Trip Report The One Where Elsa Followed Us To WDW

If I don't start this now... I never will!

When: December 3-11, 2024
Why: Our annual trip with our little family. We usually go late January/early February, but wanted a Christmas trip!
Where: Art of Animation Lion King family suite
Who: Me (Annie), my husband Ian, and my 2-year-old Nora (she turns 3 on NYE!)

I took SO SO many photos, I hope you are all ready LOL

Without further ado..

Our trip week kicked off with a rough start. On Sunday, we took Nora to see Moana 2. She did so well and LOVED it.

We got home and I proceeded to have the most violent food poisoning of my life for the next 30ish hours. SO AWFUL. I kept crying thinking it wouldn't be over in time for our trip. Somehow, I was okay on Tuesday morning when we got up to get ready to go to the airport but it was touch and go for a while there!!

Our flight was at noon out of Boston, so my dad picked us up around 8 to head from Maine to Boston.

We traveled in matching sweatshirts

We got into the city and through security pretty easily.

We checked two bags that weighed in at EXACTLY 50 pounds each. I guess this is the last trip we can get away with no suitcase for Nora!

Speaking of Nora, she was a huge fan of the escalators and moving walkways in the airport.

Once we found our gate and ensured it existed, we went to the play area to let her blow off some steam.

After running around like a chicken with her head cut off, it was time for some donuts from Dunkin.

We had more than enough time as things had been running very smoothly. We headed back to let Nora do some more playing before boarding.

We do not board early because I do not need MORE time with a toddler in a confined space lol

Ian got the carseat loaded up and soon we were taking off.

We do not do screens at home apart from family movies together, so the seatback TV kept Nora entertained the entire flight. I personally wished she would've napped, but she was an angel, and I was grateful lol

3 hours later we made it to MCO around 4 PM!

Nora was excited about the "monorail"

to be continued!

 

[Minnie1986]

Time for possibly my favorite picture and total personality photo of my child:

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I now use this picture as a meme when texting with Ian LOL

Finally she was all done and waving to her royal subjects.

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She loved the gifts she received as well.

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We headed over to get some pictures taken.

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This one!!!!

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We loved this experience for our family and Nora. These moments are fleeting and childhood is too short so I love that we will have these memories forever.

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Nora's facial expression in that one photo just gave me the laugh that I desperately needed today; so a big thanks to her for me

 

[Minnie1986]

We had planned to walk the path back to the bus at MK, but it was POURING so we decided to take the monorail. Except... so did everyone else. We survived the wait, but it took awhile.

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Nora started falling asleep on the ride.

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Luckily the rain stopped by the time we got off back at MK. We said a sad goodbye to MK!

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We got to the AoA bus stop and the line was LONG. Like.. end of the night long. We couldn't figure out what was going on until we heard someone say they had been waiting an hour and a half. WHAT?!

We were running REALLY short on time, so we decided to run over to the Pop bus. We got dirty looks from folks in the AoA line and someone yelled out "WHERE DO YOU THINK YOU ALL ARE GOING??"

Excuse me, I do not need to answer to you.

We got on a Pop bus within 5 minutes.

We really had to book it back to AoA (through the rain) once we got back as we were really pushing it on time to get our Uber to the airport.

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It was a mad rush, but we made it to our Uber.

Of course, Nora fell asleep 5 minutes from the airport lol

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Security was a breeze and we were approaching our gate before long.

Time for a snack!

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And then... we find out our flight has been delayed an hour.

Then 2 hours.

And on and on.

AHHHHHH. I tried to walk Nora around in the stroller to get her to fall asleep but she refused of course. So it was just managing her in a packed airport for HOURS.

This is how she felt about it:

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I was trying to keep my dad updated as he was picking us up back in Boston.

We eventually made it on the flight many hours later.

Nora once again refused to sleep, but she was happy watching a movie or two.

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We eventually made it home around 1 AM, and had to work the next day ugggghhhh but we survived.

This was SUCH an amazing trip. I had not gone through my IVF transfer for my pregnancy yet but did shortly after this trip. I've already been dreaming about what our first trip as a family of 4 will look like.

Real quick look at our new ornaments. We get a new one on every trip! Nora picked Dumbo and we picked the Skyliner because of all the fun we had on it this trip.

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Thank you all again for reading. Next Wednesday, March 5th, I will be doing my 24 hour Disney trip with my mom!! Stay tuned for that super short TR lol

We got dirty looks from folks in the AoA line and someone yelled out "WHERE DO YOU THINK YOU ALL ARE GOING??"

For anyone to give you dirty looks, let alone have the NERVE to say this to you at all in insane! People do this all the time, and just because they hadn't thought of it, doesn't mean they get to take it out on you three! I guess misery really does love company; glad you all made you Uber!

 

[Minnie1986]

Today was LL booking day for our 24 hour trip! We will probably arrive around 1030 and need to leave by 7.

I couldn’t get an ILL for 7DMT like I hoped and Tiana was all gone but I’m fairly happy with what we ended up with. I mostly wanted one for right when we got there so we could immediately book another.

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Mostly looking forward to a slow pace, snacks and sunshine! And time with my mama

This sounds like so much fun. Can't wait to read about it!

 

[Minnie1986]

Another baby update for those interested...

Time to start saving up to be doing BBB x2 in the future!!

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Hooray for baby girl #2!

 

[Minnie1986]

Tacking on my 24 hour trip to the end of this one in the spirit of laziness LOL

When: March 5, 2025
Why: Christmas present from Ian!
Who: me and my mama!

I specifically booked this "there and back" trip strategically on a Wednesday because that is (WAS) a day Ian worked remotely so could drop/pick Nora up from school with no problem. Until the executive order to return to work happened and messed up all our plans (he's literally an engineer who sits at his desk all day working on spreadsheets BUT I digress.....). Ian ended up having to take the day off entirely just to make this work which was a bummer

ANYWAY.

My alarm went off at 1:45 AM and I was a bit tired, but the excitement got me going.


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We were flying Frontier out of Boston to Orlando (a $90 round trip flight!!), so I had to find a personal item small enough to fit their standards.

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This bag did the trick. I actually received it in the mail from DVC the day before!

My mom picked me up at 230 and we had a quiet drive from Maine to Boston. Even though it is SPENDY to park at Logan, we were doing so for less than 24 hours so opted to do for ease and accessibility.

Security was a breeze at 4 AM, despite the fact that they were all still in a morning meeting
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Quick selfie before finding our gate.

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I was so hungry but NOTHING was open. Truly... nothing. Not Hudson News, not Dunkin, nothing. Our flight boarded at 5:15 and a Hudson News finally opened at 5. We quickly grabbed something because I was HUNGRY and didn't just want a snack.

I painfully paid $10 for this mini bagel and mushy fruit
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I got our ticket cards out at this time, something I am not used to because Ian and I always do Magic Bands!

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Boarding was also pretty quick, and I kindly gave my mom the window seat lol

She pulled her book out and had to show me the bookmark she was using. It was one I made her in 1997
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The flight was pretty uneventful. We ended up with an empty middle seat between us, so despite the tight Frontier quarters we were not as squished as we could've been.

Our flight landed around 930, and we hopped off to change into some FL appropriate clothes. Excuse my dogs barking in the below pic, I took it to brag to Ian that I was in shorts haha
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Let's hit the fonorail and get to MK!

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I specifically ordered a Minnie Van on Lyft so we could be dropped off at the entrance of MK. The quote on the trip showed us that would be our drop off and SAID Minnie Van.

Well.. a regular SUV picked us up. Okay...

The ride was quick though, and we were crossed into friendly territory soon enough.

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If you hadn't included the year, I would've sworn the photo on the bookmark was of Nora!

 

[MickeyPretzelEnthusiast]

When I first read this, I suspected you would face difficulties with your drop off.

While (pre-pandemic) Minnie Van (the character vehicles) offered service to/from a Disney Resort to/from MCO (which was a pricey $150-$250 one way), it no longer does. Minnie Van is a contractor for Lyft.

https://disneyworld.disney.go.com/guest-services/minnie-van-service/

Only the character vehicles are allowed to drop off at the MK bus depot, which is why your Lyft got turned away. I can only imagine your frustration, and I hope any extra money you paid for a Minnie Van (which tends to be about double the price of a regular Lyft within Disney property) gets refunded to you by Lyft.

Glad you made it through the Contemporary gate (which is typically very strict with ride-share drops) so you and your mom didn’t lose more precious time!

Can’t wait to read more.

No refund yet, but holding onto hope!!

 

[MickeyPretzelEnthusiast]

40 days away from our babymoon trip!!!!

anyways....

Stop number one will NOT surprise you

It was so good....... until I had my first morning sickness bout of my entire pregnancy. Which is impressive, because when I was pregnant with Nora I had hyperemesis and was hospitalized twice and got sick every day until I gave birth lol

Despite the pretzel struggle, I am still looking forward to having many of them in May LOL

My mom had no problems with hers.

Time for our first LL!

I had booked the earliest LL I could for our park arrival time, which was Dumbo.

First ride down!

We headed to Little Mermaid as it only had a 10 minute standby wait.

My mom ended up telling me this was one of her favorites of the whole trip

 

[Tuvalu]

Hope we get a meet!

 

[MickeyPretzelEnthusiast]

Success!

I contemplated Lefou's Brew but my stomach wasn't ready quite yet.

Our next LL was for Tea Cups! I promised my mom I wouldn't spin us too fast

Off to a more gentle cruise next.

My mom had never done Laugh Floor, so we decided that was our next stop.

She got a kick out of it!

 

[MickeyPretzelEnthusiast]

My mom's next request was for some chicken tenders for a quick lunch. Can do! We headed to CHH and started working on a mobile order.

Caught some friends on our way by.

It was also starting to slowly sprinkle, so we were moving pretty quickly.

I found my mom a table with some feathered friends to sit while we waited for our pick up time (it was right around 1, so pretty busy)

I left her briefly to get a treat for myself.

Where to?

This SO hit the spot. I wish I could have one right now!

I managed to make it back to my mom in time for her to try some before it was all gone... and RIGHT before the skies opened up and a downpour began.

We ducked inside, grabbed our food, and got the last table available upstairs.

As usual, chicken tenders hit the spot and conveniently got us out of the rain for awhile.

Our next LL was for Small World. We donned our ponchos and fast walked over there.

We were grateful for the LL because the ling was LONG with folks looking to escape the rain.

We emerged from our ride to continued rain, but it seemed like it was letting up at least.

 

[MickeyPretzelEnthusiast]

Proof of ponchos and made it worth me carrying them in my cross body bag all day lol

We saw that Tiana was only a 20 minute wait and we were wet anyway, so we headed over!

And apparently everyone had the same idea because by the time we arrived it jump up over an hour. Nevermind!

Let's take a train ride!

We exited at Main Street, and decided to wait the 5 minutes to meet the main mouse.

After meeting the big cheese, we ended up buying matching sweatshirts to commemorate our special day. We grabbed a quick photo!

The 3 PM parade was about to begin, so we grabbed some treats as well.

But then... they called for a delay. And we didn't really want to wait around. On to our next LL!

 

[MickeyPretzelEnthusiast]

Pirates!

... which immediately went down upon our arrival. booooooooooooo

okay, let's do something new for both of us. the new Country Bears!

We LOVED it! I can't wait to be back and May and have Ian experience it for the first time.

Mom's next request was Tiki Room. Let's do it!

As we headed out of the area, we spotted some friends.

 

[MickeyPretzelEnthusiast]

We grabbed a LL for Speedway, and slowly made our way over.

Caught more pals on our way through.

The skies were finally starting to clear up too.

We took a little break at Philharmagic next, and my mom loved the new Coco scene.

Up next, LL for Haunted Mansion!

I was bummed we didn't a ride photo, oh well!

 

[MickeyPretzelEnthusiast]

We still had time left in the park, but we were pretty tired. I asked my mom if she wanted to do one more LL and then relax at the Poly for a bit before getting our Uber. She was more than game for that.

We decided on Barnstormer, because it was basically the ONLY ride my younger brother would do when we came as kids LOL

We grabbed a quick snack before heading out of the park.

And one more final Photopass!

The sun was starting to set and the vibe on Main St was perfect.

 

[MickeyPretzelEnthusiast]

We grabbed our belongings from our locker and headed out. I wasn't as sad as usual to leave since my May babymoon was already booked!

We decided to get to the Poly via boat to be outside as long as possible before our return to Maine.

The sunset was beautiful!

Upon arrival at the Poly, my mom got a dole whip lime margarita and I got a virgin one!

Soooooo good!

We sat outside and drank them until it was time to get our Uber around 730.

Our ride to the airport was quiet and painless and security was a breeze. We grabbed a quick slice before boarding.

The flight home was easy! The drive back to Maine... rough. The weather was awful and I was exhausted but we made it. We got home around 2 AM. What I had forgotten is that I was hosting a virtual event for international students in India that started at 3 AM. It was PAINFUL. So my one piece of advice... don't forget about an early morning work obligation LOL

This day was SO FUN and I am grateful my mom took on the adventure with me. I will absolutely be doing this again, maybe after baby girl arrives though!

Thank you for reading along and watch out for my next report for our May babymoon!!

 

[Tuvalu]

What a great mother/daughter day! Thanks for sharing it with us.

Looking forward to May….

 

[Tiki Traveler]

Mom's next request was Tiki Room. Let's do it!

Your mom has great taste!

Mothers always know best don’t they?

 

[mpaulam]

What a great day! Thanks for sharing it with us.