The Land Sea and Wedding Trip Oct 2015 - Day 4, THE WEDDING DAY

[Lisa29]

The previous day is HERE.

You can read Dan's (she's the Bride ) report of the day HERE

I'll get the disclaimers out of the way now:

1. This is a family wedding so I am rather biased!
2. No apology, there are SOO many photos!
3. Some photos may be the same as you have seen in Dan's report for the day but I love them so need to share again!
4. The photos are pretty much all Phil's unless he is in the picture , though some of them are Michelle's. There will be some of Randy's , which I will give him credit for.
5. This is long. Very long! Quite a bit of your time will need to be set aside to read this in one go! I have broken it into quite a few posts in case you can't read it all in one go.

Wednesday 14 October 2015

THE WEDDING DAY!

I am so excited to write about today! Dan told me what she wanted for her Wedding Day such a long ago, I feel like we were talking about it and planning it forever. We were always so excited talking about it and now the day was finally here.

It was another early start for me today, as Phil woke me at 5.20am! Of course I was then wide awake and couldn't get back to sleep. Madison and Kaley were both awake by 6am and we all got up not long afterwards as everyone else was awake. I faffed a bit, got a few bits sorted and gave the girls some cereal. I went next door to Dan's room (which involves going down our staircase and back up her staircase due to the layout of OKW!) at 7am and the ladies from Beaute Speciale were already there and setting up.

LOTS of make-up

And lots of hair products and accessories

We had three ladies and their names were Cindy (hair), Bisi (make-up) and Erica (also hair). They were all lovely, really friendly and made us all look really good!

Dan, Mum and I were having our hair and make-up done and Michelle and Bethany were just having their hair done.

Bisi got started on my make-up straight away as I was there first and Cindy got started on Dan's hair.

I don't wear make-up at all so found it a very strange experience. I really enjoyed the pampering side to it, but I did find myself flinching a lot as I wasn't used to having someone near my eyes!

Almost done

Michelle, Bethany and Mum had already come over by now and Erica was doing Bethany's hair.

After about 30 minutes or so, Bisi was finished with my make-up and got started on Mum

She loved this and kept her eyes closed the whole time. Knowing my Mum, she was probably napping!

At this point, Dan and Bethany were still having their hair done so I was just taking pictures of them. I had to get a photo of Dan's Wedding perfume, which we all wore on the day

Erica was finished doing Bethany's hair by around 8.10am

From the side

And from the back

This looked so beautiful. I'm sure Bethany said there was something like 80 grips in her hair when she took them all out that night!

Michelle went next to have her hair done by Erica

For some reason, I don't have a close up of Michelle's hair when it was done. I think I had gone back to get my purse to be able to pay.

Soon, Cindy was finished doing Dan's hair

From the side

And the other side

Cindy then started doing my hair whilst Bisi started on Dan's make-up

My hair was fairly simple to do (so Cindy said) and only took her around 15 minutes

From the side

And the other side

I was so happy with this, it was just what I wanted.

Cindy then did Mum's hair for her

She really enjoyed this too, and had another nap I'm sure!

Dan nearly finished

And then finished

I LOVE this photo, I think she looks so happy and beautiful.

I think Mum's hair was done around 9am and it was time to settle up. The cost was $75 each for the hair and $67 for the make-up. Dan and Dave very kindly paid half of the cost for our hair so I had to pay $104.50 and I left a $30 tip.

We had such a great experience with the ladies we had, they were so good and I would highly recommend them.

They left around 9.20am.

I went back to our room and brought the five girls back to Dan's with me so that we could do their hair.

Mum gave Dan her present from her and my Dad

I think this was diamond earrings.

Michelle had already done Sydney's hair before they left CBR to come over to us

So she got started on doing Kaley's hair for me whilst I did Madison's

Someone had bought croissants so we all had some, including the girls who had already had breakfast, but always like croissants.

Madison and Kaley all done

Michelle then did Piper's hair

Followed by Kori's. We took all the kids back to our room and brushed their teeth, washed their faces, etc. I got everything together that we needed, then Phil and I both got dressed.

All the adults got ready and then we made sure the kids (and us) were covered in sun cream. We also had some ribbons for the girls hair that we put in now.

Saxon was the first of the kids ready

As it was now about 11am , Dad went to see Dan, and we sent Phil, Jamie and Ryan out of our room to the cars that had just arrived (more on them in a minute) so that we could get the girls dressed. We had wanted to put them on them at the last minute to save any disasters before the ceremony! Once they were all dressed, Mum came back from Dan's (she had helped with her dress) so that she could watch the kids while we went down to the car to go.

The reason for this was that none of the men had seen the Bridesmaids dresses as Dan had wanted it to be a surprise when they walked down the aisle.

Dan and Dave had kept the cars they had booked to take us to Paradise Cove a secret so we were really excited when we saw them

This is the inside of the car

This is the car that took Dan, Mum, Dad and the five girls to Paradise Cove.

And this is the car we got to go in

A stretch-limo Hummer! I didn't even realise that's what it was but it was amazing! This was the inside of it

It was so cool inside and we just had massive grins on our faces all the way there! There were soft drinks, loads of water and even champagne and glasses

This car took Dave, his parents and brother, Michelle, Jamie, Saxon, Bethany, Ryan, Phil and I to Paradise Cove.

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[Lisa29]

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Phil had been taking photos while they were waiting for us to finish getting the girls ready

I think we ended up leaving around 11.15am and drove the not too far distance to Paradise Cove. Dave told us that the car would be pulling into a random resort to be able to turn around, as it couldn't turn straight in to Paradise Cove because of how big it was!

It was past Saxon's usual nap time so he fell asleep on the way

I think we got there at 11.40am, plenty of time to take lots of photos!

Pictures of the ceremony site and beach area

Pictures with people in!

While we had been taking photos, Dan's car arrived. (The photos with Mum in were taken after the car had arrived.) Where we were at the ceremony site, we couldn't see the car at all so no having to turn around and not look. She needed something out of her bag so I took it round to the Bride's room where her and the girls were. She looked so beautiful. I had seen her in her dress and then this morning with her hair and make-up done but this was the first time seeing everything together. She looked amazing and I couldn't wait for 12 noon so that Dave could finally see her.

All the kids were so excited and couldn't wait for it to start.

When they had got here and Mum had come over to us, she told me about Madison's reaction when she saw Dan. Apparently they were walking down the stairs with Mum and Madison just stopped, covered her mouth and said 'oh my gosh, Dan looks so beautiful', bless her. (I've just checked this with Madison to make sure I remembered right and Kaley said 'I loved Dan in her Wedding dress, she looked so beautiful' )

I went back and we all took our seats. Saxon was still asleep

Just after 12, the instrumental version of Let It Go started playing (this was another secret, we hadn't known what the kids were walking down the aisle to) and Madison was the first to appear. I wanted to cry, she looked so beautiful and had the biggest smile on her face, I felt so proud of her

Just to the left of Madison in the photo, you can see Kaley appearing from behind the bush. She should have been next but walked straight past the aisle she was supposed to walk down, bless her! She was so focused on walking that she hadn't watched what Madison was doing. She looked so beautiful too. Because of this, Piper was next because as soon as she saw us, she started running down the aisle

I think Helen, the Wedding planner, had gotten Kaley's attention now and she was making her way down the aisle, closely followed by Kori and Sydney

I LOVE their dresses, they are so beautiful and I think they all looked amazing.

Kaley, Kori and Piper sat next to Mum and Dad

And Madison and Sydney sat in front of Phil and I

The music changed to the instrumental version of A Thousand Years (from the Twilight movies) and Dan was walking down the aisle with my Dad. I honestly did not hear this at all, I was just so excited to see Dan that I didn't take in any of the music.

I mentioned at the start that I was biased but I think she looks absolutely stunning. Her dress was so incredible and suited her perfectly.

I have to share the dress back story here, as neither Dan in her Wedding pre-trip or me in my pre-trip had mentioned much about the dress, as we had wanted to keep the details about it as a surprise. When we went to the Wedding show in Birmingham to look for a dress for her, she knew exactly what she wanted. That was a tea-length style dress and she was 100% certain of this. Well, she tried some on in this style but there was nothing that wowed her or us. Then we came across the Roberta's Bridal stand and they had the 2015 Disney Fairy Tale Wedding Dress collection. We asked her to try some on, for fun really, and just for us as she really hadn't wanted to try any long dresses on, and she said she would. She tried on Rapunzel - this was nothing overly special. The same with Aurora and Ariel. The Snow White dress was red so we said no to that and she tried on the Cinderella dress. Well, this looked lovely. We all really liked it. We were starting to have some wow moments that we hadn't gotten with any of the tea length dresses she had tried on. We got her to try on Belle next and we all really liked that too. Now, though the dresses really weren't what she had originally wanted, she was doing a 180 and really liked these two. They both suited her so well and were really beautiful.

Excluding Jasmine (this was a jumpsuit style dress so really was for someone specifically looking for something like that) there was only one left to try - Tiana's green dress. We told her she had tried the rest so she may as well try that, it was just for fun. Well, this was another big wow moment. She came out and you could tell she really liked it, one look at my Mum and we knew she did too, and Bethany and I thought the same.

Now she had to decide which Disney Princess dress she was going to have! She paid a deposit, we went away, looked at all the photos we had taken on my phone and the Tiana dress was the clear winner for all of us. We went back to the shop during the week after and as soon as she tried the dress on again, we knew it was the one for her.

And that is how she ended up with this stunning, lily pond coloured Wedding dress. Of course, this meant that the five girls had to have the matching, extremely expensive , Tiana Disney Blossoms bridesmaid dresses to match her dress.

The mens, and Saxon's, ties were all made with the material from Dan's dress when she had it altered.

Anyway, back to today and Dan was just getting to the front. Dave was very emotional seeing her, it was lovely to see

The ceremony started. The reverend they had was lovely, he said some really nice words, though I can't recall any of them!

Dan had asked Madison and Sydney to do a reading. Sydney decided she didn't want to but said she would stand with Madison so she wasn't on her own

Dave was very emotional but the words were so lovely, I'm not surprised. This was the reading

I was so proud of her. She had been practising at home and read so well. Next it was my turn to do a reading

This was my reading

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[Lisa29]

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Kaley watching

I think it was after this that they said their vows. Piper decided she wanted to join them so went and stood at the front. In this next picture, my Mum has held out her hand to get her to come away and this is her in the process of putting her hands behind her back so Mum can't get her!

I love this one

Piper decided to come and sit with me for a few minutes

Soon the Reverend was pronouncing them husband and wife

And they were walking down the aisle as a married couple, to Pharrell's Happy

(This is one of Randy's pictures.)

Followed by the girls and the parents

I actually like this picture of myself so I don't mind sharing it

I think there was champagne and orange juice now, followed by photos.

There was lots of twirling going on!

A wide shot of the ceremony area

More photos

(I love this one, our original family of 6. We took one like this at my Wedding too.)

I'm going to say at this point we stopped for some cake and pictures of cake, though I may have that timeline wrong! Dave's brother also said a short speech but I missed most of it as I was faffing trying to get the video camera on and working when I realised what he was doing!

The tier we had was red velvet and it was delicious.

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[Lisa29]

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Here are some of the photos that Randy took.

Someone took a photo of the four of us for us

Then Phil took a couple of arty shots with Dan and Dave in the background

I love this, they look so happy in the photo.

And more….

We moved to the beach area to take some photos. Madison, Kaley, Dan and I wasted no time in taking our shoes off!

Some more twirling took place, with Dan joining in too

Piper didn't like the sand so she didn't want to join in.

The girls decided they wanted to play in the sand a bit

At some points during our time at Paradise Cove, the girls were LAYING on the ground in these beautiful, obscenely expensive dresses! Thankfully the dresses must have been that good that they showed no signs of this.

Phil took some photos of the area

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[Lisa29]

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The men, and Saxon, all had Paul Smith socks in the Wedding colours so we had to get some photos of them!

Randy got a couple of great shots of this, using Kaley in the pictures

He also got some lovely photos on the beach area

Randy was brilliant throughout the whole day. He was constantly taking photos for us and was happy to do whatever combinations we all wanted. He worked really well around the girls and wasn't at all fazed when some of them didn't want their pictures taking.

All too soon, our two hours at Paradise Cove were up and we had to get our stuff together to leave. It was a beautiful location, the weather had been perfect, the kids had all been so well behaved, the ceremony was lovely, we had gotten some stunning photos and all had an amazing time.

Phil made a 4-ish minute DVD montage of clips from the ceremony, with some photos, to play during Dan and Dave's first dance at their reception back here and that is here if anyone would like to watch



Shoes back on, we made our way back to the cars. Phil and I were really lucky as Dan and Dave wanted pictures at the Poly with the girls and needed someone to go with them so we got to go in the Hummer again.

Photos outside the car first though, of course!

The girls loved it in the car and were really good again

I think Dan liked this car

The kids were all really hot so Madison had the idea of pulling her dress up to let the air get to her legs!

We took a wrong turning on the way to the Poly but couldn't stay there when we arrived as there was already a Disney bride there having photos. Another wrong turn(!) and we pulled up at the Grand Floridian.

Everyone else had gone in the other car to here and met us inside. We took the bottle of champagne with us for Dan and Dave to have later and put it under Piper's pushchair. (Keep this in mind for later on this evening.)

There were no Disney brides at the GF when we were there so they were able to get some lovely photos on the grand staircase.

Phil was taking photos from a different angle whilst Randy was taking photos, so he didn't use the flash as he didn't want to affect the pictures Randy was taking. Here are some of them

I love this photo with all the girls looking at Dan

Randy then moved up to the landing to get some pictures from above. These are the pictures Phil took from the ground level

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[Lisa29]

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Randy got Dave to dip Dan

I love this next photo. Phil managed to get this great close up of them while they were having their 'dip' photos

I think this is one of my favourites of them from the day.

Here are a some of Randy's pics from this part

I think it was at this point that Dan and Dave went off with Randy to have some photos of just the two of them. Here are a few that Randy took

The rest of us made our way to Gasparilla Grill, where we were going to use some counter service credits for a small, late lunch.

We didn't get photos of the food for some reason. In fairness, Phil had already taken so many photos at this point, I think the camera needed a break as much as he did!

Anyway, we had 8 chicken nuggets and chips (crisps) $9.99, a bacon Angus cheeseburger with chips (crisps) $10.99, a chocolate twist pastry $3.49, a cookie $2.99 and two large drinks at $3.19 each. The total would have been $33.84 plus tax but we used 2 counter service credits.

This was all lovely and it felt wonderful to be sat in the air conditioning for a while, as it was absolutely scorching outside! Phil took Madison and Kaley into the arcade that was adjacent to Gasparilla's and had a play. He was soon joined by me and Saxon. Saxon loved sitting on the motorbike and did not want to get off.

At about 3.30pm, Dan, Dave and Randy came back and were very grateful for the air-con and a cold drink! One of the Cast Members brought them over two lovely Wedding cupcakes and congratulated them and wished them well. He was lovely but I didn't get his name.

We all went outside and had some photos on the terrace area, just outside of Gasparilla's.

This is one of Randy's photos.

As we were at the Captain's Shipyard, Phil went for a wander to get a some photos of the Grand One Yacht that we would be going on later that evening

I had promised Tabz (Fairytale Sparkle) that we would get some pictures of the bag she had made for me, in action

(Another arty photo with Dan and Dave in the background)

My recollection of the direction we went in at this point is a bit vague. We went for a wander somewhere in the grounds of the GF for some more photos.

Randy's photos

I love how clearly in this photo you can see the colour of Dan's dress

Phil was still snapping away

You can see in the photos how bright it was so the sunglasses had to come out.
Just Madison first

Then all four of them

In case you were wondering where Kori and Piper were at this point, they had fallen asleep and were having naps

I think our time with Randy was finished now so we said our goodbyes to him. I know I said it earlier, but he really was amazing. He was such a lovely guy, dealt really well with all of us and all of our requests and got some stunning photos. He took all of the details of where Dan and Dave were staying and until when so that he could get their discs to them before they came home.

We went back to the main lobby area of the GF and walked through to go up the staircase to the upper floor. As a side note, so many people had stopped Dan and Dave to congratulate them and comment on her dress. It was lovely to watch the amount of people that literally stopped and did a double take and some of the reactions from little girls that went past was so cute. We had lots of lovely compliments about the kids too.

Kaley wanted a photo of just her and Auntie Dan

We all went out onto the platform and didn't wait long for the monorail to come

We actually have quite a few photos of the day when Dave is holding Dan's flowers!

A couple of scenery shots from the monorail

See you later Grand One Yacht!

We got off the monorail at the Contemporary and went and checked in for our dinner ADR at California Grill. It was just before our ADR time and Dan and Dave were able to go straight up as they had some place cards and bits they wanted to set out on the table.

I have to mention, this was our first experience of a signature restaurant and my understanding was that there was a smarter dress code. We saw quite a few people checking in who had clearly come straight from the parks so were wearing shorts, t-shirts and trainers. A shame really, as it is such a beautiful restaurant.

Anyway, we didn’t have to wait too long before Dan and Dave were finished and we were able to go up to the restaurant.

What a stunning restaurant this is. The pictures I have seen in peoples trip reports really do not do it justice. We were seated at two long tables, over in the far right of the restaurant, next to the window and by the door leading out onto the viewing walkway bit.

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[Lisa29]

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This was the view from our tables

We all had place cards for where we were sitting

All the kids had a gift bag filled with goodies

These kept all the kids occupied throughout dinner. Saxon really liked his cars

They had made personalised menus which was a lovely touch

Our servers were Roberto and Erika. They were good, Erika was very quiet and efficiently went about her job but Roberto kept trying to push the wines a bit too much. None of us are wine drinkers so wouldn't be ordering any. I'm not sure if he assumed because it was a Wedding that we would order it.

Dan and Dave told us that they were paying for the tip (we were using our DDP credits) and the starters and that we had to have them! Ok then, fine with me! My family of 4 was sat with Michelle's family so we decided to get a couple of the flatbreads to share.

First, the bread came out. This was lavender focaccia and whole wheat sourdough, both of which were delicious

We ordered the Pork Confit Flatbread - pork shoulder confit, sweet onion puree, cabbage-apple slaw, machego, gouda and brie

And the Bacon, Lettuce and Tomato Flatbread - marinated tomatoes, house bacon, romaine and lemon mayonnaise

These were both so good. We couldn't eat all of it, they were both big portions, even for the four of us to share.

Madison and Kaley both had pizza, but I don't have photos.

Part of the gifts the kids all got was a t-shirt to wear to protect their dresses and a disposable camera to take photos

Phil was still taking photos throughout the meal

For mains, Phil had the Wagyu Beef Strip Loin - Snake River Farms wagyu, cauliflower puree, autumn vegetables and maple gastrique. I don't have a photo of this either, sorry.

I went with the Oak Fired Filet of Beef - Midwestern sweet corn risotto, grilled corn relish, green onion oil and popcorn shoots.

Oh my, this was amazing. The beef was so good, it literally melted as you ate it. I don't like sweet corn but was easily able to pick around it.

We had a look at the dessert menu and placed our orders

Madison and Kaley both had fruit kabobs with strawberry yoghurt

Phil had the Chocolate Pudding Cake - luscious chocolate cake with Nutella filling, meringue kisses and Chantilly cream

I had the Vanilla Crème Brulee - rich vanilla custard, caramelized turbinado sugar and California strawberries

This was really good too, really creamy.

Once we had finished eating, we went out onto the balcony/viewing-walkway-type-area right next to us

It was lovely out here. I think we pretty much had the whole place to ourselves for a while. It was amazing watching the sun start to set.

My favourite resort, Bay lake Tower, and 'our' room (the second set of big windows on the top two floors on the right)

After we were done taking photos, we went back inside and Dan and Dave settled the bill. We checked they were sure they wanted to pay and thanked them when they said yes. I'm not sure of the cost but we did use 8 of our table service credits for the four of us.

We left the restaurant and went down to the fourth floor. We stood around talking for a bit, deciding who was doing what. While waiting, we had a look in the shops (these are my favourite resort shops) and found the baby Pegasus cuddlies in blankets that Madison and Kaley wanted in Bayview Gifts and Fashion so bought them for them. They were $23.95 each but were on offer of $39.95 plus tax for two.

We went our separate ways now. Dan and Dave, Dave's family, Mum and Dad and Michelle's family all went over to the GF, where Dan and Dave had a 1-bed booked for the night. Ryan, Bethany, Piper, Phil, Madison, Kaley and I made our way to the ground floor to walk around to Magic Kingdom. We had a couple of FP's we were hoping to use before we had to meet everyone back at the Captain's Shipyard at the GF at 9pm (another thing to remember for later).

We walked round to Magic Kingdom and we got through fine and went to wait for Ryan, Bethany and Piper. We waited a while and wondered what was wrong with them at the bag check. Well, remember that champagne from the limo earlier?! It was still under Piper's pushchair and you cannot take alcohol into the Magic Kingdom! Ryan and Bethany did not know this was under there as they weren't there when we put it underneath so I think they were quite embarrassed, oops! They were actually to be embarrassed again very soon, too!

Champagne taken off them, sorry Dan and Dave, they came through the turnstiles to where we were waiting in the PP line for a photo. We went first

This is where Ryan and Bethany were embarrassed again! The photographer was lovely, she was fussing over the girls in their dresses and asking why we were all dressed up. I told her we had been to OUR sister's wedding, meaning mine and Ryan's sister as they were stood right behind us. Well, she thought this meant that Ryan and Bethany were the ones who had just got married and made them pose for some Wedding-type photos, with us in them too!

Of course, we found this hilarious, as did everyone else when they saw them on the MDE app the next day!

Still laughing, we made our way inside and decided that as it was now 8pm, we would only use our free FPs for Mickey (RBP) and Tink (us), and not make our way further into MK to use our scheduled Princess FPs. We had some more photos first

Then made our way round to City Hall, where we went to see Tink and Ryan, Bethany and Piper went to see talking Mickey. Even using a FP, we still had quite a wait. I was getting quite frustrated at how long we waited. Eventually we were in and Tink was great with the girls, and really complimented them on their beautiful dresses

Once we were done, we waited in the gift shop you exit into for Ryan, Bethany and Piper to come out. The standby for Tink had been 15 minutes and Mickey was 45 minutes so we thought they may be a bit longer than we were. We ended up waiting quite a while for them. Seemed that even though they had a FP, their line took its time like ours did. I was starting to worry a bit as we had to be back by 9pm. Finally we saw them, they couldn't believe how long it had been but Piper had loved it. She just kept telling us that Mickey kept saying cheese!

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[Lisa29]

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As I said earlier, we needed to be at the Captain's Shipyard at the GF at 9pm and I was worried at the time by now. We quickly left MK and made our way to the boat dock, to get the boat over to the GF. We could see a full boat there and lots of people waiting so we went to get the monorail. There was a big line here and we missed the monorail that was there.

A few minutes later the gold monorail arrived and we got on. We pulled away and promptly stopped in between MK and the Contemporary. Ryan sent a whatsapp saying we may be a few minutes late and we got this reply

Now, I was inwardly, and slightly outwardly, massively stressing by this point. I hate being late and felt so bad as it was for something so important. So the next chain of events helped immensely, NOT!

After sitting for what felt like hours, we started moving and arrived at the CR. Then stopped again for an age!

We started moving….and stopped again in between here and the TTC. Finally moving again and we stop at the TTC. We leave there at 9.01 as shown in the above whatsapp. Of course, we stop again between here and the Poly!

We are all worrying now. Phil is all doom and gloom, saying we're too late and the yacht will go without us. I want to cry. Ryan and Bethany are so quiet. Even the kids aren't saying anything. Phil asks if we will still stay there if we miss it and I say no way, we will just go home.

After what seems like forever, we are moving again to the Poly. None of us are talking any more, we just cannot believe how long this journey is taking.

We pull into the Poly and it isn't too long (though still seems like hours!) before we are on our way to the GF, and for the first time on this tortuous, stressful, horrible journey, we don't stop in between stations, hurrah, and we have a plan of action.

As we start slowing down and pulling into the GF station our plan starts….

I pick up Kaley.

Bethany picks up Piper.

I grab Madison's hand.

Phil gets our pushchair.

Ryan gets their pushchair.

We pull into the station and the doors open. What do we do, you ask?

We RUN off the monorail and down the platform.

We RUN through the gate toward the entrance.

We RUN into the Grand Floridian, round the right hand side past the shops.

The grand staircase has two stairways that go into one. We are going so fast we run past the first one so run down the second one.

Phil and Ryan don't bother with the lift. No, no, no, they pick up the pushchairs and run down the stairs.

We run through the lobby, in between all the tables and sofas and people enjoying the live music being played in the lobby.

Oh, who am I kidding, we weren't running, we were SPRINTING. WE WERE SPRINTING THROUGH THE WHOLE GRAND FLORIDIAN INCLUDING THEIR BEAUTIFUL LOBBY!

We sprinted past the Grand Floridian Café and out the doors at the end.

We sprinted round to the left of the building, where we had been WALKING and enjoying ourselves earlier in the day.

The marina was in our sights, we carried on sprinting, all the way to the dock of the Grand One Yacht.

Finally, huffing, puffing and completely out of breath, we arrived just as Dave was sending a whatsapp asking if we were close.

Apologising profusely to the Captain's Tom and Ray, they let us on board and we went inside and collapsed on the sofas.

There were lots of sorry's from the four of us, to which the response was, "it's ok, we've only been on here a couple of minutes"! What?! Seriously, what?! We have just sprinted through the poshest hotel we have ever been in, had a nightmare 20 minutes or so and they weren't waiting for us all this time?! We did the only thing we could do under the circumstances and just laughed!

After catching our breaths and drinking lots of water, we recounted our tale, which of course amused everyone massively. We couldn't stop imagining what the people in the GF at the time must have thought, seeing these people all dressed up really fancy and racing through the hotel!

(This lobby! We ran through this beautiful, elegant lobby, !)

Obviously, this story kept us all amused the rest of the holiday and still does now.

(Sorry for the long section of just text, but this was such a funny story that I had to tell it and try to set the scene! )

Soon after we got on the yacht, it pulled away and started sailing around the Seven Seas Lagoon. Now a bit less stressed out, I started to appreciate how amazing this yacht was! Seriously, it is absolutely stunning. We were hoping to be able to buy one like it when we won the £1billion Powerball, but alas it was not to be! As a side note, apparently Disney were only one or two payments away from paying off this yacht and owning it outright.

Bedroom 2

Master bedroom

Third bedroom

Seating area

This was a raised table with comfy bench seating (and to the left in the second photo)

The kitchen area

More of the seating area

There were seats outside and there was plenty of room for all of us out there. You could also go upstairs and I there was either 2 or 4 seats up there, along with the Captain's. There was also 3 bathrooms but I don't seem to have photos of them. They had ordered some chocolate covered strawberries and there was lots of water and lagers too

The kids all absolutely loved being on this yacht. They had so much fun and were choosing which were their bedrooms! We did have to tell them to stop going from the inside to the outside and vice versa, as the doors being open affected the air-con.

I was collapsed inside on the sofa for most of the time before the fireworks started so I'm not entirely sure where the yacht went. We did see and hear the Electrical Water Pageant go by which was good fun

Another favourite picture of mine

A little before 10pm, we got in place to moor up to watch Wishes. We all went outside to wait for them to start. Soon, it was 10pm and Wishes started

This was such an amazing view, I don't want to see the fireworks from anywhere else now!

Unfortunately, there was a problem and the music wasn't piped in. We were all gutted, especially Dan, but we tried not to let it get us down and just enjoyed watching the always incredible Wishes.

Firework photo overload

As always, these were amazing. It would have been even better if the music was played but it was out of the Captain's hands and there was nothing he could do to pick up the signal. He apologised profusely to all of us and even more so to Dan and Dave and told them that this had unfortunately happened a few times over the last two weeks. He said he had radioed in to have someone meet them when we got back so that they could complain, and he encouraged them to do this as he was not happy himself and felt awful that he hadn't been able to pick up the signal.

We sailed around the lagoon for a while longer and were docking at 10.37pm, so we had the yacht for just over an hour and a half, which was more than any of us had been expecting.

We had one last photo of Dan and Dave before we got off the yacht

As promised there was someone waiting when we got off. I could hear the Captain (I think it was Ray) speaking to the staff and he was so polite but you could tell he was fuming. It cannot be nice for him having to apologise for something that is not his fault and that he has brought to the relevant peoples attention. We all left Dan and Dave and made our way into the Grand Floridian to wait for them to come back.

They weren't too long and they had some news that went some way to making up for the disappointment that we hadn't had the music. They had automatically been told that they would not have to pay for the cruise and could book another, for next Tuesday or Wednesday, for all 19 of us again, for free! Yay, we would get to have this amazing experience again!

It was almost 11pm now, and Dan and Dave had ordered and paid for cars to take us all back to OKW and CBR so we went to wait near the entrance. Just after 11pm they arrived so we said our goodbyes to Dan and Dave, and were on our way back to OKW by 11.05pm. We tipped our driver $10 when we got back, I have no idea of what the cost of the car was and if this was too much, or if Dan and Dave had already paid for this too, but he had got us home safely so we were more than happy to pay.

We pretty much went straight to bed as soon as we all got in. It had been an amazing, wonderful, incredible, fantastic, special and long day, and we all went to bed very tired and very happy. I have to say, I am so proud of the six kids. They were all so good all day and looked so beautiful, and handsome in Saxon's case, and they loved being a part of their Auntie Dan and Uncle Dave's day.

Thank you to anyone who manages to read all of this and who has read my previous days and commented. I know this is long and there are so many pictures, but I absolutely loved this day (thanks again for inviting us all Dan and Dave ) and I hope you enjoyed sharing with us by reading along.

The next day is HERE, Day 5 - Typhoon Lagoon, Epcot and Akershus Royal Banquet Hall


DINING PLAN ROUND UP - 20/48 Table Service used, 8/48 Counter Service used and 1/48 Snack Credits used

[Milner]

WOW what a fantastic day everyone looked stunning.

[Lisa29]

Originally Posted by Milner

WOW what a fantastic day everyone looked stunning.

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Thank you, we had the most amazing day.