“Where’s Scoop?” It is one of the more popular questions I’ve been asked during my time as Project Manager for Disney Trading. For those who are unfamiliar, “Scoop” is Scoop Sanderson, Main Street Gazette Reporter, Town Councilman and Pin-thusiast. Fellow Disney Blogger (and awesome photographer) Gene Duncan first introduced Disney Parks Blog readers to Scoop back in May 2010. Gene also provided the great picture at the top of this article featuring Scoop holding the first Scoop Sanderson pin.

I first met Scoop on Main Street, U.S.A. when I served as a member of the 2001/2002 Walt Disney World Ambassador Team. At that time, we had a few opportunities to make some magic for Guests. But it wasn’t until I got to my current role that I realized just how much Scoop loves Disney pins. During a recent visit to Magic Kingdom, I turned the tables and interviewed him about his passion for trading.

Steven: “Why do you love trading pins?”

Scoop Sanderson: “I love the people, and I love making new pin pals. I also really love looking at pins! They are little miniature works of art. I particularly enjoy seeing pins I haven’t seen in a while. They bring back good memories, and it is great to reminisce with friends.”

Throughout the years we’ve created pins inspired by Scoop Sanderson. The first retail pin was introduced at Disney Pin Celebration 2007. It was a super jumbo sized pin and featured Mickey Mouse playing the role of Scoop. The pin was so popular that it lead to additional pin collections. In 2008, we released “The Scoop,” a collection that featured Scoop reporting on fun facts about the Walt Disney World Resort. This collection was followed by “Scoop and Friends” in 2009 that featured Scoop and other friends from Main Street, U.S.A. In 2010, we featured Scoop Sanderson on a specially designed Disney Trading Night pin. The pin was released in March 2010, and Scoop made a surprise visit to meet and trade with Guests that night.

Steven: “For someone who is brand new to Disney Pin Trading, what is the best advice you can give her or him?”

Scoop Sanderson: “The best advice I can give is collect what you like! There are so many pins to collect. Trust me, I’ve tried trading for them all. But you have to collect or trade what you like. If you find you don’t love a pin anymore, I guarantee someone else will. So trade it away – you won’t hurt its feelings.”

Steven: “Do you have a favorite trading experience from Main Street, U.S.A.?”

Scoop Sanderson: “I love when a Guest comes up to me and asks, ‘May I look at your pins please?’ It is typically a kid who has grown up but learned that phrase long ago from me. It is a good feeling to know a Guest enjoyed trading so much that she or he returned to Main Street, U.S.A. to trade pins. I only hope that the Guest will pass on the trading legacy to others.”

As part of Disney Pin Celebration – Trade City, U.S.A., I invited Scoop to join us for this annual trading event held at Epcot. We created a limited edition pin featuring Figment dressed as Scoop Sanderson (a first of its kind) breaking ground for an event in 2011.

Steven: “Do you have any final tips that Guests should remember when trading pins?”

Scoop Sanderson: “Be nice as you never know what kind of surprises or magic may happen when trading pins with others. Make magic for others as pins have the ability to make people smile. You never know who might become your next pin pal. One thing I’ve learned is there are many treasures on lanyards, but really lanyards are on the treasures – great friends.”

Pin Pals can trade pins with Scoop Sanderson on select days on Main Street, U.S.A. at Magic Kingdom Park. If you have traded pins with Scoop, I’d love to hear your stories.

That's right, you can pre-order your tickets for the Mickey's Not-So-Scary Halloween party, now!  This is an annual favorite with guests to the Walt Disney World Resort.  The event attendance is capped, so you need to get your tickets before the night you want to visit sells out!

During Mickey's Not-So-Scary Halloween Party, guests of all ages are encouraged to dress up in their favorite Halloween costumes.

In addition to many favorite Disney attractions, Mickey's Not-So-Scary Halloween Party is filled with special entertainment, including:

• Mickey's "Boo-to-You" Halloween Parade—including Disney Characters and the stars of the Haunted Mansion attraction. The parade begins with a ride by the Headless Horseman.
• Happy HalloWishes—a spectacular fireworks show where the Disney Villains go trick-or-treating in the sky.
• Many favorite Disney Characters and Disney Villians in special Halloween costumes.
• Special lighting, music and theming effects transforms special areas of Magic Kingdom theme park into happy haunted hollows.

The tone of the event is, well, "Not-So-Scary", and is appropriate for children of all ages.

Tickets for this event are valid for the evenings of Sept. 4th, 11th, 15th, 18th, 22nd, 25th and 29th. Oct. 8th, 12th, 15th, and the 20th.

Quick Disney Tip!

Although the party doesn't actually start until a little after 7PM, you can actually get in the park around 4PM in the evening with this special event ticket!!  Since the party continues until midnight, you can get a full 8 hours in the Magic Kingdom for much less than a standard daily ticket!

Get your advance tickets from the Official Ticket Center for $62 per adult including all taxes and fees.  A normal one day, one park Magic Your Way base ticket will run you $89.14 for an adult to enter the Magic Kingdom.  Come to this event early and you save at least $28 per ticket, maybe more!  That's a serious discount on Disney tickets without having to sit through a timeshare sales pitch!

This is a question we get all the time!  For those of you that may be unfamiliar with the story, when Magic Kingdom opens, the train comes into the station at the Magic Kingdom gate with all of your favorite Disney characters; Mickey and Minnie Mouse, Donald Duck, Goofy, Pluto, and so on.  As part of this entourage, one family gets to "help" open the Magic Kingdom.  You ride in on the train with the characters, throw confetti, and so on.  Sometimes, you get to open Mickey's Toon Town Fair, the Tea Cups, ride in the parade, etc.  It really depends on the day, whether you have kids or not, and lots of other things.

More importantly, how do you become "that" family?  One of my favorite answers is 50% luck and 50% magic.

In truth, luck has a lot to do with which family is selected, but there are some things you can do to sway the odds in your favor.

1. Arrive EARLY!  By early, I'm talking 2-3 hours before the park opens.  Your goal is to be the first family at the gate.
2. Be enthusiastic!  I know this can be very tough when the kids are up early and cranky and tugging at your leg, whining for a bathroom and so on.  However, Disney wants happy families to open the Magic Kingdom, not stressed, frustrated parents.
3. DO NOT bother when Extra Magic Hours occurs in the morning at Magic Kingdom.  They don't have the ceremony, so you'd be wasting your time.

You can also try to be "pre-selected" to be the Magic Kingdom opening family.  Remember, I said "try."  Disney and the Magic Kingdom insist that the selection process is completely random and that you cannot "request" to be the opening family.  However, we've known several people that did get "pre-selected."  So, how did they do it?  All of them did it the night before the day they wanted to be the Magic Kingdom opening family.  Your best bet is to talk to one of the gate or guest services managers and have a story.

What do I mean by have a story?  Your grandparents are with you and celebrating their 60th wedding anniversary, you have a terminally ill child, you just got back from the Olympics where you won a medal, you saved money for 40 years to make this trip to the Magic Kingdom.  You get the idea.  Add some spice, adventure, or emotion to why they should "pre-select" you.

As I noted, this is a long-shot, as we've been told repeatedly (even when we've tried the above tactics) that you cannot be pre-selected.  However, we've known too many people that have been pre-selected to realize that this just isn't true.

Your best bet is just to arrive early and look like the biggest, most enthusiastic Disney fan you've ever seen.

Good luck!

Here's a video from the selected family perspective:

Tomorrow: Disney parades and shows.

This week on the Insider's Guide to Disney, we'll be talking about how to stand out from the crowd at Disney World.  How can you be recognized?  Participate in a special ceremony?  Gain recognition?  We'll answer these questions and more, this week with our "Disney World Do Something Special" series.

To start the week, we wanted to talk about one of our favorite ceremonies that takes place at the Magic Kingdom.  The first time I saw this ceremony, I just happened to be in the right place at the right time and shot some video of the event.

This is known as the flag retreat ceremony at Disney World.  As a huge supporter of our troops and veterans, I immediately became interested in how someone might be selected for the "civilian" participant role in Disney's flag retreat ceremony at Magic Kingdom.

I found out that you do not have to be a veteran, although Disney prefers veterans and that it's essentially first-come, first-served.  As soon as you get to Disney's Magic Kingdom (the earlier, the better), check with Guest Services to see if you're the first to ask to participate in the ceremony.  That's it!  Pretty simple, right?  Just remember, many other people will be vying for that spot, so be sure to get there early and be enthusiastic!  Disney loves enthusiasm from ceremony participants!

If you miss out on this one, don't fret.  We'll be talking about another flag ceremony in which you can participate, tomorrow.

Mickey's Once Upon A Christmastime Parade is the special parade for Mickey's Very Merry Christmas Party, a special event ticket at Disney's Magic Kingdom.  Mickey's Very Merry Christmas Party occurs on special nights throughout November and December.

You can also see this special Disney Christmas parade during normal park hours on certain days. Parade times are 3pm on December 19th to 24th, and then two performances per day (12pm and 3:30pm) for the 25th to 31st.

As a special Insider's Guide To Disney tip, although the Mickey's Very Merry Christmas Party doesn't start until 7PM, you can get into the Magic Kingdom around 4:30PM (sometimes as early as 4PM!), giving you an extra 2-1/2 - 3 hours of park time!

We love the Christmas Party and go, every year.  With limited park attendance and the most popular rides open, this makes for a fantastic event during Disney World's busiest season.

We know, Halloween's well past, but with the ending of Mickey's Not-So-Scary Halloween Party and the beginning of Mickey's Very Merry Christmas party, last week, we thought we'd share some of our photos from the Halloween decorations at the Magic Kingdom.

The way Disney does the decorations at Magic Kingdom for Halloween really reminds me of the fall season, in general. So with Thanksgiving, next week (already??!!), this might help get you in the mood for the upcoming holiday.

This past weekend, I had the opportunity to try out Tony's Town Square Restaurant.  Tony's is located right in the town square of Main Street, USA at Disney's Magic Kingdom.  It's in the first building on your right, as you enter the park.

It can actually be a little confusing, as the restaurant is part of a larger building and you actually enter what looks like a store entrance to get to Tony's Town Square Restaurant.  The host/hostess stand is located just to the left after you enter the big, double main entrance doors.  If you miss it, don't worry -- there's an outdoor host/hostess stand with Goofy sitting on a bench to greet you and direct you into the restaurant.

Tony's offers typical Italian cuisine, including one of my favorites, tomato and mozzarella salad -- although I must admit that Tony's was a bit bland.  Tomatoes were just OK and the sauce really didn't add much to the flavor.

In addition to the tomato and mozzarella salad, we tried the pumpkin soup, toasted cheese and garlic bread, minestrone with orzo pasta, and the baked ziti.

The pumpkin soup was delicious, however it was too sweet for my palate.  I loved the soup, don't get me wrong, but I just couldn't finish a whole cup, due to the sweetness and richness of the flavor.

I could not understand why they brought us two spoons for the pumpkin soup.  Although we were sharing everything amongst the entire table, this was the only item that came with two utensils.  Notice anything different about this view of the cup of soup? (Hint: HM)

Although called Toasted Cheese and Garlic Bread on the menu, this item was really more like bruschetta on toasted cheese garlic bread.  It was amazing!!

The Minestrone with Orzo Pasta was the better of the two soups (only two are available at Tony's Town Square -- the minestrone and a seasonal; pumpkin for our visit).  Deep, rich flavor and the orzo added bulk and texture to a fantastic soup.

The baked ziti was the best dish of the meal!  Amazingly flavorful marinara sauce, lots of pasta and meat -- it was more than I could finish and that's saying something.

I did not particularly like the crostini you see pictured with the ziti.  It was VERY hard (crispy) and didn't add any flavor or dimension to the dish.

The restaurant provides a very comfortable environment without a whole lot of fancy decorations.  Pretty simple and plain, overall.  There was a beautiful fountain in the center of the restaurant.

The "Lady and the Tramp" theme carried throughout the restaurant, even to the restrooms.

The restaurant also looks out over the "Town Square" at Magic Kingdom with a great view of the park and you could see part of the parade, if you're eating during one of the parades.

While we visited, they had the restaurant decorated for Halloween, which really added some needed flair to the restaurant.

Here's a pic of a booth seat in the restaurant.

Overall, the food was very good at Tony's Town Square.  Would I go back?  Not to say never, no, but it's not likely.  It's good Italian food, but nothing real out-of-the-ordinary.  It's all stuff you could get at pretty much any decent Italian restaurant and probably for much less money.  If I'm going to pay Disney prices for dining, I expect something I couldn't just cook up at home or get at the local "mom-and-pop" Italian joint.

Disney also has a ton of superb restaurants that would make my list long before Tony's.  Also, the ambiance, design (or lack thereof), and character needs a little updating and pizazz.  It's a bit plain and dated.  I feel like the Imagineer's sort of stopped midway through the plan.

If you're in the mood for Italian in the Magic Kingdom, I'm sure you'll love Tony's, just don't expect much more than an average Italian restaurant.  If you want some really good food, interesting dishes, and better theming, try Mama Melrose in Disney's Hollywood Studios.