room. Every night on every vacation we've been on she'll sit up suddenly and start angrily lecturing about something while wildly gesturing. She never remembers it the next day and I'm left curious what she was dreaming about. No one complained about anything I did, so I assume I slept like an angel that does not snore or talk in her sleep.
I'll begin with the very end of the trip while it is still fresh in my mind then go back to the beginning when I get the photos organized.
The trip ended last night with a bit of good news then bad news. Good news was our flight got us home to Portland a full hour early!!!! It was a combo of being able to take off 15 minutes ahead of schedule and winds of some kind that shaved of the other 45 minutes. We were supposed to get home at 7:30pm pacific time but got in closer to 6:30. We were really excited because that meant we had a chance at picking up our three pets from boarding before the place closed at 9pm. We had thought we'd have to wait until this morning.
The first inkling of bad news came when we got our car from the long term lot and tried to pay the parking fee. James swiped his credit card but it got rejected. He tried again, rejected again. We try mine (same account), it gets rejected. "That's not good..." we say to each other. He pays with the bank card and we race home so we can drop of the luggage and James and Maddie can go to pick up the pets. I say "don't you think we should call the credit card company?" he says "I don't wan't to waste time with that, let's just get the pets home". They get to the boarding place and James tries to pay, the credit card gets rejected again. So there he is in the pet hotel calling the credit card company to find out what's going on. Apparently multiple fraudulent charges started showing up on our account while we were in the air and our cards got shut down. We use Disney Chase Visa and I do have to applaud them for catching this so quickly. James was able to get them to let our charge for the pet boarding go through before they fully shut down the account and we were able to identify all the charges that we did not make and don't have to worry about them. It didn't make for a nice relaxing homecoming at all! I have a bad feeling that it happened at the airport just before we boarded the plane. I went to one of those airport stands that sell snacks and picked up a few things for us to eat on the plane. I swiped the card instead of using the chip without thinking and even had a moment of unease about it at the time. I think it was an ideal place for someone to install one of those card skimmers.
This was truly the most drama filled moment of the entire trip. thought there were a few smaller ones that felt big at the time! I'll start at the beginning on my next post.
...stay tuned for part one: An extremely early morning drive to the airport.

 

[Figaro Family]

While we were waiting in line for Frozen, I started to hook my sunglasses onto my purse when one of the stems snapped. Those were my favorite sunglasses! Maddie was thrilled when she found out. "hah! I'm not the only one who breaks sunglasses!" No sympathy to be found there. When we stepped out into the unrelenting sunlight after we were done in the gift shop I knew I had to find a new pair immediately. It was just too bright outside for me! We were under pressure to get to Test Track before our FP window closed so I darted to the first stand I saw selling sunglasses and made a fast choice. They are pretty cute with Mickey icons all over them but a little big for my face, oh well. That was another $20 plus tax, bringing the total spent on sunglasses this trip somewhere close to $70. I would have rather spent that on a fun souvenir. Luckily we didn't have anymore problems in that department for the rest of the vacation!
We finally made it to Test Track with a few minutes to spare.

The FP line was a little backed up but the wait wasn't too bad, about 25 minutes. The kids enjoyed designing the vehicles, though Xander started to get anxious that it was taking so long (in his mind) to get on the ride and James had to finish up theirs. The yellow one is his creation, Maddie was annoyed that it beat hers out on several categories.

Test track is a fun ride but its similarities to Radiator Springs Racers had me wishing there was a Cars Land in WDW!

After the ride, Xander started anxiously asking for a potty break. His vocal tone wasn't quite at emergency levels but close enough that we got a little frantic to get his stroller and find a bathroom. James rushed over to what he thought was our stroller and started to get Xander into it. "Someone was messing with the buckles on this thing! Why would someone do that?!" he growled as unclipped them and anxiously fought to adjust the straps to the right length. "Uh James? I don't think this is our stroller." I said as I looked it over more closely. Sure enough there was another family's name on the rental tag. This was the first time we've ever come across another special needs rental stroller just like ours. "Oops!" said James sheepishly as we hurried over several feet to where ours was parked. "You know that family is going to be angrily wondering who was messing with their stroller straps don't you?" I laughed at him.

Our next FP was for Space Ship Earth and we were already in our ride window. When we got in line outside it, the sun was beating down hard and Maddie started longing for a water spray fan as she watched some other lucky kids cooling off. I promised her we'd get one after our lunch ADR if she promised to share it.

I rode with Xander on SSE. We'd all ridden it two years ago which was the first time for James and I since 2002. I love this one but had to keep a close eye on Xander, we'd gotten stuck on it for about 15 minutes last time and he got really anxious. This time we got stuck a couple of times but only for a few minutes each time. He didn't freak out but the wheels were clearly turning in his head and I could tell he was thinking about jumping out. I slid him closer to me and kept a firm arm around him and we were good.
By the time we got off SSE we only had five minutes until our ADR at 12:30 so we had to book it over to England. We were going to have lunch at the Rose and Crown!

 

[fractal]

Thanks for sharing the story about your Dad and I'm sure he's happy to know how much you still think of him.


Good job by Xander on SSE!

 

[Figaro Family]

Thanks for sharing the story about your Dad and I'm sure he's happy to know how much you still think of him.


Good job by Xander on SSE!

Thank you, it gets "easier" to get used to as time passes but at the same time I miss him and mom more because so much time has gone by.
Lucky for us Xander has such an open expressive face, we can usually tell when he's plotting something. His teachers know to look for the signs too! On SSE when we were stopped he looked at me then glanced toward a sort of walkway on the outside of our car then slowly back at me again with his innocent angel eyes shifting side to side. Oh no you don't buddy! He did a good job listening and was able to enjoy the rest of the ride!

 

[Figaro Family]

We made it to the Rose and Crown shortly after 12:30 and checked in. Maddie and I took these pictures of each other while James took Xander for another bathroom break.

There are my new shades!

Maddie belongs to a children's theater group and has signed up for their tour of London next summer, I volunteered to be a chaperone on the trip. We thought it was funny to pose for pictures in "England" since we'd be there in a year!

When our buzzer went off we found the hostess who was a redhead with freckles like me! Her name tag said she was from Scotland. She started to lead us to an outside table and I admit I started to beg to be seated inside even if we had to wait longer. I was past ready to be in air conditioning for awhile. I appealed to her, one redhead with easily burned skin to another, and she went to see what she could do. A couple minutes later we were seated at a table indoors!

Xander was happy to chill out with his fidget toys while we waited for our meals.

We all enjoyed the lunch, the 10% discount for using our Disney Visa card didn't hurt either!
We decided to share this dessert.

It was very good and surprisingly filling for how small it was but we started to regret ordering dessert when we finished it and it took about 25 more minutes for the waiter to come back with the bill. Xander started to get antsy to leave and James decided to get silly with the activities on Xander's kids menu while we waited.

He ended up amusing Maddie quite a bit more with his antics.

He was doing a maze but drawing out ways he could totally beat it, like opening worm holes, or star gates, or perhaps using a Tardis. All this in his very serious scientist tone.

Maddie tried to stay cool under this onslaught of silliness but broke down pretty quickly. At all of our meals after this she was eager to grab Xander's menu to try to outdo her dad on silly things with the activities.

 

[rshell68]

There are my new shades!

They are cute! Make you look like a movie star!!

 

[Figaro Family]

They are cute! Make you look like a movie star!!

Thanks, I'll take that!

 

[Figaro Family]

I'm going to go on a short detour from the regularly scheduled trip report because I'm so happy that we are currently at the beach! Rockaway Beach at the Oregon coast to be specific. My parents bought two timeshare weeks at a little old place directly on the beach about 35 years ago so this is my home away from home. My sister and I were able to finish the legal process to split the weeks and become the legal owners of each recently. I'm so excited to share this place with James and the kids. We decided to do a quick weekend getaway and hit amazing weather for Fall at the northwest coast!

Fun in the sun and sand

Taking a walk with the cool "twin rocks" formation in the background.

Views from our room.

A shockingly fat squirrel we saw on our walk.
I'll be back to WDW trip reporting on Monday. Happy weekend everyone!

 

[Figaro Family]

Back to the trip report.
Picking up the afternoon of Thursday August 24.
We finally paid the bill for lunch and I got a picture of the stained glass rose.

It was still really hot and muggy when we left the air conditioned haven and Maddie reminded me that I'd promised her a spray fan. We found a stand nearby and picked one up. It is nice that they are prefilled and kept on ice.

I told her that she owed me a posed picture with the fan and she paid up. I also made her share.
We had one last FP before leaving Epcot for a break at the hotel. Figment!

 

[Figaro Family]

Figment is my favorite Disney character. I was fascinated by him before my family went to Disney World for the first time in 1989. There was an article in a kids magazine about Figment and his ride that I read over and over again and I remember studying the pictures of the cute purple dragon (I think I'm seeing a bit of my young self in Maddie and her dragon obsession here). I was so excited to finally go on the ride, (remember this would have been the original version with Dreamfinder). I bought a Figment plush afterward that was my favorite for years. When both of my kids finally "met" Figment in 2015 they fell in love too. Both of them got Figment plushes of their own. Since then Maddie started to realize that the ride is pretty cheesy though she still thinks Figment is cute. I explained to her that the current ride is very different from the original and that the most rabid Figment fans still remember the old ride. She became very intrigued and peppered me with questions about the original ride so later that night we looked it up on youtube and sure enough there was footage of the original ride on there. Maddie is now a confirmed "old school" Figment fan! Xander just loves that cute purple dragon no matter what.

Even with his love of Figment, Xander was losing patience fast when we started toward Journey Into Imagination. He was past ready to get to Magic Kingdom and Small World.
"Xander, we're going to go to Figment first!"
"NO! Small World!"
This is where a little reverse psychology came in handy.
"OK Xander, no Figment. Figment yucky. Bad Figment!"

"Good Figment! Figment yes!" responded Xander

"No, no Figment" we said sadly

"Figment yes!"

"Oh, you want to see Figment?" we asked innocently
"Figment yes!" said Xander. How dare we suggest not seeing Figment!

Xander then very happily went on the ride, take that parents!

All of my Figment ride pictures turned out blurry so I'll spare you.
After the ride we checked out the play area.

The light up music area is Xander's favorite. He was jumping and waving his hands so fast that all the pictures of him are blurry.

A little bit of Figment conducting.

I was really tempted to get this had for Maddie.
Finally we left Epcot to take a much needed break at the Contemporary.
Xander decided that he wanted a trip to the pool. Maddie just wanted to hang out for awhile, I convinced her to at least take a walk down to the pool to check things out. I'm glad she did because this was the only time I got a chance to get a picture of the kids with this sculpture.

Maddie surprised me by voluntarily hopping in the ear to pose!
James and Xander cooled off in the pool for awhile while Maddie and I went back up to the room to relax.

Maddie enjoying her personal space on the fold out couch.

Next time: We finally get to Magic Kingdom!

 

[Figaro Family]

I think it was a little after 5pm when we were finally ready to walk over to the Magic Kingdom. How amazing to just be able to walk there! Security was no problem, short line to scan the magic bands, and suddenly we were there in front of the train station!!! James agreed to stop for family photos. It was perfect timing, no line for the photographer and no one in the background of the shots. This first one is the best of our phone pictures and the other two are the photo pass pictures that I decided to buy.

The photographer obviously asked us all to give a thumbs up. I love that Xander put his thumb up in front of his face.

Then we entered the MK and the wonderful Disney feeling fully hit me. As excited as I was to get on Disney property the day before and to go to our first Disney park that morning, I felt positively ecstatic to be in the Magic Kingdom. It is just simply the best, most magical place to be! No wonder Xander had been begging to go there all day.

Halloween decor in August!
I insisted on another family photo in front of the castle.
"Didn't we just do a family photo?" asked James
"That was in front of the train station, this is the castle." Why do I even have to explain these things.

first photo is from our phone, second is the photo pass
picture that I chose. Xander was doing a great job looking at the camera and smiling this evening!

We decided to walk through the castle to get to Small World (we'd promised Xander that would be our first ride since he'd waited pretty patiently all day). I stopped Maddie to get this picture because I was excited that there was no one in the background. I was feeling really giddy at that point.

I made James take this picture of Maddie and I with the Cinderella mural. James said "can we please not stop anymore for pictures and just get to Small World?" He'd been a good sport so I agreed to put the phone away and we headed for Small World.

 

[Figaro Family]

We finally made it to Small World and were happy to find that it was just a 10 minute wait. Here is one happy boy waiting for his favorite ride.

The thing is, this version of Small World is completely inferior to the one at Disneyland. It has a sad, dark, indoor queue compared to the beautiful fairytale building at DLR and it is a much shorter ride overall. There are a lot of scenes missing! None of this matters to Xander. I guess he takes the philosophical position of "less is better than none at all."

Xander was very pleased with our journey and immediately wanted to go again. We promised him he could ride it again the next day instead and convinced him to try something else. We decided on the teacups since the wait was short. I debated on whether to get a return time on Xander's DAS for Peter Pan or 7D Mine Train. Both had really long waits and Xander loves both for different reasons. I decided on Mine Train because of the roller coaster factor and went to get that set up while James took the kids to the teacups.
We convinced Maddie to get in a teacup with her brother and treat him to some fast spinning!

I wish I could post the video of this on here. Xander gets a very blissful look on his face when he's spinning in the teacups. He loves that intense sensory experience.
He wanted to ride again and there was no wait so we indulged this request. Maddie said her arms were tired from turning the wheel so James went in a teacup with Xander this time and Maddie and I shared another one.

Maddie is such a liar!
She just wanted to trick me into a teacup with her so she could spin us really fast and watch me get nauseous. I get dizzy really easily these days and can barely tolerate the teacups spinning with no added help. I used my best "I mean business" mom voice and told her to cut it out or else! Or else what, I'm not sure. But at least she stopped and I managed not to toss any cookies.

Earlier when we were on the Monorail leaving Epcot, I remembered to check for any available FP's later in the day at Magic Kingdom. There was one for Pirates late in the evening so I grabbed that one. When we were finished with the second teacup ride there was about 30 minutes left until our FP window for Pirates opened and the window hadn't opened to go on Mine Train with Xander's DAS yet. We decided that this would be a good time to get some dinner. We'd go to Pirates after dinner and then head over to Mine Train.

When planning for the trip I'd originally booked an ADR at Crystal Palace for dinner on this night but cancelled it in favor of a more relaxed quick dinner at Casy's Corner. I was definitely glad I'd canceled that ADR right then, none of us were feeling up to the pressure of getting to an ADR on time. We were happy to take a leisurely walk to Casy's when we felt like it!

On our way there we were charmed by this "Disney bunny" and these "Disney ducklings" with mama duck that were in one of the fenced areas by the castle.

Maddie wanted to stay and coo over them longer but we were really hungry now so made her move along.
It turned out that there would be more than enough ducks to look at up close (really close) while we were eating.

 

[Figaro Family]

It must have been peak dinner time for a lot of other families because when we got to Casey's it didn't look like we'd be getting a table. Just when we were about to admit defeat and come up with another plan a couple gathered their things and left a table open! We started toward it when someone beat us to it. Fortunately they only had their eyes on two chairs that they wanted to add to the table they were already sitting at. Unfortunately that left us with a table and no chairs. We almost gave up again when I saw a couple of guys sitting at a table nearby that had four other empty chairs. I took a chance and asked if they were waiting for anyone or if the chairs were available. They said they were by themselves and we were welcome to the chairs! Now that the seating problem was solved I gave James the signal to bring Xander over and Maddie and I would go get the food. It was then that we focused on the ground and realized that there was duck poo everywhere along with a hoard of hopeful beggar ducks. It was difficult to position the chairs so that we wouldn't step in anything accidentally. Nearby was a family with several kids encouraging the ducks to stick around by feeding them fries while the parents egged them on. All the duck droppings were making our nice laid back dinner on Main Street feel pretty unappetizing but we felt like we were too committed now to leave so we forged ahead. Maddie and I ordered the food and brought it back while James did his best to keep Xander from stepping in anything. The food was good but the ducks were more agressive than I've experienced there in the past. They were feeling entitled I think because of the family ignoring the don't feed the ducks rule.

At home our dog Hattie has identified Xander as the weakest link in her no people food rule. He is a messy eater so a lot of crumbs end up on the ground. The dog hovers by his chair at every meal, sometimes I've caught her prodding him with her nose probably trying to get him to drop something. I could tell Xander was feeling jumpy with the ducks circling his feet. "animals trying to steal my food, just like at home!"

One of the vulture ducks.

Maddie was grossed out by the duck poo but couldn't keep her eyes off the cute ducks anyway.
We finished up eating quickly and gave up our table to another family then made our way to Pirates.

I took several pictures while we were waiting in line but they all turned out blurry partly because Xander was bouncing around like a Tigger. James had gotten him worked up with one of their silly line games.

I had to get a picture of the redhead since she will be changing soon. James always gives me a nudge when this scene comes up and says something like "me gots the redhead arrr" and I roll my eyes at him. Just as I took this picture he said his line.
I thought I knew where the ride photo camera was based on the photos I've seen in other trip reports so I looked for it when we got to that part of the ride. Sure enough I spotted it! I did not buy the photo but it was pretty funny. Everyone is looking the wrong way and bored just like most other photos I've seen. (why don't they take the picture at the drop?) I on the other hand am looking directly at the camera with a dead eyed stare. "I see you!" I was so focused on finding the camera and so proud of myself for looking the right way that I forgot to smile or make any kind of expression at all.
After Pirates it was time to go on the Mine Train...or so we thought.
When we got there the FP line was unusually long. The family in front of us asked if we were there with a return ticket too. I said no, but what was up with the return ticket? The dad said that they'd waited in line earlier in the day for two hours. the Mine Train had broken down but they kept assuring everyone in line that it would be up and running "momentarily" which did not happen. Finally they gave everyone a return ticket. This explained the large backlog of people in the FP line. I could tell this family was a bit on edge from their earlier experience(two hours in line and no ride!) but they did a great job keeping it together for their kids. I felt so bad for them 20 minutes later when it started to become clear that something was wrong with Mine Train again. The ride vehicles had come to a stop and the people on them were being escorted off. "Here we go again" said the dad "I'm thinking this ride wasn't meant to be for us today." Once again, I could tell he was really frustrated but wasn't throwing a fit about it. Great job dad!
This left us with our own problem to deal with. We'd only invested 20 minutes of our time but once we're in a line for a ride, Xander expects us to go on it. Two years ago we were next in line to get on Winnie the Pooh when they had to shut it down for a repair. Xander went from ecstatically happy to a crying puddle on the ground because he couldn't understand why we weren't letting him get on the ride. We had to carry him out sobbing. James and I anxiously debated how to get ourselves out of a similar situation.
"Uh, buddy? the roller coaster isn't working right now. We're going to have to wait until tomorrow to ride it."
"Fixed it!" said Xander
"They're working on fixing it but its going to take some time. It will be all fixed tomorrow."
"Fixed it, Batteries!" suggested Xander. (He believes fresh batteries can fix everything)
"No Xander, batteries aren't going to work. We'll go on this ride tomorrow."
"Batteries!!" he started to wail
It was then that I had a brilliant, desperate idea.
While we'd been waiting in line James and I had been watching Xander as he noticed that we were across the way from the Winnie the Pooh ride. Xander couldn't keep his eyes off it and kept bouncing and smiling.

"Let's go over and see if we can get a new DAS time for Pooh" I whispered to James. He agreed it was worth a try. So we made the suggestion to Xander, trying to stay upbeat and head off the impending meltdown.
"Buddy, we know you're sad that the roller coaster isn't working, but we can go on Winnie the Pooh instead!"
He sniffled a bit as the words sunk in.
"First Winnie the Pooh then roller coaster?"
"No buddy, Winnie the Pooh now and roller coaster tomorrow." We held our breath and then let it out in relief as he visibly relaxed and started getting excited about Winnie the Pooh. Crisis averted!
We got out of line and went across to Winnie the Pooh. I was so excited when after I'd explained what had happened with our DAS return time for Mine Train, the cast member at Winnie the Pooh let us get in the FP line without arranging a new return time! Very very nice lady!
It was just the bit of pixie dust we needed, I hoped that the family in front of us at Mine Train were able to salvage their evening too.

We had a very happy bouncy ride on Winnie the Pooh and right on cue James said what he always does when we ride Winnie the Pooh. Supposedly the night after the first time we rode it together at Disneyland in 1996, James had a weird psychedelic dream featuring the Heffalumps and Woozles. Basically recreating the scene from the movie. He says that the ride has freaked him out ever since and he always has bad dreams after he rides it. Sure enough "This ride freaks me out!" Maddie loves to question him about what it is exactly that is so scary about this harmless ride.

My final goal for this day was to watch the Happily Ever After fireworks and to get a view of the castle for the projections. This was going to be our only chance to watch it since the next night was the first Halloween party and we had other plans the rest of the nights. All the extra time we'd taken waiting for Mine Train then riding Pooh instead had pushed us past the time I'd wanted to go to the hub to stake out a spot.
Next time: Would we get to see the Fireworks much less have a good view?

 

[fractal]

Looks like a nice beach break - I'm amazed at the size of the sand squirrel!

Great Castle pics!

Kudos to Maddie for tricking Mom.

and Kudos to James for the Red Head comment!

Happy to see the magic appearing to save the day for Xander.

 

[Figaro Family]

Looks like a nice beach break - I'm amazed at the size of the sand squirrel!

Great Castle pics!

Kudos to Maddie for tricking Mom.

and Kudos to James for the Red Head comment!

Happy to see the magic appearing to save the day for Xander.

That squirrel photo is now the background on James' phone, he was that fascinated with it. He is always very quick to point out redheads, clearly his favorite thing about me!
Maddie has always been so painfully honest that I could trust everything she said. I have to be more careful now that she's a teen and become more devious.
My favorite thing about Xander is how openly he shows how much he loves things with his happy smiles, bouncing, and excited noises. We're lucky that he is able to flip to a happy mood so quickly after a disappointment.

 

[Figaro Family]

When we got to the hub it had gotten pretty filled in already but considering how late we'd pushed it to find a good spot, I was feeling lucky to snag an area for us to stand with this view.

Sure there was a lamp post partially obscuring the castle but we could see most of it and were close enough to see the projections and far enough away to appreciate the fireworks. Also there was no chance of rain and the temperature had lowered just enough to be pleasant.
Maddie reminded me that earlier she'd wanted a Dole Whip but I'd asked her to wait and we'd get some to drink during the fireworks. Oops! The fireworks were going to start in 20 minutes, maybe Maddie and I could make it there and back in time? James held our spot with Xander and the stroller while Maddie and I started toward Adventure Land. A cast member who was directing traffic stopped us and asked our destination. He shook his head when we told him about the Dole Whip run. "I wouldn't advise it, you'll have a really hard time getting back to your spot once the lights go out." I appreciated his advice, I was feeling a little worried about our odds myself. Maddie was disappointed but I double promised that we'd get Dole Whips the next day and that we could stop at the Main Street candy store after the fireworks and pick something out. When we got back to James and Xander, James noticed that there was a popcorn cart nearby and offered to get some and see what there was to drink since the line was surprisingly short. He made it back to us with five minutes to spare and we had popcorn and lemonade for the fireworks! Right about then several people to the left of us suddenly left and a cast member going through the crowd started urging everyone to fill in space toward the center. Apparently it wasn't nearly as packed as it seemed. Sure enough as everyone started shifting over more space opened up and our just OK view became this one!

WOW!! I couldn't believe our luck. Then the show began. I took all the photos with James' phone which turned out to take pretty decent fireworks pictures. Though I know some other people on this forum could have taken spectacular photos from this vantage point.

 

[Figaro Family]

Even more fireworks photos. I have to say, I absolutely loved Happily Ever After. Wishes was great but I don't have any specific special memories of it. This show (the amazing view helped) had me hooked. I was feeling all the emotions you can feel and though I tried not to melt into a blubbering mess during the Tarzan "you'll be in my heart" portion, I not entirely successful. So beautiful!

I think this is the first Disney fireworks show for us that we've ever had a good view of Tink!

 

[gdisneyfans]

Awesome HEA pictures! They turned out great - and nice catch of Tink!!

 

[Figaro Family]

One last post to finish up Thursday August 24!

Grand finale of HEA. I still cannot believe how lucky we were on this night. It was our only chance to see the show on our vacation and I couldn't have asked for a better view, weather, or general experience. James was very impressed too, and the kids loved it. One of Maddie's mannerisms that has similarities to Xander is that when she finds something especially pleasing she'll make fists and kind of dance her body around like she's so overcome with happy feelings that she can barely contain them. She doesn't do it so much anymore but was doing it during the fireworks, so I know they really made an impression on her.
Xander stayed in his stroller to watch and kept his hands over his ears the whole time but I know he enjoyed them because he flipped back the stroller shade to get a better view and was smiling through the entire show!
When HEA was done, Xander made it clear that he was ready to go back to the hotel. James was ready too so they started out of the park while Maddie and I went in search of some treats at the candy store as promised. It was so nice to be walking distance to the hotel so we could split up like that, just like our experience at Universal.
Maddie and I finally found the candy store after getting a bit turned around. I always have a hard time switching my mental map between Magic Kingdom and Disneyland. So similar in some ways but things aren't in exactly the same place. Here I headed to where the candy store is generally located at Disneyland then realized it was across the street and further down the way.
We both settled on mickey icon cake pops (which I forgot to take a picture of) and started out of the park. Here is where I have a pang of regret looking back. The park was officially closed so the "Kiss Goodnight" was probably going to happen at any minute by the time we left the candy store. I'd even had it in my plans to try to see it. This would have been our perfect chance but I completely blanked and forgot about it! The next day I was kicking myself when the thought flitted through my mind that I could have finally seen it but had walked out of the park instead. Oh well, a pretty small disappointment in the scheme of things. It had been a really great day overall and the HEA experience would have been hard to beat.

A couple of pictures of Maddie before leaving MK.

Really soon! We'd be coming back the next morning!

When we got back to the room James had Xander all ready for bed. Xander was much more awake than the night before and I realized that it was just after 10pm and the Electrical Water Pageant would be starting soon. I thought it would be fun to watch it one more time and Xander could watch it this time too!

He was so cute watching it, like "I'm not sure what's going on but I like it!"
A perfect ending to the day.

Tomorrow: Extra Magic Hour at MK, girls only breakfast at BOG, and a magical meet up with the Figaro's Florida Family!

 

[Figaro Family]

Friday August 25
We woke up on this morning fully expecting our good weather luck to have run out. We'd been monitoring the weather reports all week and every single one pinpointed Friday as an almost nonstop rain day. The hour by hour on our weather app had stormy rain clouds with lightning on every hour of the morning. We'd been in touch with the relatives and they were also resigned to bad weather for our meet up. James' aunt reminded us to have our ponchos and said they'd be bringing their weather gear and joked that it never failed to rain when they visited MK.
We made it out of the Contemporary plenty early for the extra magic hour and could tell it had been raining at some point earlier. We had our ponchos and a rain cover for the stroller all set in the backpack so we set out to make the best of it. As we were walking the path toward security it did start to drizzle a bit. "Here we go" James and I said as we waited for a downpour. Nope, the drizzle let up and the skies cleared. That was lucky but we didn't want to get too overconfident.

One of Maddie's favorite Disney characters is Stitch so I got her this tank top to wear on the vacation.
We got into the area in front of the train station before it was time to be let onto Main Street so we took the opportunity for some photos.

I'm wearing my new It's a Small World shirt in honor of Xander's favorite ride.

The photos on our phone didn't turn out very well so I'm glad we got this photo pass shot. Xander's not exactly thrilled to be getting his picture taken but I call it good enough!
When we were let onto Main Street we decided against another family castle photo but I wanted to a least get a picture of the kids so we got Xander back out of the stroller and had them sit and pose.

I told Xander to give his sister a smooch on the cheek which he was happy to do. Maddie was not so thrilled. "ewww!" Ah, you can just feel all that sibling love.

While we were standing in this area, I looked over at some people gathering around a photo pass photographer in front of the castle and did a double take. I realized that there was a proposal going on! Just as I looked over, a guy dropped to his knee while opening a ring box and the girl was reacting with the hoped for excitement and all the people around them were cheering. Wow! I can't believe I witnessed a Disney proposal!
"James! wasn't that cool!?" I exclaimed.
"What?" he said cluelessly
"The proposal that everyone is cheering about over there!"
He totally missed it and didn't get why I was so excited. Where's his romantic spirit? sigh.

We moved on to Fantasyland and parted ways. Maddie and I had a girls only ADR at BOG coming up soon so James was going to take Xander on some rides and get something to eat with him at Gaston's Tavern. Originally the breakfast was scheduled later in the morning for all four of us but then we found out that this was the day that the relatives wanted to meet up after regular park opening. I tried to get them added to the ADR but had no luck. My solution was to grab the only earlier time that was available for just two people since Maddie was the one who really wanted to eat there. When Maddie and I got to the restaurant there was still 20 minutes left until our check in time. Rather than just stand there waiting, we decided to run over and take a spin on the carousel.

It was a great way to pass the wait time but we both ended up with black grease all over our hands from the handles on the carousel poles! That had never happened before so I'm not sure what that was about. We had to duck into the bathroom at BOG to wash our hands before we could check in, yuck.

 

[Figaro Family]

I forgot to trade phones with James darn it! His takes way better dark indoor photos.
We checked in and got our yellow rose which I think looks more like a biscuit. We had done a pre order for our meals so we were let in to find a table really quickly.

We ate breakfast here in 2015 and sat in the Rose Gallery so we were hoping to try the ballroom this time. We were in luck, there was a table for two available in the ballroom!

We both ordered the Croissant Doughnut. It was so filling that we could barely dig into the pastries that come with the meal. We mocked up some mochas by mixing coffee and hot cocoa. I may have made myself a second one to go.

Such a cute detail that Lumiere is just standing there on a sideboard in the ballroom! We missed this on our way through last time.

I got someone to take a picture of the two of us in the ballroom when we were done eating. Maddie was like "Mo-om, do we really need another picture?"
"yes, yes we do"

a quick peek at the rose in the west wing.

I got a nice person to take a picture of us in front of the mosaic.

Here we are in the same spot two years ago! Maddie has gotten a bit taller, same ears though! I was wearing my hair in braids in anticipation of changing into my Anna costume for MNSSHP later that night.

We had a great time at our girls only breakfast!