The One With All The Birthdays - October 14 COMPLETE

Day 20

Halloween!

We woke up at about 8:30am this morning and had some breakfast in the room consisting of toast for me and cereal for Sy. We then got changed and ready to head out for the day to AK.

Walking in we stopped to look at some of the animals but I didn't take any pictures. First ride of the day was Dinosaur so we made our way over for our fastpass.

Dunno what Sy's looking at in this pic... I won't say what it looks like... but my dress was quite low cut lol

As we had only had a light breakfast we decided to go for an early-ish lunch at Yak and Yeti counter service. Sy decided to go for the chef's special which was chicken curry while I had the sweet and sour chicken, Sy also got a spring roll. I was sad to see that they weren't in the usual little orange boxes but instead plain black bowls Sy's curry was really good as was my chicken. We had brought drinks out from the room so we just asked for come cups with ice in at the counter, which was no problem.

After lunch it was time for our next fastpass which was right next to us at Kali river rapids. We got absolutely soaked through! It was a bit chilly once we were wet so we decided to head back to the room to get changed and go for a swim as we hadn't been making the most of the resort really.

Back at the resort we quickly got changed and headed down to the rather busy pool, the Poly pool was being refurbished so the guests had the use of the pool at the Grand Floridian. And boy did we know it! Lol.

Some pics by the pool.

We spent a bit too long by the pool and then had to rush to get ready as tonight we were going to Carrie and Mark's house for a quick dinner before helping them set up for their Halloween party. Carrie had decided as there was going to be so many of her British friends over there for Halloween she would throw a party so we could experience a proper American Halloween. Lots of the people going I knew from facebook and the old forum I used to use, though I hadn't ever met any of them face to face (apart from Karen and Iain who also had been invited).

We left the resort at 4:15 pm and stopped at Publix to pick up some dinner and some flowers for Carrie to say thank you for helping us arrange our Vow Renewal, we also got some balloons for Sy's outfit. We had to wait a few mins for the food to be ready (it was from the hot food counter) and then we were on our way to their house.

This was the first time we had ever been to their house, oh my! Its so pretty! I have some serious house envy. It was also lovely to meet their 2 kitties, especially when we had just lost our own.

We had to quickly scoff down dinner and get changed before heading to the clubhouse to start setting up for the party.

Carrie had gone all out with the decorations and food, it looked AMAZING!

People were soon arriving thick and fast, though lots took their children out trick or treating, but as we have no kids we stayed in the clubhouse and Carrie and I stood out front handing out candy to the locals. The British sweets went down a real treat and we gave a lot away to grown ups too hehe.

A selection of pictures from the evening

A pic of us with Iain and Karen who we had been out with the night before. (real life friends from home).

Carrie had even made a photobooth. Love this pic

Once the party was over we helped Carrie and Mark clear everything away again and went back to their house for a bit but we were all shattered and Mark had work early the next day so we didn't intend to stay long, it was still well past midnight by the time we left though! You know what its like when you get chatting to friends, suddenly hours have passed!

When we got back we went straight to bed, it was 2am by the time our heads hit the pillows.

I hadn't seen her either!

I think the bread Ohana serve at dinner might be the same at the show, that one is definitely pineapple and coconut. Maybe I'll give the bread a go if you like it, I assumed I wouldn't like it as it had the coconut in.

She really did! I was helping her plan (or more like listening to her ideas, I didn't do much!) from the UK via PM. I was so excited to see it all come together

This is really cool to find out! Though I will still miss her at the parade

Day 21

After our rather late night the night before we woke up feeling knackered but we had an ADR at Kona so we started to get ready, Sy went out on the balcony and nearly froze with the cold, turns out a cold snap had come in! It was glorious sunshine though which was a bit deceiving. So we got dressed and put on the warmed things we had with us and made our way over to Kona via the same little walkway we had done for 'Ohana 2 days before. It was really cold out, it wasn't about to snow or anything but compared to the weather we had been having it felt like being in the middle of a snowstorm! Inside the Polynesian the temperature didn't improve, people all around us were shivering We made our way upstairs to Kona to check in and were handed a pager, we started to walk away but it started to buzz right away, I assumed something was wrong with the pager but no, we were being seated (honestly, there was no point in being given a pager there was maybe 5-10 seconds between being given it and it going off! Not that I was complaining though, it meant we had no wait).

Sy didn't fancy going for the Tonga Toast after all (was the entire reason for booking this breakfast lol) so instead had the big kahuna while I went for eggs any style. There was a little bit of a wait after ordering for it to come out, I don't think I would normally have noticed only it was so cold I was sitting there freezing. It arrived in the end and was very nice.

We paid our bill and headed back over to our room to warm up. I suggested going out to get Sy a jumper or at least some warmer clothes but he wasn't too bothered, said he would be ok... I had a zip up hoodie so I was ok but he had nothing at all. We stayed in the room for a couple of hours watching some tv, napping, facetiming our parents and just generally chilling out. We then made our way out to the Walmart along the 192 to buy the last few bits we wanted to take home (honey BBQ sauce, pita chips, that sort of thing ). While we were in there I ran into some of the girls from Carrie's party the night before, I was the 'Up' girl haha. There are worse names I've been called lol.

We paid for our things and headed back towards Disney, in the car we decided we were feeling a bit peckish so we decided to have an early dinner at Tesax Roadhouse. This was a first time on recommendation on this site

Given that we were early (it was 5pm ish) I was surprised to see it was really quite busy with people waiting for tables, though as we were a table of 2 there was no wait. Our waitress was a cutie, she was so sweet! She brought us some of the famous rolls I've heard about, and some plain butter for me as the normal butter has yukky cinnamon in it. Sy had some of the monkey nuts on offer too.

I decided to go for an appertiser as my main. Sy had chicken and ribs and there was so much food he couldn't finish it all!

While we were eating a song came on and all of the waiters and waitresses did a little dance. Not sure what it was all about but was fun to watch.

We paid our bill and left our waitress a big tip for being so lovely with us. We had fastpasses for MK this evening but on walking out of the restaurant and the temperature dropping again Sy decided that actually, he was really quite cold and needed something warmer if he was gonna survive... So off we went to the outlets. Sy didn't like anything and I was starting to lose my temper but eventually he found a jumper he liked in Gap so with that purchased we made our way back to the villas to drop off the shopping and pick up my scooter (I often struggle later in the day )

We had a Wishes fastpass so we headed there first to get a good spot, it did mean arriving an hour early. That was a cooooooold hour long wait. It was cold and windy, people around us were putting hats, scarves and gloves on! It was *that* cold. We did had a nice chat with a family who were there though, the girl was an ex CM, nice to see she still loves Disney.

After Wishes had finished we made our way to our next fastpass which was Dwarves mine train, when we approached we noticed something was awry. People were standing around looking at something and CM's were all stood around too. We then noticed what everyone was looking at, Dwarves was on fire! We stood around for a little bit but of course soon enough CM's and security were moving guests out of the area. Instead we decided to go meet Ariel as we were in the area, we were the only 2 people in the queue so we had a really long chat with her, it was an awesome meet

By the time we came out the firemen were there working on the fire, it looked a lot worse than it turned out to be, the ride was open the next day. Our last fastpass was for Barnstormer but that whole area had been closed off so we missed out again. We decided to call it a night as we were really cold so we made our way back to the hotel. We were in bed by 11:30pm.

Not sure you can tell much in this pic, but this is the one we took of the fire.

Day 22

We woke up at about 8:30am and pottered about in the room for a bit, having breakfast and getting ready for another chilly but sunny day.

Ready to go we made our way over to HS and parked up. We had a little of of a wait before our first fastpass so we watched some of the actors put on a show in front of the hat. Was a really cute show, I love watching the street performers! This was the first time I had seen them all together putting on a long show, it involved some sort of radio show. We managed to watch the whole thing, we were in area just as they arrived.

We went from a really cute show to our FP, which was Indiana Jones, its been a while since we've seen this show but as there had been talk of removing it I thought we should do it 'one last time'. Yeah. It really will be the last time too, whether the show stays or not. Its so naff! LOL I think it fair to say, I am not a fan I guess I might enjoy it more had I seen any of the films...

We then went to ride GMR, one of my favourites

Our next FP of the day was for Toy Story. I got the highest score I've ever got (at this point, I've since got higher ) Sy still beat me though, as always LOL

We decided to go for lunch shortly after Studio Catering Company. I had the buffalo chicken sandwich, I cant quite remember what Sy had and nothing on the menu is jumping out at me...

After lunch we went to the Frozen singalong however we arrived as one show was about to start and the only seats left were right at the back, so instead we decided to watch the next show. We killed time by heading into Wandering Oaken's Trading Post. Sy got a magic shot with Anna and Elsa.

We then walked past the counter where Sy found a Frozen Summer magic band that he just *had* to have... We had it all set up and out we went... We then tried to buy a drink outside and his band wouldn't work pfft.

There was still quite a wait before the next Frozen show so we decided to instead come back the next day and instead head to the mall, we had a ball to go to once we got home so I wanted to have a look and see if I could get a nice dress. So off we went to the Florida Mall, should have stayed in HS... I didn't find anything I liked, and poor Sy was bored out of his brains hahaha I must have tried on 40 dresses in 6 different shops, my hubby isn't the sort of man who moans about shopping but even this was testing his patience!

We left the shops completely empty handed What a waste! We then made our way over to Teak Neighborhood Grill. I had my ipad with me as we were using the maps on it to find out way round, only it died while we were on our way so we had to kinda guess and hope for the best :-/ We did find it though we were a little bit late (10 mins). Tonight we were meeting up with Carrie and Mark again for dinner YAY!

This was a first for Teak, it was on recommendation of Carrie and Mark as they used to live round the corner and have been many times. The company was of course brilliant, and the food was good too! Our server was a bit meh, but hey, we weren't in Disney anymore

Sy had the drunken monk burger from the mahoosive burger menu while I had the BBQ chicken flatbread. Sy was completely in love with his burger, my flatbread was nice but I don't know as I'd have it again, I'd like to try a burger (not really sure why I went for the flatbread anyway!).

Carrie and Mark's food (though don't ask me what they had, I can get you as far as pasta and burger but that's about it hahaha)

This would be the last time we met up before going home so it was a bit sad at the end of the evening, though they were coming to the UK in January so we would see them again soon. I have no idea how much the bill came too as I was told to 'shut my mouth' when I tried to pay hehehehe it was said in the nicest way, honest lol!

All too soon it was time to say goodbye and head back to Disney, luckily we knew our way back without the maps It was really cold out so we said a swift goodbye at the car before driving back.

Back at the resort we watched some tv and chilled out in the room before bed at about midnight.

Day 23

A day of meet ups!

Today was our last full day Though it was at least a little warmer today, but not back up to the normal Orlando weather. I think someone somewhere was trying to prepare us for the cold we were going home to

My trip notes start with the sentence 'Omg the snoring, kill me now!' so I *think* Sy was snoring and keeping me awake...

I gave up trying to sleep at 8am and turned on the TV. We were meeting up with our friends Diane and Adam today (they were on their honeymoon, they actually got married on the day we had our Vow Renewal), so we arranged via facebook where to go. We decided on Chefs De France for lunch so I made the ADR, at least I think it was me? It could have been Diane.

We had breakfast in the room and got ready for Epcot. We hopped on the monorail over to TTC to get the Epcot monorail however it was down and there was a huge queue for the bus replacement we found a CM who was called Brendon and asked if the monorail would be up running again soon? I was on wheels today and the number of ECV's in the queue for the Epcot bus was huge. He advised us it could take hours to be running again and he looked at the queue for the bus and said we would be better off getting the monorail back to GF and heading there in the car. He gave us 10 fastpasses (yes, 10!!) which was really sweet of him, he was a really nice guy. So back round we went and got the car, this really took a chuck out of our day, I think it took an hour and a half by the time we eventually arrived in Epcot. We were running later for our ADR by this point so we actually parked at the Beach Club, we did ask the security guard on the gate if we could valet park and he said no problem, so that was good

We had about half an hour so we decided to head over to Canada and start our 'kissing round the world' pictures. This was something I had read on the forum, and as I can't drink it seemed like the perfect thing to do. I was then told when I uploaded the pics to facebook that they were gross... lol I'll include them but feel free to skip past haha

We managed Canada, UK and France before our ADR.

We met up with Diane and Adam outside Chefs and quickly checked in for our reservation. We were taken in and seated right away. Our server was a really sweetie. I decided to go for the 3 course lunch but Sy would have the starter and I would have the dessert Sy had French onion soup to start, tartiflette for main while I had the macaroni cheese and I had the sorbets for dessert, today's offering were raspberry, mango and coconut (though I skipped the coconut one in place of another mango). We both went of course for the Orangina

Sy's main, the reblochon cheese was really feet-y! I was not a fan of the smell haha

This is actually Diane's dessert, she went for 2 coconut instead of the raspberry. I started to eat mine before remembering the picture

Not as pretty...

It took ages to get our bill, we used our TiW card but she then split the check and removed the TiW discount, she then didn't know how to get it back on again... pfft! It was a bit of a PITA, and of course we were in a rush then to meet up with the Walt DisneyWorld for Grown Ups gang! We grabbed a quick photopass picture outside and said our goodbyes, it was sad that our trip was ending and theirs was just beginning , sniff sniff.

We then raced our way over to the UK pavilion and said hello to everyone. We grabbed a few pics before British Revolution came out to play... Their name was ironic though considering they weren't in fact British instead they were a group of Americans talking with fake British accents and singing old rock songs... yeah, it was AWESOME... lol

I've unashamedly stolen these from Jan and Jen! Thanks girls

We stayed around chatting a bit more once they had finished but then everyone had places to go and things to do. Jan was on her way out of the park so we walked out to the front with her and grabbed a few photopass pics in front of Spaceship Earth.

We then said goodbye and made plans to meet up tomorrow morning before we left for the airport (booo)

We hadn't visited Innoventions this trip so we decided to head there next (glad we did now as they have now announced that part of it is closing!). First up was the Piggy Bank Adventure I'll miss this cute little piggy.

We then went to Where's the Fire? Before leaving Innoventions and heading over to Figment.

We then went to use a fastpass at Test Track where we appeared to try and make the most hideous cars ever...

Time was then getting on and we wanted to go and watch Boyz II Men so we made our way over and joined the mahoosive queue.

I took this while waiting, thought it came out cute

We were meeting Anna and Edwin for dinner later but they were also going to watch the concert so they came to join us in the queue and we watched the show together. They had bought us some bandits as a Vow Renewal present! How nice is that?! Such lovely people.

Boyz II Men were amazing! It was over way too soon. I found out that they have a spot in Vegas but for the time we are there in May they have no shows on I then found out its cause they are actually doing shows in the UK, no fair!

After the show it was time for our dinner Tokyo Dining, we were a little early but they let us check in and wait upstairs. We ended up being seated late but they did sit us right at the window so all was forgiven lol. We had a wonderful view of the fireworks, just a shame they don't pipe in the music for it.

Anna and Edwin were on the Deluxe Dining Plan and they insisted on paying for our meals so we had a starter each Tempura chicken and veg, then panko chicken for main and we were meant to have a dessert only I took ill Turns out after we left Anna was ill in the same way, she and I had the same meals so I wonder if it was something we had eaten?

Panko Chicken

Sy's main

Our view of Illuminations

We had to say a rushed goodbye and make quick plan to meet the next day, we also left money to cover the tip as they had so graciously offered to buy our dinner with their DDP. I was very glad to be on my scooter tonight as I was having some serious wobbles, what a rubbish last night!! We made it back to the car after visiting a few different bathrooms along the way :-/

When we got back to GFV We found these on our bed...

I was so pleased as these were the pictures from our photographer from our Vow Renewal! Though I was a little worried as our room was a complete state and someone had been in to drop them off... I found out the next day it was Allison from the concierge who had dropped them off but she said she didn't notice any mess - I'm not sure I believe her LOL.

We did nearly all of the packing, I say 'we', it was more of the 'royal we' as in, Sy sat about and watched me pack and passed me the odd thing to put in the case To be fair, I pack better than Sy

We eventually fell into bed at 1am.

It was my first every kitty! Yeah that IJ show is very tired.... bout time they updated or changed it but then, I think HS is about to get a huge make over

I hope you like it!!

Aww thank you! I hope you enjoyed! x

Awwww I'm so pleased you have enjoyed this! I'm so very jealous of your first trip, nothing compares to that first trip, seeing the magic for the first time, its just amazing!

YS, yeah I don't usually say anything but I wont have anyone be rude to my hubby! not on my watch, that's MY job! hahaha in all serious though, if someone had done it to me I wouldn't have said anything but i'm fiercely protective of the people I love.

Where is your hubby from in Britain?

your next trip sounds amazing, celebrating in Disney is awesome they know how to help make things special

Day 24

Home time AKA the saddest day of the trip

We got up at 8am, though I hadn't slept much of the night... 3 guesses as to why that was... I'll give you a hint, it sounded like a plane taking off in the room... yup, you guessed it! Sy was snoring again.

We had set the alarm for 9am but as we were up early we got ready and finished off the last of the packing. We called Bell Services and had them store our bags for us as we had a late flight, we then made our way over to MK on the monorail to meet Jan. We were a few minutes late even though we had been up early so Jan was there by the flag pole waiting for us at 10:20am We hadn't had any breakfast yet and neither had Jan so we headed into the Main Street Bakery to pick something up. We went for croissants all round and some iced drinks

We had a look on the MDE app to see what rides had a short wait time, Haunted Mansion stated it was a 10 min wait so we made our way there. The 10 min wait was a bit of a fib, there was no wait at all so we went right on. Jan and I sat together and Sy braved it all alone

Sy managed to survive on his own just about Outside we checked the MDE app again and saw no wait at IASW so that's where we headed next.

Afterwards time was getting on and Jan needed to leave so she walked over to our fastpass at Monsters inc. Jen (Jmed) was around Tomorrowland so we were keeping an eye out for her but sadly our paths didn't cross. We had arranged to meet Anna & Edwin outside Monsters Inc so we met up outside and said hello, Jan decided as there was no wait she would be able to watch the show with us before she had to dash off We didn't bother with the fastpasses as there was no wait anyway and we all went inside.

The show was great as usual, I could watch it over and over and not get bored.

After Jan did have to make a mad dash to get to her ADR at Sanaa so we said a quick goodbye not knowing that we wouldn't just be seeing each other again in a few short months but sharing a room together in Disney!

Anna and Edwin were planning on being in MK for a little longer so we decided the next ride would be the Carousel. On our way over to ride we saw Tigger had only a few people waiting so we went to meet him. I had what I would describe as a Disney Magical Moment with Tigger. There was a reason for my meeting him, my aunt is Tigger's biggest fan and sadly she was very poorly with cancer and a few days before she had been taken back into hospital (my mum wasn't going to tell me, only I had asked about her and she didn't want to lie to me). So we get in the queue to meet Tigger so I could get a special picture to send to my aunt to cheer her up.

When it was our turn I told Tigger the story about my aunt and that she was his biggest fan, he gave me such a strong hug, like he was sad and he understood, it actually made me really choked up and I struggled to keep the tears back, he held on to me for ages. It was just one of those moments that was really special. I explained to him I'd love to get a picture to send to my aunt so he and I both posed and blew her a get well soon kiss.

We also got a few more pics with him.

We said goodbye to Tigger and made our way over to the Carousel.

Next up as there was no wait, was Philharmagic Disney Classic <3 <3

It was time for us to ride our next fastpass, Dwarves Mine Train. We said goodbye to Anna and Edwin just before we headed over to the bathroom and ran into Karen & Lucy who were also on their way there. We had arranged our fastpasses with them so we could ride Dwarves together (they were offsite and we weren't so I booked their fastpasses with ours at 60 days for Dwarves and Anna and Elsa). We went to ride Dwarves and waited while Karen did baby swap with Iain as Archie didn't want to ride.

Afterwards we went to grab a spot for the parade. Sy and I had something to eat, I had a baked potato from Liberty Market while Sy had a tuna sandwich from Columbia Harbor House.

The parade was awesome and so cute watching it from the kids perspective. There was a really sweet little boy next to me watching it, he was bowing at all the princesses and they were curtseying back, it was sooooo cute!

After the parade we had to run we said a rushed goodbye and gave them the rest of our fastpasses that we were given the day before for use in Epcot and then got stuck in the masses trying to leave. Sy went one way at the end of main street and I got stuck going the other way (I was on the scooter so have to go where everyone else is so I don't hurt people by running them down), he didn't look for me so he carried on and went out of the park completely where as I stopped as soon as I realised he wasn't walking behind me anymore. He had also taken the bag which had both phones in. I waited there at the hub for about 15 minutes crying, not knowing what to do, thinking he would come back and look for me and too scared to go out in case I missed him coming back in. Eventually I thought I'd have to just go back to the resort and get my ipad and message him on facebook. I went out the front and found him waiting by the monorail. I was *SO* mad at him, I can't keep an eye on where he's going when I'm lower down than most of the people around me, plus I have to keep my eyes peeled in front of me as people walk out in front all the time and I don't want to hurt them so its his job to keep an eye on me. This was the second time this trip he had done this to me

We got the monorail back to GF and picked up the bags, they had moved them over to the main hotel storage so it took a bit longer trying to figure out where to go, we loaded them into the car and then made our sad way to the airport. Luckily there was no traffic and we were there before we knew it. We dropped the car off at the rental return, grabbed a trolley and loaded up the bags before making our way over to terminal too check in. The lifts were a complete joke, every one that arrived on our floor was packed so we ended up getting in a lift going up when really we wanted to go down.

Check in was easy, luckily they didn't weigh our hand luggage or count them - we had 5 pieces, whoops! I did wonder if it was cause we were flying back premium? Oh did I mention we were flying back Premium? Yeah our first ever experience! So that meant not only did we have 5 hand luggage bags but 4 massive hold bags too... Yeah. Believe it or not we didn't actually do that much shopping! On the way out our parents took stuff over in their bags for us and on the way back we brought that stuff back along with some stuff for them so it was just evened out really I mean we did do *some* shopping, but we didn't go crazy!

We went straight through security as we wanted to grab some dinner before our flight. The wait at security wasn't too bad but we had been told we needed to be at the gate 30 minutes before boarding so I was worried that we didn't have time for Outback, instead we went to burger king. Where it took 20 minutes to get our food. Yeah would have been fine with Outback, grr...

After eating we went over to starbucks so I could grab a croissant for me in case I hated the breakfast and then made our way to the gate. We were taken down to the plane before everyone else. We were in row 14 H & K so a 2 seat at the edge but also a bulkhead so we had extra legroom! Bonus! We were given drinks and a hot towel before take off.

Sunrise on the horizon

We both slept most of the way home, it made a real difference to us actually being able to get some rest compared to economy. I'd do it again if I could but we have already book this years flights in economy the cost was just too high for premium. Maybe next time eh? I managed to watch The Inbetweeners 2 but that was about it, I pretty much slept the entire rest of the flight. The flight was really smooth too which was great for me and my travel sickness, that probably helped me sleep too

Before long we were touching down back in the UK Sy's parents picked us up from the airport and we went back to their house. Sy did some work while I went to bed for a couple of hours in Sy's old room *aww*. Sy doesn't like to 'waste' his holiday time so he always works the day we arrive home, not that he gets a huge amount done I'm sure lol. At about 3pm I drove us home as I was feeling quite good after the nap, Sy however was snoring most of the way home

Back home we unpacked as much as much as we could and I made about 7 piles of washing We then ordered Chinese take out. We also noted how quiet the house was without Wilbur The trip started on such a sad note that I thought I would I would end it a littler happier. You may already know this but 5 months have passed now and we have another furbaby in our lives. Her name is Tink and she came from a rescue centre where she had been since August. We brought her home about a month after returning from Orlando. She's a Siamese like Wilbur and she's certainly crazy like he was but nothing will ever take his place in our hearts. We had actually seen her picture on the website while we were in Key West but felt sure she would have gone by the time we were home, but I guess fate was looking out for us and she was waiting for us when we got home. Her favourite toy is a pair of socks she stole out of Sy's drawer one day, she will only eat expensive wet cat food and doesn't really like to be picked up, I'm slowly working on her with that though

Thanks for reading my TR! I hope you've enjoyed our ups and downs of this trip, we certainly had a blast and are already planning for the next trip to the West Coast (less than a month away!) and back to WDW for thanksgiving and Christmas celebrations. We have also started planning a big trip next October with a cruise on the Disney Dream with some other lovely Disney friends <3

If you fancy a read of the West Coast Pre-Trip report you can find it here http://www.wdwforgrownups.com/forum/watsons-go-west-may-2015