Attended the sold out October 10th party. We’ve attended many sell out parties and had a plan, so all in all had a good night. Here’s what we accomplished (which was almost everything we had planned!)
Entered the park just after 4, picked up our SOTMK cards and headed down the bypass for our starter bag of candy and pictures. Used our SDMT FP then hubby took the kids on Dumbo while I shopped in Big Top. Rode Little Mermaid and got drinks at Gastons, placed a mobile order at Peco Bills from the tavern. Tried out our new SOTMK card then picked up dinner around 6. Experienced the glitchy app,
MDE was still instructing me to pick up my order when we left WDW on Saturday, but somehow it got prepared LOL
After dinner I’d hoped to jump on the Jungle Cruise, but I assumed (incorrectly) that it ran until 7. It does not. So we hit “regular” Pirates instead (we saw the live actors last year and during VAH and had no interest in seeing them again). When we exited it was just 7 and we got our chocolate coins as we left. We then split up to collect the hitchhiking ghost trio (I mobile ordered the sipper and encountered very short lines for the other 2. Note: it was reported upthread that the Splash popcorn stand had the bucket at other parties, but it was not open our night. And the LS stand would not sell them prior to 7. I asked). We had all 3 in hand by 730 and the plan was to hit HM next, but the wait was 55 minutes so we backtracked to BTMRR. That entire area in Liberty Square was a crowded mess all night, and the construction walls there don’t help.
After BTMRR (posted 20 minute wait, pretty accurate) we did the Evil Queen MS then headed to Tomorrowland to say hi to a friend working at PM and rode Buzz. Then it was time to check in for the dessert party. (They DO have new tables and chairs
@GADisneyDad14 - it was the first thing DH noticed!). Treats were good, but my youngest was fading fast, and I was worried he wouldn’t make it till the second parade so we decided to hit the garden early and catch what we could of the first parade from there. As has been mentioned, this is not an ideal spot to watch, but you can see the tops of the floats and enjoy the music, so it’s okay if you’ve seen the parade before or will be seeing it again later in the night.
After the parade passed we settled in against the back rail to wait for the fireworks (and chatted with a very sweet Dis’er seated beside us!). The kids spread out in the grass and we took a few pics with the PhotoPass photographer in the garden. I had deliberately avoided all videos of the new show, as I’d heard it was better in person, as was glad I’d waited. It was cute enough, the projections were beautiful and Jack was awesome! We had no problem seeing him from the garden, even the kids. The music choices were .... interesting .... and didn’t scream “Halloween” to me the way Hallowishes did, but my son has been singing the final song for days (side note, if anyone knows what that song is called or who sings it and it if it’s available for download anywhere PLEASE let me know! “Trick or Treat” maybe?? I’ve searched to no avail). Anyway, it was no Hallowishes (which was my favorite fireworks show EVER) but it was nicely done and I’m sure it will grow on me the way HEA has.
After the fireworks my son had gotten his second wind so we decided we were going to push on. We checked HM again on our way to Frontierland to grab a parade spot, and it was down to 30 minutes so we hopped in line. We walked off at 11 and I was super nervous about what kind of a parade spot we’d be stuck with, but we lucked into a front row spot in front of Diamond Horseshoe between two families. There was enough room for my son to sit, my daughter sat behind him, I stood behind her and hubby stood behind me. Worked out perfectly and we got some great character interaction there. DD and DH hit the TOT station inside while we waited, and they loaded him up with the Snickers Crispers (his favorite!). I was so happy DS stuck it out because the gravediggers are sooooo amazing and I was glad I got to see them up close!!! We abandoned the midnight HP show and decided to leave right after the parade, but unfortunately we waoo slow and got stuck by the parade trying to cross Main Street to exit, so in hindsight we should have just headed to the hub for the show. But all in all, a great night and we still ended up with a full bag of candy between the 4 of us despite only hitting 3 TOT spots! The only things we didn’t accomplish in my plan were the gravediggers M&G (ok since we did it last year), the new HM hearse MS and the HP show, so not bad for a sellout night!
Here are a few pics from the evening: