Oh it's a Jolly Holiday with Masseys, a Pre Trip Report

[pkondz]

Because she's a big girl and can buy her own ticket.

Betcha she's not too happy about that!

All very good tips for the Halloween party but I'm going to the Christmas party.

Did I mention I was tired? No? Perhaps it's readily apparent. D'oh!

 

[vamassey1]

Did I mention I was tired? No? Perhaps it's readily apparent. D'oh!

Working too many hours again?

 

[pkondz]

Working too many hours again?

Too little sleep. Stupid late night campers.

 

[luvpoohandcompany]

Hiya I’m on holiday in Portugal but nipped onto the disboards this morning because I watched Fox News this morning and it seems there’s some crazy weather going on in New Orleans and it made me think of you guys ( not totally sure I’m right but isn’t that your neck of the woods?). Anyway hoping you’re all ok.
Love all the planning notebooks and artwork btw. While I do some planning online I’m old school too and prefer putting pen to paper especially for things like fastpass and dining

 

[vamassey1]

Hiya I’m on holiday in Portugal

That sounds like fun! I hope you're enjoying your vacation.

I watched Fox News this morning and it seems there’s some crazy weather going on in New Orleans and it made me think of you guys ( not totally sure I’m right but isn’t that your neck of the woods?). Anyway hoping you’re all ok.

It's so nice that you thought of us. Yes we are preparing for Tropical Storm Barry . Still waiting to see if it makes it to hurricane before making landfall. We're in Baton Rouge. This shouldn't be much of a Wind event but more of a rain event especially for us. They're predicting 8-12 inches of rain. It's got a lot of people around here stressed out. We had a major flood event in 2016 and some people haven't fully recovered from that. My home isn't in danger of flooding but the house Michelle just purchased in October did have a few inches in 2016. We're more worried about the flash flooding in the streets.

Love all the planning notebooks and artwork btw. While I do some planning online I’m old school too and prefer putting pen to paper especially for things like fastpass and dining

I'm so glad to hear someone else is "old school" too.

 

[luvpoohandcompany]

That sounds like fun! I hope you're enjoying your vacation.



It's so nice that you thought of us. Yes we are preparing for Tropical Storm Barry . Still waiting to see if it makes it to hurricane before making landfall. We're in Baton Rouge. This shouldn't be much of a Wind event but more of a rain event especially for us. They're predicting 8-12 inches of rain. It's got a lot of people around here stressed out. We had a major flood event in 2016 and some people haven't fully recovered from that. My home isn't in danger of flooding but the house Michelle just purchased in October did have a few inches in 2016. We're more worried about the flash flooding in the streets.



I'm so glad to hear someone else is "old school" too.

We are loving Portugal thank you. Glad to hear you are all ok and your house is safe. Crossing my fingers for Michelle that she is also fine. My heart goes out to those trying to get back on their feet from 2016. Hopefully Barry won’t be as bad as they’re predicting!
Stay safe and take good care of yourselves

 

[vamassey1]

We are loving Portugal thank you. Glad to hear you are all ok and your house is safe. Crossing my fingers for Michelle that she is also fine. My heart goes out to those trying to get back on their feet from 2016. Hopefully Barry won’t be as bad as they’re predicting!
Stay safe and take good care of yourselves

We're good so far. The track was moved further west so the wind threat is even less. The heavy rains haven't hit and are still off shore. We still have power, internet and cable just starting to go a little stir crazy. On a more positive note we put together an Etsy order for decals for our Magic Bands!

 

[luvpoohandcompany]

We're good so far. The track was moved further west so the wind threat is even less. The heavy rains haven't hit and are still off shore. We still have power, internet and cable just starting to go a little stir crazy. On a more positive note we put together an Etsy order for decals for our Magic Bands!

Ach that’s great news. So glad you’re hanging in there
Looking forward to seeing your decked out magicbands What would we ever do without Disney to keep us busy lol

 

[vamassey1]

We’re under tornado warnings right now.

 

[pkondz]

Stay safe you guys.

 

[vamassey1]

We spent about an hour in the closet with a 2 year old. But we survived. It touched down about a mile away. Don’t know how much damage yet. Lots more rain today.

 

[Steppesister]

We’re under tornado warnings right now.View attachment 417208

EEK!!! Stay safe!

 

[Steppesister]

We spent about an hour in the closet with a 2 year old. But we survived. It touched down about a mile away. Don’t know how much damage yet. Lots more rain today.

A mile isn't nearly far enough away!

 

[pkondz]

We spent about an hour in the closet with a 2 year old. But we survived. It touched down about a mile away. Don’t know how much damage yet. Lots more rain today.

Whoa! Close. Glad you guys are okay.

 

[kclark9830]

Meal plans sound delicious. I'm hungry now .

We ate at Chefs de France in 2016, and we all loved it. Hopefully you have a great Christmas experience!

 

[vamassey1]

Stay safe you guys.

EEK!!! Stay safe!

Thank you for the concern.

A mile isn't nearly far enough away!

I was thinking the same thing.

Whoa! Close. Glad you guys are okay.

We have survived.

 

[vamassey1]

Looking forward to seeing your decked out magicbands What would we ever do without Disney to keep us busy lol

I'm excited about the Magic Bands too. We played around with upgrading on the bands but every time I think I have something picked out it disappears.

 

[mFont23]

Update/ Next Phase in Planning

The next step in our planning is to figure out what are everyone’s MUST DOs? That way we can come up with a general “plan” so no one is too disappointed. Lord knows you can’t do it all!


Our biggest challenge this trip is going to be Grumpy versus Toddler. And no, we don’t use those terms interchangeably to describe my dad and my son… althoughhhhhhh. I digress.


Dad (i.e. GRUMPY) likes to GO GO GO and RIDE RIDE RIDE and THRILL THRILL THRILL. Mom keeps saying his pace has slowed down in his older age, but even if that’s true, then he’ll just get grumpy when he can’t keep up with his own expectations. And the center of ALL disappointment is unmet expectations.


This weekend we all had some time to sit and talk about it. Mainly because we were on Hurricane Watch and on and off tornado warnings. Mom already noted that we placed an order for out magic band bling. More on that another day.

That’s JP watching a commercial for Cinderella on a Chip and Dale dvd while we sheltered in place. By the way, that’s an old fruity pebble on his face from breakfast.

This was he and Mom storm watching. It didn’t get bad until the storm had already passed, and it didn’t stay bad for long. We were very lucky that it was not as expected. BUT LOOK AT THAT DISNEY BABY! He actually has a Mickey shirt on under the sweatshirt, Mickey shoes, and he’s holding his Mickey/Minnie pull back car we got on the last trip.


Jimmy’s been working out of state for about 5 weeks now. He’ll make his first trip home this weekend and we are so excited. His first thought was, “WE CAN SEE THE LION KING TOGETHER!” But since he’s been gone, JP has really been stuck to me. Won’t go to bed unless it’s Mom’s bed… and Mom has to be in it, too. So we’ve fought a lot. Mostly, “John Paul, go get in the bed!” kind of fights. But last week, I caught him walking into the living room. I yelled at him and he just looked at me with big, puppy dog eyes, grabbed the microphone on the karaoke and sang the words, “Booooooty and da beeeeeast.”


Okay. He knows how to work it.


Then this weekend, we were at my Mom’s and he’s like "Simon Says…."

I’m like NO! Simon Says GO TO BED!

He puts his chin on my chest, and looks up and says, “Do you wanna build a snowman?”


This kid.


So that’s about where we’re at right now. A lot going on, as per usual. But when we finally got a chance to sit down this weekend, we went through an attraction list to rank what we want to do, what we would like to do if time permits, and what we can pass on. Of course I had already gone through and highlighted the things JP cannot do and we will have to baby swap on as well.


WHO KNOWS HOW TO BABY SWAP?! I still don’t quite understand the logistics.


For organization purposes, I think i’d like to go through our must-do's, hope-for's, etc park-by-park. However, we’ve only mapped out our plans so far for the CHRISTMAS PARTY!



So that’s where we will start!


So we will be going to the party on Tuesday, 12/17. I’m flying in that morning and not doing a park. Or maybe I’ll just go ahead and get to Magic Kingdom as soon as I can. Who knows?! The possibilities are endless… until 4pm. Mark my words...WE WILL BE IN MAGIC KINGDOM BY 4PM. Well, 4:30 at the latest. Hopefully.


So party guest can be there by 4pm, and everyone else is kicked out by 6pm. Party officially starts at 7.


SCHEDULE:

We are hoping to get into the park and EAT by 5pm. Then we’d like to take advantage of any rides that we can before the party getting bumping!


Thanks to Undercover Tourist’s outline of last year’s party, this is our rough schedule to go by. At least for now until we know more.


I’m not going to lie, I’m not super into wanting to see characters. Even if it’s groups of characters in special holiday outfits. I want to PARTY! And see the parade! And See SNOW on Mainstreet. And SHOP SHOP SHOP!


7pm We want to hit CLUB TINSEL when it opens at 7pm at Cosmic Rays! Party a bit.

Then we need to be setup to watch the lighting of the Castle. I forget what the real name is called. Something about Frozen. I know we hear all the great things about staying for the later showings of this and the parade and what not, but let’s be honest. We just won’t make it that long.

So the lighting is at 8:15 and 8:30 is the parade. We plan to stay in the same spot. Still unsure where exactly that is, but open to suggestions!

After that, we’d love to make our way over to a Tomorrowland Christmas.

Other important thing we just HAVE to see is snow. And to gather all the treats we can.


We’ve talked about the idea of some of us holding down our parade spot while the others take JP to walk around and collect cookies.


FASTPASS


Here’s a question for everyone…

If Mom/Dad/Danielle/JP do Epcot that morning before the party, can they make fastpasses for both epcot and for magic kingdom (before party time)? Or should they do one over the other? Or maybe do Epcot and hope to get another in MK later in the day?


OUTFITS/IDEAS:


Mom and I seem to have to same taste on this front, so we asked Danielle if she wanted to key in and be a part of something matchy-matchy. She was less than interested. Although, with Danielle, you kinda have to time your questions. We don’t call her Tinkerbell for nothing.


Mom and I are both thinking we will make something for our shirts. I want to be comfy, but cute. Like Christmas Jammy-After Christmas Eve Mass-Family Picture kind of cute and comfy.


I’m thinking something like this for me. Mom wants more of a football/baseball-type shirt.

They also have short sleeves. And we saw this design so far that we really like.

Or maybe just something along those lines. Maybe some obnoxious Christmas leggings with it. Who knows! I also really loved:

JP’s easy. He’s just going to wear Christmas jammies. And i’ll probably even have a backup pair, Mickey-themed, of course.


When we first started talking outfits, my dad was very GRUMPY about it. He said don’t include him in any plans, that he had more than enough Grumpy shirts to make it through the trip. He’s not kidding, either. Somehow, Mom was able to convince him to get a “Is this Jolly Enough for You” Gumpy, Christmas shirt. They originally sent it in the wrong color. So now he has TWO of this shirt. I’d say that’s a win!


SO IF ANYONE HAS ADVICE OR IDEAS PLEASEEEEE TELL US!


We are super excited to experience this for the first time and want to make the most out of it. Also, we all bought our tickets through Undercover Tourist and with tax (and free shipping) it was less than buying it through Disney.

 

[StarWarsMomofGirls!]

We’re under tornado warnings right now.

Too cute. no seriously too cute for tornado warnings..

We spent about an hour in the closet with a 2 year old. But we survived. It touched down about a mile away. Don’t know how much damage yet. Lots more rain today.

Glad to hear you are all ok!

That’s JP watching a commercial for Cinderella on a Chip and Dale dvd while we sheltered in place. By the way, that’s an old fruity pebble on his face from breakfast.

I mean, he is just being prepared. Who knows how long you might be in there. He might get hungry later.

If Mom/Dad/Danielle/JP do Epcot that morning before the party, can they make fastpasses for both epcot and for magic kingdom (before party time)? Or should they do one over the other? Or maybe do Epcot and hope to get another in MK later in the day?

Ok, So, IF you wanted to make fast passes in both EPCOT and MK, You would need to that the party tickets on a seperate MDE account, that way you could make the morning EPCOT FP on the main account and then use the FP before the party on the second account.

But personally, I can't bother with this level of stuff. I would make fast passes in EPCOT and just go with the flow when you / they get to MK.

 

[pkondz]

Lord knows you can’t do it all!

Nope. Not possible.

Our biggest challenge this trip is going to be Grumpy versus Toddler.

My money is on Toddler.

Mainly because we were on Hurricane Watch and on and off tornado warnings.

Saw that.

By the way, that’s an old fruity pebble on his face from breakfast.

grabbed the microphone on the karaoke and sang the words, “Booooooty and da beeeeeast.”

Already knows what a booty call is... at that age!

WHO KNOWS HOW TO BABY SWAP?! I still don’t quite understand the logistics.

Sorry. Can't help you there.

If Mom/Dad/Danielle/JP do Epcot that morning before the party, can they make fastpasses for both epcot and for magic kingdom (before party time)?

No. Only one park. Decide which is your priority and do that.

I’m thinking something like this for me.

I like it!