On ice?

A few weeks ago, J came home all aflutter, thrusting a coloring page into my hands, and shouting, "We can win tickets to Disney on Ice!"

Now, it's important to know the following things: we're not really a Disney family--until recently we hadn't seen any Disney movies, and even now, we still haven't seen very many.  We've never been to any version of Disneyland or Disneyworld.  We have no stuffed Disney characters lying around.  And, of course, we've never even talked about Disney on Ice until now.

Apparently, the boys' school was part of a bunch of schools who were offered free tickets to raffle off.  The boys each got to color two pages to enter into a drawing for one set of four tickets per grade level.  Now E could not have cared less about all this; he actually has a deep-seated antipathy for all things Frozen borne out of overkill at school.  J, on the other hand, has a class filled with girls, some of whom are figure skaters, and all of whom were super excited about all things ice and Disney, hence his own excitement.  He dutifully and carefully colored in his sheets, convinced that the quality of his coloring would matter, no matter how much I tried to tell him it wouldn't.  Tellingly, we had to find pictures online so he could figure out what Ariel and Aladdin were supposed to look like--I told you we were Disney newbies!  E also scribbled in his sheet, so J would have more chances he said...such a good brother!

So then we began our weeklong attempt to manage expectations.  We explained that there were lots of people entering the contest, that winning had everything to do with luck and nothing to do with coloring, and that we had never even wanted to see Disney on Ice before this week.  We also negotiated.  J was by now completely convinced he HAD to see the show, so we investigated getting tickets.  Turns out Disney on Ice is really expensive!  The cheapest seats were $44 a pop!  We talked about maybe just J and I going and his having to try to earn the privilege with lots of table setting and clearing and other chores.  And, we got ourselves ready for the inevitable disappointment that was about to ensue.

The day of the raffle arrived and right after school I got this message from J's teacher:

Hi Lil,

J just won the Disney on Ice tickets and I WISH I HAD IT ON VIDEO.  His reaction was incredible, I'm still laughing.  Complete shock and excitement, it was the best :)

Have a great weekend!

K

And when J got off the bus, he proudly showed me the tickets with a huge smile on his face.  He said he had almost fallen down with shock when he heard his name and had to be helped up by two classmates!  Apparently, one sage little boy in his class had told him "if you think about it, it will go away from you; if you don't think about it, it will come to you," and he had dutifully been following this seven year old guru's advice and not thinking about the drawing at all, so he was even more shocked by the outcome!  So much for all our talks and negotiations--I fear this will set a dangerous precedent!

All of which is preamble to how we ended up at Disney on Ice: Princesses and Heroes two nights ago at the mammoth Qatar National Convention Center.  After a long hike from the parking garage (sooo far), we found the appropriate hall and our seats, which would have cost us $75 each if we had bought them.  We bypassed all the Disney paraphernalia outside; thankfully the boys really weren't all that interested in such things, because all of that was very, very pricey.  We had gotten there quite early, to account for traffic and the hike in, so the boys played on the iPads a bit before we started but mainly they were just interested in the lights and the ice, even while it was static.  E asked me to take a picture of the ice before the show began, "so we will always remember it."

And the show itself was quite impressive, though it did show us how very little we know about the Disney universe, particularly the part populated by princesses.  There were bubbles falling from the ceiling during "Under the Sea" and real snow falling during the second half of the show that was almost exclusively dedicated to Frozen.  The sky was filled with pyrotechnics, and at one point there was even a ribbon of actual fire on the ice, a neat trick.  I liked Maleficent's dragon, a giant fire-breathing creature made out of silk and wires lit by black light.  J was thrilled with everything, laughing and clapping with actual glee at the end of each number.  E was less enthused but still enjoyed the fighting and running and bursts of fireworks.   Only Anna fell once on the ice the whole night, which I thought was pretty good considering how many jumps and acrobatics the performers have to do.  

Pre-show shots!

Did I mention the convention center has totally bizarre lighting
 at night?  This was taken on a pre-show bathroom run!

So we can remember the lights.  All these seats eventually filled up.

J and E's expressions were pretty much these the whole time.

I had bought a few Disney themed trinkets in case of meltdowns or good behavior
so they got these at intermission (no meltdowns at all!).

 Do we need to do this again next year?  I don't think so, though J may have other ideas.  We will be hard pressed to explain that winning tickets isn't really the way these things go!  And if he wants to pay his own way, he may need to start saving up right now!