I saw the commercial with Eilis a couple of weeks ago, and she starts asking if she can go. Every time I look at tickets for something like this, I am left feeling like these things are WAY overpriced, and there has to be a cheaper way to entertain your kids. But, Eilis persists, and every time the commercial comes on, she tells me how much she really wants to see it.
So, I come up with the bright idea that I will take her the first Thursday after school starts back up. It will be me, Eilis, and Grace, and I’ll just grab whatever seats are available so as not to break my meager budget. Then I think I should check and see how long the show is. Of course, I don’t do this until the morning of the show, and I find out it is 2 hours and 15 minutes – including the 15 minute intermission. I will NEVER be able to take Gracie with me – she will never sit that long. I phone my mother, who is going to a doctor appointment and can’t watch Grace, and even if she could, but the time I drop Brighid off, and then drop Grace off, I haven’t got time now to go home and get Eilis dressed and ready to go.
Jim calls, and I mention it to him, and he says to take her in the evening with Brighid and he’ll watch Grace. I don’t know. I’ll have to see if there are tickets for the nightime show left. There are. There are even VIP seats.
So, here we are, front row, almost center ice, watching the Incredibles on their Disney World vacation. All I can think at this point is that for the cost of 3 VIP tickets, we could be on a Disney vacation ourselves.
Eilis is captivated. She claps, she cheers, she stands and dances, she does everything you want a kid to do. They gave all the kids a wristband to help save Minnie and Mickey and restore the Magic Kingdom, and Eilis uses it every chance she gets. The only thing that upsets her is at one point, the pirates skate over near us and as they stop, we get splashed with a wee bit of ice. How dare they?
I gotta tell you, I really enjoyed the show. I enjoyed watching Eilis and all of her expressions. The thing that bugs me is that for the amount of money we paid, you don’t even get a free program (for VIP seats to the Radio City Music Hall show, you get a program, a popcorn, and a drink). And everything was outrageously priced – $10 for a bag of popcorn or cotton candy, because they came with a “free” Incredibles mask. $12 for a snow cone because it came in a reusable Incredibles cup. I spent $60 between the program, a light toy, a bag of popcorn, a soda and a pretzel. That didn’t include parking at $10 a pop.
We’ll have to find a way to convince Grace that all the crazy things we did are so not worth the money. But that’s so hard to do when I know you can’t put a price tag on some of the smiles I got from Eilis at the Incredibles on Ice.