August Awesomeness in Disney, Part Four

See parts one, two and three.

We ate, we drank, we had fun and met characters. But we did take some other pictures throughout the week that were really fun.

The view off the back of a boat from Downtown Disney to our hotel.

Me and my fabulous Disney hat, plus a lanyard with new Annual Pass exclusive pins. Those are our souvenirs that we bring home from each trip.

Fabulous margaritas at Cava del Tequila in the Mexico pavilion at Epcot

We got upgraded to a Princess room at Port Orleans: Riverside! It was amazing. This is the backdrop of the bed, and the picture actually lights up with fireworks when you hit a button.

Princess Tiana even left us a note! Well, she painted it onto the table but same thing.

There was even a Mickey waiting for us when we checked in.

Hubs wanted to include this one because of the crane in the soon-to-open new Fantasyland!

Balloons on Main Street

We even got to take a tour of Main Street and go backstage. We learned the stories behind the forced perspective of the buildings on Main Street, and a bit behind the naming of the windows there. It’s a very big deal to have a window on Main Street and is only given for those who make a major contribution to the company somehow.

We had wonderful seats for the Wishes firework show – from an angle we hadn’t seen it before.

Even without the twinkle lights on it, the castle always takes my breath away.

And what would a trip report be without adorable pictures of my nephew?

I feel like I have a million pictures of him in different hats.

The shirt says “my daddy wanted to name me booyah” – another treat from the ESPN Zone. Hehe.

One of our favorite parks. I love that big golf ball!

We took a much smaller raft than this big boat to Tom Sawyer Island in the Magic Kingdom one afternoon, wandered around, climbed on the paths, and then found some rocking chairs to just sit and look around.

One of our views, this was the small raft that takes you to the island.

What a view!

The Imagineers have all kinds of little details that bring the story to life.

This is a tradition – the Attitude Picture. We have pictures of everyone on the last day of the trip, showing whatever attitude comes to mind. This day, my BIL and the family did NOT want to leave Disney – and you can tell by their expressions!

Less attitude here, I think.

We asked a nice cast member to take this family portrait. We were leaving Disney, but we would be back soon! We’re already planning the next one…

August Awesomeness in Disney, Part Three

Read the first installments: part one, and part two.

On our trip, we really enjoyed introducing our nephew to the characters – even though he won’t remember it! My BIL and his girlfriend had a lot of character greetings and got their autographs in his first autograph book. It was really cute. Some of our dining reservations included characters meals, where the characters come to your table for interaction rather than you waiting in line.

Tigger took an interest in my nephew. He came back again later and wanted to hold him! The cast member who was accompanying him was clearly VERY nervous at this, but Tigger did great and so did the baby. He was a champ!

Don’t think the baby knows what to think about the day-go tiger next to him.

Of course, I needed my picture with him too!

This was my profile picture right when we came back. :)

I felt bad smiling around Eeyore, but what else would I have done?

Family picture!

With the Big Cheese himself!

Goofy is my BIL’s favorite character, so this was a great picture.

Notice Mickey on my nephew’s onesie!

I love my MIL’s face in this one.

I love meeting the characters, no matter how many times I may have seen them before.

August Awesomeness in Disney, Part Two

Read the first part of my trip here.

Ok, so we ate a ton of ice cream for dinner on our first day at Disney. How else should you celebrate a three month birthday? ;)

So that was the first full day, on Saturday. Normally this would be the point where I moved on to Sunday’s pictures, Monday’s, and so on. But I guess we were having so much fun that we didn’t take a whole lot of pictures! We also have shots of almost ever part of the park, so we usually don’t take that many when we’re down there now. Also – I had SO much fun that I can’t quite remember what we did each day!

I do know that Hubs and I ate at one of our favorite restaurants during the week, at California Grill.

We were celebrating something, I’m sure! Well, since we weren’t celebrating a birthday or anything, they said we could celebrate coming back to our favorite restaurant and so, that’s what I got on my yummy caramelized banana and other awesome banana dessert. SO GOOD.

And just to continue with the food theme, we had the most amazing lunch at 50’s Prime Time Café with the whole family. It’s themed like you’re having dinner at your family table, with your aunt or uncle or cousin serving you lunch or dinner. Elbows off the table, eat your veggies, no back talk, things like that. If you mess up, you can end up doing some silly things! Our table was well-behaved and so no one got in trouble. But we all got names – Junior, Scout and I was Princess! It’s such a great theme and a fun way to interact with your server.

Brothers, hanging out in the restaurant lobby

See? It looks like my grandma’s kitchen!

We asked the server for a family portrait and we got this unposed one.

So much better than the posed one!

The last memorable actually happened towards the beginning of the trip. While my BIL and that part of the family were back at the hotel, we ended up at Biergarten in Germany at Epcot with my in-laws. We had never been there, and we had a blast! You are assigned tables family-style, although we didn’t share a table with anyone. It’s a buffet with all of my family favorites – it felt like I was going to a big family reunion and had all the usual German dishes. SO GOOD.

There were even performers during lunch!

Me and hubs, and our drinks.

We learned that Germans take their beer VERY seriously. But coming from St. Louis, this was no surprise! The family was quite amused when I tried to take a sip of beer from Hubs’ stein. It’s almost as big as my head. But my oh my was it good beer.

August Awesomeness in Disney, Part One

When we last visited Walt Disney World for New Year’s, I wasn’t sure when we would be able to come back. That trip was amazing because my mom and brother came with us and I got to show them why exactly I love vacationing at the House of the Mouse.

But when we came back, our annual passes were burning holes in our pocket. We had purchased one for my birthday trip last September, knowing that we’d get at least two trips out of them. It makes much more sense to get an annual pass if you were doing two trips. But towards the end of the trip, I started to wonder when exactly we we could get back to Orlando.

With Hubs heading to France for the semester, and starting his last semester of law school in August, we thought that an early August trip might work (and at that point we weren’t sure if he was coming home for the summer or not). It would be a reunion of sorts, for his parents and brother to spend some time with him before his last semester. When our nephew came along, my brother-in-law and his girlfriend decided to bring the little one for his first trip! So an early August trip to to WDW was planned!

I left work early on Friday afternoon to meet Hubs at the house and head to the airport. Let me just say that I feel so badly for my colleagues at the office that day! I think I was doing the happy dance all.day.long until I left around 2:30 pm. They understood though.

After many trial and tribulations, we ended up in our correct room very late at night. But we weren’t there for very long – we had an early morning date with the Magic Kingdom!

We were able to get there for Rope Drop, or, first people to get into the park. They do a fun opening ceremony with the Mayor of Main Street plus the characters coming in on the train, right in front of the train depot. I loved it.

Later that afternoon, we met up with my in-laws to celebrate our nephew’s three month birthday. I can’t even believe how big he’s getting!

The Kitchen Sink at Beaches and Cream was a fitting celebratory dessert for the adults… he had milk. ;) 8 scoops of ice cream, every topping in the joint plus an entire can of whip cream.

And the aftermath…

We didn’t really eat a lot the rest of the day. But eating ice cream for dinner is just what vacation is for, right?

And this was just the first day.

To be continued…

The Most Magical Place for a 28th Birthday Celebration, Part 5

Sunday morning and it was finally my real birthday! In Disney World! Don’t worry, I had been wearing my birthday button all weekend long and probably had about 50 cast members wish me a happy birthday. That’s the neatest feeling!

We started the day with a trip on the railroad around the park, something we hardly ever do. It’s nice to just be taken around and know that you’ll end up where you started, and can continue your trip down Main Street.

I love spending the day in the Magic Kingdom. It’s my favorite park by far. I love the fantasy, I love the magic and I love the imagination. I could spend every day there if they would let me!

That afternoon, we headed over to Epcot and ate at Via Napoli. I had the most amazing quatro formagio pizza – seriously the best pizza I ever had in my life. Wow.

 

After lunch, I got to chat with my mom on Skype back in the room. I love that technology allows me to see her smiling face wishing me a happy birthday when I was on vacation. She and the in-laws and husband gave me my birthday present which I’m keeping a secret for now – someday soon I can reveal it, I hope!

There’s something so much more special when Cinderella Castle is lit up at night.  I made sure that we got to see it after dark on this trip. I also made a requirement of the Main Street Electrical Parade. It replaced SpectroMagic, the only nighttime parade I had ever seen, and I had to see the classic original for the Magic Kingdom.

Tinker Bell leads it off, after all!

We tried to find a space on Main Street but with so many people there on Sunday night of a holiday weekend, it was almost impossible. We ended up in Frontierland and there were a few spots up front. Hubs was standing on something up behind me to get this picture – see me in the middle, right under the “e” in my ears? :)

The Fairy Godmother was with Cinderella, of course, and saw my birthday button as she went by. She waved, smiled and said Happy Birthday, princess! I grinned from ear to ear the rest of the night.

This parade was amazing. The lights, the song, all the cast members that participated. I love Spectro but I can see why people wanted this one to come back so much!

On the way out that night, a cast member had grabbed a broom to doodle a Mickey on the ground in the remaining rain from earlier in the night. It’s just one of those extra touches that make this place more than a theme park. Sorry. I’m starting to sound like a brochure! 

It’s so hard to say goodbye to this place. It’s my favorite place to visit. I’m even more excited to come back this time around - I’ll be taking my mother and brother for the first time in recent memory. We visited when we were kids, but this time? I know how to get around the crowds, which rides to avoid, and how much fun we can really have. Mom will have a better time because she won’t be dealing with a 7 and 12 year old and all the stuff that goes along with that. I’m hoping that they both have an awesome time – brother is already getting excited, and helped me picked out some dining reservations.

But we had to say good bye to the King Kamehameha Club, the concierge loge at the Polynesian. We’ll be back someday when we have another big thing to celebrate.

We had to say goodbye to the Polynesian, which has become our favorite hotel to date.

We had to say goodbye to the monorail, perhaps the most awesome mode of transportation.

I made a wish in the wishing well and I know it will come true… in December! 

I can’t wait to go back!

102 days and counting… :)