All tagged Disney Posts
During our Disney World trip in March 2023, we got to cross a fun experience off our Disney Bucket List…Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique! Prior to COVID, Melody wasn’t old enough. We only went once when she was 3, and it was a quick trip. Then on our trips post COVID, they were not open. But they were finally open for our Spring Break trip, and after a lot of research and stalking, I found an ideal time for us during our trip.
During our trip to Disney World in March 2023, we took advantage of the Facebook group “Ear for Each Other”. It is where castmembers who were laid off during COVID could post different business ventures. One properly option is where different people deliver various goodies to your resort. After looking around on the page, we decided to reach out to Storybook Treats. We were uncertain if they could deliver to Shades of Green (they can!), and once we received confirmation, we decided to order some treats for the trip.
During our trip to Disney World in March 2023, we stayed at Shades of Green. Most people do not even know this resort exists. There is a list of criteria that you must meet to qualify to stay here. The two largest qualifiers is if you are military/former military (some special rules apply to the later) or a Department of Defense Civilian. We found out about the resort a few years ago, and we wanted to give it a try. It is actually located on two golf courses, so that was how we convinced Brad’s dad to come to Disney with us. It also gave us a great opportunity to try out the resort too!
We have made many Disney family shirts over the years, and it does get hard to make up new ones. I hate to re-use themes from the past. And when you are with a larger group, it is harder to make it all unison but different. So when it came time to design a family shirt for us to all wear for our March 2023 Spring Break trip, I had a little bit of a difficult time. I didn’t want to do favorite rides, because I really don’t know that Bob and Vicki had a favorite ride prior to this trip. Brad mentioned everyone being a different park, but I wasn’t sure how we would narrow that down…and there are not five parks. So after some deliberation with Brad, we opted to try and make everyone a character or favorite “thing” and make it have Mickey ears.
During our trip to Disney World back in March 2023, I finally took Brad to the World’s Largest McDonald’s. It is located in Orlando, and it has changed quite a lot from my first visit there back in 2008. While I didn’t research the changes, I am certain they leveled the original building and rebuilt it. Either way, this was all about our experience there in March of 2023.
During our March 2023 trip, we spent our second day at the Disney parks (third day in Orlando) at Magic Kingdom that morning and Hollywood Studios that evening. We had a big, late breakfast at Cinderella’s Royal Table, so we didn’t do a real lunch. We decided to make a dinner reservation at Sci Fi Dine In Theater once we secured the plans for Magic Kingdom. Melody had never been there, and I hadn’t been there since our trip with friends in 2014
Back in March 2023, we were able to ride Guardians of the Galaxy for the very first time. It was quite the experience, and I will say, I do think this is one of the best roller coasters there (we have NOT rode Tron yet). However, my experience afterwards was not the best.
Leaving Disney World is always one of the hardest parts. We really had such a fun time this trip, and we loved almost everything about it. (I will speak to the negatives in a future post. All were in regards to changes (such as Genie+.))
Our fifth day was a day we had been look forward to for the Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique experience. It would be Melody’s first time getting to do it, and Vicki was so looking forward to it. And while the time originally wasn’t ideal, we ended up being happy with it. So this was definitely a Melody kind of day ahead!
Our fourth day at Disney World was our “break” day. We always strive to have a somewhat laidback day in the middle of a big Disney trip. Unlike trips past, we opted to still make it to the parks somewhat early, but leave after lunch. Brad’s parents are morning people, and while at Disney we tend to be too.
Our third day didn’t go quite as planned, but we also all went in different directions at different times. Generally we spent the morning at Magic Kingdom, and we spent the evening at Epcot. Bob planned to play golf that morning, so he did not plan to come to Magic Kingdom. We had plans to meet up with him at some point in between Magic Kingdom and Hollywood Studios. Where things went in a different direction is when I woke up not feeling so great. I had a headache and still had some vertigo issues. I ended up sleeping in and set an alarm to make sure I would make it to Magic Kingdom in time for our dining reservation for a late breakfast. However, Brad, his mom, and Melody went ahead and went to the park in time for rope drop. I did get up and buy Rise of the Resistance for all 5 of us, and Genie+ for the 4 of us doing Magic Kingdom. I booked Big Thunder Mountain first thing since that was a must for Melody.
On our second day, it was our first FULL day at Disney World visiting the parks. We spent the morning at Epcot and the evening at Animal Kingdom. We did open the park, but we made sure we didn’t exhaust ourselves and didn’t close the park. Follow along below.
It has been over a month since our return from Disney, but I am finally getting to posting all about our fun trip! Brad does not entirely agree, but I must say that this was one of my least tiring trips to Disney World in quite some time. I did get to sleep in one day while he got up early to take Melody to Magic Kingdom (more on that soon), but the trip overall went so smooth.
I did not mention this when writing about our time at Epcot, but we ended the night with a semi-upset child because she didn’t spend her gift card money from her Nannie. See Nannie gave all the girls a gift card since it is so rare they all go to Disney World (at the same time that is). Melody had been so torn on what to get, and she never found anything she loved. We didn’t really have time to go to the Creations Shop in Epcot at the end of our night. And Disney Springs sounded miserable that late too. So we told Melody we would go to Disney Springs when the opened. So that we did.
We spent our last day at Disney at Epcot. We opted to dedicate the whole day to Epcot. We had briefly considered returning to another park, but realistically staying at Epcot all day allowed us to see both Emily’s group and Rebekah’s group.
Tuesdays always seem to be a great day to visit Magic Kingdom, so we opted to do that. We ended the night at Epcot for the food! Epcot is our go to for great food, and we always have to fit in our must-dos. We snagged a decent timed reservation for Chefs de France on this evening, so we opted to do that.
Back in May when we went to Disney World, we were able to snag a reservation for Via Napoli. I wasn’t entirely sure if we would keep it since my dad isn’t the biggest pizza fan, but we opted to go anyhow. Brad and I went back in February 2019, and we really loved it. So we thought it would be worth trying again. We were uncertain of how things would be since due to COVID, the International Program was on hold, but we still wanted to try it again.
When we visited Disney World back in May 2021, character meals were still minimal and came with little contact even when present. One we could not get before arriving was Hollywood and Vine during the breakfast hours. During those hours you are greeted with Disney Jr. characters. I thought for sure Melody would love this and be less skeptical. She is obsessed with Doc McStuffins, and she is a fan of Fancy Nancy. With little contact as an added bonus, I really wanted to snag this reservation. Well the night before a 9 am reservation opened up, so I grabbed it.
So in this COVID world, things are constantly changing. I really feel like that is totally the case these last few months. On our recent trip in May 2021, we expected it to be much different. We expected temperature checks, masks indoors and outdoors, relaxation zones, and plenty of social distancing. But literally days before our trip, that all went out the window. There were still rules, but not quite like we expected. Below you can check out what our trip was like with a lot of COVID rules in place. **Note that a lot of the rules have even changed when this article was published. It is a constantly changing thing. This is just how it was May 2021.
One of Brad’s most favorite restaurants at Disney World that we do almost every single trip is Chefs de France. On our last few visits, I finally found food I really loved there. My favorite has always been the lobster bisque, but on our trip in 2019, I found a new favorite - flat iron steak with pomp frites. It was amazing. But with COVID, they have limited their menu dramatically. So I wanted to do another review with the current menu. Below are review from previous trips:
