Merry Christmas, Happy New Year and 6 months to go!!

Idiot of the week:

Lady: (Looking at the quiz in one of our shops which asks 'What are the four countries that make up the UK?') Erm... England, Spain, France...

It's been a long time since I've had the chance to update this blog, i've been soooo busy, work has been crazy and i've also had my parents here! Lots to catch up on!

On the lead up to Christmas we had a few good nights to try and get ourselves in the festive spirit. Disney's Contemporary Resort held a Winter Formal for cast members one night so we got all dressed up and went along. They had free food and drink, music and also a chance to meet the characters, it was really good fun! Having a group photo with Mickey was definetly the highlight!
Another night Beth threw a christmas do at her apartment for a few us. She really went to town with food music and games, yes games! There was 'find the chocolate santas around her apartment' which I have to say I was appalling at so much so, Beth had to secretly point one out to me so I didn't look stupid lol. Although I was rubbish at that game we had an xmas quiz and Kirstie and I were in a team. It came down to us and Nick and Mimi and the deciding question was to name all of Santa's reindeer and Kirstie and I smashed it! hehe. We won a goody bag full of British choclate and biscuits! It was a really fun night and really nice of Beth to do it for us.

It was also my housemate Sarah's birthday in December so we decided to have a party at our apartment to celebrate! The first party I've had here eek! lol. I spent the afternoon decorating the apartment and moving all the furniture around while Sarah got the food and made some cakes! (She's a great cook!) We decided that although we were just staying in our apartment for the evening it was definitely a dressing up occasion! It was a wicked night, we played pass the parcel thanks to Sam organising it and Dan gave a speech for Sarah as she was a little worse for wear! I ended up tidying up after everyone had gone at 2.00 in the morning much to Sarah's amusement but I felt much better the morning after when I got up and everything was back to normal!

After experiencing everything Disney in the christmas run up, Beth and I decided to go to Universal Studios one day to see what was going on there. We headed over to Islands of Adventure first where they had a show of 'How the Grinch stole Christmas' and an area of the park was set up as Whoville with lots of cast members dressed up as Whos! It was really fun and the show was impressive. After this we headed back to Universal to catch the Macys Parade. In New York at christmas Macys have a huge parade and Universal has like a smaller version but basically the same. Lots of huge inflatables and weird and wonderful things with of course Santa at the end. It's still nothing on Disneys magic but it was still fantastic to see!

On 20th December my mum, dad and brother finally arrived In Florida after a 3 hour delay because of the snow in the UK! They picked me up and we went straight back to the villa. Like before I spent the week there.
The next day I had a day off so we went to Walmart and Lowes etc. as my parents had to get some stuff for the house. That evening Rachel, Kirstie and Beth came around and we had a miniture party to try and make them feel less homesick! Mum made a buffet and we ate lots, played games and pulled crackers like a real xmas day! It was a fun night and the girls stayed over, we were up until 4am catching up! The next morning my Dad showed off his cooking skills by making us a fried breakfast which Beth called 'the best meal she's had in six months!' After we dropped the girls back to the Commons we went to Celebration. Celebration is a town created by Disney which is meant to be what Walt visualised as the perfect American town. It's really beautiful and looked even nicer with all the christmas decorations, there was even a small ice rink and one street was covered in fake snow! We went for a walk around the huge lake that is there and looked at the amazing houses which people own there and at 6pm it started snowing in the snow covered street, it was lovely!

I worked the rest of the week including Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and Boxing Day. We all gave eachother a hug at work on Christmas Eve when we realised it had turned Christmas Day back home! I'm not going to lie Christmas Day was awful! Everyone was very depressed and homesick at work, no one wanted to be there and time went very slowly. The managers tried to cheer us up by bringing in cookies and cakes and stuff but people still felt very down about being away from home. I celebrated with my family after work and they opened the presents I gave them but even they admitted that it wasn't the same as being back home. It seemed like a big countdown for nothing and I'm just glad it's over. I can't wait to spend Christmas Day back at home next year.

On the Sunday I had a day off again so we hit the outlets which were crazy busy! So much so that we parked in The Commons and walked across because there were no parking spaces! Luke was in his element spending all his money in Ralph Lauren and Tommy Hilfiger and he bought me some Converses as an xmas pressie and Mum bought me a cardy from Tommy Hilfiger. If I can offer one bit of advice it would be to NEVER visit Florida at Christmas, I've never seen so much traffic in my life! Having said that we had a lovely evening. I booked us a table at Citricos, a restaurant in Disney's Grand Floridian Resort. It's very expensive, however I got 50% off with my cast member holiday discount! The food was incredible and although none of us were very hungry we all managed all three courses! After dinner we went to the bar there for something to drink and we explored the hotel as it's one of Disneys expensive ones!

On the Monday it was time for the fam to go home. As their flight wasn't until 7ish we had lunch at Golden Corral and Dad very kindly bought me a big food shop from Walmart! It was just as hard as last time to say goodbye, I don't deal with them leaving me here very well, there were lots of tears and not just from me! I felt very down that evening but fortunately Beth was on hand to give me a hug and take me for dinner at Bahama Breeze! The fam were delayed another three hours on the way home too which made for a pretty rubbish flight for them.

The week after my family left I had awful hours at work, two days I worked until 1am and then had to be at work again at 10.30am the next morning giving me 4 hours sleep! It was tough! New Years Eve is the busiest day of the year for Epcot and I was working a 12 hour shift- 1pm until 1.15am. I've never seen anything like it, Magic Kingdom was closed by midday because it had reached full capacity so most people got the monorail across to Epcot. Fastpasses had gone by 10am and some of the rides reached a 5 hour wait! They even removed the benches so more people could fit in the park! The park can hold 77,000 guests and we reached 83,000 by the end of the night! I'm just trying to explain to you just how busy it was, it was incredible! The shops had non stop queues which was good for us because time flew but it was also stressful and guests were impatient and rude. Having said that I ended up having a great new year. At 7pm you guys were celebrating new year and our managers very kindly covered the shops for us while we all went out together to count it down. All the guests were crowded round and The British Invasion (our Beatles tribute band) did the count down, then once it hit new year they sang Auld Lang Syne and we all did the dance together with the Americans staring at us wondering what the hell we were doing lol. The next few hours flew by quickly and at midnight the managers let us go outside to watch the count down and fireworks for the American new year. The fireworks as usual were incredible and they also went round each country and we each had our own fireworks too. In the end I was really glad I worked New Years Eve and got to celebrate two new years!

It sounds like back home is having some crazy weather with all the snow? It is very cold here in Florida and I know you are all probably thinking i'm talking rubbish and that I have just got used to the heat but i'm not lying! For the past week it has been 7*C during the day and -2*C at night! It's bloody freezing! I have spoken to alot of Floridian guests and they have said that it is very unusual for it to be this cold for this long, Florida usually gets about one or two cold days but nothing like this length of time. I've read reports that Florida has had it's hottest summer for a long time this year but is now having it's coldest winter for 25 years! Typical! I just hope the heat comes back soon, I have come to the conclusion that I am definitely a summer kind of girl, I don't know how I am going to cope when I get home!

Now the craziness of Christmas and New Year is over my hours are back to normal so it's back to the gym and diet time! It also means I have reached the 6 months mark, can you believe that? I can't believe i've spent 6 months in Florida already, it's scary how fast time has gone by, I've got to make sure I make the most of the last half of my year. I'm doing ok so far, Kirstie, Beth and I have New York booked for the 22nd January and I can't wait!! I'm soooo excited although slightly scared about how cold it is going to be! I've also booked to stay in Animal kingdom Lodge for my birthday next month, it's one of Disney's more expensive resorts because it feels like you are on safari, your balcony leads out to giraffes and elephants!! It's going to be a fun couple of months!