Incredibly long trip report - first family visit

[erinkippen]

We spent last week at the Beach Club Villas. It was the first trip for my husband, DS5, and DS3 (technically two weeks shy of 3, but 3 for the purposes of this recap). I was there in 1999 and 2000, but those were university trips with friends in the age of paper fastpasses, so very different trips. I was suuuuper excited about this trip - I spent fully a year planning it, researching, reading Touring Plans and various other websites, menus, etc. I learned so much. I read so many trip reports. I was so excited to be able to write my own! A little too excited, as it turns out - this trip report is going to make you feel like you were really there, in large part because it might take you as long to read it as we actually spent living it. I got carried away. I’ll post day by day so that it doesn’t get to be way too much.

Travel Day – the fun one

Our Disney day dawned not-so-bright and early – the alarm went off at 2:30am. Or rather the alarm did not go off, because somehow neither of us managed to correctly set an alarm, but luckily I was mostly too excited to sleep. We threw all the last minute things into the bags, picked up the half-asleep kids and carried them out to the car in their jammies, and headed to the airport. I had hoped that they’d sleep in the car but they were also too excited (they’d only found out we were going on this trip the day before). Air travel is becoming less and less fun and while I’d been pretty mad at my husband for insisting that we be at the airport three hours before our flight we turned out to need most of that time for getting through baggage drop-off, security, and customs. Settled into the plane and we were officially off! Less than three hours later (Florida is so much closer than I realized!) we were in a different world. MCO is nice! It’s all airy and open and there are trees growing inside! Followed signs to Magical Express, waited about 20 minutes, then loaded up. It was so nice to not have to pick up our bags!

On the ride we placed our Amazon Now order. Got to the Beach Club at the same time as the guy dropping off the stroller from the rental place, so dealt with that, got checked in (which took a lot longer than I thought it would, given that our room wasn’t actually ready), left some of our stuff with bell services, and headed to the pool. It was a bit awkward with a double stroller and a wheelie bag (we’d packed all our swimming stuff as carry-on), not knowing where we were going and negotiating around deck chairs trying to find a change room, but the pool area was gorgeous and the kids jumped right in. Did some swimming and had just grabbed some lunch at Hurricane Hanna’s when we got the text that our room was ready, about 1pm, so we took the food up to the room and then everybody had a nap.

Later we went back to the pool for a while then rushed back to the room again to change quickly and race back down to Beaches and Cream for dinner. We had planned to order the Kitchen Sink to blow the kids’ minds, but when we saw how big it actually was we downgraded to the Mickey Pants sink instead, which still blew their minds, and was still too much ice cream.

After dinner I remembered that we needed to activate our tickets with our passports (Canadian resident tickets) so we walked over to the International Gate to do that. Then it was bedtime, in anticipation of the next day, our first day at the Magic Kingdom.

[missoverexcited]

No problems with a long trip report! The more detail the better for me. What a fun way to start your trip!

[Agent355]

Can’t wait to hear about the rest of your trip. I would love to stay at the beach club for our next visit. Would love to hear all the logistics of how you got around travel wise etc with the littles.

[momfourmonkeys]

Love trip reports. The more detail, the more fun to read!

[DeepInTheHeartofTexas]

Sounds like a great first day!! We’ve never stayed at the BC but it is on my short list for sure!

[planplanplan]

My kids are exactly the same ages for our upcoming trip. I can’t wait to read what they thought of the rides!

[Tate]

I love seeing the words long trip report, don’t keep us waiting if you’ve already written Day 2

[padfoot86]

I love long trip reports, and can’t wait to read the rest!

[Rachael.330]

Also looking forward to the rest of your trip report! We are staying at BC in march with two LO’s.

[erinkippen]

Whoops, sorry - I got caught up with work. I’ll post the rest over the course of today!

Day One – Magic Kingdom

We had a little trouble ordering a Minnie Van (our only option, since apparently the buses don’t start running until an hour before park opening – something of an unpleasant surprise) but got it sorted, and arrived at the gates around 7:30. Got through security and into the breakfast reservation line, and then it opened up and we were off to the races! Walking down Main Street was so wonderful. Stopped at a Photopass photographer, and then realized we’d done it too soon and there were others much closer to the castle, so stopped again, then made our way up to BOG. I realized on the way up there that while I’d pre-ordered I wasn’t sure if there was some kind of “confirm” or “order” button that I had needed to finalize the order, but when we checked in they gave us the “yellow rose” that signifies a pre-order, so apparently not. It took a few minutes to actually get into the castle and confirm our order, and then we were turned loose into the dining room to get a table and silverware and wait for our meal. The kids were super excited and had a hard time sitting still so my husband took them on a bit of a tour of the other rooms, which turned contentious because DS3 (technically he’s a week from 3, but close enough) was terrified by the Rose Room and DS5 thought it was amazing and wanted to move in. We went back several times to see the portrait change, something our Minnie Van driver had tipped us off about. Our food came and it was fine, nothing special but totally worth the QS credit for the surroundings. We finished up just before 9 and headed to Winnie the Pooh. As we were walking there we saw a HUGE crowd of people coming towards us – we beat rope drop by about 15 seconds. The swarm going to 7DMT was unreal! Walked on to WtP, and then it was time to officially start our Touring Plan. Which let us down immediately! The predicted 4 minute wait time at Dumbo actually took 30, and the play area wasn’t open yet, but it was visible through the gaps in the walls, so it was 30 minutes of “I want to go in there! This is boring! Why can’t we go in there?” Which, fair enough, a long line was NOT what I’d planned for the second ride of the day!

We were supposed to then do Barnstormer and Under the Sea but Dumbo took so long that by the time we got off it was 9:45 and I figured we should probably skip to “meet Gaston” to avoid another long lineup, so we did that, and he was WONDERFUL. So funny and vain and in character, I LOVED him. The boys spent a long time talking after about how they were glad he didn’t try to fight them, because the only line from the song they’d remembered was “No one fights like Gaston”.

Things get a little jumbled in my memory here because I was a little bit stressed about how off our Touring Plan we were, but I think that we FPP’d Peter Pan, did Under the Sea, had Mickey bars, RACED over to Haunted Mansion and just barely made our FPP window and then seriously regretted it – it was WAY too scary for the boys, something I probably should have realized after DS3 was scared by the Heffalumps and Woozles part in WtP. By this point everybody was a little hot and tired so we decided to head to our lunch at Tony’s Town Square a little early (parade package), but we wandered upon the silhouette booth in Liberty Square, woke the artist up (I think – he did not seem to acknowledge that we were there in the slightest until I said “Excuse me?” twice, and after that was super taciturn), and did the silhouettes, which I was thrilled about because that was one of my big wants for the trip.

Then we went over to Tony’s. The meal was fine, although nobody was really in the mood for a heavy pasta lunch and a lot of food went to waste. It was also at this point that my cranky 5 year old said he was NOT going on Mine Train (a little gun shy after Haunted Mansion) so I dropped our FPPs for that and changed to it’s a small world, which was physically painful. So we did PhilharMagic and then it’s a small world and then raced back for the parade – they had said to be there by 2:55, and it became clear we weren’t going to make it, and I was freaking out, but arriving at 3 was no problem and we still got a space right on the curb (and it all became a moot point when about 2 minutes before the parade started DS5 said he had to go to the bathroom, so my husband and DS5 ultimately watched it from the regular area across the street, but they could see fine). The parade was so wonderful – the elaborate floats were amazing, and the fire breathing dragon! So much more incredible than I’d even imagined!

After the parade the kids had been agitating for some shopping so we walked through the stores and let them pick out a toy (light up pirate swords – my heart sank. How were were going to pack these? And more immediately, how were we going to keep them from slashing their way through the crowds whacking shins right and left?).

During the parade I had picked up a FPP for Buzz Lightyear (the grab and modify trick was incredible, I couldn’t believe how well it worked!) so we headed to Tomorrowland to do that, stopping to grab a refillable bucket of popcorn. We did Buzz, and a very sweet thing happened – DS5 tripped and scraped his knee a little, and he was crying, and the lady behind us in line tapped him on the shoulder and said that she happened to be a knee doctor and she had a special knee bandage for him, put a bandaid on his knee, and said she thought he’d be ok in five minutes. She was so sweet with him and it was really nice! Next was Monster’s Inc, then looked at Astro Orbiter but it was a 45 minute wait so got in line for People Mover instead. DS5 complained through the whole ride (“This ride is going to be so boooring! Why do I have go on this boring ride?!?!” but then almost fell over on the escalator up to the platform because it was so steep and then the ride was much faster than he’d expected and actually everybody loved it. We then went to Pinnochio Village Haus for dinner (it was bad! Pizza toppings on cardboard!), at some point stumbled across Aloha Aisle and I got a Dole Whip (so good! One was not enough for four people!), and staked out some spots for the fireworks. Made friends with a lady and her daughter sitting next to us and the kids had a good time playing together with glow stuff we’d brought, and that passed the time until the fireworks. It was the first fireworks for both our kids and they were blown away – as was I, actually, that is an impressive fireworks show! And with the projections…wow. Once that was over we entered the crush of people trying to leave. I got lucky and was able to get a Minnie Van on its way just as we were heading out of the Hub, and we arrived at the pickup location about a minute before the van did. Loaded the two sleeping kids into the car and headed back to the Beach Club.

[erinkippen]

Sorry about the varying photo sizes, I don’t know what I’m doing!

Day Two – Epcot

Since we were so close and no PPO reservations we could sleep in today – although I was awake at 5, too excited to go back to sleep. We finally got up and moving and wandered over to the International Gate and joined the short line at about 8:30. Realized that the people in front of us AND behind us were also all Canadian so we chatted with them until they started letting us in at about 8:45. We headed straight to Norway – we wanted to meet Anna and Elsa and get some treats at Kringli Bakery Og before our 9:20 Frozen FPP. Got both of those things done – Anna and Elsa were lovely, but I was unimpressed by the School Bread, it tasted dry and stale – and then went on Frozen, which was fun, although the seats were SO uncomfortable! The backwards plunge was a fun surprise for my family.

Our Touring Plan was a lot more relaxed this day and so much easier to actually follow! From Norway we headed to meet Ralph and Vanellope and played in that little area for a bit, then did Journey into Imagination (a bit lame, and I think my kids were a bit confused, but not terrible), Spaceship Earth, and Living with the Land (which I really liked – the greenhouses were so cool!).

Grabbed some lunch at the Mexican quick service place, which was good, and scored a great table right along the water in the covered area, which came in handy when a sudden downpour came through. The plan was then to head back to the resort for a nap for DS3 but it quickly became obvious that that was not going to happen, so we all went to the pool instead. Around 4:30 we headed back over - I’d picked up a FPP to the Epcot Character Spot so we did that, then wandered the World Showcase - spent a lot of time in Morocco, because we were there 6 years ago and it felt so similar to the real thing.

Eventually we made our way to Germany for our dinner at the Biergarten. We were seated at a table with another group of four – they were probably in their mid-20s and we got a bit of an “Ugh, we have to sit with kids” air off them at first, but two of them turned out to be pretty friendly – the other two kept to themselves and didn’t talk to us at all, which was a bit awkward. The food was great, though, and the entertainment was very fun. As an added bonus we were sitting right next to the “dance floor” so when all the kids could go up and dance our kids, who are pretty clingy, were about to be 3 feet away from us and didn’t insist that we come with them. Points for being able to sit at the table and drink wine while the kids had fun that didn’t involve me!

After dinner we were heading back to the hotel when we passed Snow White doing a character meet and despite the fact that the boys had no idea who she was they wanted to wait and meet her, so we did that. Got some cool photos outside China from a photopass photographer with a light-up flower thing.Stopped in a shop because DS3 had seen some big stuffed Mickey hands earlier and for some reason was desperate for them, so we got those, which he then put on (he was also wearing a Mickey hoodie, with ears) and promptly fell asleep in the stroller, which looked hilarious. Second night in a row that nobody got baths or teeth brushing – I guess you can slack on the parenting on vacation, right?

[sbbradshaw]

Loving this report – your boys are beautiful!

[Laura_hastings]

This is the most real kid trip report ever. You have me laughing because I know so many of these unexpected mishaps are going to happen with my kiddos too

[missoverexcited]

That’s the best photo!!

[erinkippen]

Day Three – Animal Kingdom

Continuing our tour of various methods of Disney transportation, today we took the bus. I was pleasantly surprised – we got on around 8:10 and were there by 8:30. No problem getting seats. Arrived just as the rain started, and this was not one of those “just blowing through” Florida rains, this was real rain. Sometimes light, sometimes really hard, but pretty cool and very wet. Busted out the ponchos, but it was, frankly, a little unpleasant. Our first stop was the Russel and Dug meet, which was happily covered, so we waited there and were first in line. This was a GREAT character interaction! They spent a lot of time with my kids, DS3 rubbed Dug’s belly and he was so funny, behaving just like a dog. He also licked both my kids, which they thought was hilarious.

After this we had a bit of time to kill before our 9:20 Kilimanjaro Safari fastpasses, so we got some Mickey pretzels and ate them while listening to the African drummers, then hopped onto the safari. At the beginning of the ride the driver said that due to the rain he didn’t think we’d see too much and my heart sank – my kids are animal obsessed and were really excited about this – but I later realized I think this was just part of his patter and he knew what we were going to get. Which was a LOT! Baby and adult giraffes and baby and adult elephants were the highlight – we have a very good nearby zoo but a few years ago our elephants were moved down to California so my kids had never seen them in real life before, so that was wonderful. DS5 left a little sulky because he’d really wanted to see cheetahs, plus he only got to see the butt of the male lion, but in general this was a great (bumpy!) ride. We got off the ride, retrieved the stroller, and realized we were already started down the Gorilla Falls trail, so continued down that way. It was a little unpleasant, because it was raining and mucky and the kids were a bit grumpy, but we ran into a Wilderness Explorer stop and that perked everybody up – they provided us with the books and got the boys started on collecting badges, which they were really into. They then lost all interest in the animals and only wanted to get the stickers.

Once we got through the trail we headed over to Tusker House. Checked in, and by the time we’d parked the stroller we’d been paged to go in (I was surprised by how many restaurants want a cell number to text you when the table is ready – lucky that we had a roaming plan, usually we wouldn’t use our cell phones on vacation!). It was nice to get in somewhere warm and dry. I loved Tusker House – the juice was so delicious, and the mimosas were even better! The food was great, the kids ate a lot (rare, DS3 survived mainly on popcorn for the week), and they were blown away by having the characters come right to the table. DS5 gave the meal “infinity thumbs up”.

By the time we were done eating the rain had stopped and the sun had come out! We headed over to Pandora for our Na’vi River Journey FPPs. I was blown away by Pandora – the theming was incredible! It truly looked like another world everywhere you turned. Na’vi was incredible, but felt really short, and I feel like it could have used some kind of story. In some order we then did Festival of the Lion King (VERY cool!), the Hakuna Matata dance party about 7 different times (every time we walked by they had to stop and dance), and the Boneyard (too scary with small kids, I didn’t want to actually go down slides but I didn’t want to lose sight of my kids). The Maharajah jungle trek was also good, although in retrospect I can’t remember if we actually saw any animals? We got some more stickers, though!

Grabbed a delicious dinner at Flame Tree, and then we were headed back to the buses to go home when we were stopped by a cast member who asked if we’d seen Mickey Mouse that day. We said yes, we’d had breakfast with him, and he said “Well, he sent me to tell you he’d love to spend some more time with you! Do you want to go meet him again?” The boys were all excited and said yes, so he took us and ushered us through the FPP line for the character meet. It was very sweet, and exciting to get some pixie dust, but…we were heading out, and it still took about 15 minutes of waiting, and my feet were wet. DS3 was super excited to see Minnie again, though, so it ultimately was a nice way to end the day. Grabbed the bus back to Beach Club, bundled up (cold front coming in!) and walked over to Ample Hills for some ice cream – a great end to the day.

[erinkippen]

Day Four – Hollywood Studios
Rereading this day, I do a lot of complaining! Be prepared, as Scar would say.

Oh, day four, you were a tough one. To begin with, it was cold. Like, really pretty cold, and we’re from Canada.

We put on layers, topped them off with the fall coats we’d worn to the airport leaving Canada, and stuffed a blanket from the hotel under the stroller, and headed out. Walked over to Boardwalk Bakery for some breakfast treats, then over to the boat launch, where we JUST missed a boat, and were told that the next one was coming in 20 minutes, but also that it was a 20 minute walk. Decided to walk, so headed back to the boardwalk. We got…pretty lost. We walked through the Boardwalk hotel, and asked the valet, and she gave us somewhat confusing directions that we also totally misinterpreted, and then we were walking down a very main road and used google maps and turned the wrong way at the intersection and…ugh. 20 minute walk turned into 40 minute walk, we got to the park right at 9, there was a crowd for security, we missed rope drop, by the time we got to our first stop (meet Woody and Jessie) there was a huge line and I was kicking myself. Waited 45 minutes to meet them while trying to explain to DS3 why we couldn’t ride Slinky Dog, which was zooming past us about every 60 seconds (“so many reasons, buddy! You’re not tall enough, and also it’s a two hour wait!”). We were about three people back from meeting them when the lady in front of us said “My husband and son aren’t here yet, you go ahead.” So we moved up one, and then about three minutes later she said “Actually, I just heard from them, they’re almost here, I’m going to go ahead of you.” What? I mean…I thought that was weird. You already gave up your spot in line, just wait the extra two minutes! It seemed pretty ballsy.

Anyway, we met them, and then decided to skip our next step (Alien Swirling Saucers, but we were supposed to get in line about a half hour earlier) and head to meet Mike and Sully. Except the lineup there was another 45 minutes, so we bailed on that also and headed to our first FPP, Toy Story Mania, which was really fun and cute. After that we checked back in on Mike and Sully and the line had gone down to 25 minutes, so we did that, then did Frozen (I had considered skipping Frozen and am so glad I didn’t, even my “I hate Frozen” 5 year old was cracking up and singing along), getting out just in time for the March of the First Order, which was so cool! Seeing all those Stormtroopers marching around was really really neat.

After that we headed to Backlot Express for lunch, which was a mystery – the chicken strips were REALLY good, but the chicken on my chicken salad and my husband’s chicken burger was basically inedible, super dry and tasteless. The daiquiris were pretty good, though (I don’t usually drink at lunch but when you’re trying to get the most out of the dining plan you have to go for the booze!). From there we split up – my husband took DS5 to Star Tours, and I took DS3 to meet Olaf, with a quick side trip to see another March of the First Order. The lineup to the Olaf meet was advertised at 25 minutes and took more like 50, so we had some impatient kids (the rest of our group met up with us, because it took so long) but they were happy to meet Olaf. It was also in this lineup that I had my first really grab/modify success – I was able to grab an Alien Swirling Saucers for 7pm. Modified and refreshed about 50 times seeing either nothing before 8 or nothing at all until suddenly, a 2:15! Huge victory for the grab and modify system!

We had half planned on going back to the resort for a break but with DS3 not napping and it too cold to swim, we pressed on – saw the Voyage of the Little Mermaid (where I encountered some total a-holes, who decided they were going to sit in the middle of the row and everybody else could just squeeze past them. When I asked them to move down they refused and said I could go past. When I pointed out that there were only two seats beside them and we needed four, they said “we’re not moving” and shrugged. So I turned to all the other people, said “They won’t move down”, and sat down on their right. At which point they moved down one seat, so there was one empty, the two of them, one empty, and us. There were still people filing into the theatre so then I moved over one. At which point the man huffed “She thinks she’s everybody’s mom!” and moved to the other side of his wife, so I moved over AGAIN, and all the seats were full. Why are people such jerks?). Little Mermaid was kind of meh, I probably would skip it next time. We did the Incredibles Dance Party but it was pretty underwhelming, the Hakuna Matata dance party had way more energy. Shared some churros, hit the Muppets as a nostalgia thing for me, and then headed to our 5pm reservation at Sci-Fi planning to eat, go to the Launch Bay and meet Chewie and BB8, and then use the Fantasmic FPPs I’d picked up. Got to Sci-Fi about 4:55, and they said they were running 15-20 minutes behind on seating people, they’d page us, but “don’t go far because when we page you you only have a few minutes to get here.” Kind of annoying, but fine. We found an empty area and played rock soccer for 25 minutes, then went back to see if we’d missed a page, or what, and they said there was a problem with the kitchen, maintenance was on its way, but they weren’t currently seating anybody and didn’t know when they’d be able to start again. Which…was a problem, because we were on the dining plan and we really needed to use the table service credits. We asked what we could do and they said 50s Prime Time could probably fit us in and they’d call over, so we headed over there. When we got there they said they could seat us, but it could take up to 30 minutes. We said we couldn’t wait that long, explained the situation, and they said they’d get us in sooner. Which, I guess they did…five minutes sooner. It was a long grumpy wait followed by a mediocre meal and the realization that we no longer had time to do Launch Bay. Finished dinner, got our desserts to go, and headed over to Fantasmic. Our FPPs said to arrive between 7:20 and 7:35. We got there at about 7:28 and the FPP section was probably 75% full – I was pretty surprised! (I later found out that this day was a crowd level 9, which maybe explains some of it).

I found the show to be pretty underwhelming, but it could be because at this point I was pretty cranky. Getting out of the theatre was a nightmare – the FPP area is on the far side from the exit and the crowd was shoulder to shoulder. A very sweet lady behind us heard DS3 saying “I want what she’s eating!” about her daughter and shared some lollipops with my kids, which was lovely. We finally got out of there, bundled the kids into the stroller (borrowed blanket for the win!) where they promptly fell asleep (eating a lollipop and then not brushing their teeth for the loss!) and walked home on the correct, 20 minute walk, path.

[GeneralOrgana]

Great photo! That’s one tired mouse!

[Church95]

Thank you for the reports, unfortunately there are not so great people everywhere. But sometimes there are super amazing people when you least expect them.

[missoverexcited]

I’m sorry you had a rough day!

[erinkippen]

Day Five – Magic Kingdom day 2

Back to the Magic Kingdom! This is the day that I started to realize that our vacation was coming to an end, and get preemptively sad and nostalgic for a trip I was still on. We had an 8:05 reservation at Crystal Palace so got another Minnie van over there and were in the park by about 7:45. Headed up Main Street stopping for some more castle shots (can’t get enough!) and requested some magic shots, as I’d bribed the kids into being in more photos by telling them about the “magic cameras” that could see special Disney friends.

They called us into the Crystal Palace and I was immediately charmed – it’s so pretty in there! All light and glass and it felt so 1930s, it seems like the perfect place for Winnie the Pooh to celebrate Friendship Day.

Grabbed some food for the boys and rushed back to our table to meet Piglet. We noticed Tigger was also working the room but he somehow skipped our table. Another wonderful breakfast buffet – how does Disney make such good scrambled eggs in such large quantities? And the puffed French toast was so yum (which makes sense, because it was basically a doughnut smothered in cinnamon sugar). Also I tipped my mimosa over and they brought me a new one. The only tiny downside was that missing Tigger meant we had to wait for him to come around again, so while we were finished eating at 8:45 it was another 20 minutes before we actually left – so much for rope drop.

My initial plan had us going from breakfast to meeting Mickey and Minnie, but I’d realized the night before that being in the park early wouldn’t actually help with that lineup because people were allowed onto Main Street early, so we’d already scratched it and our next stop was meeting Stitch, which didn’t open until 9:15. We headed over there and were second in line at 9:10, and about five minutes later a huge crowd of people came in. The boys were THRILLED to meet Stitch, it was super cute. We did Buzz Lightyear again with our first FPPs, then Astro Orbiter (boys loved it, I hated it. Ugh, I felt so sick!) and the People Mover again, then headed for Fantasyland.

Winnie the Pooh had terrified DS3 on day one but I talked to him about it and he decided that he wanted to give it another try so we did it and he was fine, and so proud of himself getting off – “I did it! I was so brave!” While in the WtP line I modified our last FPP (Jungle Cruise) up an hour so we could go straight there, which we did, and while were in that line I grabbed an FPP for Pirates and modified THAT so it started in 15 minutes, so as soon as we got off Jungle Cruise (so many puns! So many terrible puns! But the kids loved seeing the “animals”) we were able to hop on Pirates. Which was scarier than I remembered, “too scary for kids!” as per DS5. Whoops! Lunch at Pecos Bills, where was disappointed to discovered that guacamole is no longer free, but it was still delicious.

Grabbed another FPP for Buzz so went back over that way, took the opportunity to ride the People Mover for a third time while we were there, then headed over for the parade. Got a good spot in the shade and took turns saving the space with one kid while taking the other kid into the shops – DS5 picked out a giant stuffed Stitch, which obviously DS3 then also had to have (packing logistics for the trip home was something I should have considered more when letting them pick out souvenirs). The parade was, once again, wonderful – it was nice to see the boys experience it together, DS5 kept jumping out of the stroller to see what was coming next and then climbing back in to tell DS3 about it.

My husband had tweeted what had happened at Sci-Fi to the WDW twitter account and they’d given us two any time FPPs for the whole family (tip that we realized too late – they’d also given them to our 2 year old, so we could have taken his Magic Band and gotten a few more rides), so my husband talked DS5 into trying 7DMT and I took DS3 to meet Mickey. We were about 2 people from meeting him when DS3, who had been leaning on a velvet rope barricade, did a flip over it, landed on his head, started to loudly cry, and wailed “I DON’T WANT TO MEET MICKEY MOUSE ANYMORE!” I felt SO TERRIBLE, especially because at the time I’d been texting my husband to tell him we were almost done so felt like the other people were judging me for playing on my phone and not watching my kid. The cast member realized his lip was bleeding so got her boss who escorted us over to First Aid to get him checked out – he said when we came back to ask for him and he’d take us back into the room to meet Mickey. DS3 was fine, they gave him some Tylenol and some ice, and in a few minutes he told us he was feeling better and wanted to go back and meet Mickey, so we headed back over there. Went to the FPP line, told the cast member working there that Gabriel had told us to ask for him, and the guy basically shrugged, said “I don’t know Gabriel, but you can go back in the FPP line”, and washed his hands of us, which was kind of frustrating because once in the FPP line there are still 3 separate small room-lines you have to go through, plus by this time my husband and DS5 were waiting for us. It went pretty quickly, although once we got in there DS3 got super shy and basically refused to be put down and just buried his face in my neck.

DS3 had also wanted to try a roller coaster so I grabbed a FPP for Barnstormer and we headed over there, but between being measured to see if he was tall enough and getting to the front of the line he fell asleep in my arms – I guess the drama caught up with him – so we rider swapped and DS5 got to ride twice. We then headed over to 7DMT again to rider-swap that but only got through one ride before we realized we had to go if we wanted to make our ‘Ohana reservation.

We were debating boat vs monorail but DS5 heard boat and got all excited – “we’re going on a CRUISE?!” We juuuust barely didn’t make the boat that was at the dock and probably should have bailed and gone monorail but DS5 was really committed to his “cruise” so we waited, and then it was a bit hectic finding ‘Ohana once we arrived, but we did have time to notice that the Polynesian is BEAUTIFUL! Wow. Checked in and were told it would be about 20 minutes, which I’d expected because I’d heard they were notoriously late at seating people. DS5 saw another kid drinking a drink out of a pineapple so he and my husband set off to find that, and by the time they returned we’d been paged. ‘Ohana was wonderful – so much food! Our waitress was very sweet and brought the kids their own meals even though technically only one of them had a meal plan, and then brought an extra hot dog when DS5 dropped his on the ground. I had to keep asking her for less food, because she’d ask if we wanted, for example, chicken, and then go to put 6 pieces on my plate. We finished with an extra bowl of ice cream because it had been, at that point, about 8 hours since the kids had eaten ice cream which is obviously far too long.

Had a bit of trouble getting a Minnie van – the app kept getting stuck on “contacting drivers” - but that let us go out on the lawn and watch the fireworks, so actually it was kind of a bonus.