The Mouse House - Again

Our passes we bought to Disney are only good on weekdays and not during the summer.  Last Friday was the last day before summer that our passes were good - so we took the whole family for another day with the mouse.

We arrived early so we could beat a lot of the crowds.  The boys were excited to ride Thunder Mountain since it has been under renovation all year.  Our plan was to ride the train over to Splash Mountain and then ride both Thunder and Splash.  However, our plans were foiled as the train was closed at park opening.  So, we improvised.  They were just bringing out the horse drawn carriage, so we hopped aboard.

We enjoyed our ride down Main Street to Cinderellas Castle then hopped off and went to the Mountains.  By the time we finished Splash and Thunder, the train was running.  So we hopped on the train and rode over to Fantasyland where we rode Goofini.  From there, we headed over to Space Mountain.  The girls opted out of Space Mountain and rode Carousel of Progress.  We also got to ride the Buzz Lightyear ride before we headed out of the park. 

We rode the train to the entrance then headed over to Hollywood Studios.  We didn't stay long as the crowds were horrible.  

We then headed over to Animal Kingdom.  We rode Expedition Everest and Kali River Rapids.  The boys rode Everest a few times and asked to ride up front.

We enjoyed our day and missed most of the rain.  

Animal Kingdom

On Thursday, we went to Animal Kingdom and were joined by our good friend Mr. E.  This is my least favorite park, but it contains my most favorite ride!  We headed straight for Expedition Everest.  I had never ridden this before, but I LOVED it and so did everyone else (except HJ). 

The boys liked it so much, they rode it again, but the girls and I took a pass.

After Expedition Everest, we stopped to watch the monkeys.

No, not them - the furry ones near the top in the middle!

We then nearly drowned on Kali River Rapids.

And then decided it was a good time for a post-placement report picture of hte family (drenched and all)!

We then went on the Safari ride and got to see the Rhinos (not the political kind) up close.

After that we nearly lost AT to the dinosaur!

That was all we were going to do, but the boys decided they wanted to ride Primeval Whirl (bad! decision).  So the girls and I hit the Dumbo-like ride across from it.

That fateful decision started a course of events that left us with a memorable day!

The ride wait times were about the same, so I expected them to meet us at the appointed spot shortly after the girls and I finished our ride.  We went to the appointed location and quickly noticed that their ride was stopped.  No big deal, happens all the time.  We figured someone was just slow in getting on/off of the ride.  But after a while, we saw some of the employees walk over and talk to the folks sitting on the ride.  Then they handed them some sort of ticket.  At this point I knew that the ride was broken.  I had seen some of the cars still moving after the car we were watching stopped, so I figured the boys would be joining us shortly.  Well, 20 min later,  I finally spotted CP and Mr. E.  They explained that they were at the highest point when the ride stopped and it took them that long to be released by the employees and walk down.  I asked where the boys were. CP said they were in the car in front of them and thought they should be down by now.  I told them I had been watching the exit for the last 20 minutes with no sign of them.  CP postulated that they had gotten back on the ride again since they were given passes to do that.  I told him I would have seen them if they had done that.  About 10 minutes passed with NO SIGN of the boys, so Mr E walked over and told an employee about the missing boys.  As the employee and Mr E were walking back to us, I finally spotted the boys walking down the exit ramp! 

When they got to us, they explained that the employees didn't realize there was anyone in their car at first.  When the employees finally got to them, they couldn't get the safety bar up.  It took another 10 min for them to release the safety bar and then the boys were finally able to walk down! 

Needless to say, after such a long wait, they were excited to actually finish the ride.  So off they all went again to actually enjoy the ride. 

After that, we headed to the Magic Kingdom and tried to catch up with our friends.  We finally did and we all ended up getting on the Tomorrowland Speedway.  The boys were in one lane and the girls and our friends were in another lane.  We got in our cars and took off.  We quickly got ahead of the boys.  When we arrived at the end, AT approached shortly after.  But there was NO sign of the other 3 boys (CP and Mr E sat this one out!) We got off and went up to wait in the grandstands.  We finally noticed that the lane the boys were in had backed up almost to the start point.  Finally, we saw BG pushing JA's car and JA's car pushing TJ's car.

TJ's car had DIED on the track!  When they finally made it back, they pulled TJ's car off the track and let all 3 boys go again!

What a memorable day!

The girls and I then headed over to the Teacups with our friends

We ended the day with Splash Mountain and the Electric Light Parade.  Despite the adventures (or because of them?), the kids gave the day a "thumbs up"

Hollywood Studios

Sorry for the delay - life is just busy around here!  BG and TJ are both in basketball and AT will be starting baseball soon.

At Hollywood Studios, we first headed for Star Tours.  There was a very short line, so we jumped on.

After that we headed over towards the Muppet Studios and SG caught a fish!

Then we Shrunk the Kids and lost them in the weeds!

Then we headed for the Studio Backlot Tour

Later we headed for the Toy Story ride, but the wait was 90 minutes! and all of the Fast Passes were gone. We settled for a picture with some Big Green Men

Next we headed for the Lights, Motors, Action show.

And ended the evening at the Hollywood Tower Hotel

The boys asked to spend the night there, but I was afraid they would fall out of bed!

Epcot

On Tuesday, we went to Epcot.  We skipped Spaceship Earth to start and headed to Test Track.  We LOVED it!!  And the kids enjoyed checking out the cars at the end.  

No boys, you won't be driving a Dodge Charger for your first car! 

We then did Mission Space.  Since we found out TJ does not like spinning rides, he did the less intense version with me and the girls while the boys and CP did the more intense version.   They all liked it!

AT was fascinated by the water-up (not waterfall).  

We saw this after watching the Captain EO movie.  

I L-O-V-E-D seeing Captain EO again.

I am not a MJ fan, but I absolutely loved watching this movie when it originally played at Epcot back when I was in college.  The 3D effects are awesome and I just really liked it.  The kids were all fascinated with MJ's moonwalk and are trying to figure out how he does it.

We then went over to China and had lunch at the Nine Dragons Restaurant.  You will notice that TJ is hiding his face.  He does NOT like having his picture taken and will do anything possible to avoid having his face in the picture.  He also doesn't want his picture on the blog, so that's why you aren't seeing any of just him.

We eventually made it over the Nemo attraction which the girls really liked.

After that we went to Soarin' and everybody loved it.  I think it was HJ's favorite of all.

We then wandered over to The American Experience and watched it.  After that, we hung out until the fireworks show.  Everybody liked it too.  However, TJ liked the one at the Magic Kingdom better.  He calls it "The Magic Castle".  

Magic Kingdom

We spent last Monday at the Magic Kingdom.  We were up bright and early and got to the park shortly after opening.  We headed for Fantasyland and did Small World, Peter Pan's Flight, and Snow White.  We then wandered over to Frontierland and did the Haunted Mansion (won't get HJ on that again any time soon), and then did Splash Mountain.  (Big Thunder is closed)  We then hit Adventureland and hit the Jungle Cruise, Pirates of the Caribbean and the Tiki Room.


We took a break for lunch at Cosmic Ray's and then did the Buzz Lightyear Ride, Monsters Inc, Stitch's Great Escape and the Speedway.  Space Mountain was near last as we had to get Fast Passes.

I was shocked at the crowds there.  I don't know if it was the warm weather, the Marathon (which was Sunday) or what, but there were more people there for a January day than any other January I've ever been (and I went a lot in Jan because I grew up in Orlando).

And, what you've been waiting for... pictures!

 AT LOVED playing the piano at the Haunted Mansion.

 Lock 'em up.

Scary to think he may be driving a real car before long.

 We discovered TJ does NOT do well with spinning rides.

 TJ really did have a GREAT time; he just does NOT want his picture taken.

We had a SPLASH!!!

Since I had this week off of work, we decided to use our Disney passes!  We had a TERRIFIC time there.

We got soaked on Kali River Rapids.

 Took a picture for our 12 mo post-placement.

Visited DinoWhirl

 Made LOTS of memories!

Raced all over Tomorrowland. 

 Took a spin with some friends.

Got caught speeding by Emporer Zurg. 

 Had a Rockin' Time on the roller coasters

and got to meet a few celebrities. 

We spent 5 days (M-F) checking out the parks.  We spent Monday at the Magic Kingdom, Tuesday at Epcot, Wednesday at Hollywood Studios, Thursday was split between Animal Kingdom and Magic Kingdom and Friday was split between Hollywood Studios and Epcot.

The boys L-O-V-E-D the roller coasters.  We discovered that TJ loves the fast rides as long as they don't spin (aka teacups).  And BG, who had absolutely no interest in any of the rides at the amusement parks in China, showed his true teenage boyhood by loving all of the fast rides!  The girls did all of the roller coasters at least once (except Hannah who wasn't tall enough for Rockin' Roller Coaster).  And they even did a few of them twice.

We had a great time and can't wait to visit a lot this year.