Sister Selfie A Day Keeps the Magic Alive! March 2014 TR with Sis and Friends! 5/27x1

[rachel09985]

Hello All!

I am back for my 3rd trip report on the DisBoards!

My name is Rachel and I normally travel to Disney World with my boyfriend Corey, however this trip was different.



This time I took my little sister Jessica for her 21st birthday! Technically, her birthday isn't until April 9th BUT this was her spring break from Bowling Green State University and my annual pass expires in April and I am not renewing (for the time being) so we had to go now! Our last trip together was a family trip in 2011 for her high school graduation.



The other stars in this TR are my good friend Patty (emmebear here on the DIS) and her sweet daughter Emme. I met Patty in 2012 on the DIS and then we met in Disney January 2013. This led to a girl trip in April 2013 and then we have met up every time that I have been in Disney since then. I love seeing Emme grow older each time I see them here in Disney.



We were in Disney World 8 nights this time! Poor Corey had to stay home this time but he had baseball to keep him company.

Our dates were March 9th through March 17th and the first 3 nights were at Animal Kingdom Lodge with DVC points, second 2 nights at Old Key West with DVC points, and last 3 nights at POR Royal Room with my AP discount.

We had a great time and I will hope you join me as I retell our stories I am keeping it short and sweet because I didn't take great notes and I prefer to pictures anyways!

Enjoy!

 

[rachel09985]

Reserving for Links!

 

[emmebear]

Hooray for another trip report!!

I can't wait to see what you guys did when Emme & I weren't around.

We had such a great time & miss you two!

 

[rachel09985]

My flight out of Minneapolis was at 9:15am and we left our apartment at about 7am. I only live about 15 minutes so I thought I would have plenty of time at the airport.

WRONG!

First off, my bag was 2 lbs over. I quickly rearranged some stuff, then checked in to the self serve kiosk then went to find the bag drop where I ran into this.





The bag drop line was sooo long. I have never seen this in my entire 5 years in Minneapolis. It took me 30 minutes just to drop my bag off. At this time it was already 8:20 and I was getting worried for my flight about making it in time. I was getting very worried about how long the security line was. Luckily, that only took 20 minutes to get through. Can you believe the bag drop off line was longer than security!? I ended up getting to my gate about 15 minutes before it was time to board. I have the Delta credit card so I was in Zone 1.

Our plane was HUGE and I had a window seat. It was a 2-3-2 plane. I have never been in one of those to Orlando before. I just love Orlando flights because of all the families going to WDW.

The man I sat next to was very nice and we talked for a while. The kids in front of us were sooo excited because they have never flown before so they were getting so hyper because of the plane.

Before I knew it we were close to landing. I even saw Disney, which I have never noticed or seen before in the air. You can see the Epcot ball in the picture.



Now, one of my things I had to do today was work for a few hours. I promised my manager I would get something done this day (data updates on Sunday so I had to refresh some data). My goal was to get my work done at the airport waiting for my sister since she wasn't going to arrive for 1.5 hours. I went to a BK and sat down but the outlet didn't work so I frantically went to find another outlet because I wanted to get the work done so I didn't have to worry about it. It was hard to find outlets so I had to end up sitting on the ground staring at the fake-o-rail.





Unfortunately, my data did not come back so I could not do my work. I kept trying to log in and log out repeatedly but the data still was not new. So upset as this meant I would have to work at the hotel.

Finally I gave up and sat and waited for my sister. I saw her so I videotaped her coming! (hoping to do a trip video).

Yay- we were so excited! We grabbed her luggage and then waited for Magical Express, in which we were led right in to a bus.

On the way we caught up since I hadn't seen her since Christmas. We discussed our plans for our present to our cousins which was we were going to take videos of every character we met for them. My aunt's uncle is a fireman and just died fighting a fire in January so they had to cancel their trip in February so they are very down and just aren't doing good so we wanted to cheer them up. I will post a link to the video that I made for them. We also talked about her crazy college friend...yikes! I won't get into that.

Sister selfie time! We were making fun of this selfie song and decided to take a selfie as a joke. It turned out to be a daily sister selfie that we took, hence the title of the TR.




First we went to Art of Animation, then POP, then AKL. Jessica really wanted to see AOA so we made plans to visit the resort. She loves Ariel sooo much!

When we get to our hotel the bus driver let us out and went back in the bus and almost left without getting Jessica's bag! Umm...hello, we need our bag! Haha. We called him back out and he got it.



It was 4:30 so we checked in and knew our room would be ready. It took a little bit to get our magic bands straightened away like always but our room was ready and it was room #5134



We walked in and I was blown away! First, we got another safari view which I was amazed at. I just couldn't believe we got another safari view when we only paid for standard. Our room was awesome AND my luggage already arrive from Magical Express!













Animals!







Jessica was just in awe. She was loving this resort so far.

Unfortunately, we had dinner in about 2.5 hours but we were starving so we knew we needed to eat something. We didn't want to eat a lot but we were sick we were so hungry so we went down to the Mara and had carb overload.





Lol! It actually hit the spot and satisfied our hunger.

We went back up to the room so I could continue working which STILL didn't work! Grrr. I was running out of time and I so was not going to be working the next day.

Continued in the next post!

 

[rachel09985]

After lunch we walked around and took some pictures of animals.






Patty arrived at AKL at 6:15 so I went down to help her. I brought Emme up the room and introduced her to Jessica. I could tell they were going to be friends.

Unfortunately, at this time, my data started to come back...this was not good because our dinner was soon and I would have to refresh everything if I closed out before dinner. It was also painfully slow. I don't know if it was the system or the internet.

When patty arrived, I gave Emme her birthday present. I got her a palace pet because she collects them.

It was getting close to 7 and Patty's luggage still did not come up and we had to go. I called bell services and they said you were supposed to call them when you are ready. They told us it would automatically come right up. So we called and had to stay in the room to wait for it. It came about 7:10 and we headed right down to Boma (so nice!).

Dinner was with my friend Kami and her family. We were in the same FB group for November 2012 and it spun off into a different group and we are both on there so we decided to meet up. We were with her family of 5 including husband and daughters Collete, Isabella, and Giselle. Collette loved Emme and they were BFF instantaneous!

There was a little bit of confusion with our ADR. She said they could seat us together so I checked in and told them we were here but wanted to sit with the other family. They seemed to have no idea what we were talking about even though Kami already talked with them. Anyways, we got it situated and we were sat somewhere in the middle of the restaurant. When I got back home and noticed I had a $40 cancellation on my card!! I was mad. Somehow they didn't check me in right so I got a charge. They took it off though.

Dinner was honestly a blur because we were talking so much. Kami is a huge disney nut/planning obsessed as I am I, so we had a lot to talk about. Her husband was really funny and we all had a nice time!

I had pork shoulder, roast beef, coconut ginger soup (my fav), spinach and corn dish, salads, dessert. For dessert the mint strawberry panna cotta was good along with the zebra domes. Jessica got a beautiful happy birthday tart! We all sang happy birthday to her.









Here is Kami and I! We matched!



I let them use our TIW card so we just went on the same check. I had to hurry up and figure out how much we owed since we just gave them gift cards. Hopefully it was correct! They were appreciative of the 20% discount!

They were heading on a cruise the next day so they were excited for that. We said our goodbyes then Patty had to fix her magic bands. Emme was so hyper and was running all over the place with Jessica. She kept running to the statues and pretending it scared her, then running back to the rocking chair. A little girl started copying her and doing the same thing.



We all were just drained after dinner so we decided to stay in the room. I had to work anyways, so I worked until midnight. I was emailing back and forth with my manager...she was like why are you working?? I didn't get this because she was the one that told me to work! Anyways, I wanted to get it done so I continued and I wasn't making progress so I just went to bed and was going to finish it up in the morning.

An uneventful first day in Disney but it was a great one because I was with family and friends in Disney!

 

[emmysmommy]

Hi Rachel! I'm joining in.

What an eventful travel day with the long lines and the work project but to get to AKL and see that view!! So worth it! I've never seen bags arrive before getting to your room. That was fast!

Ahhhh Boma dinner - awesome! And even better with friends.

Hi Patty and Emme!

Looking forward to reading more.

 

[DisneyKid4Life]

Here Rachel!! Wow, is this really only your 3rd TR?? I know you've done lots of postings over in Dining, but this still surprises me.

WOW, I have always wanted to see Disney from the plane, but have never had the good fortune. How seriously cool that you did!!

 

[wilma-bride]

Hey Rachel, nice to see another TR. Our trip overlapped with yours so, who knows, I may just spot myself or my DD in one of your pictures

Great start, looking forward to more.

 

[nyygirl44]

Joining in! I stayed in AKL march 9th-11th and I loved it!! My only regret was not doing a savannah view. We only got to spend a little time in the savannah while our wedding photographer took pictures of us. Luckily my husband loved it so much he is considered joining DVC!! Can't wait to keep reading your report!!

 

[rachel09985]

Hi Rachel! I'm joining in.

What an eventful travel day with the long lines and the work project but to get to AKL and see that view!! So worth it! I've never seen bags arrive before getting to your room. That was fast!

Ahhhh Boma dinner - awesome! And even better with friends.

Hi Patty and Emme!

Looking forward to reading more.

Hi! Glad you are here! I agree about the fast bags. But I was also at the airport for 1.5 hours after my flight landed. The view was amazing. I just love AKL.

Here Rachel!! Wow, is this really only your 3rd TR?? I know you've done lots of postings over in Dining, but this still surprises me.

WOW, I have always wanted to see Disney from the plane, but have never had the good fortune. How seriously cool that you did!!

It was cool to see Disney. I saw Sea World first and then knew Disney had to be close and then I found the ball!

Hey Rachel, nice to see another TR. Our trip overlapped with yours so, who knows, I may just spot myself or my DD in one of your pictures

Great start, looking forward to more.

Hi! I didn't know you were there around the same time! I hope you have a wonderful time.

Joining in! I stayed in AKL march 9th-11th and I loved it!! My only regret was not doing a savannah view. We only got to spend a little time in the savannah while our wedding photographer took pictures of us. Luckily my husband loved it so much he is considered joining DVC!! Can't wait to keep reading your report!!

I just love AKL. Congrats on the wedding! How exciting. I would love to join DVC as well.

 

[dsjrmomma2010]

Joining in. We are going next feb/march so I am reading trip reports to see weather and events.

 

[rachel09985]

This morning was the morning of Monday March 10th.

Jessica and I originally had plans to eat at Chef Mickey's but they changed when I invited my cousin Kelcey to breakfast. Kelcey and her husband live in Orlando with their 4 month old baby Ava. March plays baseball for Houston Astros and his spring training is in Kissimmee so I decided to invite her and Ava to breakfast since I only see them at Christmas. Ava doesn't get up until 9:30 so we had to change our plans since Chef Mickey's was too early. Thus, we ended up with Boma at 11am.

I got up super early this morning. I did not sleep at all. Emme was coughing really bad throughout the night so I was up for most of the night. I actually put my headphones on throughout the night to drown it out. I was actually really nervous for the rest of the trip because I knew I couldn't function on no sleep every night. I am an incredibly light sleeper so any noise wakes me up.

I woke up at 7am which is 6am my time and I finished my work as well as I could. The internet was so slow I couldn't finish it entirely, but it was as good as we were going to get.

Jessica and I just layed around until our breakfast. Patty and Emme had a date at Animal Kingdom so they went there in the morning around 9:30 or so. Hopefully she can tell you a little bit about their time at AK!

Around 10:30 we headed downstairs to wait for Kelcey.



We looked around in the gift shop to pass time.



Jessica is majorly into makeup so the Beautifully Disney line caught her eye.

Kelcey texted me soon after that they pulled in so we went outside to wait for her. Jessica spied a backpack that a family left behind so we ran after them to give it to them. We are such good samaritans!

Soon Kelcey showed up and we headed to Boma and were led inside. The table that they put us at we couldn't have Ava face us so they moved us to a bigger table where we could put Ava at the end where we could both see her.

She is such a precious little baby! I loved seeing them. We talked about Marc's baseball and a little more about our family. It was such a great time. our server was so nice!

Breakfast was so good!!! I love the ham with the spicy mustard.



Oatmeal with brown sugar and cinnamon! Sooo good!



They have mickey waffles now!! Unfortunately they were a little hard.



I really enjoy Boma breakfast. There is a lot of unique things and a lot of american things as well. I used to love the goat cheese scrambled eggs but I don't like them as much anymore. Can't wait to eat here again.

We asked our server to take a photo of us and he took like 20 pictures. No joke! They were trying to get Ava to look but she wasn't having it.





We were there a long time and we were one of the last few tables there. I am so glad they don't pressure you to leave. I ended up paying for my cousin since she drove to meet us but when I went to pay with the room card it wouldn't take my pin code so I had to pay in gift cards. I was so confused why it wasn't working. They kept telling me I was typing in the wrong code but I knew I wasn't.

My aunts are just obsessed with Ava so I had to get a picture of her smiling. So cute!! She is such a happy baby!




After Kelcey and Ava left Jessica and I went up to the room to change into our swim suits.

I recently lost 17 lbs so my bottoms were almost falling off of me. I changed into another suit I brought but that one was a little too small so I stayed with the loose bottoms and just decided to hold them up if I needed to.

At the pool area we found two chairs right away at the edge.

I went to get us two drinks! I got Jessica the pina colava and I got the Island Moonshine which had moonshine, blue curacoa, coconut, pineapple juice, and coconut water. The bartender asked I liked coconut and I said yes. I didn't realize it was going to be sooo coconutty. It was too much!

It was way too sweet- and I hate those paper straws. I could barely drink it because of how sweet it was.



After relaxing for a bit we decided to go on the fun slide. We went down it twice before we swam a bit. After we got out it was soo cold! I had to cover up with the towel.

We warmed up before we headed up. We are both pale so we didn't want to get burnt so we got out before we could get burnt.

I lounged around on the patio while Jessica got ready. My gosh- it takes forever for her to get ready!! I thought I was bad!

I spotted this hidden mickey in the desk.



While I was on the patio I saw this animal. I saw him lay down and it was the weirdest thing ever. It looked so awkward when he layed down.



Jessica finally got ready after begging her to hurry up and then we headed out! It wasn't too long before a bus showed up.



Our destination was Art of Animation via Animal Kingdom. When we got to Animal Kingdom there was already a bus there for Pop so we decided to take the pop bus and then just walk to AOA.

We got on the bus on 3:18 and off we were to POP!

Ahh..it felt good to be back at Pop. I posted on instagram that I was glad to be back because it is the resort where I fell in love with Disney at. It will always be home to me even if I like the deluxes now.



Next up- Art of Animation tour

 

[emmebear]

Sorry for the coughing...Emme has pretty bad allergies but I think it was the pixie dust that cured her as her coughing ceased the very next day! It was nothing short of a miracle.

I'm going to join in and add some things to Rachel's trip report as the first 3 days I felt like we were on 2 different vacations as we were at different parks! We were on a frenetic pace the first 3 days.

Also, Rachel will be joining my dining report as we will be doing another tandem dining report together which can be found here: http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=3188991

 

[rachel09985]

Joining in. We are going next feb/march so I am reading trip reports to see weather and events.

Thanks for reading! It was a little chilly, especially in the mornings. The sun was brutal which was bad even when it was cold.

Sorry for the coughing...Emme has pretty bad allergies but I think it was the pixie dust that cured her as her coughing ceased the very next day! It was nothing short of a miracle.

I'm going to join in and add some things to Rachel's trip report as the first 3 days I felt like we were on 2 different vacations as we were at different parks! We were on a frenetic pace the first 3 days.

Also, Rachel will be joining my dining report as we will be doing another tandem dining report together which can be found here: http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=3188991

No worries on the coughing it definitely did get much better which I was very thankful about! Yay for adding things and helping me!

 

[rachel09985]

Jessica and I crossed the bridge at Pop Century and decided to go to the Cars section first.

I forget what car used to be here but it is now blocked off temporarily. At first I didn't even notice that the walls weren't supposed to be there.





I realized at this outing just how horrible of a picture taker my sister is. She would barely even look and she would like cut me off or completely not center it!



I think Fillmore is my favorite.











Jessica liked this car the best



Me being a goof and pretending to be handcuffed!



Radiator Springs!



By the way I am going to Disneyland in July and I am SO excited! I can't wait to see Cars land!

On the way back to Lion King area we stopped with Rafiki for another sister selfie! Rafiki traumatized me as a kid so he is always an inside joke.



I think this piece is my favorite thing in all of Art of Animation!





Jessica was in heaven heading into the Little Mermaid section. She is a majorly majorly obsessed Little Mermaid fan! She loves Ariel!





Walking over to Ariel she was so excited to see her!









King Triton's got some abs!



Trying to smoke from the pipe..



On the way back we were walking by some lady and she goes was that you back there? You know smoking's not good for you! I was like "Whaat?? I don't smoke" I was so worried because I seriously thought she thought I smoked! Then I realized she was joking around and laughed!

We went in the lobby after this and looked around. I was trying to get Jessica to buy a shirt but she didn't really like their Ariel shirts.

However, I did find the Jodi Benson signed sketch!



I love the artwork in the lobby



Jess staring longingly at her girlfriend!



I really love Art of Animation because it is just so disney! There is nothing about it that isn't disney. Whereas the other resorts have parts of Disney, there is still parts that aren't Disney. I just wish LM were part of the room only discounts!

 

[JessM]

Joining in! Sounds like a great start to your trip!

I love the view from your room!

 

[Jennifer84]

Yay for this TR! I love your dining reviews

Nothing better than a Savannah view at AKL! It stinks it took forever to get your work done, but I'm glad you finally got it out of the way so you could enjoy the rest of your trip.

I haven't seen AoA, yet, but I am staying at Pop soon, so I will definitely be going over there to check it out. I love all the pictures I keep seeing!

Can't wait to read more about your trip

 

[nilla]

LOVE the theming at AoA!

Since I'll be in WDW in a few months, I can't wait to hear about your experiences with FP+.

 

[benji2012]

Joining in! I hoping to do some touring around the resorts, and AoA in particular when I'm there in Sept! Love seeing all the fun pics.

 

[rteetz]

I'm Joining in as well!

We love the AOA we went and looked around right after it opened and said we have to stay here one day.