disneydietitian
Earning My Ears
- Joined
- Jan 4, 2022
We had to cut our summer trip short due to Covid (boooo) but Disney gave me back my 2 days of unused park tickets and added complimentary park hopper. I also received points back so what better way to make up for all that than planning a Christmas trip! My kids also have birthdays in December so we had one big celebration. My son's birthday (#17) was a week before we left but we let him have our first day as his "birthday" and my daughter's actual birthday was on Day 2 (#19 on the 19th!!). It worked out well and they got to do what they wanted! My main wish was the Candlelight Processional and just touring the resorts and looking at the decorations. I also bought one extra day of tickets and we did want to add park hopper. I realize I pretty much paid for the "complimentary" add-on of park hopper on my summer tickets but oh, well! We hit all 4 parks that day so it was worth it! Here is the run down. I did not buy Genie+ but did purchase ILL for Guardians twice for my kids and husband. It was a one & done for me this past summer!
We stayed in a preferred studio at Riviera for 3 nights and then switched to a 1 BR preferred for 2 nights. I would have rather had standard to save points, but I got what I could! Beautiful resort- we love it so much!
Day 1- Hollywood Studios/EPCOT
The rest of the family loves Rock 'n' Rollercoaster so that is what we headed to first. Early entry was 8:00 but my family was getting on their first ride at 7:50 am. They came out and headed in for ride #2 at 8:04, ride #3 at 8:23 and ride #4 at 8:50. I've done that one a few times but I would rather enjoy a coffee and people watch now than go on it.
I'm happy they love it so much. My husband and son ended up riding it 7 times that morning! My daughter bailed after 3 and we went shopping and headed to Runaway Railway and the Frozen sing along.
10:50 am Sci-Fi- my son's pick! Did not get this at 60 days out but got it about a week later using an alert service.
The guys headed back to finish out those 7 times riding Rock 'n' Rollercoaster and my daughter and I went to Lightning McQueen and watched the Beauty & the Beast live on stage show. We were so mesmerized by the sign language interpreters. I had never noticed interpreters before during that show, but WOW- their names were Jill and Demar and we did Cast Compliments for them. They were amazing!!!
After that we went back to the room for a couple hours to rest and charge phones before our Biergarten Candlelight package reservation at 4:05 pm. Loved, loved the food and atmosphere here!
After dinner, we rode Soarin' and I purchased an ILL for Guardians for my husband and teens for 5:30-6:30 pm so they could enjoy that between dinner and the show.
The Candlelight Processional was amazing! Neil Patrick Harris was our narrator. I am SO glad we got to see this show. We had reserved seating for the 8:30 show so I didn't think we had to get there too early. We showed up about 8:00 and oh my goodness- the LINE!! We got seats about 4 rows from the back which was fine, but I really didn't know we had to get in line so early for even the reserved dinner packages.
My son was super happy with his day because he got to eat at his favorite restaurant, ride Guardians and RoR 7 times!! Tower of Terror was down most all morning and then the wait times were ridiculous. That was the only thing he didn't get to do that he wanted to but we would try another day!
Day 2- EPCOT/MK for dinner
Today was my daughter's Golden Birthday (19 on the 19th)! That is what she had the Cast Member write on her button and then it was funny because one Cast Member in EPCOT thought she was celebrating her golden retriever's birthday. LOL
We started out sampling the lemon blueberry pancakes at Primo Piatto. YUM! We just split one order for all 4 of us because we wanted to eat in World Showcase.
Got virtual queue group 24 for Guardians so we didn't get there right at opening but not too long afterwards. While they were on Guardians, I caught the JAMMitors. So fun!
The guys wanted to eat in China and my daughter and I ended up eating in Italy & America and also getting some fresh caramel popcorn in Germany. Wow, that is amazing stuff!
They caught up with us in America and it was just in time for the Voice of Liberty show as Dickens carolers. It was really beautiful singing and I really enjoyed it!
Next, we watched the Voyageurs show in Canada and it was really great music, as well. We shopped a little bit and then went back to the room to rest a little while before our dinner.
We had reservations at Cinderella's Royal Table at 7:10 p.m. Magic Kingdom was absolutely bananas at this time with everyone lined up for fireworks. So many areas were blocked off and it was an adventure getting over to get checked in for dinner. We really enjoyed this. We all got the beef tenderloin. My chili was really good as an appetizer and the desserts were amazing! It was a great birthday dinner for her and hopefully a magical memory for the rest of her life.
Day 3- Rest day
I stressed over Topolino's breakfast because I couldn't get it 60 days out and it never came up on the dining alerts. However, the night before, several popped up! I actually booked it while we were waiting on food at CRT. As everyone says--- it was awesome! Such good food and service. What a great way to start the day.
Then we headed out on what I called Mom's Magical Christmas resort tour. This took so much longer to do than I imagined. We started from Riviera at 11:30 am and back to the room closer 6 pm. That was the day we moved over to the 1 bedroom, but I still thought we would be back earlier to rest. Oh well- it was worth it!! Just didn't really know how to gauge how long it would take. We didn't stay too long in one place either, but we did manage to take all forms of Disney transportation- bus, monorail, boat and skyliner!
Rivera to MK, monorail to Contemporary, Poly, GF. Loved all the monorail resort decorations. We bought a gingerbread house shingle for $11 and meh. It was okay but now we know we don't need to sample it again. LOL
Boat to WL and we all 4 split a bison burger because we just couldn't pass that up. It was already about 3 pm at this point- crazy!)
Boat back to MK and then bus to AKL. This might have been my favorite tree!
Bus to AK park from AKL to catch a bus to Boardwalk. This bus went to Yacht/Beach/Boardwalk and Boardwalk was the last stop. It was about 5:00 so we were exhausted and I skipped out on the Boardwalk, Yacht & Beach decorations but we got tomato soup & grilled cheese and reubens from Boardwalk Deli. Then, we walked to Epcot and rode the skyliner back to the room.
Day 4- All 4 Parks in One Day!!!
This family of 4 from Kentucky spent $957 for this day so we were getting our money's worth! That price is for the one day park hopper plus ILL for 3 to ride Guardians.
In trying to avoid Genie+ which would have been another $100, we talked about our day and they all really wanted to do RnR and try for ToT again. So, I refreshed a few times and was able to change our park reservation the night before from MK to HS. ToT was the priority. They booked it there and RnR was down so everyone was in line for ToT. It quickly climbed to a 100 min wait. My daughter didn't want to wait, so we looked around in some stores and then went to Toy Story Mania. It said 15 min but it was really only about 5 min. After that, we tried Woody's Lunchbox and it was really good! We waited in a pretty long line at Trolley Car Cafe for coffee and the Starbucks HS mugs. The guys had ridden ToT but wanted to wait around on RnR. It was down all morning until a little after 10. We sat around and waited so they could be one of the first in line when it came back up. They did ride it a couples times finally. I thought I might go to the Frozen sing along again but as I got closer, they said they might be reaching capacity. Yikes. I ducked out of line. The wait times were so high for HS. I've never seen Star Tours at 45 min. You know it's bad then! We were ready to go & went back to the room until we could change parks to EPCOT for the Guardians ILL which I got for 2:05-3:05 pm. That is really all we did in EPCOT besides Club Cool. Then, it was off to AK. I went to the Finding Nemo show which I had never seen before while they did Everest. You can see the theme here that my family likes the thrill rides and I end up doing my own thing. I am totally fine with that, though and I have a great time solo! We ended up buying a Starbucks AK mug so we decided to go back to Riviera to drop that off before going to Magic Kingdom for the rest of the night. We arrived about 7:45 pm and ate at Cosmic Ray's while the fireworks show was going. Then, we did some attractions in Tomorrowland and my daughter made it on the screen during Monsters Inc Laugh Floor. It says "loves all this attention" haha! The guys went to Space Mountain and my daughter really wanted a waffle from Sleepy Hollow. The biggest letdown for me this trip was that we took our sweet time here and by the time we went to Jingle Cruise which I really wanted to do, it was 11:01 pm and they wouldn't let us in. It is not an attraction for the extended hours. It's just crazy to me that as much research as I do, I let that one slide. I could have easily went to that first but it was my bad....I just thought we had until 1 am and no big deal. Oh well, first world problems!
We had an amazing trip and I just had to share! If you made it this far, thanks for reading!
We stayed in a preferred studio at Riviera for 3 nights and then switched to a 1 BR preferred for 2 nights. I would have rather had standard to save points, but I got what I could! Beautiful resort- we love it so much!
Day 1- Hollywood Studios/EPCOT
The rest of the family loves Rock 'n' Rollercoaster so that is what we headed to first. Early entry was 8:00 but my family was getting on their first ride at 7:50 am. They came out and headed in for ride #2 at 8:04, ride #3 at 8:23 and ride #4 at 8:50. I've done that one a few times but I would rather enjoy a coffee and people watch now than go on it.
I'm happy they love it so much. My husband and son ended up riding it 7 times that morning! My daughter bailed after 3 and we went shopping and headed to Runaway Railway and the Frozen sing along.10:50 am Sci-Fi- my son's pick! Did not get this at 60 days out but got it about a week later using an alert service.
The guys headed back to finish out those 7 times riding Rock 'n' Rollercoaster and my daughter and I went to Lightning McQueen and watched the Beauty & the Beast live on stage show. We were so mesmerized by the sign language interpreters. I had never noticed interpreters before during that show, but WOW- their names were Jill and Demar and we did Cast Compliments for them. They were amazing!!!
After that we went back to the room for a couple hours to rest and charge phones before our Biergarten Candlelight package reservation at 4:05 pm. Loved, loved the food and atmosphere here!
After dinner, we rode Soarin' and I purchased an ILL for Guardians for my husband and teens for 5:30-6:30 pm so they could enjoy that between dinner and the show.
The Candlelight Processional was amazing! Neil Patrick Harris was our narrator. I am SO glad we got to see this show. We had reserved seating for the 8:30 show so I didn't think we had to get there too early. We showed up about 8:00 and oh my goodness- the LINE!! We got seats about 4 rows from the back which was fine, but I really didn't know we had to get in line so early for even the reserved dinner packages.
My son was super happy with his day because he got to eat at his favorite restaurant, ride Guardians and RoR 7 times!! Tower of Terror was down most all morning and then the wait times were ridiculous. That was the only thing he didn't get to do that he wanted to but we would try another day!
Day 2- EPCOT/MK for dinner
Today was my daughter's Golden Birthday (19 on the 19th)! That is what she had the Cast Member write on her button and then it was funny because one Cast Member in EPCOT thought she was celebrating her golden retriever's birthday. LOL
We started out sampling the lemon blueberry pancakes at Primo Piatto. YUM! We just split one order for all 4 of us because we wanted to eat in World Showcase.
Got virtual queue group 24 for Guardians so we didn't get there right at opening but not too long afterwards. While they were on Guardians, I caught the JAMMitors. So fun!
The guys wanted to eat in China and my daughter and I ended up eating in Italy & America and also getting some fresh caramel popcorn in Germany. Wow, that is amazing stuff!
They caught up with us in America and it was just in time for the Voice of Liberty show as Dickens carolers. It was really beautiful singing and I really enjoyed it!
Next, we watched the Voyageurs show in Canada and it was really great music, as well. We shopped a little bit and then went back to the room to rest a little while before our dinner.
We had reservations at Cinderella's Royal Table at 7:10 p.m. Magic Kingdom was absolutely bananas at this time with everyone lined up for fireworks. So many areas were blocked off and it was an adventure getting over to get checked in for dinner. We really enjoyed this. We all got the beef tenderloin. My chili was really good as an appetizer and the desserts were amazing! It was a great birthday dinner for her and hopefully a magical memory for the rest of her life.
Day 3- Rest day
I stressed over Topolino's breakfast because I couldn't get it 60 days out and it never came up on the dining alerts. However, the night before, several popped up! I actually booked it while we were waiting on food at CRT. As everyone says--- it was awesome! Such good food and service. What a great way to start the day.
Then we headed out on what I called Mom's Magical Christmas resort tour
. This took so much longer to do than I imagined. We started from Riviera at 11:30 am and back to the room closer 6 pm. That was the day we moved over to the 1 bedroom, but I still thought we would be back earlier to rest. Oh well- it was worth it!! Just didn't really know how to gauge how long it would take. We didn't stay too long in one place either, but we did manage to take all forms of Disney transportation- bus, monorail, boat and skyliner!Rivera to MK, monorail to Contemporary, Poly, GF. Loved all the monorail resort decorations. We bought a gingerbread house shingle for $11 and meh. It was okay but now we know we don't need to sample it again. LOL
Boat to WL and we all 4 split a bison burger because we just couldn't pass that up. It was already about 3 pm at this point- crazy!)
Boat back to MK and then bus to AKL. This might have been my favorite tree!
Bus to AK park from AKL to catch a bus to Boardwalk. This bus went to Yacht/Beach/Boardwalk and Boardwalk was the last stop. It was about 5:00 so we were exhausted and I skipped out on the Boardwalk, Yacht & Beach decorations but we got tomato soup & grilled cheese and reubens from Boardwalk Deli. Then, we walked to Epcot and rode the skyliner back to the room.
Day 4- All 4 Parks in One Day!!!
This family of 4 from Kentucky spent $957 for this day so we were getting our money's worth! That price is for the one day park hopper plus ILL for 3 to ride Guardians.
In trying to avoid Genie+ which would have been another $100, we talked about our day and they all really wanted to do RnR and try for ToT again. So, I refreshed a few times and was able to change our park reservation the night before from MK to HS. ToT was the priority. They booked it there and RnR was down so everyone was in line for ToT. It quickly climbed to a 100 min wait. My daughter didn't want to wait, so we looked around in some stores and then went to Toy Story Mania. It said 15 min but it was really only about 5 min. After that, we tried Woody's Lunchbox and it was really good! We waited in a pretty long line at Trolley Car Cafe for coffee and the Starbucks HS mugs. The guys had ridden ToT but wanted to wait around on RnR. It was down all morning until a little after 10. We sat around and waited so they could be one of the first in line when it came back up. They did ride it a couples times finally. I thought I might go to the Frozen sing along again but as I got closer, they said they might be reaching capacity. Yikes. I ducked out of line. The wait times were so high for HS. I've never seen Star Tours at 45 min. You know it's bad then! We were ready to go & went back to the room until we could change parks to EPCOT for the Guardians ILL which I got for 2:05-3:05 pm. That is really all we did in EPCOT besides Club Cool. Then, it was off to AK. I went to the Finding Nemo show which I had never seen before while they did Everest. You can see the theme here that my family likes the thrill rides and I end up doing my own thing. I am totally fine with that, though and I have a great time solo! We ended up buying a Starbucks AK mug so we decided to go back to Riviera to drop that off before going to Magic Kingdom for the rest of the night. We arrived about 7:45 pm and ate at Cosmic Ray's while the fireworks show was going. Then, we did some attractions in Tomorrowland and my daughter made it on the screen during Monsters Inc Laugh Floor. It says "loves all this attention" haha! The guys went to Space Mountain and my daughter really wanted a waffle from Sleepy Hollow. The biggest letdown for me this trip was that we took our sweet time here and by the time we went to Jingle Cruise which I really wanted to do, it was 11:01 pm and they wouldn't let us in. It is not an attraction for the extended hours. It's just crazy to me that as much research as I do, I let that one slide. I could have easily went to that first but it was my bad....I just thought we had until 1 am and no big deal. Oh well, first world problems!
We had an amazing trip and I just had to share! If you made it this far, thanks for reading!
