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]

Last weekend while we were at the beach I had what I thought was a little annoying cold. Maddie had one too but was feeling better by Monday morning while I continued to feel worse and started coughing out my lungs all day and night and generally grossing everyone out. I've pretty much been vegetating on the couch every day napping and trip reporting while the kids are at school. Dishes and laundry have piled up, many takeout dinners have been eaten. James was pushing me yesterday to get checked for pneumonia but I didn't want to jump the gun in case I magically felt better today. After several coughing fits while typing up my report earlier today I finally gave in and went to Zoomcare. Congratulations it's pneumonia! Now I have some fun antibiotics to take and some sweet sweet prescription strength cough syrup to finally get good sleep tonight. James will probably say "I told you so" which is annoying, I like to be the one who says these things.
With this great excuse to continue vegetating on the couch, I suppose I will add more to my report while I'm waiting for Xander's school bus.

As Maddie and I were leaving BOG I got a text from James with this picture and a "guess where we are!" message

Not too hard to guess!
He didn't take any other pictures during their alone time but gave me the rundown on their activities. They had a breakfast snack at Gaston's Tavern, then did some teacups and Goofy's Barnstormer. For some reason Xander said no to a ride on Dumbo. This was surprising because it's usually one of his favorites. Maybe it was because he was fixated on getting back to the number one bestest ride ever, Small World!! James actually took him on it two times in a row.
After I got the text, Maddie and I headed towards Small World and caught up with the boys as they were exiting their second ride. We checked in with the relatives and found out that they were still about 20 minutes from getting to the parking lot. They would still have to get through security and take the monorail from the TTC so we had a bit of time to kill before the meet up. There was already a 30 minute wait for Peter Pan so I got a return time on Xander's DAS figuring we could come back and ride it just before we went to meet the family. Then we all visited the best themed restrooms at the park.

I personally like Tangled more than Frozen (though I do really like Frozen) This movie deserves its own ride!
After the bathroom stop we decided to go on the Carousel since Xander hadn't ridden on it yet.
As predicted, Xander was more than happy to ride the Disney World carousel. No fussing like with the inferior Caroseussel at Universal!

At least our hands didn't get so dirty this time.
We still had some time until we could go back to Peter Pan so the kids tested their strength with the Sword in the Stone.

I didn't get a good picture of it but Xander tried out a new method of grabbing it directly by the blade. We'll continue to keep him away from real sharp objects.
We slowly walked back toward Peter Pan and had Xander pose for a picture when we got there.

Then it was time for a ride on Peter Pan at last!

After our ride we got a text that the Aunt and Uncle were on the Monorail to MK and the cousins had just parked their car. So we started walking toward the park entrance, we had decided to meet up by City Hall on Main Street so we could add everyone to Xander's DAS for the day.

*Finally ready to post this, I had to take a break to get Xander off his bus and do all the after school stuff like snack time. Then Xander and I had to go pick Maddie up from Middle School. Our house is "too close" to qualify her for the bus but too far for me to feel comfortable with her walking by herself. Now we're back at home and I've reclaimed my vegetative position on the couch with an ear out for Xander and the possibility of his mischief making. Just a couple hours left until James arrives with some Friday night pizza!

 

[Figaro Family]

Just vegetating some more on the couch while James is out with Xander, taking over my usual job of getting Xander to his music therapy group and piano lesson. This doing nothing would be pretty great if being sick wasn't a factor.

Picking up where I left off yesterday...

We made it to Main Street and started scanning the crowd for familiar faces. A few minutes later Aunt and Uncle appeared! They have four sons and it is those weddings that we had been making trips to Florida for since 2011. We chatted for awhile while we waited for the cousin and his wife who were joining us along with their two year old daughter who I'll call "Little M". They left their baby girl at home with her other grandma for the day. This cousin is the youngest of the boys, it's so funny to me that he's a grownup now with two kids! When we came to Florida in 2002 he was Maddie's age and begged his mom to take him out of school the day she was going to meet us at Universal. Two of the older boys had already left for school and the eldest was away at college. She couldn't resist the pleas of her baby boy so we adults (24 and 25 at the time) spent a fun day with her and Jame's Middle School aged cousin.
They finally arrived and we spent more time hugging and chatting in the middle of Main Street. Little M is so adorable, when we met her two years ago she was just 9 months old. She reminds me so much of Maddie when she was little I wished I could borrow her for the rest of our trip.
We got everyone added to Xander's DAS no problem. We only ended up using it twice with them but it was helpful.
Snow White was doing meet and greets in an alcove by City Hall and had a very short line so of course Little M needed to see her. I sent Maddie over too, it's been a long time since she met a Disney princess.

Little cutie

The cousins were nice enough to send us all the photo pass pictures and ride photos they got with their AP's that day.
We moved on toward the castle and got some family photos.

Little M was the first grandchild and has had her Grandpa wrapped around her little finger for the last two years. She spent most of the day sticking to him like glue and rejecting her parents. They weren't too upset about it.

I got a picture of James with his aunt. I'm kicking myself for forgetting to get one of him with his other aunt the next day. These aunts are his dad's sisters. They all grew up in New York but eventually James' dad ended up in Oregon while the sisters settled in Florida. James' dad passed away when he was about 12. He's really private about it so I won't go into any details here but the Aunts in Florida are very important to James and his sister as a link to their dad so we're trying to make a point of staying in touch and visiting when we can.

The family had managed to overlap two FP's with ours for later in the day, Space Mountain and Big Thunder Mountain. They hadn't managed to grab Splash Mountain but were OK with sitting that one out while we got our ride. We were really lucky to go on Splash that day since it was going to shut down for refurbishment over the weekend. The FP they got instead was for Buzz Lightyear and the window was opening soon. We headed that way and I decided to get a DAS return time so the four of us could join them. The return time fell later in their FP window so we decided to catch a show at the Laugh Floor next door while we waited for our time to open. The guy chosen as "that guy" was right in front of us and was pretty hilarious playing along. None of us were picked on but I was nervous the whole time because one time we went on another trip I was put on the spot. Later that day when we went to eat at Tony's Town Square someone recognized me from the show. I was a temporary celebrity!
After the show we went on Buzz Lightyear.

The cousins sent us these ride photos.
I couldn't tell what I was aiming at or if I was hitting anything I intended to but it was fun!
There aren't many rides that Little M can go on yet but Speedway is one of them. Her parents were hoping to take her on it for the first time but the wait was an hour. This is when I suggested we get a DAS return time so we could all go. I checked in with the cast member there but they were having problems with their system so he wrote me out a return time on a paper slip. This meant that I could get a DAS return time for something else in the meantime! I thought of our disappointment the night before at the Mine Train and decided it was worth a shot to try again. We headed that direction and I got a return time for later in the day, I think the wait right then was 2-3 hours. Aunt decided that she'd be the one to sit out with Little M so I set it up for the rest of us. Dumbo was nearby and was a walk on so we walked on! Xander was much more open to it than he'd been earlier. He got a little upset though that we made him bypass the play area. I hadn't thought he could play there anymore because there were signs posted two years ago that said the age limit was 9. I was happy to see that they'd upped it to 12 and we promised Xander he could play later.

 

[Figaro Family]

A couple more Dumbo pics that the cousins took. After our Dumbo ride Xander had not given up on his burning desire to play at the Dumbo playground and was anxiously trying to drag James back in. Everyone else needed a bathroom break so we decided James would just take him back in since there was no reason not to. This turned out to be a good plan, Xander was happy to check things out for a few minutes then was satisfied enough to leave. The FP window had opened for everyone to ride Space Mt. so we went back to Tomorrowland. Aunt offered to sit this one out with Little M too since she was worried about aggravating her back. I should have sat out with her. It was a big mistake for me to try Space Mt. and I was Iucky I didn't go into a total back or neck spasm!

I think the weird look on my face is a result of my internal monologue "uh oh, this was a really dumb idea!"

I have not ridden Space Mountain in WDW since 2002. I had been more brave recently at Disneyland which made me over confident here. The problem is that Disneyland did a somewhat recent refurbishment and the ride is a lot smoother. I tried my best to keep my poor neck steady and could feel my lower back tweaking. The Disneyland version also allows two people to sit side by side. I get nervous about Xander being in his own compartment "alone" as you can see from the photo, he does not hold on to anything and I feel nervous that he could slip out. While I was concentrating on keeping my head steady in the dark, James yells "How is Xander doing?!"
"I can't see anything so hopefully he's still there!!!" I shouted back. The torture, I mean "fun ride" finally stopped and the good news was Xander was in fact still there grinning ear to ear. I got out with my back and neck twisting at weird angles. I slowly and carefully straightened myself out and did a couple of my PT stretches. My back twinged a bit the rest of the day and I knew I'd been very lucky, so no more rides on MK Space Mt. for me ever again!
We decided to go over to the Speedway and use our paper return time. I rode with Maddie and got a flash forward of two years from now when I might be teaching her to drive for real.

We usually skip this one when we're on our own so it was fun to try something out of our "zone". Speaking of things out of our zone, everyone was getting hungry for lunch and the relatives were set on eating at Cosmic Ray's. We don't normally spend much time in Tomorrowland so we have never eaten there. When we got our food and sat down I realized that this was the restaurant with the infamous Sonny Eclipse...and we had a front row seat!

He definitely gave off an ALF vibe.
After our lunch we went back to Mine Train and actually got to ride it this time! I probably shouldn't have gone on this one because of my back and neck but I really did not want to miss out.

Everyone else looks so happy! I once again am like "What have I done?!" It was really fun though, and I'm glad I survived, er went.

 

[Figment Forever]

I felt the same way way about Space Mountain. Even though Hope said she wanted to ride, I said no - which I usually never do. But she is such a peanut still, I had visions of her flying out at some point! I think if there was a seatbelt, or if you could ride side by side, I would feel differently.

 

[Figaro Family]

I felt the same way way about Space Mountain. Even though Hope said she wanted to ride, I said no - which I usually never do. But she is such a peanut still, I had visions of her flying out at some point! I think if there was a seatbelt, or if you could ride side by side, I would feel differently.

This is the reason I haven't let Xander ride the Matterhorn at Disneyland yet! That has the same ride vehicle setup. I'll probably give in next time but it makes me nervous that he doesn't have the self preservation skills of other kids his age to hold onto something! Go with your instincts on it, Xander was really small at Hope's age too. He seemed bigger and sturdy enough this time for the lap bar to hold him in so we went for it.

 

[Figaro Family]

I think I've finally turned the corner on this pneumonia thing. Way less coughing today and I finally slept through the night! Yesterday's store of energy went into decorating the house for Halloween, after that I didn't have any coherent thoughts left for trip reporting. Xander loves holidays and has been watching the calendar like a hawk in anticipation of October and Halloween decorations. He woke up yesterday and crept downstairs like it was Christmas morning expecting the decorations to have magically appeared. He gave me a look like "you've totally failed me mom"
"Halloween! October!" Is what he actually said. I had to get all the decorations out after that and get to work. Xander followed me around as my official supervisor and thankfully approved of my decorating skills. He was very happy until he realized I'd forgotten something. He cried for awhile as we tried to figure out what it was. He finally led us to the spare bedroom and pointed to the shelf of holiday DVD's. "Dora Halloween!" He said while still crying. Apparently he thought mean mom was going to deprive him of the joy of watching Dora the Explorer's Halloween special for the millionth time. All was well again as we hauled the Halloween collection down to display by the TV and Xander settled in to watch Dora and Boots.
Getting out the decorations means we get to spend another Halloween with the "other" Figaro.

Two Figaros together again!

 

[Figaro Family]

Back to Friday August 25.
On my last couple of posts I forgot to give an update of what the weather was doing up until our ride on the Mine Train. Pretty much nothing, is the answer. Remember at the beginning of the day we were absolutely certain there would be nonstop downpours based on the weather reports and the Aunt and Uncle's usual bad luck when visiting MK. We got sprinkled on just a bit around the time we went on Dumbo which was actually great because it cooled everyone off a little bit. Then, nothing! It did not rain on us the rest of the day. I was starting to seriously wonder if my parents were pulling some strings for us somewhere up there and if so, how they got such good connections!
The Florida family was seriously baffled at our good luck with the weather.
After the ride on Mine Train we headed toward Splash Mt. our FP window had opened awhile back. The four of us went ahead to the ride while everyone else took a break.

I'm glad I took a photo of the picture monitor on this one. When I checked our account later, the wrong photo showed up with a log full of strangers! Check me out, I totally found the camera! Xander decided that he needed to change clothes, he was just too wet to go on. I had bought the shirt he was wearing that day in two sizes. So the shirt he changed into was the same one just a size up.
When we were done with Splash, the FP window had opened for Thunder Mountain next door. We went on with just the Cousins while Aunt and Uncle sat out with Little M. I really wish there was a ride photo on that one. It was about 2:45 when we got off the ride and it was time for the Florida family to go. Little M needed a nap and her parents needed to pick up the baby. Aunt and Uncle were worn out and were going to be hosting a get together at their house the next day.
We planned to leave MK ourselves by 4pm to take a break before heading over to Epcot for dinner. We said our goodbyes to the family and headed to Adventureland since we hadn't spent time there yet other than Pirates the night before. I got us a return time for Jungle Cruise with Xander's DAS since the wait was over an hour. Then we went on the Aladdin carpets since the wait was only 10 minutes.

I like that this one is a four seater so we could all ride together!
After the carpet ride we took a detour to Liberty Square for the last showing of "Great Moments in History" with the Muppets. This was our only chance to see the show so we didn't want to miss it. James is an enthusiastic Muppets fan and the rest of us aren't too far behind.

I think Sam Eagle has become the family's most favorite Muppet. We watch the Muppets Christmas Carol every year and Maddie's favorite part is when Sam Eagle forgets he's supposed to be English in the movie "You will love business, it is the American way... I mean the British way."
This show was hilarious, we got the one about the history of the declaration of independence. Great Moments in History (but only the American parts) indeed!
Back to Adventureland, we went to the Tiki Room since a show was just about to start and we still had to wait for our DAS return time on Jungle Cruise. We only got this one chance to go to the Tiki Room on this trip but usually go two to four times when we're at Disneyland. It is another one on Xander's list of favorites. We love watching his happy face and wiggling fingers as he enjoys each part. His favorite is when the tiki eyes open and close.

Entertaining Xander with selfie mode before the show started.
So glad the show reverted back to the original in the MK. James and I saw the "Under New Management" version once in 2002 and hated it!


Next was our ride on the Jungle Cruise.

I was really wearing out by then and only took a few not great pictures, this is the best of them. I wish I'd taken one of our Skipper, we agreed he was the funniest one we've ever had. He had a bit of a nerdy Buddy Holly with black frame glasses look. At the part when the Skipper usually scares away the Hippos with a pop gun he used a variation of a new line that I've read in some other reports. His delivery of it was pitch perfect. "I'm going to scare away these Hippos the way I scared away my last girlfriend. "I love yoooou!! I want a Commitment!!!" He had a lot of other jokes that were refreshingly new to us but that was the favorite. Maddie tries to use it whenever possible. Usually scaring away squirrels for her dad in the backyard.
The last thing we did at MK that day was to get some delicious Dole Whip floats so I was able to fulfill my promise to Maddie from the night before. I didn't get pictures of them, I think I was spacing out with the need to get out of the humidity for awhile. On our way out of the park we saw people in costume entering for the first MNSSHP. That would be us the next Tuesday!

 

[krisri18]

We were some of those people in costume waiting to enter for the first MNSSHP!

 

[fractal]

So cool that you met up with the Aunts and cousins! Yes, WDW Space is like a different ride compared to DL Space. They really need to replace that track! Great picture on 7DMC.

 

[Figaro Family]

We were some of those people in costume waiting to enter for the first MNSSHP!

What were your costumes? Hope you had a great time that night!

 

[Figaro Family]

So cool that you met up with the Aunts and cousins! Yes, WDW Space is like a different ride compared to DL Space. They really need to replace that track! Great picture on 7DMC.

Thanks! Yes I think I'll stick with Space at DL from now on. It's frustrating to have to analyze every ride I go on for what way it might "break" me.

 

[Figaro Family]

When we got back to our room we found that Mousekeeping had been up to some mischief.

We didn't have too much time to rest because we had to turn around and get ready for our ADR at Nine Dragons in Epcot which was at 6:45. We had to convince Xander that there was not enough time for a trip to the pool but he did have some time to play with his toys. Maddie and I changed outfits for dinner to get a little more dressed up. She was in on the surprise for James that this was actually his 40th Birthday dinner! I had arranged for a birthday cake to be served for desert and had chosen this particular restaurant because I thought it would be James' favorite of the trip (spoiler, I was right!).
We hopped on the monorail, made the switch to the next one at the TTC and arrived at Epcot with everyone in good moods and looking forward to the dinner. We got through security again then went to go through the entrance. James and I scanned our magic bands and fingerprints then got Xander out of the stroller to do his fingerprint.
A side note here: Xander refuses to wear anything on his wrist. We'd all gotten two sets of magic bands because we were going to be staying at two Disney resorts so James wore one of Xander's bands for him and I bought two mickey icons that clipped to my purse. I put the disc from Xander's other band in one and one of my MB disks in the other since I didn't like wearing the band either. I really like the new MB design that allows you to remove the disk! We took turns scanning Xander's band for him during our trip depending on who was with him.
When we checked into Epcot that night, Xander had obviously been very observant of everyone touching their wrists to the Mickey circle because he very seriously tapped his bare wrist to the icon and looked very pleased with himself! He kept trying to do this throughout the rest of the trip.
We were still chuckling over Xander and his bare wrist tapping when Maddie exclaimed "OH NO! I left my Magic Band in the room!"
James and I just kind of stood there in disbelief as we started trying to figure out what to do. We had to move off to the side to let other people through and it got a little bit awkward and tense. "Argh Maddie! Why did you take off your band?!"
"I don't know, I just did!! You didn't remind me to put it back on!" oooh that really pushed my buttons.
"You keep telling me you"re not a baby, so I shouldn't have to remind you about everything!"
James tried to step in here and calm things down "Let's not get mad at each other" but he shot a warning look at Maddie like "watch it kid" Maddie was starting to get really upset so I did my best to calm down and try to figure out what we were going to do. There was no way we could make it to the Contemporary and back in time for our reservation. Suddenly the answer to our problem dawned on me! In an early move of over planning for any possibility, I had put all of our actual Disney tickets in a ziplock baggie and tossed it into the depths of our travel backpack! I started frantically digging down deep in the backpack and there it was!! I knew which one was Maddie's because they each had a Disney ride on them and Maddie had picked RRC so that was the ticket I'd attached to her magic band. I held it up triumphantly. "Who's the bestest mom ever?!"
"You are." Maddie said reluctantly "Thanks Mom." We finally made it into Epcot after the ticket worked for Maddie. We were still in a bit of a sour mood as we walked toward the world showcase but luckily it lifted quickly.

Maddie took a picture of her parents in front of the fountain.

I took this picture of Maddie in front of Mexico while we were walking toward China.
.

Maddie remembered these puppets from our last trip and had a kid moment when she just had to check them out again.

We made it to China! Just in time for our ADR.

 

[Figaro Family]

James took Xander for a bathroom break while I checked us in and took the opportunity to make sure the birthday cake was showing up on the reservation. I was assured that it was all set so we were on for the surprise birthday dinner! We were seated quickly and I wish I'd taken more restaurant pictures because it was really nice in there.
I must have caught James in the middle of teasing Maddie with a pretend serious lecture. He ordered tea because he really likes it and drinks tea regularly. I like the smell of tea but don't feel like the taste ever lives up to the smell.

Xander enjoyed himself but was a little antsy during our dinner. This restaurant was noticeably quieter than restaurants we usually go to. Xander has no volume control which was a bit more noticeable here so we had to keep him occupied and say "shhh, indoor voice" a lot. It didn't help that there was a birthday at the table behind us and the birthday cake was presented along with the birthday song right when we sat down. Xander kept loudly demanding "Cake! Birthday cake!" throughout our meal. It was kind of funny because his wish was actually going to come true but I couldn't say anything and ruin the surprise and James kept saying "No Xander, we're not having any cake!"

We decided to get a couple of appetizers, General Tso's Chicken Buns and Shanghai Spring Rolls. Maddie and James wolfed the spring rolls down before I could get a picture. Maddie had an extra good time at this restaurant. It had originally been her pick when we were trip planning. She chose it because she had just taken a Chinese class at school with a guest teacher from China. The teacher had taught them some Mandarin Chinese words as well as how to draw the Chinese figures for some words and a lot of lessons were about authentic Chinese food and traditions. Our waitress at Nine Dragons was from China and was very impressed/surprised that Maddie ordered the Roast Duck Salad. Not something most kids are interested in but Maddie wanted to be adventurous and try something different. She told the waitress about some things she'd learned in her class and at the end of our dinner the waitress brought Maddie a clean rolled up place mat. You can sort of see in the pictures that the paper place mats there had examples of the history of different Chinese word characters.

Maddie actually ate the duck and like it. I am an extremely picky eater so I marveled at her adventurous spirit too. We teased her that they used the ducks from Casy's Corner that had been fattened up with french fries.

One of the ears of Xander's Mickey plate was full of carrots which he munched right away. Also fascinating to me because my pickiness extends to all veggies except fresh spinach, lettuce, and corn on the cob. As I said earlier in this report It has been really nice how much Xander has expanded on his willingness to eat different things. He draws the line at rice unfortunately. I don't know why, but he hates it. I should have been smart enough to ask for his meal to be served without the rice because he'd only touch the chicken after I'd gotten every speck of rice away from each piece.

I played it safe with my dinner and got the sesame honey chicken. It was absolutely delicious and I love white rice so I was very happy with my non adventurous meal.

James was very happy with his fish.

 

[gdisneyfans]

Lumiere is just standing there on a sideboard in the ballroom

Oh my goodness, I've never seem him there!! Definitely going to have to be on the lookout for him next time!

So sweet that you all met with up James' family and got to spend time in the MK together!!

 

[Figaro Family]

Finally it was time for the birthday surprise!

I wish I'd taken a better up close picture of the cake. It was actually really pretty and delicious! James was in a good mood since he was loving this restaurant and had enjoyed his meal a lot so he took the birthday attention very well. His card had Happy Birthday spelled out in Chinese characters which he liked and has on display in his office at work now! I forgot to mention that James took Mandarin Chinese classes himself for fun a few years ago, the other reason I thought he'd like this birthday dinner. Xander was pleased with the arrival of the cake and was like "I totally knew there was going to be cake!" (at least that's what his self satisfied expression while eating the cake told me)

All in all, it was a perfect 40th birthday dinner for James. Oh yeah, I did say "Surprise! This was your Birthday dinner!"
The other nice surprise was that even with ordering appetizers, fancy drink for Maddie, mixed alcohol drink for me, and a birthday cake, the final bill was still less than we'd paid at Chef Mickey's the night before!

 

[Figaro Family]

Oh my goodness, I've never seem him there!! Definitely going to have to be on the lookout for him next time!

So sweet that you all met with up James' family and got to spend time in the MK together!!

I wonder how many kids have tried to pick him up, he's so tempting just sitting there.
We really enjoyed the family time. It was so nice to get to know those cousins better. They are the biggest Disney fans in their family if the AP's didn't give it away! We had a lot of fun geeking out over Disney stuff with them.

 

[krisri18]

What were your costumes? Hope you had a great time that night!

We went as Lilo, Stitch, Jumbaa and Pleakley

 

[krisri18]

I like the smell of tea but don't feel like the taste ever lives up to the smell.

I completely agree! My mom always says tea tastes like hot water with a brown crayon dipped in it.

 

[Figaro Family]

We went as Lilo, Stitch, Jumbaa and Pleakley

Great idea, I love the Hawaiian shirts!

 

[Figaro Family]

When we finished the successful birthday dinner it was going on 8pm. Once again our rain luck held as it had rained a little while we were eating but magically stopped when we came out of the restaurant! If the rain kept holding off, our big goal for the evening was to watch illumiNations which we'd never made time to see before. We had one hour until start time so we decided to walk around the China pavilion a bit more and also visit Mexico. F&W was going on during our 2015 trip and it was very hot and crowded for our Epcot day. We ended up only taking a walk around the world showcase but not going in and exploring any of the countries. As we were walking around we realized that it was much nicer to visit the world showcase at night. Easier to enjoy ourselves when it was cooler out!

When I took these next two photos a memory fell into place from my family trip in 1993. Once upon a time, I had some photography aspirations. I was in my freshman year of High school in 1993 and taking a photography class where I learned how to use an old school manual camera as well as how to reel up the film for processing in the dark and develop the pictures in a dark room. It was all very fascinating and my teacher let me check out a camera to take along on our spring break vacation to Disney World. I took all kinds of pictures but was most proud of one I took in the China pavilion. I developed the shot multiple times trying different things with it. I have no idea where those pictures from that trip are now, I haven't thought about them in years. My parents got me a really great manual film camera the next Christmas and I used it for several years including on the trip to Italy where James and I met. I also used it when I took another photography class in college. It was about this time when digital photography started picking up steam and I was too intimidated by technology to make the switch to it other than simple point and shoot. I'm kind of regretting that now after seeing the major difference it makes in photographs here on the forum when you take the time to use a "real" camera. I'm starting to feel inspired to try again!

I bought a very pretty Christmas ornament at this store, then we went to Mexico.
As we were parking the stroller, Xander suddenly made the dreaded pronouncement "DO YOU NEED TO GO TO THE POTTY?!!!!" It was in his most urgent, "this is not a drill" tone of voice. Meaning we were in imminent danger of a flood. We'd dumbly neglected to take a bathroom break after the dinner where Xander had drunk a huge glass of chocolate milk and a huge glass of water! James and I helplessly scanned the area for bathrooms as Xander did a frantic potty dance. "There's a restaurant inside Mexico!" I remembered "There has to be a bathroom in there!" We ran up the stairs into Mexico as fast as possible with Xander yelling "Do you need to go to the potty?" over and over. (We really know how to make an entrance!) Thank goodness there was a bathroom by the restaurant! James ran in with Xander as I waited to find out if they'd made it in time. While I was waiting, I had the horrifying realization that Xander was currently wearing his second outfit of the day that he'd changed into when he got wet on Splash. We'd taken the other outfit out to dry in the hotel room and hadn't put a new one in the backpack. I started scanning the gift shops in Mexico trying to come up with a solution just in case. Why don't they sell shorts for boys anywhere in Disney? Would I be able to get underwear for him anywhere? As I was trying to decide if Xander would accept wearing a Mexican poncho as an outfit, James and Xander finally emerged. Somehow Xander had been able to make it without an accident and we could all breath a sigh of relief. I told James about the missing backup outfit and he shared my horror at the thought of the situation we'd just avoided. "Xander really knows how to bring on the excitement!" we both joked. This actually wouldn't be the last bathroom emergency narrowly avoided. The final one is coming up on our day at Animal Kingdom.
Now that we were past the crisis, James was able to really look around Mexico. "This is cool!" he said We honestly couldn't remember if we'd gone inside here on our honeymoon in 2000 or our trip in 2002. I know I'd been there on my family trips in 1989 and 1993, I still have a little ceramic cat from there that I bought on one of the trips.
There was no wait for the Grand Fiesta Tour so we hopped on a boat. Xander enjoyed it, he was feeling the Small World vibe. Maddie revealed that she's actually watched the Three Caballeros at her Grammy's house (that's what we call James' mom). James and I have never seen it so we deferred to her expert knowledge that the scenes with Donald in the ride are authentic to the cartoon.

The animatronic Caballeros were definitely the highlight of the ride. It is a cute little ride but an update might be in order?