Stop Signs - A Near Miss

Today started as any other morning.  Kids rushing around getting ready for school.

I still fighting this awful cold, was throwing up just moments before the kids left. 

As I do every morning I left the door open as I watched the  girls 9 and 11 cross the street at the 4 way stop in front of our house.

I watched them step out to cross our street,  a van was coming to the stop sign, signalling left.  I wasn't concerned about it as it had to stop at the stop sign and the kids were already walking across the street.

This is when everything stopped for me.

The van never stopped at the stop sign.  It kept going, turning into my children crossing the street.  They screamed.  One ran backwards, the other froze and stared at the car coming at her.  All the while I stood at my door helpless.

The Van  narrowly missed my daughter 11.  She realized at the last minute and stopped, but then drove around my daughter. 

The driver stopped and got out of her van in front of my driveway.  My Momma bear kicked in.

"What were you thinking?,  That's a stop sign you are suppose to stop."  She replied, the sun was in my eyes I didn't see them.  I said many things to this, including if you would have hit her, the sun in your eyes would not have been an excuse.  I was furious.

This women, says I have a daughter too.  Which still didn't make her error better.

She simply was in a hurry, not paying attention to the 4 way stop, like so many who drive past my house.  They treat it like it is a stop if it's convenient. 

The worst thing is this lady lives in the neighbourhood, her child most likely knows my girls.  I have seen her run the stop sign before, today was not the first time.  However today was almost a tragedy. 

So many of us rush around, much like teenagers we don't think that a rolling stop is dangerous, we will see pedestrians before it's too late.  However today showed, she didn't.

So many people once in a car, disobey the 4 way stop.

Please stop completely at them.  They are there for a reason.  For safety.
The next time could   be tragic.

I will be holding my girls tightly this evening.

Hollywood Studios and Illuminations Dessert Party

November 3, 2012

Have we really already gotten to our last full day in the parks before our cruise?

We headed off to Hollywood Studios for our breakfast at Hollywood and Vine.  From the Beach Club there is a boat you take to Hollywood Studios.  Once there, we headed straight to get our fastpasses for Toy Story Mania.  On this day we were lucky at 9:30, fast pass return was at 12:15. 

We still had time before our breakfast reservation, so we headed towards the street of America, where we stopped to see Mater and McQueen.  There was no line here and we had then to ourselves.  Next stop was Phineas and Ferb, there was a short line here.  We had left the autograph books at our hotel, so Phineas and Ferb signed Meagan's Hat instead. 

Hollywood and Vine once upon a time use to have Minnie and Mickey dressed up as characters in the 50's and I fell in love  with the place then.  Now it is a Playhouse Disney character Meal with Handy Manny, Oso, Jake and June, along with CM who sing playhouse Disney songs.  We went for Ashley who was 2 at the time, but it was Gillian who was almost 11 who had the most fun.  She went and danced like crazy with the CM.

Next we divided,  Meagan and Jeff went and got fast passes for Star tours and then went to see Voyage of the little mermaid.  While Gillian, Ashley and I went to the drawing Academy to draw.  We drew Eeyore, mine ended up looking like a sock puppet,  Gillian's was really good.  Ashley's looked like a 2 year old drew it.  :)  He did keep saying circle, circle, circle,  repeating the CM.

The 3 of us then went to meet Wreck it Ralph and Penelope.  We had yet to see the Movie yet, so we had no idea of  her name at the time.  The interaction was fabulous and well worth the wait.

Then we were off to Toy Story Mania.

Note a 2 year old is not very helpful in getting a good score.  He wanted to pull the string, but he had no idea how to do it correctly, so we had a very low score.

Meagan and Jeff  headed to Tower of  Terror, while Gillian, Ash and I headed back to our hotel, as Gillian was feeling dizzy, from Toy Story Mania and wanted to get out of the sun.


After a little nap in our room, the kids took a swim, then we headed to Epcot for some Supper.  The kids ate at the Electric Umbrella, while Jeff and I ate at food and Wine.  Epcot was crazy busy.  If there wasn't the pre cruise Dessert Party we would have left and gone to another park.  The kids wanted to do the Kidcot stops, so we started in Mexico and worked our way around.  Jeff and I grabbed food at a variety of places, we didn't have room for our previous visit.

In Germany we realized that Gillian was still feeling dizzy, she really wanted to stay for the dessert party, so we rented a wheel chair for her.  We quickly found out that people move out of your way more when you have a wheel chair then they do for a stroller.

We arrived at the Dessert party, got our wristbands, and waited to be let in.  I saw several of my friends from my last cruise, and I met several new friends. 

Meagan met her penpal and a group of them sat together and watched together.  Seeing this group of kids together was a magical moment. 

At then end of the evening we headed back to our hotel, put the kids to bed and got packed up ready for the cruise.

Meeting AFP :) and playing agent P

Today was Friday November 2nd.

This was the day I was waiting for.  I was meeting my Disney friend Amy Falk Peterman for the very first time.  I met Amy in the "box" right around the time her family was getting ready to moved to Florida.  Since then we have chatted through social media, both going through milestones with our oldest girls at the same time.  So I was so excited to finally be able to meet her in person.

We met at Beaches and Cream at 11am.  We were getting our wrist bands for the pool, when I saw her walking towards us.  Now after seeing someone only on the computer seeing the person in front of you makes you second guess yourself.   I think my first words were, wow you look different in person.  LOL. 

We had a lovely lunch together with the family. and afterward we while the kids went swimming, Amy and I sat in the shade and talked for 2 hours.  It was so much fun.



After Amy left we started getting ready for our dinner reservations at Crystal Palace.  When we got to the Magic Kingdom, we were told as we entered that the park closed at 7pm (for the final Halloween Party). 

Of course I had to get my photo with Eeyore  :)



After dinner, Jeff and the girls went and did the Magic Kingdom part of  Sorcerers.  Ashley and I went to ride Small world.   Ashley's face was Magical.  He loved every minute of it.    After they were done with the Sorcerers (where Meagan somehow lost her 3 favourite cards), we rode small world as a family. and then headed to the Carousel to ride that as a family.

Ashley loved every minute of that, he told us he was flying.

  At 7pm we exited the park and headed to Epcot to do Agent P.  The girls who previously loved Kim Possible, really didn't enjoy agent P.  They said it was a lot of the same things from Kim Possible and they were bored.  They did Mexico and Japan and they were done, last trip we did all of the countries with Kim Possible.

The one bonus of staying at the beach club was when the girls were cold, I ran back to our room  changed Ashley into his Pj's and grabbed the girls sweaters and return in 15 minutes.

We went to bed, realizing how quickly our trip was going.

Epcot Food and Wine

The one thing I had never been to and always wanted to attend was food and wine.  Our original plan was to wander Epcot daily and taste the food as we went, however the children this trip wanted to spend more time in Magic Kingdom than in Epcot.

So Thursday November 1, we put both children in the on site Castle club, for the evening and Jeff , Ashley and I headed to Epcot.

Epcot is just beside the beach club so it takes no time to walk there at all.

We started by getting our food and wine wrist band, and we were off.  The crowds were really light and the lines were really short.

Our first stop was Ireland, here we both had the Warm Chocolate Lava Cake.
Yes starting our evening off with dessert.  It was heavenly.

Next we stopped at Canada

I finally got to try the Cheese soup.  We also had the Wild Mushroom Beef Fillet Mignon with Truffle butter sauce.  Now I hate mushrooms, but this was heavenly.  (I didn't eat the mushrooms though, I gave those to Jeff).

Next Stop Greece.

Here Jeff had the Spanakopita and I had the Greek salad. 

This was the point we realized that we were already getting full as we didn't share, we each got our own serving.

We didn't see anything we wanted to try in the next few booths.  I am personally don't like anything with curry or anything too spicy so there was quite a bit of food I wouldn't eat.

In Australia: this is our favourite booth.
Jeff because of the Grilled Lamb Chop with Mint Pesto and Potato Crunchies
and Me because of the Shiraz Cabernet.

We continue to wander around, both of us already full, but checking out menus at each booth.  We enjoyed our stroll around Epcot.  By this point Ashley had fallen asleep in the stroller. 

In Germany Jeff tried some beer, somewhere I tried another sample of wine, though I have no idea where it came from now.

In France I had the Crème brûlée au Chocolat au lait, which was fabulous.  I also noticed that staff working this booth were actually french, unlike most of the other staff members working the booth were not from that country. 

It took us just over an hour and half to walk around world showcase.  Then we headed back to our hotel.  It was a fabulous night.

It's November = Mickey day!!!!

We woke up this morning November 1st, not believing that it was November and we were wearing shorts and sandals.

Today we went to  Chef Mickey's , it was here that I discovered that my camera was broken, still usable but broken.  Thank goodness for my iphone. 

We made good time,  arriving 30 minutes before our reservation.

We were seated and my kids were so exited to see Minnie, Mickey, Goofy, Donald and Pluto.  Ashley kept saying "look Pluto!"  Ashley would only take a picture with Mickey in Daddy's arms.

We gave the kids the option of what park to go to for the day, the kids choose Magic Kingdom.  So off we went to the Magic Kingdom.   First stop was to get our sorcerer's cards for the day, next we got fast passes for the princesses.  Standing right there was Mary Poppins.

 

 

We then went to see Mickey seeing as there was only a 5 minute wait for him and there was a photo pass photographer there.  This was worth every minute.   Ashley went up to Mickey and gave him a hug.  The photo pass photographer caught it too.

 

 

We had 15 minutes until our fast passes for the princesses, so we went to La Chapeau and looked at hats and then into the candy store.  While in there a show started on Main street about autumn so way the girls sat at the corner and watched.

 

It was time to go see the Princesses.  This again was amazing.  There were 3 Princesses, Cinderella, Aurora and Rapunzel.   Each princess took the time to chat to the girls, before any posed photos.   Ashley liked to look at them from afar but didn't want to get close to them.   Rapunzel was fabulous, she danced in a circle with the girls, giggling and playing with them.  The smiles on their faces made my day.

 

Next we made a stop at the Main street bakery.   I am so glad we did as Disney is making it a star bucks, and our beloved bakery will be quite different our next trip. 

 

We headed off to Fantasyland  to ride Dumbo and play in the big top.   I could have sat in the big top all day and read a book while the kids played.  Ashley and Jeff and Meagan rode Dumbo, while Gillian and I stayed and played.  Ashley loved Dumbo.  This new set up is nice, with two Dumbo wheels, there is no longer crazy long lines to ride, you actually can ride it.

 

Next Meagan played in the new Casey Junior splash area.  It was quite warm by this point.  So we decided to start heading back to our hotel.  We stopped at Cosmic Rays for lunch.  I discovered the chicken counter is way faster than the burger counter.  I had my order and Jeff hadn't even ordered yet.

 

Now that the kids were fed, we started heading out, right at the 3pm parade.  We found a nice spot and took the time to watch it. 

 

 

 

 

Then we were back to our hotel.  This is when we noticed that the bus ride to the Magic kingdom was 10 minutes, but the ride back was 20 minutes.  We decided to take advantage of the on site Sandcastle club.  Jeff went down and made reservations while I got the children ready to swim.  After a swim we drop the girls off at the Sandcastle club, while Jeff, Ashley and I headed off to Epcot for some food and wine.

 

 

Happy Halloween

We woke up and had breakfast at Cape May Cafe.  It was our first time eating there ever.  The nice thing was that it was located in our hotel, so we just had wander down for Breakfast, no catching buses or running to make our reservation on time.

Donald and the girls at Cape May

Me and Ashley (just before his haircut) enjoying Cape May

My first Mickey Waffles of the trip.  They actually brought tears to my eyes, they made it so happy.

 

 

Next we went to the Magic Kingdom, to get Ashley a haircut.  The wait was about 15 minutes and while we were waiting, we were lucky to have the Main Street Barbershop Quartet come in and sing "Grim Grinning Ghosts".  Margaret cut Ashley's hair and she had given him his first haircut last year when we were there.



Ashley getting  his haircut 

The finished product.

 

After the haircut, we headed to Adventureland to play the Socerer's game and have some lunch. 

 

As we walked up main street Ashley saw the Castle for the first time this trip.  He yelled "CASTLE, CASTLE".   He actually got mad at me when I made the turn to go to Adventureland. The girls loved the Socerer game.  While in Adventurland we went on Jungle cruise and saw the back side of water.  :)    Jeff laughs at me at how excited I get about that.

 

Then we went up the treehouse.  After that we decided to go back to our hotel for a swim and dinner and change for the Halloween Party.

 

We ordered room service for the kids, and Jeff and I went to the hot food counter at the Marketplace on the main floor of our hotel.  Just before 6pm we headed off to the Magic Kingdom for the Halloween Party.

 

I will get to the Halloween party in a separate post as all those photos are on my photo pass and my CD isn't here yet.



Getting there is half the battle

So if I am traveling a major storm must always head my way.

In December 2007 a major snow storm hit southern Ontario.  I remember stressing at the airport, my non refundable Christmas Tickets for that night and my Cinderella's Royal Table reservation at 6:30pm.  I sat there watching the plows at the airport clear a spot only to have it filled immediately with snow a second later.  In the end it we left 2 hours late not because of  the planes were not taking off, but because the staff couldn't get to the airport by road.

Ashley I bought you a seat on the plane

you really don't have to go in my suitcase.
 

So let's leave in October, not a huge chance of a major storm, who would have thought a hurricane would effect Toronto.  We went to bed not knowing if our flight would take off the next day.  I tried not to stress this time, I had no plans for October 30th, but I did have 3 excited kids.

Thankfully our flight took off on time and we made it to Orlando as planned.

Getting out of the airport and to the Beachclub was seamless, thanks to Magical express and our luggage magically arriving in our room.  Check in was painful.  I had a person who was very meticulous that it took 30 minutes to check in.  I would always to precheck in now.

Finally in our rooms and they were beautiful. It was already 4pm.  We took a walk around our resort to check out our surroundings.  Then off  to Beaches and Cream for Dinner. 

I felt like a huge Disney geek, when I recognized our server from being in the box at home.  She was fabulous, we were tired from traveling but really enjoyed our meal

 

 

 



After eating we headed out to storm a long bay for a swim, now the temperature was 18 degrees celcius, and the pool is heated.  Being a former lifeguard I know all about guarding in cold weather, but never did we guard at this temperature in winter hats and mitts.  Jeff and I giggled about this.  Here we were enjoying the warmth  and they were that cold.

After a swim we changed, showered and wound down from our long travel day. 

I was asleep by 8pm.

Has it really been over a year since I have blogged?

Wow!  I seemed to have forgotten my blog. 

I haven't lost the magic, I just have a busy household.

This blog started as a trip report of my February 2011 vacation.  At that time I booked a cruise with WDW radio on the Dream.
Last week I returned from that cruise, and I have lots to Blog about on that trip.

I spent the last year and a half planning this trip.  It included a Halloween Party, 4 day cruise and ended with a Christmas party.  When originally booked our whole family was going (all 6 of us) however Sarah decided to go to University, and that meant she had to stay behind.

This was the first trip that I used MEI mouse fan travel for both my cruise and my onsite stay, and I have to say it was the best Travel Agent experience I have ever experienced.  Suzy was fabulous and answered many many many questions I had, and even saved me $500 this summer once a better rate was available.

For those of you interested, we booked our stay at the Beach Club in July 2011. 

In January 2012, things changed in our house, that we thought we were not going to be able to go on the trip.  I was sad and when we discovered that Richard Sherman was going to be there, I was even sadder.   At the end of March Air Canada had a great seat sale and we got our flight for half of what we usually pay to fly.  So our trip was back on again.