Sketch: Figment and Agent P

On my first ever post I said my favorite character was Figment, and if you don't know who Figment is he is a purple dragon who is basically the mascot of Epcot. In 1982 there was a ride called Journey Into Imagination in the Future World section of the park. On the ride you followed the characters Dreamfinder and Figment through their adventures of collecting things to spark the Imagination. The ride has had several variations for better or worse. Today the ride is called Journey Into Your Imagination with Figment. For the longest time I have been wanting a drawing of Figment on my shoulder and my Dad drew this for me recently.

In the rest of this post I am going to talk about my Figment collection. My collection kind of accidentally started in late 2015. For my souvenirs I wanted a stuffed animal from every park. It was almost time to leave so we went to Mouse Gears and I saw a figment plush so I got it to represent Epcot.

Figment Plush from 1982 on left, and from 2015 on right

For my 13th Birthday I wanted a Vintage Figment plush. I wanted one because recently my Family and I got into collecting vintage stuffed animals. On one of my recent trips I got a Figment Pop Figure that I am so in love with.

A big part of my Figment and pin collection are Figment themed pins. Recently I bought some EPCOT Festival of the Arts pins that are based on real life artwork. My favorite is the "Mona Figment". Recently I bought this pin that had my birth year on it that was from an old Cast Member Pin Party. I love anything that has my birth year, month, or day.

Figment patch from "Pin Folio" pin carrying case

Figment themed Disney Pins

On my next trips I want to grow my collections even more. Happy Figment Friday!

A Kids Perspective on Disney Pin Trading

Pin trading is a very fun thing to do but it can be super addicting. You can find pins of your favorite Disney Character doing something silly! It can be a very expensive hobby and confusing. So I'am going explain the lingo and tips for starting.

History of Pins
Pins have been around for years in some way or another. Button Patents have been around since at least 1896. The oldest Disney pin we own is from around 1970 and is themed around Orange Bird. But Official Disney Pin Trading didn't start until 1999. During the Countdown to the millennium they started a pin promotion and they have been making pins ever since.

Steps
1. Go buy pins. The cheapest pins you can get at the parks are usually in mystery packs or pin sets and they will end up costing around $5-$6 per pin.

2. Go find pin lanyards and boards. Most Cast Members have them and a lot of sit down restaurants have them. You can also find them at shops & hotel front desks. Be sure to ask nicely.

3. Once you find a pin you like, you ask for the pin that you want and offer them one of your pins in exchange.

Some Pin Terms
NFT/NFS-Not For Trade or Sell

OE-Open Edition

HM-Hidden Mickey, note the small Hidden Mickey emblem somewhere on the pin. These are issued to cast members, so you get them by trading!

LE#-Limited Edition of #, these are only made in a certain number and are usually for special events

Ways to Wear or Display Them

I have been exploring quite a few ways to display them and I'am going to go over some of the main ones!

The first thing that comes to mind are lanyards. While lanyards are functional and can have cool designs, I find that after a while they can start scratching my neck and make me itchy. You can wear them on your clothes but you don't won't to wear too many or your clothes will have a lot of holes.

Some of my favorite pins on one of my lanyards

 So one of my favorites are pin boards, you can hold a lot of pins and you can even decorate them with cool designs.

I had an old cork board lying around so I covered it up in some fabric I found. It is kinda hard to see them, but it looks so cool.

But I like the portability of a backpack, you can take them anywhere and can show of some of you best pins. The downside is they can easily get a little scratched. I was online looking for a better option for storing pins when I found something called a Pinfolio. I went on etsy and looked them up. On their etsy site they have a bunch of designs so I looked through them and I found a Figment one. I was so happy. I really like it, it holds quite a few pins and the pins don't feel like they are going to fall out. The only problem is that the back pocket does not have a zipper. But I really love the design and I feel like the pins are protected in there.

The front of my Pinfolio! I picked the Figment one because he is one of my favorites.

These are my Limited Edition and my figment/orange bird collections.

This page is full of mostly Attractions pins and Traders.

The only downside is it can kind of be expensive after awhile. Overall pin trading is a really fun hobby. Especially for a person who goes to Disney World a lot!

I give Pin Trading 4 and half, because it is super fun even thought it has it hiccups!

I give Pinfolio a 4 stars because it is a really solid display unit.

Harmony Barber Shop: A First Haircut at Walt Disney World

Flashback to June 2016 for Baby’s First Haircut at Walt Disney World.         

We were on a mission, our 9 month old son's hair was growing way too fast and it was getting harder to style it in a way that kept it out of his eyes. It was driving the poor little guy nuts.He was born with a full head of hair...the ultrasound tech could see his hair swaying in the amniotic fluid(and no Mom did not have heartburn!)  We discovered that there was a Harmony Barber Shop at the Magic Kingdom that had a wonderful First Haircut package so on a whim we decided to try and see if we could make Baby's first haircut memorable(for us anyway...but he'll have pictures). There were several constraints, we only had a weekend, we'd really only have time to hit one park...but we rationalized that would be okay. After all we grew up in Los Angeles and throughout our childhood Disneyland was a one day thing.

Dueling Haircuts

Cast of Characters:

Dad & Mom., Big Brother(11 yrs old at the time), Little Brother("The Baby" he was 9 months old) We live in Charlotte, NC but "Home" is Southern California

Thursday-

Big Brother was in rehearsals for our town's children's theater production of "Disney's Jungle Book Kids" and he only had the long weekend free. We picked him up from rehearsal, had a quick dinner at McDonald's and were on the road by 10 PM. We drove all night stopping for gas as needed, luckily The Baby pretty much slept the bulk of the trip, and when he was awake we had Zootopia and Mickey Mouse Clubhouse on the DVD for entertainment. Split driving duties with Mom so no one had to drive more than about 4 hours each. Thought that was pretty good.

Friday-

We arrived in Orlando around 9AM, our plan was to spend the morning/afternoon at Disney Springs, and then head over to our offsite hotel.

Disney Springs-

We got to Disney Springs soon enough that there was plenty of parking but by the time we left later that day the lots were near capacity. We swore we'd never come back to Florida in the summer(our first trip was In June 2015) but what can we say...we were on a mission! World of Disney right at opening was our first taste of Disney Magic on this trip and it was the shot of adrenaline we needed after that long trip. It also was a much needed air conditioned environment, We can not stress how hot and uncomfortable summer in Florida is, something that doesn't come across in photos...after all it's supposed to be Disneyland on the east coast, right? California gets hot but there is no significant humidity and that is a big difference. We lived in Washington, DC, now Charlotte, NC so we thought we knew what humidity was until we experienced Florida. Oh well...it's Disney World...it's worth it!

Dad modeling his Retro Fantasyland T-Shirt while we visit Roy & Minnie

We love retro stuff so Dad picked up 2 T-Shirts at World of Disney a red Fantasyland shirt and a blue Tomorrowland shirt. They had vintage artwork and "Walt Disney Productions" on them. Dad loves them. We had lunch at  the "Bongos Cuban Cafe" takeout window, We love Cuban food...Mom Had the Picadillo plate(seasoned ground beef), Dad had the Ropa Vieja(Shreded Beef) and Big Brother had the Cuban sandwich(Ham Sandwich). It was a fun but exhausting morning; we parked at the Lime Garage...walked to the West Side, then to the Village Marketplace, them back to the West Side! Crossed the Town Center 4 times! that place is enormous!

Offsite Hotel-

Checked into our hotel late afternoon, it was a villa type place with a studio over near Sea World. It did the job but we definitely were missing the Disney bubble. We were able to get our tickets Friday at our hotel and we were planning to go to Magic Kingdom the next day.  Linked our tickets to our magic bands and we were ready to arrange what we were sure would be awful fast passes. To our surprise and delight we were able to arrange Seven Dwarfs Mine Train, Peter Pan's Flight, and Space Mountain! We thought that was a pretty good line up to set up the day before. We rested in the room and then went to dinner. It turns out Orlando has Del Taco, a Southern California based fast food place…sort of like Taco Bell but with fresher ingredients. It's one of our favorites and not very common in the east coast so we were happy to eat there. It was over near Universal. We tried to get an advance reservation for Baby’s First Haircut, after many tries to get through Dad finally reached an agent who informed us that there were no further reservations available, so we went into the trip not knowing for sure If we could get a slot at the barber shop. Hopefully tomorrow would work out.

Highway In The Sky

At the time we weren’t really rope droppers, we think we had successfully pulled it off once previously and only because we were staying at the Disneyland Hotel and we could walk there.  This trip would be no exception…it seemed like we always ended up walking through the Magic Kingdom arches at 12 noon. But what a way to arrive! We still find the whole procession from Orlando via World Drive to the TTC and then across the Seven Seas Lagoon to be an enchanting experience.  Those first glimpses of the Castle looming over the lagoon gets to Dad every time, there really is no approach quite like it in his opinion. This time we took the local monorail to the park as it had the shortest line.  The stretch of track that elevates above the canal feels like you are flying, it really is a highway in the sky.  We have no complaints with the Magic Band system, love being able to walk right through the gates without passing through turnstiles or having to insert tickets.  This made it super easy to get in after passing through security of course.

                  

                                                                                               

It was “Talk Like a Whale Day” in honor of the release of Finding Dory but in order to receive a souvenir button you had to exit the park...so we did, got our buttons and then came back in! We then briskly walked over to the Harmony Barber Shop…would they be able to accommodate our little guy? We were afraid they would be all booked up, but as it turned out they did indeed have an opening!

 Big Brother wanted a Disney World Haircut too so we arranged for a double haircut at 3:00, which worked out perfectly with our fast passes. We did not realize it but a 3:00 appointment meant we would also have a great view of the Festival of Fantasy Parade.

The barbers were fantastic, they kept baby entertained with a Lightening McQueen toy and lots and lots of Mickey stickers. The first haircut package includes Mickey Ears, a Certificate and a souvenir bag for a lock of hair. There also was a splash of pixie dust (glitter confetti) should it be desired. We were very happy with the haircuts (Big Brother looked good too!) and when we were done we walked outside and watched the parade! We did not know going into it whether it would work out but as it turned out our mission was a success and we enjoyed a parade in celebration!

Review: Chef Mickey's at Walt Disney World's Contemporary Resort

Recently we kicked off the celebration of Teenage Son's (aka "Agent P") 13th Birthday at Chef Mickey's at Walt Disney World's Contemporary Resort and had a wonderful time. It was Mom's idea to give character meals a try way back in 2006 when we lived in Southern California. Our first character meal was at Disneyland's Plaza Inn, and we've been hooked on them ever since. We've done several at both Disneyland & Walt Disney World and our time at Chef Mickey's did not disappoint.

Mom and her "Sleeping" Boys

In contrast to some folks we tend to take several smaller trips spread out through the year versus a longer annual or biennial visit to Walt Disney World. Our trips can be fairly impromptu and are sometimes little more than long weekends.We ended up kicking off "Agent P's" 13th birthday celebration with a long weekend trip to Walt Disney World that would include 3 nights on property, dinner at Chef Mickey's, attending the last Magic Kingdom After Hours Party of 2018 and a day at the EPCOT Flower & Garden Festival.  We were very surprised to snag an 8:00 PM dinner reservation for Chef Mickey's at about 60 days out. 

Dining(well..sleeping)under Monorails!

Our Chef Mickey's reservation was for our arrival day- a Wednesday. We left Charlotte Tuesday night and drove straight through to Orlando arriving early Wednesday morning (about an 8 hour trip). Many times we have been fortunate enough to receive early check in at our Disney Hotels but we were not so lucky on this trip. So we spent the morning and afternoon doing some shopping, opening a Disney Store and visiting the Character Warehouse Stores at the local Outlet Malls. After a day out and about in greater Orlando we were able to check in at our room at the Caribbean Beach Resort right between 3-4 PM. We had a pretty full morning & afternoon so we got some rest at the room and then got ready for dinner. 

We decided to drive from Caribbean Beach to the Contemporary, and were probably in the car by about 7:15 and on our way. Ideally we try to give ourselves 30 minutes to drive between destinations on property at Walt Disney World, so we figured we'd get to the Contemporary by 7:45. Toddler Son had pretty much slept the entire drive down from North Carolina, so he seemed pretty rested most of the day but as soon as we were in the car and on our way to dinner he fell asleep. He is not much of a napper...if we are lucky he will take a 2 hour nap, but the time is not consistent no matter how hard we've tried. He just seems to be too afraid to miss out on something (even if we are not at Disney World...or "Walt Dee" as he calls it.). So there would have been a very good chance that he would be up for an 8:00 dinner...but not this time.  We got to the Hotel, made our way up to the fantastic Grand Canyon Concourse, and checked in at Chef Mickey's. And Toddler Son stayed asleep in Dad's arms the entire time.

They checked us in very quickly, and we had a very short wait. We let them know it was Teenage Son's Birthday and they made him a very nice birthday button...sometimes the cast members can be really great at doing "Disney Script" with a sharpie on the button and this was one of those times. They remarked how Toddler Son was knocked out and assumed he was down for the evening. We told them he was most likely napping...he would wake up in 2 hours...they were sceptical. The photo pass photographer was great and suggested we pretend to sleep like Toddler Son in some of the pictures and we ended up really liking a photo of Mom with her "sleeping" boys.  We were seated at a very nice table against the East Windows overlooking Bay Lake...you could make out the Orlando Eye in the distance. 

Minnie insisted on taking pictures with the whole party...

including a sleeping Toddler

The characters were delightful and very efficient. Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Goofy, & Pluto would visit us. This is definitely the appeal of Chef Mickey's as you get to see all of the Fab Five at one time, here they are wearing Cooking Outfits. Teenage Son is a VERY young 13, he genuinely loves meeting the Characters, getting their autographs, and filling out his collection of Autograph Photo Albums...he has a collection dating back to his first trips to Disneyland and our trips to Disney World.  He had so much fun meeting the characters, taking pictures, getting autographs and joking with them. There were several standout interactions with the characters. Goofy noticed that Teenage Son was wearing a Disneyland Main Street Electrical Parade T-Shirt, he then repeatedly pointed to the shirt and pantomimed that he used to drive the parade float! Minnie made sure to greet everyone at the table and insisted on posing for pictures with all four of us even checking up on sleeping Toddler Son...who in fact slept through the ENTIRE meal. Minnie gave Teenage Son a kiss for his birthday too!

A kiss from Minnie on his 13th Birthday

Hugs from Pluto

We found the food to be delicious, Dad enjoyed the shrimp cocktail especially and the carving station, while Mom really enjoyed the soup. Teenage Son could not get enough of a mushroom gravy on one of the meat dishes. Teenage Son was brought a cupcake and a wonderful souvenir birthday card signed by all 5 characters. Our personal view on Character Meals is that the price includes a "live entertainment" component and don't generally expect the food to solely justify the price. We had read reviews that said the food was not very good, or that the meal itself was overpriced. Chef Mickey's is definitely on the expensive side if not the most expensive of the character meals...but as a special occasion we felt very satisfied with our experience. There was a variety of food and plenty of it, there were 5 characters (many character meals at WDW have only 3 or 4) and you have the remarkable ambiance of Monorails traveling by you through the spectacular atrium of the Contemporary Resort. We definitely would return to Chef Mickey's.

Poor Toddler Son was noticed to be asleep through the whole experience by the cast and like we said earlier even Minnie herself. Dad tried in vain to wake him up but to no avail. We finished our meal and proceeded to browse the shops of the Grand Canyon Concourse.  Right at 2 hours Toddler Son woke up, he knew we were here to celebrate big brother's birthday with Mickey & Friends and in his way asked about that. At first we were pretty heartbroken that he had missed the whole thing and...and by minutes. He awoke from his nap within 10 minutes of leaving the restaurant.

On a fluke Dad took Toddler to the check in desk, by this time they were to close within an half hour. He explained how Toddler Son had slept through the whole thing and would it be possible for him to go in and real quickly meet the characters? The cast member said she would check with the manager. The manager came out and said "Oh I heard about you, they were talking about the kid who slept through the whole meal, of course we can have him meet Mickey & Friends". So the manager took us to a transitional area between the different dining rooms and proceeded to bring each character by to meet Toddler Son. It was such a sweet gesture and we were thrilled he did not get to miss out on the experience entirely. We were very grateful to the staff of Chef Mickey's not only for the great service and memorable birthday meal for Big Brother but for this kindness to our little guy who otherwise would have really missed out.

Sketch: It's A Small World

Our Toddler son's middle name is Elias, as a joint tribute to a family name on  Mom's side and to Walter Elias Disney who was a childhood hero of Dad's. In keeping with the Disney/Elias connection we found an It's A Small World receiving blanket and would wrap him it, it became his favorite blanket. We also hanged It's A Small World illustrations in his nursery/play area. He has been looking at the It's A Small World clock face and facade pattern his entire life! It has been burned into his subconscious like the sun motif was to Rapunzel in "Tangled".

We had some It's A Small World records and would play them for the baby. As he has gotten older he really has taken to the song and insists on hearing it "Again! Again!" Eventually we showed him videos of the ride on YouTube, first ride throughs and ultimately old episodes of Walt Disney's Wonderful World of Color. He fell in love with the videos as much as he did the song and books. Our Teenage son has always liked and appreciated the ride and fairly early on would dance along to the ride but it did not resonate with him like it has for our toddler son. On one of our trips to Magic Kingdom at Walt Disney World earlier this year the Toddler insisted on riding It's A Small World "Again! Again!".

It was a pretty busy, extremely cold day in January. When we arrived at the park at 8:00 AM we were able to snag a same day fast pass for Peter Pan right at 8:30 AM. When we emerged from Peter Pan we headed to It's A Small World which was a walk on. After going through the ride we got off the boat walked out the exit...and headed right back in and walked back on. We did a ride through and when we got back to the dock there was no one waiting so we asked to stay aboard and rode through again. So by 9:15 AM or so we had already been on the Happiest Cruise that ever Sailed 3 times. We managed to get the little guy off the ride to go on the Tea Cups. But his desire to go on It's A Small World could not be satiated. By 10:30 AM the ride was a 40 minute wait or more (and would grow throughout the day). Dad was able to secure fast passes for the ride...repeatedly. We'd get our fastpass (usually within 15 minutes), then we'd cross the touch points and as soon as we were in the line or no later than by the time the boat returned to the dock we'd obtained another fastpass. And each time we got back to the dock the Toddler would say "Again! Again!" and the cycle would repeat "Again! Again!". After 8 rides we lost count...but the joy on the little guy's face was too much to resist and they kept having fastpasses so we kept riding. Dad likes to draw so he put together this sketch of the time he and the Toddler spent the better part of a day at The Magic Kingdom riding It's A Small World Again! and Again!