A Very Merry Mickey Christmas

Did you enjoy your Christmas Parties this year?

Perhaps they are like mine - with dysfunctional family interactions and suspect catering

"We're gonna have the hap, hap, happiest Christmas since Bing Crosby tap-danced with Danny fucking Kaye. And when Santa squeezes his fat white ass down that chimney tonight, he's gonna find the jolliest bunch of assholes this side of the nuthouse."

So it is nice to have somewhere sane to seek asylum and just chill out for a while.

So I went to Mickey's Very Merry Christmas Party! YAY!

Unlike Chef from South Park, Mickey's balls are big and shiny and projected up for all to see

MVMCP is, like the Halloween Party, a hard ticketed event held in the Magic Kingdom, where they sell "supposedly" a limited number of tickets and put on some exclusive activities. Compared with Halloween I didn't think the party was as inventive and engaging, but then again I wasn't dressed like a big red Sorcerer's Apprentice.

Let's have a skip through:

I arrived at just after 7pm and immediately got stuck for 30 minutes in the throng at the entrance all having their wristbands attached. Once through that I wandered around, admiring the decorations and planning what I was going to do.

Mickey head shaped wreaths everywhere - twinkling Christmas lights

Light up snowflake mickey balloons in your favourite Christmassy colours

A different sort of projection ... snowflakes were drifting across the building facades - see one exactly in the centre

 A Christmassy "where's wally" moment - can you spot Santa's elf? (clue - bottom RHS - Cast Member outfit)

And of the course the Castle was lit up in ever changing flashing lights.

At this party I rode a lot of rides and they were walk ons - no waiting! how good is that?! Unfortunately, WDW doesn't do the Christmas ride overlay's like Disneyland has - so it was just the normal rides. For example it was ordinary Haunted Mansion and Small World rather than (Tim Burton's) Nightmare Before Christmas and Small World Christmas.

The freebie at this party was hot cocoa and cookies - however I did not avail myself, fearing watery packet mix.

There were many stations where you could access your required dose of sugar, glucose, HFCS and colouring all in one beverage. (source: allears.net)

Here you can see the cookies - large and plentiful. I LOVE the CM costume of Christmas trees and candy cane stripes. (source: allears.net)

Then came the parade - this was great. Heaps of characters bouncing around -  more that appear at the usual parade and then supplemented with Christmas characters - most of which have now become iconic. Such as Santa, the Gingerbread Men, the reindeer and the Tin Soldiers - who have been appearing since Disney began Christmas Parades. So it is much longer than the normal parades they run every day - and it is more structured and choreographed. Again - really good fun to see different floats and characters not normally available. Also they do things like the gingerbread float smells of gingerbread and there is a candy cane float that smells of peppermint

Now about half way through the parade I discovered the secret to great photography. Don't stand directly opposite a blinding floodlight. So I shan't bore you with my light flooded blurry photos. Instead enjoy the magic that is a special Disney parade with this video from Laughing Place.com:

Whilst I love the Gingerbread Men, I have to admit that I am a Scrooge McDuck girl.

Also - did you notice the "snow" billowing around? This is one of the other great touches - snow in Florida is completely incongruous (and half those Fort Fiends are in FW to avoid snow!).

This stuff is continuously pumped out - hmmmm .... just like Disney advertising ...anyway, I shan't ruin the magic for you by explaining how they do it!

Magical snow that doesn't melt!

More rides, and I admit that I did not queue up for character photos this time - I felt I had met enough at the Halloween party and various character dinners. Suddenly it was time for the fireworks show.

This was one of the best fireworks works shows I have ever seen.

It started with some magical projections onto the Castle - like this:

Gingerbread Castle. How amazing is this? All done with projection! Can you believe all this icing and candies just done with precision projection?!(source: epbot.com)

The fireworks show was a special one for the party - and it was one of the best I've ever seen. Timed perfectly to the music - when there was light twinkly music, there were dancing firefly type fireworks, when it was bold and dramatic, there were huge explosions. All done in lots of christmas colours - red and green. A real standout.

I've already bored you with a video of the parade and if you really like watching fireworks on you tube go and track it down.

Then, for me at least, a few more rides and I left. With 30,000 others. It took an hour to get to the Grand Floridan. I am never riding those little boats again.

Anyway - so where would you rather celebrate Christmas? Gingerbread cookies or a gingerbread castle! Family fireworks or Fireworks show! And maybe even the food could be better: