It's A Mommy & Me Kind Of Trip! August 2014 TR *FINAL UPDATES 12/21 X2*

[ThePin Princess]

Introduction And Other Welcoming Things

Hi, hello, how do you do, I’m Princess Grace and I’m here to welcome you!

I’m back again from another trip with another Trip Report to share. If you’ve been here before HI HOW ARE YOU I MISSED YOU!!!! and if you’re here for the first HI I LOVE YOU THANKS FOR READING! I just got back from another amazing trip to Disney World, of course it was amazing… it’s Disney!

For those of you who are new here I’ll do a little intro!

This is me, Grace! HIII! You can called me Grace or Princess Grace or Grae or just Princess or G, whatever you feel!



I’m a Disney loving (obviously) college student! I’m a self-proclaimed princess, I mean yeah. I love everything that has even the smallest relation to Disney, I love making bows, and scrapbooking, crafting in general. I love reading about everyone’s trips on the Disboards and writing about my own trips! I love planning my own Disney trips, and PINTEREST oh my gosh! I love Pinterest!!!! I also love my majors in school which are Film/Video and Graphic Design, I love running for my schools Cross Country and Track & Field teams, and I love my school in general. And I’m a summer camp counselor and I love that too!

I’m obsessed with the Princesses of all variations, with Gaston, with Hercules (Bae), with Peter Pan, and Minnie, and Aladdin, and Tinkerbell, and Tigger, and Flynn and Rapunzel. Yeah I have a lot of obsessions, it’s fine! I’m also a huge fan of Disney food, and have quite a few obsessions my number one right now being Poutine Fries, oh my heavens! More on that later I promise!

I’ve been going to Disney since I was a fetus so this was my 11th or 12th trip, I’m really not sure.

Another fun fact about me is that I watch Hercules on a daily basis, it's fine nobody minds.

This is my amazing mother, half of the Disney loving duo that is my parent whom I am forever indebted to for my Disney love. Her name is Donna, but she frequently goes by “Mom” “Mommy” “Mama” “Mum” “Mimi” or my personal favorite “Don”. She’s the greatest mom/grandma/friend in the books.



Mom loves Disney (duh), she’s been so many times it is useless to even attempt to count them all. She loves the characters, she says she loves watching me meet the characters. She also enjoys planning trips, she loves a good spreadsheet. She frequently lurks on the Disboards but rarely posts, she loves reading about others’ trips and learning new tip and tricks about Disney. This was her first time with Magic Bands and fastpass plus so that was an new experience for her.

She loves scrapbooking and taking pictures with her new phone, and she loves Donald Duck and Minnie Mouse and Mickey (of course!).

This was a decently last minute trip for us, usually we know we’re going 6-8 months in advance and plan like maniac, this time we knew about 6 weeks out and had to do a lot of quick planning, but everything worked out amazing and we were able to do everything we wanted to and have a lot of new experiences with dining and attractions!

We stayed at the Pop Century! for 5 days and 4 nights on the hottest week Florida has had in years, August 21-August 25. If you were also there during this time and you miraculously survived I salute you for you, my friend, are a hero. I almost didn’t make it out alive (not actually, but it was pretty dang hot).

We had such a blast on our first Mother-Daughter trip and I can’t to write all about it, so I hope you all enjoy! Thanks for reading!

Day 1 coming soon!!! Let the fun begin!!
​

 

[ThePin Princess]

Table of Contents:

Day 1 - August 21, 2014:
It's Disney Time!
It's an EPCOT Kind of Day!
Ain't No Party Like A Selfie Party
What Do You Mean No Ooey Gooey Cake!?

Day 2 -August 22, 2014
The Breakfast of Champions
Meet And Greets Galore!
Hoop Dee Doo Revue
Please Stand Behind The White Line
Celebrate The Magic Take Two

Day 3- August 23, 2014
Getting Artsy Fartsy
Tale As Old As Time
Eat Your Heart Out
Let Me Take A Selfie

Day 4 - August 24, 2014
Hontas! Hontas!
Oh I Just Can't Wait To Be King!
The Good, The Bad, And The What Were You Thinking
Frozen Fireworks

Day 5 - August 25, 2014
Magic Kingdom Morning
O Canada!


​

 

[Gracefulskinny]

looking forward to following along!

 

[ThePin Princess]

looking forward to following along!

Thanks for joining in!!

 

[ThePin Princess]

Day 1 Part 1: It’s Disney Time!

Thursday, August 21st 2014

**BUZZZ BUZZZZ BUZZZZZ** Everybody wake up! It’s 4:00 AM it’s time to go to WALT DISNEY WORLD!!!

My alarm went off and I jumped out of bed as excited as ever! I mean we were going to Disney… who wouldn’t be excited! It was THE morning! The morning I had been waiting all summer for! I had been counting down the days since I called mom in June from the sleep-away summer camp I was working and asked if we could go to Disney! Counting down to this magical morning!!

I jumped into my clothes quickly packed up and ran downstairs. “Mom! Mom!! Let’s GOOO IT’S DISNEY TIME!!!!”


This is my excited face!!

What time is it!?
DISNEY TIME!!!
(High School Musical? Anyone? Anyone?)



We pulled out of the drive way at 4:51 leaving the rest of the family behind and embarked on our first Mother-Daughter Disney trip. I have been without my other siblings, just my parents, before, and I have been without anyone from my family before, but never just with my mom.

The drive to the airport was not long, at about 5:30 the sun started rising! Silly sun, don’t you know the day starts earlier when you’re going to Disney World!



At 5:45 we parked the car in the Long-term lot (woot woot none of that short stuff we’re staying forever!!!) and a shuttle came by and picked us up and transported us to the JetBlue terminal!


The sunrise was absolutely gorgeous this morning!
We checked in and made our way through security, Mom had Pre-Check but I didn’t so we waited with the common folk, uh such a struggle.

It took about 20 minutes, a lot of travelers on the morning of August 21! Eventually we made it through, I sat with the luggage while Mom ran over to Dunkin Donuts before we boarded, us Boston girls need our coffee and egg and cheese on a bagel to start the day right!

At 6:50 we were boarding the plane, and we took off at about 7:10. I had a window seat (per usual) and Mom was in the middle, with a stranger friend on the isle seat.


Airplane selfie!!!

And we were off!! It was a very uneventful flight, I listened to XM radio and jammed out to the new Andy Grammar album that he was doing a commentary about and I fell asleep on Mom’s lap a couple times.



At 9:50 our plane landed and we were able to deboard in a sluggish fashion, as always. We made our way over to the [insert name you like to use for the MCO monorail here] and headed over to the DME area.


Fake-O-Rail Selfie

We tapped our Magic Bands and made our way over to the POP!/AoA/AKL bus and jumped in line, there were a lot of people waiting for DME busses, especially ours. The wait wasn’t long though! We were on a bus in just few minutes. The bus was pretty full so back of the bus for us!


YOU LOOK SOO BEAUTIFULL TO MEEEEEEE!

Not gonna lie, this new DME video isn’t nearly as awesome as the old one. Waiting Donald and Daisy’s trip unfold was so much better than waiting this blonde lady tell you things I feel everyone already knows about Disney, but hey I was on my way to Disney World so I really can’t complain!


The “Back-of-the-bus-welcome-gate-photo” attempt!

First stop Art of Animation!!!


About half the bus got off, then we made our way over to the real destination! POP Century!


“Remember When…”



This was our first stay at Pop! and our first time even visiting, I’ve only ever seen pictures in TRs and online.





I love Disney Resort carpets I wish I had one in my dorm! Grace’s DORM ROOM!!

When we arrived at about 11:20, we skipped on over to the online-check in desk, and thank goodness Mom did online check-in because there was quite the line over at the regular check-in. When we were checking in the CM looked at me and said “Oh! Happy Birthday!” and handed me a birthday pin. I was just like “Uhhh thanks?” Folks it was not my birthday! I mean my birthday is only in a month so we were like “Sure this can be a birthday trip”

I tweeted this picture:


“When someone hands you a birthday pin with your name on it you don’t say no”

I put it on for about half the day, but I just felt a fraud and that I was robbing everyone whose birthday it actually was of their birthday magic, so I stuck it on my pin lanyard and stuck it in the bag.

So with everything settled, we hopped in a time machine and took a journey to the 80’s. We found our room after a little stroll over to building 9 and we came to find we had a pool view. Yay for pools!

The room next to us had these adorable decorations I obsessed over every single time we walked by.



So cute, I would honestly hang those in my room at home!

We had your typical two-queen sized bed Value-Resort room.




Mickey towel, I love you.





We dropped our bags in the room and grabbed what we needed for the parks and headed out.



I loved the big decorations all throughout Pop! They’re very fun and add a lot to the environment, we’ve stayed at All Stars before so we knew to expect this, as well as a bit of walking from Lobby to room, but we were okay with that.

We got the bus stop at 12:00 and we were ready to head out, we were talking to the family in front of us. It was a young woman and her mother, mid conversation they realized that the mother had left her magic band in the room and the daughter had to run back to the room and get it just as the bus was pulling up. So sad, we said goodbye and boarded the bus.

And we’re off!! Let the Disney magic begin!!!

Up Next: Taking on the world… the future kind. ​

 

[usd2bmd]

I'm thinking about taking my daughter on a Mother -Daughter trip when she graduates from college. So I will be following along. Can't wait to read.

 

[ddm118]

Great start Grace! I can't wait to hear all about our adventures!

 

[theworldneedscolor]

I'm so glad I discovered this TR! I too am a Disney-loving college student, so it's fun to read a TR written by someone is very similar to me.

Mother/daughter trips are so fun! My mom and I went to Disneyland for my 16th birthday, and it was one of my most memorable trips. I can't wait to read about yours!

I'm currently reading your first TR while I wait for this one to be updated. I just finished Day 1, and I'm loving it so far

 

[ThePin Princess]

I'm thinking about taking my daughter on a Mother -Daughter trip when she graduates from college. So I will be following along. Can't wait to read.

Thanks for joining! It was so much fun just going with my mom, and such a different dynamic than going with the whole family! We both like to plan and do a lot where the rest of the family likes to take things slow, which is understandable, but we were able to do some much more and we had a great time! Mother-daughter trips are the best.

Great start Grace! I can't wait to hear all about our adventures!

Thanks for joining in!

I'm so glad I discovered this TR! I too am a Disney-loving college student, so it's fun to read a TR written by someone is very similar to me.

Mother/daughter trips are so fun! My mom and I went to Disneyland for my 16th birthday, and it was one of my most memorable trips. I can't wait to read about yours!

I'm currently reading your first TR while I wait for this one to be updated. I just finished Day 1, and I'm loving it so far

I'm so glad you found my TR too! Thanks for reading and joining it!

 

[ThePin Princess]

Day 1: Part 2 – It’s an EPCOT kind of day!

It was just about 12:15 when we arrived at EPCOT for our first park of the trip! And it was a hot one out there!

First thing’s first, Spaceship Earth photos!



We didn’t really have a plan other than our fastpasses, the first being Soarin’ at 1:05. So we made our way over to the Land with plenty of time to kill. We decided it was time for a little lunch from Sunshine Seasons. We split the Power Salad, which was extremely delicious.


YUM YUM YUM, I highly recommend this salad to everyone because it was that good.

It was extremely packed, but we were able to scope out a table and sit down for a few minutes to eat. When we finished we still had about 25 minutes until our fast passes were good so we decided we’d take a nice boat ride and live with the land.


PINEAPPLE! I love pineapples!


Where can I get me one of these because I live off of peanut butter!?


I thought this was really interesting how the lettuce grows in the water, so cool!

A tour group walked by whilst we were on our journey and Mom mentioned how she thinks that’s one of the tours she’d want to do at Disney. I have to agree it seems really interesting!

We disembarked our boat and headed over to Soarin’ for a little flight. From water to air in a just a few moments!

With our fast passes we were in and out of Soarin’ in just about 20 minutes. I love Soarin’ it’s just such a nice break, the breeze, the smells, the way you feel like you’re flying through the air with no cares. It’s just fabulous. Not something I would wait for a long time without a fastpass, but definitely a ride I enjoy dedicating a fastpass to.

Our next fastpass wasn’t until 2:30 and we had about an hour to kill so we headed over the Imagination Pavillion to hand out with Figment. I was telling Mom how I have no memories of going on this ride, so it’s definitely something I did in one of my very first trips to Disney World but not since before 2000. I really enjoyed it though. I feel like I’m a little after the Figment generation.


My Figment

There was absolutely no line for Figment so that only took a few minutes, when we were done we decided we need more AC so we journeyed over to the Seas with Nemo and Friends, another walk on!



After Finding Nemo yet again, we had to go visit my manatee brothers. I’m not sure why but I just adore manatee, especially Disney manatees who eat lettuce in the most adorable way!



Eventually Mom was able to pry me away from the glass. BYE MY LOVES!!!! We surfaced and faced the heat to make our way to our next fastpass.

Continued in Next Post

​

 

[ThePin Princess]

Day 1: Part 3 – Ain’t No Party Like A Selfie Party!

It was just about 2:35 when our next fastpasses would be in effect, so we made our way over the Character Spot to meet some friends with no wait. There was no one in the fastpass line but us. Just a tap of the Magic Band and boom!

First up was the Big Man himself!


MICKEY!!



A few pics with the Big Cheese and then we moved over, we understand Mickey is a highly sought after man, no prob!



Goofy is such a little prankster, he kept switching sides and tapping my shoulder trying to trick me, but he was all about the selfie.





And lastly everyone’s favorite sweetheart, Minnie!!



I just love her, she’s the definition of fabulous!


Just the girls!

We blew kisses goodbye and made our way back into the heat. It was at least 90 degrees, probably hotter, I tried to refrain from checking the actual temperature in attempts to keep from crying, but hot is an understatement.

We made a quick stop in the Cool Station and tried a few international beverages.



I tried the Fanta Watermelon from Thailand and the Inca Kola from Peru, both were actually pretty good, I’m not a big soda drinker so I would never get a big cup of either if the opportunity presented itself, but it sample size that were pretty darn tasty.

We decided to indulge in some more AC and shopping so we wandered around MouseGears for a while. I found this cup that I ended up buying later in the trip because I love it so much, I use it all the time at school and people think it’s hilarious.



We headed out of MouseGears and made our way over to Spaceship Earth but noticed almost no line for Test Track so we made a quick stop.

It was about 3:15 when we got in line and the wait time was listed at either 20 or 30 minutes, but I mean it was indoors and air conditioned so we were fine with waiting. We had a quick wait before the design station but after we had designed our car there was an issue with the tracks so the wait took much long and all in all it was about 45 minutes.



Our vehicle ended up winning and being the best, no big deal.

I’ve been on this version of Test Track before, and I know that I haven’t been on the old version of Test Track in about a decade, but I really liked the old version better. Maybe it’s just me, Mom agreed though, the old was better.

We headed over to SE to use our last fastpasses, I wasn’t feeling so hot so I opted we go green, Mom was fine with that. This was her first time riding, but she definitely would have gone orange (I’m not sure I would’ve even if I felt fine).



At about 4:30 it was time to head over to MK, so we said bye bye to Epcot and made our way to the monorail, which was having some difficulties but eventually got back up and running.

Up Next: Thanksgiving in August!​

 

[mickyzzzzz05]

I am loving your trip report! Great pictures! Thank you for taking the time to do this!

 

[CaptainCook]

Following along! Yay to both of us for surviving the heat that week, it was killer!

 

[JessseJ]

It looks like a great first day!

We were there during that time, it was SO HOT!!

 

[DisneyKid4Life]

Hiya Grace. I totally missed seeing you started a new report, but I'm all caught up now.

"I’ve been going to Disney since I was a fetus" <----- Love that!!! It's never too early.

Wow, it was so hot last week when I was there, it's hard to imagine it being even hotter. Kudos to you for surviving.

Love that you took this trip with just your mom. I read about so many Mother-Daughter trips (not so many Father-Son trips oddly), and they always seem so special.

I miss Pop!!! But thank you for the Welcome Mat photo. I too love (maybe unhealthily) them as well.

 

[amazingact21]

Just read your intro and am subscribing! How can I not follow along with a fellow Disney loving, running fan, scrapbooker?
I, too, was at WDW with my mom that week in August. Talk about brutal! We should get a medal for enduring that heat.


Anywho, I'm going to go back later in the day and read the rest of the updates, just wanted to say that I'll be following along.

 

[ThePin Princess]

I am loving your trip report! Great pictures! Thank you for taking the time to do this!

Thank you for reading along! It is absolutely my pleasure writing! Thank you so much for taking the time to read!

Following along! Yay to both of us for surviving the heat that week, it was killer!

Thanks for joining in!!

It looks like a great first day!

We were there during that time, it was SO HOT!!

It was so hot! I'm really not sure how we all survived it!

Hiya Grace. I totally missed seeing you started a new report, but I'm all caught up now.

"I’ve been going to Disney since I was a fetus" <----- Love that!!! It's never too early.

Wow, it was so hot last week when I was there, it's hard to imagine it being even hotter. Kudos to you for surviving.

Love that you took this trip with just your mom. I read about so many Mother-Daughter trips (not so many Father-Son trips oddly), and they always seem so special.

I miss Pop!!! But thank you for the Welcome Mat photo. I too love (maybe unhealthily) them as well.

Thanks for joining in Rob! It was a great trip, soo hot but great none the less.

Just read your intro and am subscribing! How can I not follow along with a fellow Disney loving, running fan, scrapbooker?
I, too, was at WDW with my mom that week in August. Talk about brutal! We should get a medal for enduring that heat.


Anywho, I'm going to go back later in the day and read the rest of the updates, just wanted to say that I'll be following along.

Thanks for joining!! Yay for loving Disney, running, and scrapbooking!!! That was a rough week sooo so hot! Hope you enjoy reading!

 

[ThePin Princess]

Day 1: Part 4 – What Do You Mean There’s No Ooey Gooey Cake!?

We arrived by monorail at the happiest place on Earth! The Magic Kingdom!! I was overwhelmed with excitement at this point!

We headed through bag check, we got the green Mickey, and we were on our way!



Aw Mickey!

We had a nice picture taken in front of the train station.



We headed on to Main Street and stopped to watch some custodial water painting.



I am so incredibly impressed by these, like I don’t think people really appreciate how much talent and skill this takes, like oh my gosh I couldn’t do anything nearly as good as that!

We had some time to kill, but not really enough to get any rides in. So we stopped in the Emporium and did a little shopping! I got some postcards to send to my friends at school, my niece Jessica, and my friend who goes to school in Tennessee! Then we headed over to Guest Relations and got Main Street USA stamped on the postcards before dropping them in the mailbox.


Coming soon to a mailbox near you!

We continued down Main Street stopping to take a few pictures!



The Move It! Shake It! Celebrate It! Parade came through as we were making our way up Main Street.




More pictures!

While we were in Guest Relations we used the FP+ booth and snagged some fastpasses for Buzz Lightyear so we headed over to Tomorrowland. Mom kicked my butt, she got a 170,300 and I got a 92,900.



After battling the evil Zurg, we made our way across the Hub and I took some castle pictures, naturally!



Ooooohhhh!



Aaaaaahhhhh!



We arrived early to our Liberty Tree Tavern reservation and decided to just hang out.



With lots of times to kill, I decided to head to the kids table and color. Naturally.



I’m quite the coloring expert, no big deal.

We were sat at 7:05 in the Paul Revere Room (named so because of the silver, PR was a silversmith, just so you allll know) and our waitress was Doreen. She wasn’t fabulous but she wasn’t terrible.

We both got strawberry lemonade. I wasn’t the biggest fan, so I ordered water later in the meal.



Our food came and it was delicious.


Salad and rolls. I LOVED these rolls, I would give a lot to have a basket of these rolls right now.











My thoughts: The turkey – AMAZING, phenomenal, absolutely delicious. And I don’t even like turkey. My mother is amazing cook but I don’t even eat turkey on Thanksgiving. But this turkey… Oh my goooodness!

I really enjoyed the gravy also, another thing I don’t normally like.

The mashed potatoes – delicious, the sweet potatoes – great, the green beans – yummmmm!

The mac and cheese not so much, and I didn’t try the other type of meat because I was too in love with the turkey.

It dawned on us as we were finishing our meal that the number on reason I wanted to eat here was not on the menu. What… NO OOEY GOOEY CAKE!?!? I panicked. This was THE reason I wanted to eat here. This alluring dessert. When I read something about cranberries and apples I was like “um what is this”. I was so sad. I googled it only to find out it was just a lunch dessert! My dreams were shattered! I played dumb and asked Doreen about the dessert, told her I read about it online and I was so exciting to try it. She was not enthused by this or my (fake) birthday button sitting so pretty up on the table. So I left, sad, and stuffed, but with no Ooey Gooey Cake. I guess we’ll just have to go back for lunch.

Before we got up from dinner, we decided we were extremely tired and just wanted to head back. I was so tired I couldn’t even think of standing for another two hours to see my beloved Wishes.



When we walked out of LTT, there was lightening in the sky, lots and lots of lightening and the suddenly the rain!

We ran down Main Street looking for cover in all the shops we could squeeze into. Then we stopped near the stroller rental area to look for my friend Peter who is currently in Disney working on his DCP.

We finally found him before we left and chatted for a few minutes before snapping a picture.



By 8:30 we were on the bus back to Pop! We got back and climbed into our beds and got all snuggled up and soon enough we were fast asleep in. We had a big day ahead of us!

Up Next: The Breakfast of Champions!
​

 

[theworldneedscolor]

Yay, another update! What an exciting way to distract myself from doing homework

It looks like it was such a nice evening, I'm surprised that it was stormy after dinner. I guess that's Florida for ya

Those postcards are too cute! I love sending postcards to friend and family when I'm at Disney, and I'm sure they love getting mail from Main Street, USA

 

[DisneyKid4Life]

OK, it has to be said. That Mickey in the stroller is adorable.

I completely agree. I can't even draw those characters on paper let alone asphalt with water. It is seriously impressive.

Yay, how great to meet up with your friend like that.