Disney World: Day 1 and 2: Disney Springs and Hollywood Studios

Last November, we learned that this would be our final year in Florida.  At least for a while.  We made a mental bucket list of things to do before we moved.  Number one on that list was to get to Disney World.  We tabled the idea until after Christmas, at which time I started to look at prices.  As the days went by, we realized we really needed to make a more solid plan if we were going to pull this off.  Around the 1st of February, we decided the week of President's Day (also my birthday week) would be good so that Eric would only miss four days of work (he's kind of a big deal, like Finn from The Force Awakens).  I waited another week and started looking at rentals.  It seemed like we had our pick of many...then I actually spoke with a landlord who said the website I was using was terrible and most of the places were actually booked up for that week.  I immediately started emailing several landlords.  All came back with messages that they were all booked...save one!  And it just happened to have bedrooms decorated in Harry Potter Theme and Disney Princess Theme.  And the price was great!  Score!  My procrastination was once again positively reinforced.  Who says you need 6 months to plan a Disney vacation?

Now to buy tickets...as Florida residents, we could take advantage of a special going on right now that allowed us to get three day passes for a low rate.  We had known this for 6 weeks, but I kept putting off the purchase.  Because...who knows.  But, now that we had a condo for the week, I was committed and it was time to pull the trigger.  The week before we left, a friend came over to watch the KU game and discuss Disney.  She asked if we were planning to do Fast Passes.  I assumed that costs extra money, because they do at Universal.  A lot of extra money.  Turns out, every Disney ticket holder is allowed to sign up for three in advance of their visit.  But, you are suppose to do this pretty early as the most popular rides fill up quickly.  Great.  Our visit is a week away and I haven't even bought our tickets, yet.  I spend most of the KU/West Virginia game searching the Disney website.  Don't worry, I caught the amazing comeback and victory.  Obviously.  Speaking of KU, it is due to my regular participation in the NCAA bracket competition that I already had a login to the Disney website.  Who knew?  So, if you are reading this...you probably do to.

The next day, I purchase the tickets and start to attempt to use this crazy Fast Pass option.  Except it doesn't work.  I wait a day...still doesn't work.  The site is not recognizing my confirmation number.  I call Disney and get put on hold...and listen to 'It's a Small World' over and over and over again.  So much for a magical experience.  But, the lady I eventually speak with is helpful and it all gets figured out.  Not before she definitely has a tone that I am just one more in a line of technologically deficient patrons (not necessarily out of line)...but, once she realizes it is on their end, she is much more conciliatory.  It is all figured out and we wish each other a Magical Day.  And I'm off to the races with the Fast Pass.

Then I get Fast Pass cold feet.  I don't want to reserve stupid rides.  I don't want to waste time on rides while I could be riding awesome rides.  I am about to scrap the whole idea.  Until I go speak with my neighbor who explains it even more to me and I realize it is always going to be a win.  As Eric puts it, you are just reserving your spot on a ride for a certain time period.  Which means they will seat you as soon as possible while those waiting in 'standby' get whatever seats are left over.  This use to be referred to as standing in line and looks pretty similar to 'standing in line'.  And with standby (aka: standing in line) sometimes lasting over an hour or more, it is well worth your time to get over your Luddite ways and sign up for the Fast Passes.  Preferably all in the morning, so you can maybe sign up for another and another and another until the park closes.  All with your handy dandy smart phone. 

I go home, and choose my families' destiny at Disney.  So much pressure.  But, I feel better and a little more in control.  Eric is happy to not have to worry about a thing.  He has enough of that at work (see: Big Deal) The next day, we load up, and head to Orlando. We are on our way!

The boys are thrilled with their room.  Molly and John are thrilled with their room.  Eric and I are less than thrilled with ours...but, Eric continues to look at everything in a positive way.  He and Dom head to the store to get some rations for the week.  The next day is my birthday and we elect to swim in the pool in the morning, head to Disney Springs and go to The Lego Batman Movie.  It was a beautiful day and everything feels like it will go well.  After the movie, we come back, go to the pool and Molly, John, and I practice the likely scenario that I will say 'No' to every request they make.  It goes like this:
Molly: I want to ride that ride again!
Me (looking at the standby time of 90 minutes): No, the line is too long.
Molly (the only acceptable response):  I love you. (Fine, judges would also accept a simple: OK)
Me: I love you more.
Molly: I love you most!
Me: I love you forever!
 (we stole this from a scene in Batman...but, it really worked over the next few days)
  My last worry is the fact we have elected to do three long days at Disney World in a row.  Something we have never attempted.  So, technically we once attempted to go to Universal two days in a row, but elected to only do one when Eric and I were both exhausted by 2 in the afternoon.  However, we are committed as we have the condo for the week.  I've asked many people to keep us in their prayers...

The next morning, everyone is up by 7 AM.  Eric makes sandwiches, we have some other snacks, water bottles, and most importantly a huge chocolate bar to break out should anyone be attacked by Dementors.  After we get into the park, Dom, Will, and I head straight to the line to sign up for Jedi training.  It is 9:06 when a park employee (or cast member as they are called) informs our section of the line that we are quite close to the cut-off for slots.  We may have to sign up as alternates.  I explain this (multiple times) to the boys.  Dom, realizing he'd need to perform in front of a crowd, elects to get out of line and go to a ride with Eric, John, and Molly.  Will remains.  It was a frustrating situation.  I knew waiting in line was inevitable, but waiting in an hour line and not knowing the outcome had not been part of my plan.  This could just be a waste of time.  I bonded with other parents over this situation.  As we got to the front, a young man passed us to warn the people behind us that they would be alternates.  My new group of friends and I took this as a good sign.  Then we get up to the front and they stop all of us because there are only 8 spots left.  And that could include people already at the computers...It was intense!  Fortunately, Will got the third to last slot and we were scheduled for the last show.  As a bonus for waiting in line, they also gave us two additional fast passes that we could use at any time on any ride.  Sweet!

Though, as it turns out, the vast majority of attractions at Hollywood Studios are shows.  So there are only a few rides you might have to stand in line for.  Which can still be tiring for a 2 year old. 

Our first show was a Frozen Sing Along.  And it was absolutely wonderful.  The actors were hilarious and I loved hearing the boys laugh and watching Molly sing her heart out.  Something she recreated last night as we watched Frozen in our living room.  It was the perfect experience after the self inflicted stress of standing in the Jedi line.  Other shows we watched included The Indiana Jones Spectacular, Beauty and the Beast (abridged Broadway edition), A Muppets 3-D film,  and several Star Wars themed shows.  Frozen was definitely our favorite stage show, but a wonderful surprise was when we happened upon some street performers on our way to another attraction.

They were dressed in the fashion of 1940s and Glenn Miller was playing over loud speakers. I was already hooked.  Then it turned out it was a comedy competition.  The host would ask for random item ideas from the audience (staples, deck of cards, paper, engineers...I can't remember the rest) and then each actor contestant would have to make up jokes in the form of: 99 staples walk into a bar and the bartender says: Get Out!  We don't serve staples here.  And the staples say: Ah come on!  We promise to not get SLAMMED! (get it?)
So, not only were they dressed in 1940s fashion, they were telling my favorite kind of cornball jokes.  I was in Heaven.  I don't know if Eric has always liked this sort of humor, or I have influenced him, but he laughed as loud as I did.  Our favorite comedian wore huge Harry Potter glasses and would yell: Nailed It! after every terrible joke.  But, as enjoyable as the show was, I am not sure if my favorite part wasn't every time Will would figure out the punch line and then explain to us why it was funny.
Here is our favorite joke told:
99 Engineers walk into a bar.  The Bartender says: Get out!  We don't serve Engineers here.  And the Engineers say: Why not?  We promise to be Civil! (Will did not get this one, but Eric and I howled and that particular lady came in second.)

As I said, the majority of events were shows, but we did ride all the rides available.  At least some of us did (Dom, John, and I sat out Tower of Terror).  The first ride we got to do as a family was Toy Story Mania.  A 3-D ride where you get to shoot at targets.  Even John hit three.  I hit a few more and Eric was the high scorer for our vehicle.  Like I said, he is a Big Deal.

We also rode Star Tours which was Dom's favorite ride.  It made me sick, but what else is new when there is motion in a ride.  Luckily, most of the Disney rides are slow moving and you get to view various scenes from popular movies.  So it was kind of the perfect amusement park for me.  The Great Movie Ride had scenes from many of the great films from the 30s and 40s.  Katie and Mitzi, you would love it, too!  Surprisingly, our kids really liked it, also.

 

A friend of Eric's works at Disney now and met us in the afternoon.  I voluntold him to watch John at the Tower of Terror (see picture above) while Dom and I perused an exhibit on Walt Disney.  Dave borrowed Eric's hat to take some pictures of his 15 minutes of babysitting. 

A word about visiting the Walt Disney exhibit.  Always having an eye towards education, I checked out a biography on Walt Disney and gave it to Dom to read prior to our trip.  He devoured it and it was great having him point out photos he recognized from his book and talking about which cartoons had not been great successes.  Turns out, there are several.  He was also able to explain to Eric who Oswald the Rabbit was: A predecessor to Mickey that was a huge hit at the time, but apparently didn't have the staying power of the famous mouse.  Also, I got to see Hayley Mills dress from a childhood (and adult?) favorite: Summer Magic

Once we all met up again, it was time to get Will to his training session.  He took off and the rest of us sort of jogged to keep up with him.  There was thirty minutes to kill, so we bought a souvenir bucket of popcorn and hung out while we waited to see our young padawan in action.  A note about the souvenir popcorn, the initial bucket costs $10, but every additional re-fill is $1.50 for the duration of your stay.  Or I could buy a regular popcorn for $4.25...which didn't have as much popcorn based on my rough volume estimations.  I'm totally planning on using this scenario as an Algebra problem in the future. In many ways the plight of parents on these Disney Vacations is not unlike the plight of good versus evil in Star Wars.  I'm trying to save money while all of the forces in the park are trying to get you to spend money.  As it turns out, my sons, at least, are very receptive to all of my mini lectures on thriftiness.  And are just grateful if I ever pull out my wallet.  The fact I bought popcorn makes me the best mom ever in Dom's eyes.  We sprang for ice cream, too. The kids felt like they won the lottery*.

Speaking of good versus evil: Will totally dominated Darth.  He'd been practicing the moves most of the day after witnessing an earlier show.  Dave was pretty impressed. As was Darth Vader, I'm sure.

Post show, they got one more ride in at Star Tours. My stomach and I humbly volunteered to stay with John.  Then they all got photos on this contraption.

I don't know if you can see it, but I had bought some glow sticks at The Dollar Tree (I love that store!) after reading a suggestion to do this to forestall your child wanting a million dollar (I am estimating a little high) glowing contraption sold in the park.  Sure, ours didn't move and didn't change color, but the kids were pretty happy.  Heck, John even excitedly called his a Light Saber.  Don't ever change, kid!

By this time, the grand Firework Finale was imminent.  We headed to the staging area.  Broke out the chocolate bar: Another point for best parents ever in our children's eyes.  Molly and I headed to the bathroom where she was complimented by a nice family for being their favorite child at the park (aside from their own) for her bubbly personality even after a long day at the park.  I was otherwise occupied, but she had exited her stall, spied their son with a Mickey hat on and nonchalantly greeted him with a: Hello, Mickey!

We watched the fireworks, left the park, road the tram

and John finally melted down when he had to get off his favorite ride of the day.  It was short lived as he passed out almost immediately.  As did Molly.

They had sweet dreams once we got them safely into their bed back at the condo.  The day had gone better than I could have imagined.  We still had two days, but Eric and I were both impressed with the fact we were not exhausted.  Though 7AM did come awfully early the next day, but we were ready for whatever adventures were in store! (except for the rain...probably should have checked the weather...)

*A quick story about the ice cream.  Molly started asking for ice cream at 10:30 in the morning.  One of the rare occasions her response to my 'No' was not 'I love you', but additional requests for ice cream.  We finally got ice cream about 3 in the afternoon.  I nixed the waffle cone option much to Will's chagrin. Until he saw the amount of ice cream in the cups.  It was a tower of ice cream.  It was reminiscent of the scene from Fellowship of the Ring in the Prancing Pony when Pippin sees a pint of beer and goes: It comes in pints? I'm getting one!