*The Secret to September* 2015 TR COMPLETED 3/26/16

[MissMaryQC]

The Secret to September
a 2015 TR


Hey there Pals! Welcome to our Trip Report: The Secret to September! My mom, sis and I spent an entire week (well almost) in sunny Walt Disney World, during the warm month of September. Come along as I relive the great, the greater and the greatest parts of our trip!


Let’s start with the cast of this wild adventure:




I’m Mary, and I will be telling this tall tale. I work for Nordstrom, I’m the lucky mama of this adorable little Booboo



and the partner of this ever loving man



I love all things Disney, and I have as far back as I can remember!


This is my sis, Kat



She is a brand new Orlando resident and WDW CM currently making magic in the Starbucks at Epcot. She lives with her honey in a gorgeous high-rise over looking downtown Orlando. Her love of Disney runs deep, not as deep as mine, but whose keeping track (me, I am).


The third member of this bunch is our mama, Betsey



This ever patient, I’ll be it sometimes grumpy, lady has put up with Kat and me for 31 years! Mama works for the Miami Film Fest and runs an awesome Etsy shop in her spare time. She is a fantastic Baba (grandma) and, like her daughters, loves Disney. Mom was actually in the MK when it first opened; her daddy was one of the union lawyers on the project!


Now that you know a bit about us, let’s talk about this great trip! This trip was WAY over due (if you want the full story follow the link to my PTR in my signature). Mama, Kat and I hadn't been to WDW together in 10 years. And while I'd gone a few times and so had Kat there was a ton of stuff we'd never done or seen. We knew going in that this trip would be jammed with activities, but we also managed to find time to relax, well at least a little bit! Oh, and we ate. We ate like none of us has ever eaten before, but we will get there!!


Any who! September 12, 2015 finally arrived! I spent the morning with my partner and our daughter just kind of hanging around



Come about 1 pm Mama got to my house in Pompano, I kissed my fella and my DD goodbye and we were off!


Our resort reservation wasn’t actually until Sunday the 13th, but mama and I headed up to spend the night at Kat’s place in Downtown Orlando. The drive was super fast and easy; we made it to Kat’s before 4 PM. Kat gave us the tour, we ordered Thai food and then we all exchanged a few gifts! Nothing crazy a few towels, sneakers and, the best gift of all, PINS!!! We bought a giant bag of Disney pins for trading. I already had quite a few, as did Kat, but we had fun going through the new ones and setting up our lanyards for our first park day!


Those are our happy about pins faces.

The plan was to get up early on Sunday, check into the hotel and then drive to MK for our 8:35 AM ADR at CP. This was one of my mom's only requests so I was super pumped when I was able to snag it.

By 10 pm we were all in bed, not sleeping from too much excitement. After all we had waited ten years for this trip! And boy, oh boy would it be a great one.


That’s all for now folks, I’ll be back soon with our first park day! TTFN friends!


​

 

[MissMaryQC]

Table of Contents
*The Secret to September* 2015 TR
Wow, there are a lot of people here!
No Clever Titles Here
Some People
Disney Wins
Adventure is out there!
Tame the Yeti!
The dinner of Yelling
It's Really Not So Scary
Grumpy Gus
We Made a Bad Choice
Hollywood Studios in Four Easy Posts!
I swear I didn't Abandon your guys!
A Small Correction
Is this Real Life?!
Makin' Memories
The Finale
AQuick Review​

 

[Stasieki]

Looking forward to following along. Your mom sounds like a hoot! Any chance you all are Polish? I have Baba's in my family, too.

 

[chicita713]

Y'all are so cute. Sounds like a great trip. Tuning in!

 

[accountingbabe08]

Sounds like a great trip

 

[STLMickeyMom]

I'm here! You all look so cute and excited in your empty Main Street picture! I can't wait to hear about all the magic!

 

[MissMaryQC]

Looking forward to following along. Your mom sounds like a hoot! Any chance you all are Polish? I have Baba's in my family, too.

Welcome aboard!! Glad to have you here.

My mom is a hoot! I love that lady so much! We are Polish, but on my dad's side. We started the Baba cause she's Baba Betsey (like baba black sheep), we thought it was funny!

Y'all are so cute. Sounds like a great trip. Tuning in!

Well thanks so much! Welcome to the show! Thanks so much for joining us!!

Sounds like a great trip

It really was!! Glad we will be able to share it with you guys!

I'm here! You all look so cute and excited in your empty Main Street picture! I can't wait to hear about all the magic!

YAY!!! So glad you're following along!! Many more of those empty Main Street photos; we hit every photographer down the way that first morning...

 

[dglilbit]

I'm following too! Can't wait to hear more about the trip!

 

[jandlinz]

Following along. It looks like you all will be so much fun!

 

[MissMaryQC]

I'm following too! Can't wait to hear more about the trip!

Thanks so much for following along!

Following along. It looks like you all will be so much fun!

Thank you!!! We do have a good time when we get together, being super goofballs helps with that.

 

[MissMaryQC]

Day one "Wow, there are a lot of people here!"
​

It was our first official day in WDW, so we went, of course to the Magic Kingdom!! We woke up before the sun did this morning.Kat and I felt we'd need at least 3 hours to get to the park on time for our pre park open ADR at CP. I'm am gonna say this was intuition, but it was likely just over excitement. No seriously, she lives maybe 30 minutes outside of Walt Disney World but not a one of us could sleep past 5 AM. We all quietly got dressed in the dark. We went Disney Bounding every day of this trip.



What do you think? Can you tell who we are? Ready to go and super psyched, we loaded up the little bit that we unpacked the night before and headed out.

We got on the road and immediately there was more traffic than I thought there would be at about 5:45 AM. We figured it was parties, or maybe cast members getting ready to go in for their shifts. Boy were we wrong!

We were made it to the Main Gate with little to no issues; I was so busy looking around at the signs and getting excited that we are on property that I nearly missed our turn we may have almost died. But that's another story.


We finally got the resort, Port Orleans Riverside; what A gorgeous resort! I was totally impressed with everything! None of us had ever stayed here before so it was so nice to see a brand-new resort. The lobby was gorgeous and a girl helping us was very nice. Because it was before 6 AM we actually weren't able to check in; before 6 AM is still considered the day before I guess. So we waited, rather impatiently, and took a few early morning selfies. Mom went outside to find a DSS, this be a theme of the trip.



Once the cast member helped us we came across the first of a few issues that we would have... see Kat is now a cast member, which means that her magic band is tied to her main gate pass. It's also tied to the reservation that we made for this trip long before she was a cast member. We had a couple issues with this during the trip and this was the first of them, but our checking cast member, whose name is completely scared me right now, was nice and very helpful and got everything in perfect order for us!

We knew that our room wouldn't be ready until later that afternoon, which was fine we had an ADR to get to! She told us where we can get our refillable mugs and we went to go get some coffee.




With little issue (only got two mugs cause they only had two colors) we got our mugs, dropped our bags with bell services, jumped in the car and drove over to Magic Kingdom. I will admit that we initially figured we would be taking the bus to and from the parks, but we really only took the buses one day; I was just easier to drive. Plus since we were staying on property we had free parking!

We got parking in the villains lot, I believe it was Jafar 37; we mean steps from the ticketing center. The cast members were already out, wearing the big Mickey hand and waving us in, welcoming us to our home! A quick ride on the monorail and we were finally there!!



When we got the front gate the bag check was already backed up; did I mention that it wasn't even 8 the morning? We walked over to the left, and joined our fellow early birds waiting for for our pre-park open ADR. We were so excited and started chatting with people around us, we actually made friends with a wonderful woman who was on a solo trip! She was going to take the keys to the kingdom tour that day. This is something that I would love to do it somewhere in the future, probably some point in the very distant future as I will likely be taking dear daughter on the next Disney trips.

We waited and waited and waited, rather impatiently I'm sure. We were all just so excited to finally be in the Magic Kingdom! As soon as they drop the ropes and allowed us to go through we immediately went to guest services; Kat wanted to make sure that her magic band wouldn't have any issues throughout the day. They assured us that everything was fine and that she will be able to access her dining credits, charge to the room, and get our fast passes!

We were finally finally here! I really honestly just couldn't believe it.



Standing in the morning dew on this gray Sunday in Orlando and I couldn't possibly been happier. We strolled down Main Street and hit just about every PPP we saw. I mean, I'm going to pay a few hundred dollars for a bunch of photographs you better believe I'm getting as many as I possibly can! Here area few favorites.







I had to add our magical character to that last one; nothing appeared but our faces were just too good!

Everything looked as beautiful as I remembered, possibly even more beautiful with all the wonderful fall decorations and the new hub!

We got checked in with no issues for our ADR at CP, had a little bit of complimentary citrus water, and then we waited. It was actually only a few minutes until they called our party. We had a seat directly to the left of the buffet; these people know who we are. We such a wonderful server, who's name I can't remember; I need to take better notes next time. But he was great; left us two full pots of hot coffee. What a gem!

We hit the buffet and I was completely blown away at the quality food. I've had breakfast at CP before bu I don't remembering it being this good. I mean sure, it was always good, but this was really exceptional; fresh and hot! The entire trip a big theme for us was "wow this food is really good!" I don't think any of us remember the food being as stellar as it was on this trip.



We all got a little of everything and headed back to our table. Couple of bites in and who came to visit us but my darling daughter's favorite bear, Mr. Winnie the Pooh!



We got a bunch of pictures. Next came Piglet, then Kat's fave Eeyore and then there was a parade!





We had been at breakfast for about 45 minutes and while we had not yet seen Tigger it was time for us to go (I'm gonna get it from Kathy for this and I know it).


Took a few pictures of Kat with the topiary of Eeyore,



and walked out into The Hub! With the construction around the castle still going on, you weren't able to walk through. This was a little saddening to me, as it was something that I always enjoyed when I was a child. Oh well, I knew we'd get to see the inside of the castle that evening for dinner at Cinderella's Royal Table.

That's all for now; my lunch break is long over and I have to do some actual work! TTFN!!


​

 

[STLMickeyMom]

I need a hint on the disney bounding.

We loved POR when we stayed there. Isn't it so pretty?

We love breakfast at CP! What a great start to the morning! I didn't see pooh's puffed French toast? Did you try that? It's a must for us--right up there with Mickey waffles!

 

[Sisa]

Following Along!

Love your Mickey PP and that you hit like every one of them. I wish we had taken more PP pictures.

CP was one of the best meals we had! Such good food, I agree! Love all the character photos, bummer you missed Tigger though. Those topiaries were SO cool!

Looks like a great start to your trip so far, can't wait to read more!

 

[Chicago Mo]

I’m Mary, and I will be telling this tall tale.

YAY!!! your doing your report!! Im SO EXCITED TO READ!!!

I’m the lucky mama of this adorable little Booboo

Oh you so are! HOW ADORABLE!

and the partner of this ever loving man

So sweet! love this picture!

This is my sis, Kat

Hi Kat

but whose keeping track (me, I am).

I would too..

our mama, Betsey

It's nice to meet you! LOL

MK when it first opened; her daddy was one of the union lawyers on the project!

NICE!

We ate like none of us has ever eaten before, but we will get there!!

too funny!

PINS!!!

YAY!!!! Love pin trading!

Those are our happy about pins faces.

the best.

That’s all for now folks, I’ll be back soon with our first park day! TTFN friends!

Best picture ever!!!

What do you think? Can you tell who we are? Ready to go and super psyched, we loaded up the little bit that we unpacked the night before and headed out.

Mickey Minnie and Donald?

I nearly missed our turn we may have almost died. But that's another story.

Ugh oh. i want to hear this...

DSS, this be a theme of the trip.

Not that there is anything wrong with that..

I was just easier to drive.

I cannot agree more! I love having my car. Especially when my family wants to sleep.. a lot.

possibly even more beautiful with all the wonderful fall decorations and the new hub!

But he was great; left us two full pots of hot coffee. What a gem!

the man deserves a raise!!!

"wow this food is really good!" I don't think any of us remember the food being as stellar as it was on this trip.

it can be a hot dog and it would be the best. Disney food just tastes that good!!

I'm gonna get it from Kathy for this and I know it).

yes.. you better hide now..




Great intro!!! I am so excited!!!

 

[MissMaryQC]

I need a hint on the disney bounding.

We were Oswald, Ortensia and Mickey! It is easiest to tell in our pics with Peter Pan, you'll see!

We loved POR when we stayed there. Isn't it so pretty?

S, so pretty! We were in the Alligator Bayou and I loved it!

We love breakfast at CP! What a great start to the morning! I didn't see pooh's puffed French toast? Did you try that? It's a must for us--right up there with Mickey waffles!

It was delish! I have had it before so I honestly only had a few bites. The breakfast lasagna was my favorite; I could eat that all day!!

Following Along!

So glad to have you!!!

Love your Mickey PP and that you hit like every one of them. I wish we had taken more PP pictures.

You guys have a lot from what I saw!

CP was one of the best meals we had! Such good food, I agree! Love all the character photos, bummer you missed Tigger though. Those topiaries were SO cool!

I told my honey that when we go with DD we have to go to CP, and not just for Pooh Bear!

Looks like a great start to your trip so far, can't wait to read more!

Yay!!

YAY!!! your doing your report!! Im SO EXCITED TO READ!!!

I'm so glad you're here MO!!

Oh you so are! HOW ADORABLE!

So sweet! love this picture!

Hi Kat

Ain't we cute?!?


YAY!!!! Love pin trading!

We do too! Although i was kinda bummed at some of the guest trading; a lot of people wouldn't trade. Or worse they'd ask for a specific pin and then give me one from a bag in their pocket... Not cool.

Best picture ever!!!

We are total hams, as you will see.

Mickey Minnie and Donald?

Close! Oswald, Ortensia and Mickey!

Ugh oh. i want to hear this...

Oh, you know, just too busy watching all the Disney stuff go by to realize our exit was on the right... So I cut over a few lanes... No one was hurt! But there was yelling, at me...

Not that there is anything wrong with that..

I know, I'm a former; quit when I found out about DD. But it bugs me. The smell especially. Poor mom got one of those vapor sticks for the trip and we still gave her caca about smoking. We mean well, but we have no tact...


the man deserves a raise!!!

He got a special little card from us to go on his Disney record!

it can be a hot dog and it would be the best. Disney food just tastes that good!!

True story.

yes.. you better hide now..

I know!!
Great intro!!! I am so excited!!!

Thanks!! We had such fun, I'm so psyched to share it with you guys!!

 

[KatMark]

Mary, I find it harder and harder to get here, but I had a feeling you started your TR and I don't want to miss it. So I've read up to this point so far and I am thoroughly enjoying already. Love all the PP pictures and the pictures at breakfast (my favorite). I don't know how well I'll keep up since, as I said, I'm rarely here, and I leave next Saturday for fifteen days, but I will certainly do my best.

 

[Wood Nymph]

She is a fantastic Baba (grandma) and, like her daughters, loves Disney. Mom was actually in the MK when it first opened; her daddy was one of the union lawyers on the project!

My mother was BaBa to our oldest. I have a Polish grandmother but she would never let us call her BaBa. But my mom liked it.

This trip was WAY over due (if you want the full story follow the link to my PTR in my signature). Mama, Kat and I hadn't been to WDW together in 10 years.

I'll have to go back to your PTR to read the whole story. But I don't have to read it to know that it must have felt great to get away from the baby and enjoy some time with your sister and mom.

We went Disney Bounding every day of this trip.

I am terrible at this game, but I am going to take a stab at it anyway. I'm guessing that you are Snow White.

I had to add our magical character to that last one; nothing appeared but our faces were just too good!

That's cute. I like that you added Mickey.

We hit the buffet and I was completely blown away at the quality food. I've had breakfast at CP before bu I don't remembering it being this good. I mean sure, it was always good, but this was really exceptional; fresh and hot!

Maybe it was good because it was fresh.

 

[Clarf]

YEs! You're doing a report! I was hoping you would. I"ll be back to comment more later1

 

[MissMaryQC]

No Clever Titles Here


When I last left off we were finished with our wonderful breakfast at CP and we headed out into the hub. Where we met Mary Poppins! She was cute and very friendly, but I've met better Mary's. We walked around into Fantasyland. This is a first for us guys! We have yet to see the expansion of what had gone on in fantasyland. When we got back there I was absolutely blown away, sorry not many pictures of stuff. I was really trying to just take it all in, althought I did end up taking about a million selfies...



We were looking and walking around when Kat suggested we get some ears! Now I already had mouse ears at home, but I wanted a new pair, with my actual name on them; I convinced a CM to let me get Free Bird (my nickname) embroidered on my ears. I got a pair of traditional ears with Mary embroidered on them, Kat got Oswald ears and mom got a baseball cap. We also bought a few pins.


We left the store and Kat saw that Peter Pan was about to come out for some pictures, we got in line. He was so cute!! He asked us if our pins were treasure, and if we stole them from pirates. When he saw mom didn't have any (she doesn't trade) he asked if she wasn't a good thief. She said no and Peter said it's cause she's a grown up. It was awesome!!





Alright, we'd been in MK for about two hours at this point and had yet to get on a ride! I was getting antsy so we ride the first ride we saw, a favorite of mine (but likely not yours) It's a Small World!!


I genuinely adore this ride, it is just SO Disney to me! At this point poor Kat was really struggling with her ears. See, she has a tiny peanut head and those bug felt ears were just not staying on. We went back and exchanged the Oswald ears for traditional Mickey ears. Kat liked the new ears, but they just didn't complete her outfit the way the Oswald ears did; vacation ruin!


I'm totally kidding! We had a FP for a flight through Neverland with my favorite pixie Peter Pan!! We had a super hook up this trip; Kat was able to secure us a few extra Fast Passes. Good thing too; it felt more like July than September. I mean it was only Mid-morning and PP was already at a 90 minute wait. Not for us though! We rode in our magic ship, then we jumped into Mickey's Philharmagic.


I love this attraction, although I do wish it was titled something for Donald; that poor duck needs some credit! We had hit a hiccup here; none of our PP pics were showing up yet. I got on the phone, but was on hold longer than the line was, so I had to hang up. We didn't think much of it and just went about enjoying the attraction.


Mama loves this ride too, but the glasses make her dizzy, so what better than to immediately ride the carousel?! She loved it.


We jumped off our majestic royal horses and headed back towards Pooh. The line was longer than I wanted to wait (45 minutes) so we went onto FP two; Space Mountain!! Quick photo stop!

We had a few minutes still so mom found a DSA and Kat and I checked out photos on the app. I wasn’t seeing anything and she only had some… we figured we check it out later.


We whizzed through the line and rode SM for the first of a few rides this trip.




I swear it was darker than I remember. After we went on a space adventure we thought we’d do the People Mover or Buzz, but the wait on both was not good. The people mover was backed up around the queue for Astro Orbiter and Buzz was 90 minutes. I thought September's were slow?!? No worries, a showing of Carousel of progress was about t start. To my surprise Kat had never ridden this! And mom said it’d been years (obviously). It was a great show, as always and it was nice to get out of the rain.

Did I mention it was raining?! We skipped onward. The Laugh Floor and Stitch both had minimal wait times, we chose Stitch! I know everyone hates this ride, but I think its funny. And having been on Alien Encounter I like how they switch a SUPER scary ride to a funny kid friendly ride. After we followed Experiment 626 to the Magic Kingdom we headed over o our lunch time ADR at The Plaza! This was another of mom’s requests.

Well, DD is up from her nap, so that's all for now! I'll be back for replies later today! thanks for following along!​

 

[MissMaryQC]

Mary, I find it harder and harder to get here, but I had a feeling you started your TR and I don't want to miss it. So I've read up to this point so far and I am thoroughly enjoying already. Love all the PP pictures and the pictures at breakfast (my favorite). I don't know how well I'll keep up since, as I said, I'm rarely here, and I leave next Saturday for fifteen days, but I will certainly do my best.

No worries Kathy!! I'm glad you popped in at all!! Have a great trip, I can't wait to see pictures.

My mother was BaBa to our oldest. I have a Polish grandmother but she would never let us call her BaBa. But my mom liked it.

How funny! My grandmother is Lynn to us kids cause she didn't wNt to be called grandma; my mom chose Baba!!

I'll have to go back to your PTR to read the whole story. But I don't have to read it to know that it must have felt great to get away from the baby and enjoy some time with your sister and mom.

It was very nice, we hit one little hiccup and I thought the worst would happen but we'll get there...

I am terrible at this game, but I am going to take a stab at it anyway. I'm guessing that you are Snow White.

It's actually Mickey, Oswald and Ortensia; it's easier to see in our pictures with Peter Pan, I think.

That's cute. I like that you added Mickey.

He's my favorite!!

Maybe it was good because it was fresh.

All our meals were great this trip, even the couple of QS meals we had.

YEs! You're doing a report! I was hoping you would. I"ll be back to comment more later1

Yay!! I'm so glad you're here Claire!!