Never say Neverland: Easter '18, May/June '18, July '18, Sept '18, Nov '18 TRs (8/22 UPDATE!)

Love the cat porn!!!! That's no worse than what we saw in October...Are you ready??? A hippo literally shot crap out of his butt into the pool he was swimming in and then the birds came down to eat it...Yep, just when you think you've seen it all...You got to hear it first before it even makes my current TR...
 
Love the cat porn!!!! That's no worse than what we saw in October...Are you ready??? A hippo literally shot crap out of his butt into the pool he was swimming in and then the birds came down to eat it...Yep, just when you think you've seen it all...You got to hear it first before it even makes my current TR...

ACK...ok you WIN on that one. Ew!

I totally have a video of the cat porn though...and the comments of everybody on the bus. It was great.

And some good news just for you...this morning I moved up my flight to Disney next Saturday by 30 minutes. It got me a credit of a few hundred dollars on SWA...but more importantly it should give us even more time to get to MK on that day by our 10:30am breakfast at THE PLAZA! :)
 
It's all my fault, I take total responsibility :rotfl2: Yup, I booked HS EMM but for the 21st, we're in Universal on the 19th. I was only able to get one SDD FP for our whole trip and it's on the 23rd so I think the boys will be happy with this because I really think they're going to enjoy SDD and Chris loves TSM.
BTW, I'm also trying to get the Up Close with Rhinos tour but it's fully booked for every day I want it, so there's a slight chance my plans will still change again, too!

So glad you are taking responsibility...and I'll send you the bill too! :-)

I think the EMM sounds really cool, and I think it would be a fun morning for us...but that price...UGH! We only have SDD one other time, but I know we could probably squeeze it in on an evening during the trip, or even doing it early on Thanksgiving Day...with the MASSES of people! I'm just not sure.

Good luck getting the tour. Right now I have THREE specialty events...Fantasmic Dessert & VIP on Sun 11/18; EMM at HS on Monday 11/19 and Jingle Bell Jingle Bam dessert party on 11/20. Of all of these, I think I'm likely to keep JBJB Dessert and will probably cancel the other two events.

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I don't see me making too many other changes right now, but as I just posted to Jenny I DID change our Saturday morning flight...from 6:45am to 6:15am. Honestly knowing my husband and FIL they would have had us at the airport at 4:45am anyway with the 6:45am flight (and we live 15 minutes away with ZERO traffic most of the time and plenty of back road options) so I am tempted NOT to tell them that the flight is 6:15am since then they may want us there at 4:15am. Since our plan is to have my son drop us off at the airport anyway, I think if we leave our house by 4:30am, we'd be at the doors and in the terminal no later than 5am which is PLENTY of time for that flight. We'll see if I can convince them of that.

Sometime this week or weekend I need to do a trial run of making sure my son knows how to get us to the airport and can get himself to the parking lot for his flight a few days later. It seems weird to be leaving him behind and on his own for 3 full days but I know he'll be fine and I have friends in the area if anything was to happen, just no immediate family nearby for him. However having friends that are like family anyway I think it will be fine.
 


I thought I'd take a moment for a flashback here...because this time of year is somewhat difficult for me when I think back. Every one of these happy memories brings a tinge of sadness to me. This month my mom would have turned 72 years old. She was just shy of her 70th birthday when we had our last family trip together:

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The day after this photo was taken, she would leave Disney early (this was Monday before Thanksgiving) and a few days later receive the news that after years of battling breast and lung cancer...she now had 3 tumors in her brain. They were affecting her eyes for months and she had no idea. I guess we'll never know if she had pushed for more testing sooner if the outcome would have been different. She ended up having radiation in December of 2016, and then she just never really recovered from that. Cancer just took over, by January she was under hospice care and we lost her in early February.

And yet, I was so thankful she made the trip down and spent this ONE day with us at the park. I know she was probably feeling pretty miserable at the time. She did seem to enjoy our meal at Crystal Palace:


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Now I know what I posted above seemed sad and it is because I know some of those memories will come back when we take this upcoming trip. However I'm also planning to enjoy every last minute with my family, including my two nephews:

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They were two and four here, so they will be 4 and 6 this trip. So fun!

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Fun on the train...this was our last day I think.

Earlier in the trip we waited in line to meet these guys:
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The boys just loved meeting them, which is why I am considering keeping that EMM event for them. We'll see.

We did drop Tusker House, which was also a great time:
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Since we are staying at Kidani this time, we hope to spend more than one day at Animal Kingdom. We definitely didn't do a whole lot there other than the meal. FOTLK is on the MUST-DO for this trip for sure...and BOTH boys can do EE now.

I'm also really hoping to have some girls time:
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Last time we spent the last night at HS for the evening, just to ride RnRC and ToT, just the girls, last part of the night. It was so much fun. We also had an evening at MK.

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So much fun.

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This was our final MK day. Wow...hoping for some sunny weather for sure like this one, especially with temps in the 30s this weekend here at home.

I think I'll need to try to do a then-and-now of some of these to post when I get back!






 
Good luck getting the tour. Right now I have THREE specialty events...Fantasmic Dessert & VIP on Sun 11/18; EMM at HS on Monday 11/19 and Jingle Bell Jingle Bam dessert party on 11/20. Of all of these, I think I'm likely to keep JBJB Dessert and will probably cancel the other two events.
I think I'm giving up on the tour :( I'll try once more Friday but so far no luck.
We did the F! Dessert party in March, loved the snack boxes! And it's a good thing to book during busy times, we didn't even go in the theater until 30 minutes before the show and still had great seats.

Refresh my memory: did you cancel Tokyo Dining on the 23rd? Because I Just booked it :laughing: Catching Illuminations with the holiday tag is a priority for me and this way we'll have a great view from their balcony.
 


I think I'm giving up on the tour :( I'll try once more Friday but so far no luck.
We did the F! Dessert party in March, loved the snack boxes! And it's a good thing to book during busy times, we didn't even go in the theater until 30 minutes before the show and still had great seats.

Refresh my memory: did you cancel Tokyo Dining on the 23rd? Because I Just booked it :laughing: Catching Illuminations with the holiday tag is a priority for me and this way we'll have a great view from their balcony.

So sorry about the tour. I ended up cancelling the F! Dessert Party because I'm just not sure who will be up for it. We may just take our chances and try to show up that evening, grabbing our own desserts before we enter the theater.

I did cancel Tokyo Dining on the 23rd...and booked 3 other meals in the place of it. I have a breakfast, and two lunches and am trying to decide which ones to keep. Plus I thought if any of my family wanted to try to attend, I could always hold the others for them...even for the family I don't like as much if they end up extending their trip.

Hmmm...I love the plan for Illuminations. I actually managed to somehow snag Rose & Crown Pub for one evening near Illuminations time, as we've had meals there twice before for Illuminations and it worked out well. I'm looking forward to sharing this with my family as they've not seen it and since it will be going away. We have that planned for the 21st. I'd still love to try Tokyo Dining but can't seem to fit it into the schedule this time.

 
Can you believe we are down to SINGLE DIGITS already? I told my coworker this morning that I'd be out next week...and she didn't believe Thanksgiving was NEXT WEEK!

Very few changes have happened and as I said I don't think too many more will happen other than cancellations. I may have dropped a few more ADRs but I've kept the main ones. I did drop the Fantasmic! Dessert Experience for sure.

I caved and mentioned the flight change to my DH yesterday at breakfast. I told him he had to promise me that he wouldn't make me go to the airport any earlier. I think he's okay with our plans, saying it's on me if we miss our flight. We should be totally fine arriving at 4:45am for our 6:05am flight. I may cave and say we can leave at 4:15am but we'll see.

We picked up an additional suitcase yesterday as we are trying to rid ourselves of some of the older and heavier luggage in favor of the 360 degree and lighter rolling variety, especially since we hardly ever check any luggage.

I also mentioned the Early Morning Magic event at Hollywood Studios which my husband thinks is a great idea given holiday crowds. That would be on Monday morning but I'll have to see how my brother and family feel about it. Right now it's booked for 10 of us to include my family with two kids and my brother's family with two kids plus my dad and his girlfriend. We'll see who will be up for it because I'd need to cancel it soon if we change our minds.

Some friends of mine left this morning for their trip so I'm hoping they get some good weather. They had plans to attend the Christmas Party tonight but the weather wasn't looking that great. I've also been informed that a potential hurricane is forming in the Atlantic but according to my weather sources (I have a cousin who is a meteorologist in Florida) there will be cold front to keep the hurricane away from Florida. Fingers crossed.

My SIL and her family from California are due to arrive in Florida tomorrow but I think they are doing Universal for a few days. I have no idea what their other plans are other than some of the Disney plans or if they ended up extending their trip. I guess I'll find out when we see them which right now isn't supposed to be until Wednesday.

The temps here in MD have dipped below freezing already so I am so ready for sunshine and warmer temps!
 
TWO MORE SLEEPS! How crazy is that?

Not nearly as crazy as having SNOW in Maryland today. WHAT? I don't recall any other November snow, but maybe one Thanksgiving about 15 years ago, but I've been told it's not that unusual. I managed to get to work early enough to avoid the snow (it was just light sleet during my drive) and now it's a snow and slush mess out there. It's not too bad on the roads, but it won't take much and I don't know if it will refreeze tonight. I was SERIOUSLY looking up flights yesterday to see if I could hop on one last night or today. I could have...but that would have been nuts. If it was just me (and not leaving the family behind) I just may have done it.

In other scheduling news, my brother would like me to let him know what days he and my dad can get in some golf. UGH. That's not an easy question when I'm trying to schedule most of our stuff for mornings when the crowds will be at their lowest. I gave him a day, so we'll see what happens with that. At least if he misses stuff he was just there two years ago and saw a lot of it...well my brother but not so much dad. I guess his girlfriend will hang out with us at the parks while he golfs.

And my family calls me crazy with my tennis!

Other than that, while I'm not packed I do have a few piles of clothes sitting on various furniture in my bedroom just waiting to be packed. I have done the shorts vs pants debate and determined based on the predicted weather that a combo of both would be good. Perhaps tonight at least the clothes will make it into a suitcase. I do still have tomorrow to pack though.

My SIL and her family are exploring Universal today, or at least I guess they are as they were posting from Citywalk last night. She posted various photos all of which were too dark to make out faces for the most part, including some from Voo Doo Donuts. I have to say we went in there during our trip in September and as much as I love donuts there wasn't anything that looked extra special there for me to buy any of them. It looked like she had a photo of her husband walking away with a box though.

I know by this time next week I'll be sad as our vacation will be coming to an end not too long after that. Why does it go so quickly?
 
Greetings from WDW! It's been an eventful 24 hours for sure..and not all in a good way.

This time yesterday we were taking off for our flight. That and getting to MK from the airport all uneventful. I ended up changing our Plaza breakfast to an earlier time...which I was the afraid would burn us. Traffic through the MK toll booth...crazy. Monorail broke down before we got on it requiring a reboot. We eneded up at The Plaza around 10am for our 9:45am reservation but they didn't even blink at check-in.

Now...it's hard to give a review of breakfast NOW only for one reason...nearly right after we left breakfast I started hanging stomach pains and I would end up spending from 3pm until now in bed. Let me say this...at the time everything we ate was very good. I tried the Lobster Eggs Benedict on fried green tomatoes...way out of my food comfort zone since I don't like tomatoes. DH had the steak and eggs and enjoyed it. I'll do a better recap later hopefully.

So after lunch we managed two rides via FP which was good as the lines were insane. We met up with my husband's sister and family but since they had no FPs we only did one ride with them..HM after a 30 minute wait (posted standby was 45 I think).

Chceked into Shades around 3pm and that's where I climbed into bed never to get out. My brother and family arrived around 5pm...I haven't seen them yet but my family went to dinner with them and hung out at the playground and pool with them last night. Without going into graphic details I will say I spent way too much time on the (thankfully pretty clean and newly renovated) bathroom here at Shades. The severe stomach pains I experienced in 24 hours almost had me considering a trip to the ER. DH seeing me in pain really wanted to take me. I figure if I was still in pain this morning I would go. Thankfully I got up around 4am feeling like a new person. Sadly the Chef Mickeys buffet planned for today isn't sounding too appealing but I'll manage.

So hoping for a much better day today. We are planning a day at MK and cannot wait to finally see my family!
 
OMG! What a horrible way to start your trip!!! Do you think you had food poisoning?
I'm glad you are feeling better!!!! Have a great day in MK!!!
 
OMG! What a horrible way to start your trip!!! Do you think you had food poisoning?
I'm glad you are feeling better!!!! Have a great day in MK!!!

Thank you. It does seem like it since I didn't have any other symptoms. It just hit me soooo fast and I'm not sure what it could have been from.

After that first night it has taken a day or two for me to feel completely better and attempt eating too many things.

Last night my SIL and I killed off a bottle of wine while chatting in our room here at AK and so far so good. I think I'll be okay.
 
So just another short update from me. We are pretty much halfway done here at Disney but it has all been good since that first night of misery.

Our first day at MK went very well. We got a lot done. Chef Mickeys was fun and seeing my nephews enjoy it was great. We even managed to head back to MK at night to ride 7DMT and watch HEA.

Yesterday was HS Early Morning Magic. SO. WORTH. IT. We rode saucers, met Woody and Jessie and Buzz, rode TSM and two rides on SDD before leaving the area that by 9:30am was INSANE. Breakfast was actually pretty good too. Then headed to EPCOT to meet up with my dad and GF, rode TT, MS and SE as well as the boat in Mexico and then snagged some margaritas. Dinner at TREX was a big hit. Then last night the 3 girls left our room at 8pm to head to AK to refill a popcorn bucket...and rode EE and Dinosaur before leaving.

Today is an AK morning followed by probably a pool afternoon break. Dessert party is tonight at HS.
 
Hanging out in our hotel room near the airport. Still full from too much food and drink today, We finished our evening with the 5Pm CP show.

We had a great trip despite the big crowds and as a bonus I got to meet @ariane37 in person on Thanksgiving. I was so excited to see her and meet her lovely family in person and I know I talked her ears off. Wish we could have visited longer. I guess another trip is in order for that!
 
Oh man I didn't know about your first day, that sucks! Unfortunately I know what it's like to have stomach troubles on vacation
#thanksgiving2015
#disneystomachbug
And you did NOT talk my ear off, I felt like I did that to you :laughing: So very glad we met, I actually told Steve I wished we'd had more time to talk too. I think we would have had a good time!!!
 
Oh man I didn't know about your first day, that sucks! Unfortunately I know what it's like to have stomach troubles on vacation
#thanksgiving2015
#disneystomachbug
And you did NOT talk my ear off, I felt like I did that to you :laughing: So very glad we met, I actually told Steve I wished we'd had more time to talk too. I think we would have had a good time!!!

Yeah...this first day of vacation was quite rough, but thankfully it really only lasted about 24 hours and it was at the start of vacation. I think the same thing...it would have been so fun to hang out and chat more! It was so funny that we ended up sitting RIGHT next to your table! I have to admit I was so engrossed in getting everybody figured out and seated (did you see our crazy game of musical chairs happening when we arrived? we must have been quite a sight to see!) that I probably would have totally forgotten to look for you and I would have been so mad at myself for that! According to my husband I didn't even bother to introduce you to my sister-in-law's husband (I don't think she was even at the table at the time) but that's no big loss to me. Thankfully our time with them was even more limited than I thought which worked out great for me. Sadly I think it didn't work out as well for them because some of the stories my FIL told about rides they did or didn't do...I totally could have helped them through some of that. For example, after Thanksgiving dinner the 3 girls (me, my daughter and the SIL I like) took my two nephews to Animal Kingdom Park around 6:30pm. We were able to ride Triceratops Spin, have some fun at the Dinoland Dance Party dancing with Chip and Dale, ride Kahli River Rapids (showed 20 min wait, was a walk on of course), ride Dinosaur (showed 30 minute wait I think, it was more like 10 or 15), ride Expedition Everest (50 min shown, we walked on), and then at 8:30pm we got in line for Flight of Passage and waited about an hour (for the 120 minutes that it showed there). My FIL, SIL and her family also went to Animal Kingdom after dinner. They rode FoP at around 6pm with FastPass then got in line for the Safari around 6:30pm. When they checked the wait times for other rides, like EE, the posted times (which of course were inflated) scared them away. They had already waited over an hour for EE earlier in the week to ride standby and I know it is a favorite they would have done again. I had considered briefly trying to meet up with them knowing we were in the same park, but after dealing with my SIL at dinner and rolling my eyes about some of her narcissitic comments while sharing a bottle of wine with my other SIL who also couldn't believe her...I just wasn't up for it.

Love that you 2 got to meet up!!!!

Me TOO!!! Now I have to meet you next!! :)
 
So now that we are back to reality here, I just thought I'd provide a brief summary of our trip.

SATURDAY: Travel was fine, we cut it way too close for our breakfast at the Plaza but thankfully they didn't even blink when we checked in about 15 minutes late. I am glad we were able to try this, but I'm not sure how fair I can be with a review since almost immediately after leaving there I started feeling ill. While eating, I actually did enjoy the Lobster Eggs Benedict though:

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This was something completely out of my normal food comfort zone. I love seafood...I'm not a fan of tomatoes (even fried green ones...though I'd never had them before this) and I've never had eggs benedict. We ended up meeting up with my DHs family at MK after breakfast but did not hang out with them long at all. My FIL went off with them while we did our FPs and then left. I spent the evening from 3pm until 3am huddled on my bad in pain from stomach cramps. I wasn't even able to greet my brother and family when they arrived, but my DH and family hung out with them that first night.

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SUNDAY: I woke up feeling like a new person...hurray! We spent the morning and afternoon at MK and the crowds were definitely crazy. We pretty much did our FPs and got out, but we did start off with Splash Mountain because the boys hadn't done that two years ago. We also rode this:
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Chef Mickey's for Mickey's Birthday was fun...nothing too special and we pretty much got skipped over by Mickey making his table rounds, but SIL wasn't having that and she found a cast member to reroute him to our table before he left the area completely.
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We grocery shopped to stock the room, brought back dinner from off property, then the girls spent a few hours at AK alone! Here we are back row!

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MONDAY

This was our Early Morning Magic at Hollywood Studios. My dad and GF didn't attend but went directly to EPCOT. This was the BEST THING EVER because we got in two rides on SDD, one ride on the saucers, one ride on TSM and then my nephews got to meet Buzz, Woody and Jessie.
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Before leaving I insisted on tracking down these guys for a photo:

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Then we headed to EPCOT and finally met up with my dad and his girlfriend. We all used our FPs there for TT:
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, MS and SE before leaving for an early dinner at T-Rex Cafe. The food at T-Rex was good and the boys loved the Dinosaurs as predicted.

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TUESDAY:
We managed to come pretty close to arriving around opening for Animal Kingdom, but not early enough to attempt Na'Vi River. Thankfully we did head right to Pandora and use our FP for FOP and then took this:
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EVERYBODY loved this ride of course. It showed a 210 minute wait when we got in line. We also saw FOTLK show and ride the Safari. That night was our Jingle Bell Jingle Bam! dessert party...another FANTASTIC event!
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I had as many tiny alcoholic hot chocolate drinks as possible and some delicious desserts. The show was fun.


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WEDNESDAY:
Another day we met up with my DHs family to ride BTMRR together because I had managed to overlap our FPs with theirs. After that we parted ways until early (11:15am) lunch at LTT where we ate together. Unfortunately we tried to ride HM before lunch but the line was over 45 minutes and not moving due to FP returns, so as we approached the area to go into the first room, I asked the CM about leaving and we did. Lunch at LTT was good, dessert didn't disappoint there either. That night we had a late dinner at Rose and Crown pub and ate on the water while watching Illuminations...totally worth it!

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THURSDAY:
We decided to try to do EPCOT first to ride Soarin' on standby since we hadn't done it yet, but we didn't get out as early as I'd hoped and even at 11am the wait was about 75 minutes...and yes we got in line and waited just for that ride. We got out around 12:25pm and had a 12:50pm FP for Tower of Terror. We hopped a bus (which pulled up right as we arrived at the stop) but still arrival at the park was around 12:55pm. I knew my SIL wanted to take both boys on this one, so I had them all sprint ahead to go try to ride while I was backed up through baggage check. Thankfully they let them on the ride despite being about 15-20 minutes late...Happy Thanksgiving to us! My SIL made two sets of matching shirts for the 3 girls and these were our Thanksgiving ones:
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Thanksgiving dinner at Boma was very good, and meeting @ariane37 was awesome too. That night the 3 girls and the 4 and 6yo hit AK for one final night, getting in rides on Triceratops Spin, Dinosaur, Kahli River Rapids, EE and FoP all on standby between 6:30pm and 9:30pm. We got in line for FoP at about 8:30pm to a shown 120 minute wait...and were on close to 9:30pm. It was a great way to spend our last night together and those two boys were troopers!



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FRIDAY:

My dad and GF decided to extend their trip since that still had a day left on their 5-day park hoppers. My FIL had to check out of his hotel and say goodbye to his daughter and family who were unable to extend their trip another day as they had hoped. The 6 of us hit AK park first to do the 3 FPs we had for that one, and then met my dad and his gf at EPCOT park where we mostly wandered the World Showcase, ate and drank our way around that, stopped to see some performers, and then had a late lunch/early dinner at Marakesh part of our Candlelight Processional package. Food was delicious...just too much as part of that package (I just can't do appetizer, entree drink and dessert). We saw the 5pm CP show and it was wonderful.

Our hotel for Friday night was a Hampton Inn near the airport...it was cheap, clean and perfect with free breakfast the next morning and a quick ride to the airport. Security wasn't bad at all at 7:30am for our 9am flight. We were back home by noon or so.

This trip really was fun but I wished we had managed to do a few other rides that we missed due to the long lines. We are seriously considering the next time we all go together to pick a time other than Thanksgiving Week.
 

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