Gravity Falls Costumes

My son and I had the opportunity to go to Mickey’s Not So Scary Halloween Party at the Magic Kingdom a few weeks ago. I got the tickets last minute, so I had four hours to throw together costumes for the party. My son and I had previously talked about Gravity Falls characters, and knowing that the Wreck It Ralph costumes would be outside our reach in the limited time I had, I was able to make my son into a pretty good Dipper Pines, and myself into a passable Grunkle Stan.

While we were at Not So Scary, we saw a few other people dressed as Dipper and his sister Mabel, but I didn’t see another Grunkle Stan that night.

Overall, I think they turned out pretty good for the time/resources I had.

For my son’s Dipper costume, I found the vest jacket at Ross in the kid’s section for about $10. The hat is a plain white hat I found at Michael’s for $2.99. (One of the Mabels we saw made her brother’s Dipper costume and said she found a plain white trucker hat at Walmart.) The red t-shirt was $4 at Target, and the grey shorts were $12 at Target (but those can be worn all the time, so it was a good buy). The book is a faux leather journal that I glued the 3 hand to.

Movie Review: Wreck It Ralph

Yesterday, the fine folks at The Disney Parks Blog organized a Family Game Day Meet-Up at DisneyQuest with a preview screening of Wreck It Ralph. I was fortunate enough to be invited along with a friend from Twitter and her husband.

If you’re unfamiliar with DisneyQuest, it’s 5 floors and 100,000 square feet of video games and interactive attractions, like CyberSpace Mountain, where you can design a rollercoaster, and then ride it in a simulator with 360 degrees of movement (coaster with 13 loops FTW!).

For the upcoming release of Wreck It Ralph, they’ve added 7 arcade cabinets of Fix It Felix, Jr., the game from where Ralph comes. There was a long line to play these games, and while there’s a cluster of six on the 3rd floor, there’s a “hidden” one on the 4th floor, among the kiddie games.

I’m sure I could talk about the Lego building area that was set up that my son loved, or the Wreck It Ralph cupcakes that they had available, or the cool swag we got in the form of hero medals, or the contests that they had for playing the games.

But we all know you just want a review of Wreck It Ralph. Is it worth seeing? Is it worth seeing on the opening weekend?

Yes and yes!

New Fantasyland: Dress Rehearsal

My son and I got to see parts of the New Fantasyland at the Magic Kingdom as they are doing their dress rehearsal. This is their soft opening while they test and adjust the attractions, food and merchandise. Almost everything was up and running except the Be Our Guest restaurant, though they let us walk in to see how it looks. This new area of the Magic Kingdom opens officially December 6th.

We had Le Fou’s Brew at Gaston’s Tavern, which is apple juice slush with Monin Toasted Marshmallow syrup and topped with a passion fruit foam,  and a pork shank, which will probably be as popular as the ubiquitous turkey leg. It’s a pretty hearty meal, and well fit for Gaston’s.

The Enchanting Tales with Belle experience is what every character meet and greet should be. Ariel’s Grotto was done well so that there is plenty of individual time with everyone’s favorite mermaid. The Under the Sea ride is solid, with good audio animatronics, but the queue is awesome.

The attention to detail in the whole land is wonderful, with surprises to see everywhere you look. Along with the already-open Storybook Circus, the new additions to the Magic Kingdom really make you wish every part of the parks were as detailed and lush. The adjacent Tomorrowland could use a tender loving makeover with a fine bristled brush.

Here’s a slideshow of our New Fantasyland experience. The pictures are on Facebook, too, with captions. And, a few were posted on the very awesome Disney Food Blog.

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