Mouse Kids

MouseKids Podcast Episode 8: Top 10 World Showcase Countries

podcast@mousedaddy.com (MouseKids.com) — Tue, 18 Jan 2011 18:17:22 PST

The kids rank their 10 favorite countries from Epcot's World Showcase (which by exclusion ranks all 11). World Showcase isn't generally considered to be very fun for kids but they can pick their favorite things from almost all countries.

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Have some questions about taking kids to Disney World or obscure Disney World trivia? The kids enjoyed their listener question episode so please write any questions with your first name and hometown to mailbag@mousedaddy.com and they will try to answer them in an upcoming episode.

MouseKids Podcast Episode 7: Favorite Rides in Each Park

podcast@mousedaddy.com (MouseKids.com) — Mon, 20 Sep 2010 16:52:53 PDT

The kids both name their favorite ride from each park. This podcast is live from Test Track.

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MouseKids Podcast Episode 6: Name that Tune

podcast@mousedaddy.com (MouseKids.com) — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 16:00:03 PDT

The kids play Name that Tune, listening to songs from Walt Disney World and trying to guess which attraction they are from.

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MouseKids Podcast Episode 5: Star Tours

podcast@mousedaddy.com (MouseKids.com) — Sat, 17 Jul 2010 16:00:01 PDT

The kids list their Top 7 favorite things about Star Tours and are excited to see the new Star Tours 2.0 next year..

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MouseKids Podcast Episode 4: Listener Questions

podcast@mousedaddy.com (MouseKids.com) — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 20:08:30 PDT

The kids answer listener questions including trivia about the tallest building in Magic Kingdom, how scary they think the Halloween Party is, and their favorite characters, fireworks and snacks.

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MouseKids Podcast Episode 3: Fantasyland Favorites Past and Present

podcast@mousedaddy.com (MouseKids.com) — Sat, 26 Jun 2010 14:59:38 PDT

The kids cover their favorite attractions in Fantasyland, and try their best to cover some rides they are way too young to have ever seen. This episode is recorded "live" from Mr. Toad's Wild Ride.

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Have some questions about taking kids to Disney World or obscure Disney World trivia? The kids want to do a listener question episode so please write any questions with your first name and hometown to mailbag@mousedaddy.com and they will try to answer them in an upcoming episode.

MouseKids Podcast Episode 2: Best of Toy Story in Disney World

podcast@mousedaddy.com (MouseKids.com) — Wed, 23 Jun 2010 19:56:07 PDT

The kids have Toy Story fever after seeing Toy Story 3 and wanted to list the top Toy Story related attractions in Walt Disney World. This episode comes to you live from Toy Story Mania in Disney's Hollywood Studios.

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MouseKids Podcast Episode 1: Top Seven Scariest Things in Disney World

podcast@mousedaddy.com (MouseKids.com) — Mon, 28 Jun 2010 06:08:27 PDT

The kids cover their scariest attractions at WDW. After listening to several podcasts of WDW Radio and WDW Today, Jack decided he wanted to try doing his own podcast. He got his younger sister to be his co-host. The first subject is the scariest things at Disney World (to them). They went back and forth between doing a top 10 and a top 7 but decided on 7 since "most of the things they used to be scared of they aren't scared of anymore". Episode 1 (fictionally) takes place at Comic Ray's Starlight Cafe in the Magic Kingdom.

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Kids Movie: Chip & Dale in Up the Ele-Vader

podcast@mousedaddy.com (MouseKids.com) — Sat, 13 Feb 2010 06:40:19 PST

After discovering Star Tours on our last WDW Trip, our daughter wanted to do another one of their cartoons in a Star Wars theme. Lucy plays dual roles as Dale and Vader (or Ele-Vader as she calls him).

Top 7 Must-Sees from our Disney Vacation

podcast@mousedaddy.com (MouseKids.com) — Sat, 13 Feb 2010 06:33:33 PST

Pulling inspiration from the propaganda channel in WDW, I have compiled the top 7 memories from our latest vacation:

#7- Behind the Seeds Tour

Given the kids interest in the workings of WDW we looked at taking one of their tours. Most of them have an age minimum of 16 and take the greater part of a day. This was a great first step for $14 and an hour of the day. The kids got to see the hydroponics up close, feed the fish farm, and try some cucumbers grown there.

#6- Star Tours

Our daughter is finally over the 40 inch mark this year and so she is finally trying some of WDWs best rides. The kids didn’t previously have a lot of exposure to Star Wars and initially she was scarred to go on this one. We went on this ride 3 times and it is her new favorite. Star Wars (or Tours) fever has now taken over our house.

#5- Fantasia Gardens

Our son really loved Mini Golf and wanted to try one of the courses. This one is located right in front of the Swan resort. It was the only really hot day on our trip so we were a little tired after walking to this but then Jack hit a hole-in-one on the first hole.

#4 – Triple Mountain Whammy

Our son did the 3 Magic Kingdom mountains 3 times on this trip. Space Mountain just re-opened after a refurb and the changes weren’t that big of deal but he was excited to ride all 3 without dad holding onto him.

#3- First Lost Tooth

Our son lost his first tooth right in the middle of the Block Party Bash. He put his tooth under his pillow where Tinkerbell left him a Mickey Dollar. He actually lost his second tooth a few days later when getting dressed. Upon reflection, I am surprised more milestones like this haven’t occurred while we have been at WDW.

#2- Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique

This was our daughter’s big moment. For her 4^th birthday, we got her the full package at the BBB in Cinderella’s Castle. She got made up like a princess and walked around like one for the rest of the day.

#1- Christmas

We broke from our tradition of going mid-fall and decided to take a week long trip that started Thanksgiving weekend. It was a great experience and I would recommend early December as a great time to go. For one thing, some Christmas activities start at WDW the day after Halloween and are in full swing starting the day after Thanksgiving. We had a great time seeing all the decorations and most of the special events. My personal favorite was the Osbourne Festival of Dancing Lights at the Studios.

We had a few bad experiences with the festivities. Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas party was over-crowded and was not worth the extra money; especially given how great the “free” festivities were at the other parks. Yes, I am complaining about the price and value of something at notoriously expensive WDW and this is it.

We also got stuck at Magic Kingdom on the day they rescheduled the Christmas Day parade TV shoot (the original day got rained out). It was a great morning but the Magic Kingdom was wall to wall herds of people when the tapings were done.

Despite these hiccups, we are excited to go back to WDW and hope to go for the holiday season again soon.

Making Character Cookies: The Muppets

podcast@mousedaddy.com (MouseKids.com) — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 20:48:32 PDT

The kids have a recipe for character cookies in one of their books that involved making the shapes of characters out of cookie dough and then filling in the colors with hard candy. They have always wanted to try it. We finally indulged them. Here are our results. This how-to assumes you know how to make dough for sugar cookies. Have that dough ready and chilling before you begin.

First, have the kids decide what characters (or other designs) they want to make, this will determine what colored candy you need. The subjects should be colorful (for example, Mickey Mouse would not be a good choice since he is mostly black and white). The kids decided on the Muppets.

Get hard candies in all the colors you need. Our grocery had Jolly Ranchers in green, blue, red, pink and purple so I got a pound of those along with some butterscotch and root beer candies. It was too much. A half pound may have worked.

The kids can help sort and unwrap the candies. Gather up all candies into baggies, one for each color.

Put a towel over the baggies and smash them up until they are in small pieces. They do not need to be smashed so much that they are turned into powder (that will make it harder later).

Cover your cookie sheets with tin foil. Use thin stripes of the cookie dough to draw the outlines of your subjects. You can also use it for white areas such as the eyes. Fill in the outlines with the appropriate colored candy pieces. Having features such as an open mouth or hat adds a little variety so that a cookie will have different flavors.

Put it in the oven (preheated to 400F) for 6 to 8 minutes. Any more than this and the candy may start to bubble (ours did).

The outcome: I'll call it good for a first try. I made the cookie dough strips a little too thick thinking they needed to be big enough to hold the cookie together - they don't if they are filled in with candy. One cookie sheet was a little inclined which caused Gonzo's nose to spill a little. When they finally cooled, the kids were excited to try them.

Here are the kids enjoying their first pick of the cookies, Green Apple Kermit and Watermelon Miss Piggy (with Butterscotch hair). Tomorrow there may be a fight because they both have the same second choice...

It will be a salute to the cookies of all nations, but mostly AMERICA.

Kids Make Another Chip & Dale Cartoon: Ghost Ride

podcast@mousedaddy.com (MouseKids.com) — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 17:50:01 PDT

The kids wanted to do another Chip & Dale cartoon, this time dealing with their favorite topic - the Haunted Mansion. They both play dual roles as Chip & Dale and the ghosts. Dad decided to try out his blue screen and some other tech.

Kids Eye View Tour of Walt Disney World

podcast@mousedaddy.com (MouseKids.com) — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 14:36:05 PDT

Here is a video and photo tour of Disney World taken from the perspective of our kids. It spans the 4 parks and my intent is to add annotations to make it a sort of "pop-up video" guide for other parents.

Where to See the Characters

podcast@mousedaddy.com (MouseKids.com) — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 20:00:01 PDT

When visiting Walt Disney World you are likely going to want to spend at least a few moments interacting with the characters around the resort. Maybe your kids are collecting autographs, maybe they like to interact and play with the characters, maybe you just want that iconic picture with Mickey. Whatever the reason, there are plenty of opportunities to see the characters, and plenty of other people who will waste your precious vacation time by having the nerve to get in line before you do. In this piece we will outline the best places to see some of the characters without standing in long lines.

To meet some characters, one method is to eat at a restaurant with "Character Dining". This is probably the best way to meet available characters because they come to you while you eat; and you have to eat sometime, so these meals help you multitask. Downsides are they cost a fair amount (meeting them elsewhere is "free" once you have admission) and they do suck up about an hour (at least for us). That said, we'll present a dining option and a "free" (with park admission) option for each group of characters.

Mickey & Friends (Minnie, Goofy, Donald, Pluto)

There are options for seeing these characters at all the parks, but our pick for the best spot is actually not a dining experience; it is the Epcot Character spot. Located just West of the Fountain of Nations, this place lets you see all of the 5 characters in a row after standing in line once. It is the best place to get that iconic Mickey picture, because Mickey is in his classic garb (not a safari, chef or other costume as in other areas), not to mention you get to see the others immediately following. The best way to avoid lines is to get to Epcot right away at opening, hit your favorite of the headliner attractions (Soarin or Test Track) and then go to the Character Spot (by this time they should have the line moving).

At the other parks: Camp MinnieMickey at Animal Kingdom is also a good spot to see the characters in Safari garb. It is pretty easy to do right away in the morning but each character has a separate line. The Studios has Sorcerer Mickey at the Magic of Disney Animation pavilion. This is fairly easy to do but again it is one line for only one character. Avoid Mickey's Judge's Tent at the Magic Kingdom- it is one big line for just one picture. You can still tour Mickey's house and exit before going into the tent.

For Dining options you can see different mixes of the characters in different places but the best (only) place to see all of the "fab 5" is at Chef Mickey's at the Contemporary Resort. It is on the monorail loop, so it is easy to go there on a Magic Kingdom day.

Pooh & Friends (Tigger, Eeyore, Piglet)

The best spot to see the Pooh characters is far and away Crystal Palace, a character dining buffet (and in my opinion, the best food inside the Magic Kingdom park). They even open before the park does, so you can get in early, get a picture with the Castle with no one around, get breakfast with the characters, and be out at about in the park when the rides open.

The best free spot is behind the toy shop at the United Kingdom in Epcot's World showcase. They usually have Pooh, Tigger and Eeyore all at once, and often have Mark Poppins and Alice at the same time. Animal Kingdom also has a character spot outside the entrance to Dinoland where you can see 3 or 4 of the characters by standing in one line. It tends to get a little longer than the Epcot line though.

The Princesses

The best spot for seeing the Princesses for us is the "Storybook Dining" at Akershus in Norway at Epcot. You get to see 5 of the Princesses, get a complementary photo, a pretty good meal, and darn good dessert all for one dining credit on the dining plan. Princesses vary but you can probably depend on Ariel (Scandinavian fairy tale I am told) and Belle.

At Magic Kingdom, Cinderella's Royal Table gives you an equivalent experience for twice the price. It is in the castle, however, so it may be a big deal. Food is not quite as good. Dessert is nowhere close. Princesses vary but Cinderella will be there.

The best free spot is a series of spots- Princesses can often be found in their proper country at World Showcase in Epcot. Aurora and Belle in France, Jasmine in Morocco, Snow White in Germany, Mulan in China. These spots are really pretty good and you often get to see others with them (Dopey, Mushu, Aladdin, etc.), the only drawback is you won't be seeing Ariel and Cinderella; who tend to be the favorites. The Magic Kingdom has a spot to see Ariel and a spot in Toontown to see 3 princesses. These lines may very well be the longest in all of Disney World at any given time so if you are going to spring for one character dinner make it the Princesses.

Pixar Characters

There is currently no character meal for the Pixar characters. Disney likes money, so I expect that to change at some point. Although you can often see Buzz and Woody at Magic Kingdom, the best (and maybe only other) place to see the popular Pixar characters is at Disney's Hollywood Studios.

Toy Story - Buzz & Woody: Be at the Studios when it opens. Ride Toy Story Mania first, then hop across the street to see Buzz and Woody and take pictures on a bunch of Toy Story scenes.

Monsters Inc. - Mike & Sulley: You can find the Monster's Inc photo opp at the exit of the Backlot Tour, but you don't need to take the Tour to get there.

Cars - Lightning and Mater: Go out behind MuppetVision and Mama Melrose's. This line moves surprisingly slow for two stationary vehicles.

The Incredibles: Find them at the Magic of Disney Animation pavillion (along with Sorcerer Mickey and whatever the newest Disney film is). One tip is you don't have to go through the tour and see the film, you can skip right to the fun stuff by entering the pavilion through the art store (the exit).

If your kids are Bug's Life fans you can often see them in Animal Kingdom close to the Tree of Life.

So in summary:

BEST DINING OPTIONS

Mickey & Friends: Chef Mickey's at the Contemporary

Pooh & Friends: Crystal Palace at Magic Kingdom

Princess: Akershus at Epcot's Norway

BEST FREE OPTIONS

Mickey & Friends: Character Spot in Epcot

Pooh & Friends: United Kingdom in Epcot (back of Toy Shop)

Princess: Around World Showcase in Epcot

Pixar: Around Hollywood Studios

AVOID

Trying to see characters in Toontown at the Magic Kingdom

Kids Make a Chip & Dale Cartoon

podcast@mousedaddy.com (MouseKids.com) — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 19:45:00 PDT

The kids wanted to make a Chip & Dale cartoon. They came up with the plot and all the antics and MouseDaddy edited it. Here is the result.

Getting rid of People in your Picture

podcast@mousedaddy.com (MouseKids.com) — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 19:40:00 PDT

Finally we were going to do it...

Mousedaddy and son had taken a good picture on Test Track last year, but this time our daughter was finally tall enough to ride- and she loved it. I wanted to get that family picture on Test Track. We went to Epcot and rode on Day 2 of our trip but the Photopass kiosk was down. When we came back later in the week with the Grandpa now along for the ride, I was determined to get that picture.

We presented our Fastpasses and got in line. It only took a few minutes to get to the front. We were lined up to get into our car when - oh no! Single rider came up to fill the last vacant seat. Oh well, there were other riders when I got that picture with Jack before. No big deal.

OK kids, here comes the crash zone (where the picture is taken before you crash into the wall). Everybody yell!

When we collected our picture we saw that everyone in our group was looking and yelling as if it was our first time on the ride. Sure, I had a dopey look on my face but hey it fits. But what's this? 5 people yelling at the danger ahead and one bored teenager looking out the side of the car. Ugggh.

My photoshop skills are not what they could be, but even if I was a pro it could get really involved to remove the person from the picture and make it look right. I suppose we could have put Grandma (who didn't ride) in her place but really there was no way to make that look right either. The answer? Fade the single rider out and make them not stand out.

I did Google Disney charcter photos and found one of Stitch looking in the right direction for the picture. I cut out his head and pasted it over hers. Then (since Stitch wasn't actually sitting in a car seat) I colored her body blue like a Smurf. This stuck out like a sore thumb. So the last set was to lower the brightness and contrast of the Stitch head and single rider body until their brightness was such that it matched the background features of the photo and the contract was such that nothing about the new Stitch character really stood out.

General advice when trying to alter photos: Set your expectations low.

Another Magical Trip in the Bag

podcast@mousedaddy.com (MouseKids.com) — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 19:30:01 PDT

Another fun trip to Disney is over and done with, and we had a great time. This was a big trip for our daughter, who with her new glasses could actually see all the attractions clearly for the first time. We found out over the holidays that she was very nearsighted. Mom and Dad got a little teary when she exclaimed "The Castle!", seeing the huge structure in person for the first time. She was also 40 inches tall, which means that a whole new world of rides opened up the now she (and by extension, our whole family together) could ride; and now she is a Test Track junkie.

Grandpa and Grandma joined us mid-trip and we rented some boats to tour Bay Lake. The kids had a lot of fun with it and we'll probably have to do it every trip from now on. We didn't branch out much with our dining choices (partially because the kids wanted to hit all our favorites with Grandpa and Grandma and we are accumulating enough "favorites" for a 2-week trip) but we did for the first time try the Sci-Fi Cafe. Food was OK but the kids loved the atmosphere of the Drive-in at night so I recommend it for families.

We stayed at All Star Music, which for the first half of our trip was hosting a Cheerleading tournament. Needless to say, the resort and pools were wall to wall screaming girls. It actually worked out nice though - they were going to tournaments instead of the parks so bus rides were much easier, and teenage girls don't wake up early enough to get breakfast when I do so for the first few days when we had plenty of energy to go to the parks it was just fine.

Plan to blog on some of the subjects I promised after last trip. The difference is I spent that time processing trip video and this time I actually have it.

Review: Disney World Souvenir DVD Collection

podcast@mousedaddy.com (MouseKids.com) — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 17:02:02 PDT

When not at Walt Disney World, our kids really enjoy watching or reading about Walt Disney World. So when I saw this video collection, a 5-pack of DVDs highlighting each park and the Disney Cruise line, I was intrigued. The kids loved our own movies (2007 version shown here), so I guessed that a dedicated video created with all of the resources of Disney including characters, music and direct footage would be the pinnacle of multimedia for Disney Park lovers.

Disney gives out a different free vacation planning video. It is a good thing, too. If they gave out these souvenier videos, no one would come.

We begin by loading the Magic Kingdom DVD. Things start innocently enough as we are treated to a series of aerial shots of the park and the castle...

along with this balloon from the 70s/80s. Actually there is a lot of old canned footage mixed in; which is fine, other than it looks like they captured that old footage from a bootleg by hooking up two old VCRs.

We are greeted by our hosts, Mickey and Minnie. Having now watched all the videos I am actually pleasantly surprised that they used the real character voices for every character. The mice are going to give us a tour of the Magic Kingdom (sans any rides like Pooh where they would have to pay 3rd party royalties).

Apparently this tour was taped at sunrise in the middle of September since the Magic Kingdom was not a crowded sea of humanity.

Chip & Dale take over for the Swiss Family Treehouse, and tell some jokes so bad that Dale wishes he could make like a tree and leave.

Goofy, shown here flailing his arms like he is in a Richard Simmons video, is very excited to take us on a ride on Big Thunder Mountain!

Unfortunately, the film crew couldn’t get the same special access they could on Main Street and we are treated to footage taken from directly behind the train so you cannot see anything.

From there we see clips of other Frontierland favorites, and right about the time they get to the Country Bear Jamboree it hits you: they have been using non-Disney stock music for the entire video. That’s right, Disney’s merchandise division couldn’t even secure the rights to use in-park audio.

So with this knowledge we go to the Hall of Presidents, where Lincoln is now being voiced by Stephen Hawking. More time on the video is devoted here than any other attraction, which makes perfect sense for a kids video.

Minnie takes over the tour at Fantasyland. The tour goes on in much the same way except instead of narrating Minnie coos and giggles in a way that makes you wonder what she is doing up there.

Peter Pan and Wendy ride their own ride, but not before Peter takes 30 seconds to do the most flamboyant and intricate point to the sky ever that must been seen to be believed.

Donald and Daisy take over in Tomorrowland, where in the future clothes look like something from The 5th Element. Donald eases Daisy’s fears about riding Space Mountain…

And then proceeds to take her on the tamer, side-by-side seated Disneyland version of the ride in Anaheim.

The show closes with Mickey and Minnie watching a blend of current and old nighttime parades and fireworks complete with stock music together from the Train Station.

As much of an abomination as this video was, it was actually by far the best of the lot. Having the characters voiced by the official voice actors at least helped set this one level above an amateur film. Such is not the case as we travel to the other parks.

In Epcot we are greeted by Dr. Cy N. Tific, who is going to be our tour guide of Future World. He is also doing the same format and shtick from the Magic Kingdom video with one slight difference: he is not a costumed character. He is a creepy over-actor you have never seen before. No way your kids are liking this.

Once again, we see footage of Epcot from the early 80s when it had a skyline that wasn’t littered with fish-shaped hotels.

In the World Showcase we are greeted by representatives who tell us fun facts about their country. Unfortunately, the facts don’t get more profound than “we have Vikings in Norway” so don’t expect an education here folks.

But at least they are closing with Illuminations. Heck, even with the cheesy stock music that can’t be all bad, right?

Except your viewing has voice-over from a cheering (and almost moaning) Dr. Tific, who is clapping so feverously that his hands disappear.

Even the film’s editor crew gets tired of this guy, evidenced by the fact that they fade to black before he is done giving his good-bye monologue.

Onto the Studios where it wasn’t yet “Hollywood Studios” but they didn’t want to pay royalties for “MGM” so we just have “Disney Studios”. Once again we have a mix of old and new footage, which this time is a little misleading because it leads you to believe that the park is still a functioning studio. Oh well, you bought this DVD in the park so I suppose you already know better.

But what’s this? We are rolling! They are in the middle of filming some exciting new hybrid of High School Musical and the car chase from Ronin…

The huge Hollywood star has arrived by limousine! The crowd anxiously waits just to get a glimpse…

Why even Mickey is star struck as he shows respect to this Hollywood icon on his own home turf…

Alas, we are greeted by the films hosts – the stars of Streetmosphere. These are performers at the Disney Studios park that behave as if they were stars and other Hollywood-types of the 30s and 40s. I am not a fan, but I get the appeal inside the parks where they ham it up and interact with the park guests. Why, they even get guests involved with impromptu film scenes in the middle of the park…

but here you see A LOT of them. More of them than the actual park. In between the skits where they advance their plot, they show the attractions. Or, rather, they show themselves experiencing the attractions. Here is a grown man dressed as a little girl, which will actually get you kicked out of the Disney Parks.

Although they do actually show Star Tours and the Tower of Terror, most of the content where they would have to pay royalties has been removed; as shown here on The Great Movie Ride. When the camera isn’t on the characters having hot flashes, it is showing the most generic scenes from the ride possible.

Until they destroy the “magic” and suspension of disbelief entirely by showing that mobsters really don’t die when shot, their floating torsos are lowered by a robot arm.

When the video shows ride scenes that the child-scarring Streetmosphere characters cannot possibly be a part of, such as the Rock n’ Rollercoster, the video quality takes a noteworthy dip. Noteworthy in that is looks like it was ripped from YouTube.

Onto the Animal Kingdom where our host is Journey Jack. (Yes, I know what you’re thinking: THE Journey Jack?) JJ tells us that Animal Kingdom is an adventure.

For his part, JJ is not as over the top as the other hosts; and Mickey even shows up from time to time. He does have a habit of telling a bad joke every 30 seconds. No harm, no foul, right? Except that they follow his bad jokes with the “whah whah” music and another extended period of him laughing at himself. My son was wondering “when are they going to show the rides?”

He will have to wait as we go to Dinoland where we meet Chester and Hester. I thought that Chester and Hester were the dinosaurs holding the signs at Dinoland but apparently they are stewards of the world’s most lurid trailer park. You learn something new every day. You also learn in their 3-hour spiel that Chester isn’t meeting his wife’s expectations.

Back to Journey Jack who has run into some costumed dinosaurs who slowly devour him.

Sadly he survives long enough to find Mickey and ask him if he has spotted any leopards. Mickey is made a liar when he indeed confirms the discovery of Animal Kingdom’s non-existent leopards. Journey Jack is made a liar when he puts over Camp Minnie-Mickey as a Campground in the Wilderness.

Journey Jack shows his range as an actor when his safari passes the poachers. He also gives some misinformation such as “Hippos are good swimmers” which is not only false but the fact that they don’t swim but walk along the bottom is part of the regular script on the Kilimanjaro Studios ride. I wonder if the safari’s script was purposely updated to correct anything that was heard in this film.

Our coup dis grace is the Disney Cruise DVD. This video shows tells the story of a little girl named Lisa, who gets a piece of a treasure map from a hyper-active Mickey. Lisa is told that she and her family must find the other pieces to find the treasure.

The boat departs and stock audio rears its ugly head again as apparently even the boat’s famous whistle song costs too much in royalties to be heard on the film.

We get on board and learn that a Disney Cruise means that you and your family can take entirely separate vacations. We are shown a bunch of kids left in the science lab…

And adults at the fitness center; including with this woman, who could not be more thrilled to be here.

The family does see each other to eat, and when they do they discover that they have all been finding pieces of the treasure map. They also discover dad had a previous life as Journey Jack.

On the private island Castaway Cay, they find the last piece of the treasure map while trying their best not to do a Crocodile Hunter impersonation. The treasure map leads them to….

all of the Photopass pictures from their cruise! Mickey shows up to take their credit card at $19.99 plus shipping per picture.

The videos all contain extras including a “trivia track” where the regular movie plays with a sort of pop-up video trivia reel. Unfortunately even some of the facts here are false. There are also a few on-board vids of some of the rides but for some reason they are abbreviated and again the quality is not good.

For several trips I declined to purchase the set but after seeing the prices that it sold for on eBay I finally broke down and picked it up at the earport shop on the way home; figuring I could sell it and make back most of the purchase price if it turned out to be a dud. Let me advise those of you do own a copy of these videos: they sell for more individually than as a pack.

My recommendation, of course, is do not buy. They don’t hold much value as entertainment or souvenirs. If you want some video to remember the parks you can check out the Travel Channel, which has recently been running about a dozen well-produced shows about WDW. Disney obviously assisted with these productions and put a lot more care into them.

http://search.travelchannel.com/travel/Walt%20Disney%20World

Even the free vacation planning DVD from Disney does a better job of showing the parks from different angles. Just click the link and request one.

http://disneyworld.com/

We Could Use Some Warm Weather

podcast@mousedaddy.com (MouseKids.com) — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 06:47:11 PST

UMmmm, I think its time to go back to Disney!

Disney Halloween Costumes

podcast@mousedaddy.com (MouseKids.com) — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 13:17:13 PDT

At our house, costumes aren't just for Halloween. Our kids have a dress-up tent full of costumes that they play in all of the time. Luckily Mouse Grandma is a professional seamstress, we have been lucky to receive lots of beautiful costumes from her. Our kids have been: Mickey and Minnie, Tinkerbell and Peter Pan, Tigger and Pooh, and Buzz Lightyear and Snow White. This year I "thought" they were going to be Sleeping Beauty- a beautiful satin dress with a full skirt (Thanks Grandma!) and Goofy. But, "Goofy" decided to be Leo from Little Einsteins. Well, that was a very easy costume. Orange shorts, a black t-shirt and green glasses frames (dollar store!), plus the coup de gras orange hair from a can- very exciting! For his birthday/Halloween party our son was Leo. But yesterday, October 29!, he said "When is my Goofy costume going to be ready?" I said, "You are going to be Leo, right?" But he explained that he was Leo for his party but Goofy for Halloween. After a brief panic, I thought about what it would take to get a Goofy costume made. He got a Goofy baseball-style hat on our last trip, so the hard part was already done. So I needed and orange long-sleeved t-shirt, blue pants and a black vest. He had already told me that blue jeans wouldn't work, thats not the right color! So we went to Walmart and bought an orange t-shirt for 4.50. Then on to JoAnn fabrics for vest and pants fabric. I bought some black felt for the vest and royal blue cotton for the pants. And, with some guiding from Grandma, Mouse Mommy is proud to say that I have made a pretty good Goofy costume, and it only took me about a half an hour!(Not including shopping) So, Heeere's Goofy!!!

FastPass Primer

podcast@mousedaddy.com (MouseKids.com) — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 16:04:00 PDT

For some of the headliner attractions, rather than standing in line you can get a FastPass (FP) ticket that gives you a time to come back where you’ll get in a much smaller line (usually very minimal). This option is free with your park tickets. You go to the attraction, insert each of your group’s tickets into the FastPass machine, and it will dispense a FastPass ticket.

There are rules that prevent abuse of the system. Each person must have their own FastPass to ride. Generally, each person can only have 1 immature FastPass at a time (unless they take more than 2 hours to mature- the time that you can get another one will be printed on the ticket).

If the times change while your group in getting FastPasses your group can abide by the times of any one of them. Castmembers may be lenient if you missed your FastPass time (especially on less popular attractions) but they will not let you in early.

There are more complex methods of using FastPass to avoid long lines at Disney but here are some rules of thumb:

After getting through the morning steps before the big crowds get there, avoiding lines mostly depends on good use of the FastPass system. You’ll get a FastPass for the big attraction in the area, hit the lesser nearby attractions until the FastPass time is ready. Ride the FastPass ride, then go to the next area and get another FastPass. Our Park Guides will show the steps in more detail.

Fastpass Runner – Often when we get to a new area I will break from the group and go to get the FastPass tickets while the rest of the family moves onto the next step; where I meet them there in line. Mom or Dad can usually walk faster alone and the group will make it to the attraction faster. If you are comfortable with being a runner, it can be done so that these splits aren’t far apart (usually in full view of each other) and it saves a few minutes each time. Note: The runner will need to carry all the park tickets because only one FastPass will be issued for each.

Try to always be sitting on a FastPass. Get a FastPass right before you eat lunch or dinner so that it matures while you are eating (but not so far ahead that it expires before you are done).

In our upcoming Park Guides, we'll show how to make best use of FastPasses and schedules to avoid the lines at Disney.

Disney Trip Excursion: A Day at the Beach

podcast@mousedaddy.com (MouseKids.com) — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 20:17:22 PDT

One of the great things about our trips to Disney has been the convenience of not having to rent a car and having our baggage handled by Magical Express. The only drawback is that these services strand you at Disney, making it inconvenient or costly to see other nearby attractions such as other theme parks, Kennedy Space Center, or the coast.

Usually this is fine by us, Disney World is overwhelming by itself. This past trip however, we wanted to take the kids to the beach - so I tried to find the easiest solution for getting there without having rented a car for our whole trip. Our travel agent suggested renting a car for a day from the Dollar Rent a Car located in the Regal Sun Resort next to Downtown Disney. Dollar’s rates are generally near the lowest you will find, and Downtown Disney was easily accessible from our hotel via Disney bus.

So if you want to take a day off from Disney to head to the beach- here is what you can do:

Pick a day or range of days you want to go. I like to avoid crowds, so we chose to go on a weekday (weekends have a more profound crowd effect on the beach than they do on Disney parks). Reserve a car from the Dollar Rent-a-Car station at the Lake Buena Vista - Regal Sun Resort. Our car was about $25 for the day, plus $10 each for 2 car seats.

On the big day we took an early bus from our hotel to Downtown Disney. We were told the Regal Sun was across the street from Downtown Disney. It took us a moment to figure out which side it was across the street from- It is across from the main walking entrance (different from the bus entrance) shown below. This entrance is behind the Once Upon a Toy store.

With our car, we drove North on Highway 4, West on 528 and South/West on 520. There are toll roads so bring about $4 in quarters each way. The drive to Cocoa Beach took just over an hour.

When you get to Cocoa Beach, there are several businesses (Cocoa Beach Surf Company and Ron Jon’s Surf Shop included) that have free parking ramps. You have to walk through their store to get to the beach but that’s it. We stopped at Wal-Mart to get cheap sand toys for the kids but they were actually very reasonable at the surf shops. We also found a place to change there.

The beach was loads of fun and the kids really enjoyed seeing it for the first time. Cocoa Beach is huge, so there is plenty of room to have your own space if you come on a weekday. The only thing I would have changed it our dinner reservation at Epcot – we made it at 5:15 which means we had to leave a little sooner than we wanted to.

Back yet again

podcast@mousedaddy.com (MouseKids.com) — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 10:57:16 PDT

With a heavy heart I announce our return to reality from our latest 13-day trip to WDW. I cannot say we’ll never take an equal or greater vacation there but the perfect storm of me having the vacation time available, our youngest daughter still under 3 (and therefore free), having annual passes already and getting free dining for the entire trip may never happen again (certainly Lucy will never be 2 again). So at least for the immediate future, this was “the big one”, and it lived up to all expectations.

The weather was what it should be for late September (minus any hurricanes). We had a couple humid days but only really got rained on once. Even the rain turned out fine because we were stuck in World Showcase and ended up seeing everything there that we usually pass over. We went to all our favorite restaurants, our second favorite restaurants, and tried some new ones. We celebrated a birthday, went to the Halloween party, and took a day to go to the ocean for the first time with the kids. We saw all the attractions we wanted, including all the parades and fireworks shows. We even had a day at the Magic Kingdom where we hit every attraction, the mountains twice!

In the coming weeks I plan to document on this blog how we toured the parks, made an easy getaway offsite, and put together a primer on planning a trip you and your family will get the most out of.

Disney Photo Ideas: Publish a Book

podcast@mousedaddy.com (MouseKids.com) — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 20:01:32 PDT

We are relatively frequent visitors of Walt Disney World. Not frequent enough to impress most Disney super fans that run sites and blogs like ours, but more than enough to make us the “Disney people” in our circles of friends. It is natural for families to take more photos than they usually do when they are on vacation; and we have gone on many vacations to Disney World, so logically we have tons of photos from our trips to Disney World. Rather than letting them digitally rot on our hard drive or have them developed and let them sit in a box, we have found some fun ways to make our pictures accessible.

Here is my first project – the Digital Memories Book.

Lots of people (women) scrapbook with their Disney pictures. I have heard what I am doing compared to scrapbooking; it is essentially the same thing to the reader. The main difference is retention:
-A physical scrapbook, by nature, will always take a minimum of 2x more space.
-A physical scrapbook cannot be reprinted, it has to be recreated. Keeping an option for a second copy means keeping all the physical supplies for a second copy.
-A physical scrapbook cannot be revised without partially dismantling the existing book.

Disney’s Photopass Service will also print your pictures in a book like this, but again you cannot store the original copy and reproduce it long term (it is also far more expensive).

I used the service at http://lulu.com/. It is a service that allows you to create and sell media for free, and then just takes a flat fee from the purchase price. It is not uncommon for people to make their own CDs, books, etc. on Lulu just to make their product available to themselves (i.e. not offer for sale to others).

The online interface for making a photobook is very easy. For each page, you just pick a layout and insert pics from your hard drive. To have some separation between the parks and lands within them, I used Photoshop to make full page graphic titles but there are text options for the pages you can use instead.

The book ended up being about $20 and was pretty high quality. For our first run, we went with the paper binding, figuring that once we understood how to get the most out of it we could go with a hard cover binding. It was also immaculately shipped – I have never seen so much care taken for a book.

It turned out very nice. The only issue I had with it was the sides of the pages got cut off a little (they did warn me but I didn’t listen). Disney sells a paperback photo souvenir book for about $20. For the same price we got a very similar product with our own pictures. Now that it is digital we can always order another one, make a revision after our next trip, or save the PDF version and get a brand new copy of our book 50 years from now!

My Favorite Travel Bag

podcast@mousedaddy.com (MouseKids.com) — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 17:01:02 PDT

I think that having the "right"bag is essential for making our Disney vacations, or any vacations for that matter, successful. As you may have read in earlier posts, Mouse Daddy loves commando style days at the Disney parks. So, this means that I need to pack everything we will need all day at the park as well as into the evening. I love the convertible-style bags such as Petunia Picklebottom, they are beautiful and give you different choices of how to carry them(backpack style or over the shoulder). But, they are also very expensive. I found a less expensive bag with a similar style at Target. It worked well, but it wasn't perfect. When that bag started to wear out, I decided to re-create it but with adjustment to make it perfect for us. I decided to use my favorite oil cloth fabric; its stylish, durable and waterproof.

I used sturdy hardware and straps. The hardware slides really easily, so when I am not using the backpack straps I cinch them tight so they don't dangle far down.

I also included many pockets on the inside and out so I wouldn't have to dig around the whole bag everytime I needed something.

And of course, no Disney travel bag is complete without the WDW travel tag!

I have used this bag on four Disney trips now, plus many other trips and daily outings. It is still in great shape, mostly wearing where the lining meets the closures. I am going to make a new bag for our next trip, and plan to make a sort of tutorial on its construction. This bag is a lifesaver! Even mouse daddy will carry it as much as I do when we are in the parks. I did get a request for a more neutral color though:)