T-minus 3 weeks and counting!
Okee-dokee. I've never written a trip report before so this should be a pretty big undertaking for me. I love to write. I write like I think which is totally non-stop so good luck to all you readers out there.
Just like many of you I am a total Disney freak. Yep. I have no problems claiming my addiction. My name is Kelly and I'm a Disney Freak. I love all things Disney for lots of reasons. Here's a quicky background on how I arrived at my insanity: Mom & Dad took older brother, Jerry, and me to WDW the 1st time in 1975 or 6. Gramma & Grampa were with us. Here's a pic of little ol' me in the stroller with Grampa pushing:
In later years we went again just before my parents divorced when I was 3, after my parents divorced (mom & a boyfriend took us), when I was 5-ish Dad & aunt took us, and then we moved to Orlando with Mom & step-dad/siblings. Over the years growing up in Central Florida my dad would come to visit us and take us out to Disney. I very much remember Epcot under construction and went there the 1st time in 1983 (Dad came to visit and brought his new wife to meet us). My brother fussed at me for wanting to post this picture from that day but I just gotta do it. After all, what are little sisters for??? Here ya go, Epcot and 2 veeery cool kids circa 1983:
I love you, Jerry!
My grandparents would come to visit us over the years and we'd all go out to WDW. They even stayed at the Poly once. I remember thinking that was the most awesome hotel I'd ever seen. We had the old Florida resident "3 Season Salute" passes for several years. We went to Disney soooo much during that time. When I was 12, I remember my folks taking all 5 of us kids out...again...(it was over an hour drive from the other side of Orlando where we lived), handing us each a couple dollars, and setting up a place for us to meet them back in a couple hours. My younger step-sister and I walked off, stopped, turned to each other, and couldn't decide what we wanted to do because we were sorta bored with it all. Can you imagine??? Kids bored in the Magic Kingdom! In high school we had field trips out to Epcot. That was always fun. I'm sure day guests just loved us.
When I was 16 I left Orlando to go live with my dad & his wife. I didn't make it back to WDW again until I was 24 years old, married, & had 2 kids of my own. It was 1999. That 1st trip back we left the kids who were little bitty guys with my mother-in-law and made a long weekend trip for us. We stayed off-property and only went to the Magic Kingdom & Epcot. Hubby didn't understand why I made such a fuss about going. After all, he'd been to Disneyland when he was a kid and didn't think it was that big of a deal. Then we actually got there. And he's a changed man today!
We finally took our boys to WDW in January of 2004. We stayed in the newly opened POP Century. I think the boys were 6 & 7 years old. Wow. Doesn't seem like that long ago but I guess it kinda was. Anywhoo, we went again and stayed at POP in January 2005, January/February 2006 (took the inlaws with us which was a blast), and February 2007. We made the move to the Contemporary for our 5th family adventure in early December 2007. That rocked! Hubby & I went to "da World" to celebrate our 15th anniversary sans our sons in May 2008. That was incredible!
So here we are at family adventure #6. This one has been interesting to plan. We started out shooting for the 2nd week of December with my family, my brother & his 2 daughters, and both my parents (who are now divorced from their other spouses and remarried...go figure). Hurricane Ike had different plans for us, tho. We ended up having to postpone the trip because we had so much repair work to do on the house. We worked really hard doing a lot of that work ourselves. So now we're rescheduled for January 23rd thru February 1st. Mom & Dad have since elected to stay home. My brother's 2 daughters won't be able to join us because of school, ballet, and no permission from their mom. Bummer. So our current line-up has become:
Me! Kelly. 34 year old mom/wife/jack-of-all-trades. Planner Extraordinaire. World's #1 Procrastinator. Shopping fanatic. Disney Freak!
Hubby. Tracey. 36 year old dad/husband/comedian. Victim of Planner Extraordinaire. Disney Freak Convert. Bass fisherman. Temperament of Donald Duck. But best of all, best friend to ME!
Oldest son. Chandler. ChanMan. Chandelerina when he's whiny. 12 year old going on 22, self-declared genius. What would we do without a kid who knows everything??? He's an emotional mini-me at his age. Mature beyond his years in many aspects. Caretaker. Music Man, plays electric guitar & drums. 7th grade student. Cherished firstborn. Quite the young man.
Youngest son. Brian. I call him my Boo. Brianna when he's whiny. 11 year old future special forces leader, most likely a Marine. OohRah! Emotionally a mini of his dad: soft spot is his mama and fiercely protective of all he loves. 5th grade student. Loves weaponry & war games. Very imaginative guy, artistic, and creative. Cherished "baby" of the family even if he argues that he isn't a baby anymore.
And, my big brother. Jerry. Knuckle Jerry (the boys didn't say Uncle too well when they were little). 36 year old single adoring daddy of 2 gorgeous girls. Soon-to-be-victim of Planner Extraordinaire. Intel-collector & planner-in-training. 1st real trip staying on-property. Also slated as videographer. 1st timer to DHS and AK. 1st trip back since the teen years. May as well call him a Newbie, huh? Will be planning his daughters' 1st trips for May. (photo to come...can you believe I can't find one???...I'm ashamed)
We are booked at the Contemporary with a Magic Kingdom view again Friday, January 23rd thru Sunday, February 1st. You just can't beat that location and we love contemporary architecture, even if it is retro-contemporary. We're actually going to be leaving home on Thursday the 22nd to head into Houston and stay at the LaQuinta close to Hobby Airport. Our Soutwest departure is at 6:30 on Friday. We should be arriving at MCO around 9:30. I'm guessing we'll be checking-in at the resort by about 11:00.
I'm not one to make an itinerary and flip out if we don't follow it to a T. I learned a long time ago that overplanning and unrealistic expectations make life miserable. Part of being on vacation is having fun, relaxing, and going with the flow. I run out park hours, EMHs, crowd calendars, etc. to guess-timate where we will be and make my ADRs. The only ADRs I really stick to are the prepaids or credit card guaranteed ones. Otherwise, if we change plans or won't make an ADR it's not a big deal. I call and cancel them. No problem. I'll have to show y'all my trip book sometime. I'm really proud of it considering I'm not that organized anymore. Here's our tentative daily stuff:
Friday. 1/23. Arrive! Hang out, do whatever, get a little nap considering how early we're getting up. 5:05pm ADR @ Chef Mickeys. MK this afternoon/evening. Wanna show Jerry Wishes. Feels like a good start to me.
Saturday. 1/24. It's a very Epcot day. 8:45am breakfast at Akershus. This will be a 1st for my boys. Tracey & I tried it on our anni trip and loved it. 6:45pm dinner at Biergarten. It's a family favorite. Chandler will mow you down to get to the cream cheesy cakey dessert. LOL!
Sunday. 1/25. Roarin' into AK today. We have a 10:15am brunchy meal at Tusker House. Gawd, I hope we get a quieter room this time away from the windows where there's drumming outside. If we feel up to it, evening EMHs at DHS are an option. Knowing Jerry, he'll be there with the kids and probably me. Tracey is an early to bed sort of fellow.
Monday. 1/26. Sleepin' in. AK usually wears us down so we try to build extra rest in the next morning. Back to DHS or do whatever. Dinner is at Cinderella's Royal Table at 6:50pm. I'm hopeful we'll be able to still be IN the castle for Wishes. TRacey & I did this for our anni trip also and loved the different perspective as well as the yumm-o food. Then it's evening EMH time at MK. Yaaaayyy!!!
Tuesday. 1/27. Brutal as it is, I scheduled us for 8:05am breakfast at Crystal Palace. Oh come on! It's not like it's sooooo faaaaar to walk over there. After breakfast we'll prob'ly play in the park until we can't stand it and have to go take a nap. Again. It's not like it's sooooo faaaar to go back to our room. I heart the Contemporary. Nothing planned for evening. Hhhmmmm. Maybe we'll run over to TRex. We'll wing it.
Wednesday. 1/28. DHS in the morning. We'll be in that mad rush to get to TSM. 3:55pm late lunch/early dinner at Sci-Fi. It's not my favorite eatery but the kids love it and Jerry should experience it. The theming is so incredible. I'm actually thinking I should reschedule this one for earlier lunch so we can catch a nap before heading to AK for evening EMHs. Hhhmmm...The Planner never rests...
Thursday. 1/29. Nuttin' really planned. Maybe we'll head to morning EMH at MK. Never done that before. I know where we'll be in the evening, tho! 7:45pm dinner at LeCellier. We'll be the family of mostly redheads standing outside drooling. This is our faaaaave!
Friday. 1/30. Again, no really solid plans. We can go wherever and do whatever. We have 5:40pm dinner ressies at Cape May for the clambake. THis is another of those things Tracey & I did on our anni trip that we want the boys to experience. It's a good location, too, since there's evening EMHs at Epcot. I know we won't miss that since Epcot is our family's overall favorite park.
Saturday. 1/31. Last FULL day. On our 1st family trip we started this thing where our last full day was reserved for everyone's favorites. Inevitably hitting each person's favorite attraction would create this challenging journey of twists-n-turns as we trek'd into numerous parks. I don't know if we'll still do this but it's always an option. Our last supper is planned for 5:20pm at Ohana. What a way to sum it all up, huh?
Sunday. 2/1. D-Day. Dangit, Depressing Departure Day. Icky-poo. Booooooo! Breakfast is slated for 8:15am at Chef Mickey's. Our flight home is at 2:30pm. We will NOT use Magical Express back out to the airport. Tracey and I didn't like waiting for our scheduled bus which is so far before the flight. We didn't like the depressing ride back to the airport. The video on the bus made me cry. So we'll be taking a limo. Yeah, it's money we don't have to spend but we feel like it'll be more bearable if we can leave when we want to, not make additional resort stops, not watch depressing videos, have a treat with a cool limo, and have that quiet transition time out to the airport to disconnect from Disney-time and start moving back to reality. We should be arriving back in Houston by 4:30pm which puts us back in our Texas home by 6:30pm.
So there ya have it! I'll be updating more as our departure approaches. For now I better get my booty in gear and start cleaning up the Christmas explosion in our house and start ramping up with the pre-packing, organizing, etc.
Wow. 3 weeks from today we'll BE home again! Yaaaaayyyyy!!!!!
Okee-dokee. I've never written a trip report before so this should be a pretty big undertaking for me. I love to write. I write like I think which is totally non-stop so good luck to all you readers out there.
Just like many of you I am a total Disney freak. Yep. I have no problems claiming my addiction. My name is Kelly and I'm a Disney Freak. I love all things Disney for lots of reasons. Here's a quicky background on how I arrived at my insanity: Mom & Dad took older brother, Jerry, and me to WDW the 1st time in 1975 or 6. Gramma & Grampa were with us. Here's a pic of little ol' me in the stroller with Grampa pushing:
In later years we went again just before my parents divorced when I was 3, after my parents divorced (mom & a boyfriend took us), when I was 5-ish Dad & aunt took us, and then we moved to Orlando with Mom & step-dad/siblings. Over the years growing up in Central Florida my dad would come to visit us and take us out to Disney. I very much remember Epcot under construction and went there the 1st time in 1983 (Dad came to visit and brought his new wife to meet us). My brother fussed at me for wanting to post this picture from that day but I just gotta do it. After all, what are little sisters for??? Here ya go, Epcot and 2 veeery cool kids circa 1983:
I love you, Jerry!
My grandparents would come to visit us over the years and we'd all go out to WDW. They even stayed at the Poly once. I remember thinking that was the most awesome hotel I'd ever seen. We had the old Florida resident "3 Season Salute" passes for several years. We went to Disney soooo much during that time. When I was 12, I remember my folks taking all 5 of us kids out...again...(it was over an hour drive from the other side of Orlando where we lived), handing us each a couple dollars, and setting up a place for us to meet them back in a couple hours. My younger step-sister and I walked off, stopped, turned to each other, and couldn't decide what we wanted to do because we were sorta bored with it all. Can you imagine??? Kids bored in the Magic Kingdom! In high school we had field trips out to Epcot. That was always fun. I'm sure day guests just loved us.
When I was 16 I left Orlando to go live with my dad & his wife. I didn't make it back to WDW again until I was 24 years old, married, & had 2 kids of my own. It was 1999. That 1st trip back we left the kids who were little bitty guys with my mother-in-law and made a long weekend trip for us. We stayed off-property and only went to the Magic Kingdom & Epcot. Hubby didn't understand why I made such a fuss about going. After all, he'd been to Disneyland when he was a kid and didn't think it was that big of a deal. Then we actually got there. And he's a changed man today!
We finally took our boys to WDW in January of 2004. We stayed in the newly opened POP Century. I think the boys were 6 & 7 years old. Wow. Doesn't seem like that long ago but I guess it kinda was. Anywhoo, we went again and stayed at POP in January 2005, January/February 2006 (took the inlaws with us which was a blast), and February 2007. We made the move to the Contemporary for our 5th family adventure in early December 2007. That rocked! Hubby & I went to "da World" to celebrate our 15th anniversary sans our sons in May 2008. That was incredible!
So here we are at family adventure #6. This one has been interesting to plan. We started out shooting for the 2nd week of December with my family, my brother & his 2 daughters, and both my parents (who are now divorced from their other spouses and remarried...go figure). Hurricane Ike had different plans for us, tho. We ended up having to postpone the trip because we had so much repair work to do on the house. We worked really hard doing a lot of that work ourselves. So now we're rescheduled for January 23rd thru February 1st. Mom & Dad have since elected to stay home. My brother's 2 daughters won't be able to join us because of school, ballet, and no permission from their mom. Bummer. So our current line-up has become:
Me! Kelly. 34 year old mom/wife/jack-of-all-trades. Planner Extraordinaire. World's #1 Procrastinator. Shopping fanatic. Disney Freak!
Hubby. Tracey. 36 year old dad/husband/comedian. Victim of Planner Extraordinaire. Disney Freak Convert. Bass fisherman. Temperament of Donald Duck. But best of all, best friend to ME!
Oldest son. Chandler. ChanMan. Chandelerina when he's whiny. 12 year old going on 22, self-declared genius. What would we do without a kid who knows everything??? He's an emotional mini-me at his age. Mature beyond his years in many aspects. Caretaker. Music Man, plays electric guitar & drums. 7th grade student. Cherished firstborn. Quite the young man.
Youngest son. Brian. I call him my Boo. Brianna when he's whiny. 11 year old future special forces leader, most likely a Marine. OohRah! Emotionally a mini of his dad: soft spot is his mama and fiercely protective of all he loves. 5th grade student. Loves weaponry & war games. Very imaginative guy, artistic, and creative. Cherished "baby" of the family even if he argues that he isn't a baby anymore.
And, my big brother. Jerry. Knuckle Jerry (the boys didn't say Uncle too well when they were little). 36 year old single adoring daddy of 2 gorgeous girls. Soon-to-be-victim of Planner Extraordinaire. Intel-collector & planner-in-training. 1st real trip staying on-property. Also slated as videographer. 1st timer to DHS and AK. 1st trip back since the teen years. May as well call him a Newbie, huh? Will be planning his daughters' 1st trips for May. (photo to come...can you believe I can't find one???...I'm ashamed)
We are booked at the Contemporary with a Magic Kingdom view again Friday, January 23rd thru Sunday, February 1st. You just can't beat that location and we love contemporary architecture, even if it is retro-contemporary. We're actually going to be leaving home on Thursday the 22nd to head into Houston and stay at the LaQuinta close to Hobby Airport. Our Soutwest departure is at 6:30 on Friday. We should be arriving at MCO around 9:30. I'm guessing we'll be checking-in at the resort by about 11:00.
I'm not one to make an itinerary and flip out if we don't follow it to a T. I learned a long time ago that overplanning and unrealistic expectations make life miserable. Part of being on vacation is having fun, relaxing, and going with the flow. I run out park hours, EMHs, crowd calendars, etc. to guess-timate where we will be and make my ADRs. The only ADRs I really stick to are the prepaids or credit card guaranteed ones. Otherwise, if we change plans or won't make an ADR it's not a big deal. I call and cancel them. No problem. I'll have to show y'all my trip book sometime. I'm really proud of it considering I'm not that organized anymore. Here's our tentative daily stuff:
Friday. 1/23. Arrive! Hang out, do whatever, get a little nap considering how early we're getting up. 5:05pm ADR @ Chef Mickeys. MK this afternoon/evening. Wanna show Jerry Wishes. Feels like a good start to me.
Saturday. 1/24. It's a very Epcot day. 8:45am breakfast at Akershus. This will be a 1st for my boys. Tracey & I tried it on our anni trip and loved it. 6:45pm dinner at Biergarten. It's a family favorite. Chandler will mow you down to get to the cream cheesy cakey dessert. LOL!
Sunday. 1/25. Roarin' into AK today. We have a 10:15am brunchy meal at Tusker House. Gawd, I hope we get a quieter room this time away from the windows where there's drumming outside. If we feel up to it, evening EMHs at DHS are an option. Knowing Jerry, he'll be there with the kids and probably me. Tracey is an early to bed sort of fellow.
Monday. 1/26. Sleepin' in. AK usually wears us down so we try to build extra rest in the next morning. Back to DHS or do whatever. Dinner is at Cinderella's Royal Table at 6:50pm. I'm hopeful we'll be able to still be IN the castle for Wishes. TRacey & I did this for our anni trip also and loved the different perspective as well as the yumm-o food. Then it's evening EMH time at MK. Yaaaayyy!!!
Tuesday. 1/27. Brutal as it is, I scheduled us for 8:05am breakfast at Crystal Palace. Oh come on! It's not like it's sooooo faaaaar to walk over there. After breakfast we'll prob'ly play in the park until we can't stand it and have to go take a nap. Again. It's not like it's sooooo faaaar to go back to our room. I heart the Contemporary. Nothing planned for evening. Hhhmmmm. Maybe we'll run over to TRex. We'll wing it.
Wednesday. 1/28. DHS in the morning. We'll be in that mad rush to get to TSM. 3:55pm late lunch/early dinner at Sci-Fi. It's not my favorite eatery but the kids love it and Jerry should experience it. The theming is so incredible. I'm actually thinking I should reschedule this one for earlier lunch so we can catch a nap before heading to AK for evening EMHs. Hhhmmm...The Planner never rests...
Thursday. 1/29. Nuttin' really planned. Maybe we'll head to morning EMH at MK. Never done that before. I know where we'll be in the evening, tho! 7:45pm dinner at LeCellier. We'll be the family of mostly redheads standing outside drooling. This is our faaaaave!
Friday. 1/30. Again, no really solid plans. We can go wherever and do whatever. We have 5:40pm dinner ressies at Cape May for the clambake. THis is another of those things Tracey & I did on our anni trip that we want the boys to experience. It's a good location, too, since there's evening EMHs at Epcot. I know we won't miss that since Epcot is our family's overall favorite park.
Saturday. 1/31. Last FULL day. On our 1st family trip we started this thing where our last full day was reserved for everyone's favorites. Inevitably hitting each person's favorite attraction would create this challenging journey of twists-n-turns as we trek'd into numerous parks. I don't know if we'll still do this but it's always an option. Our last supper is planned for 5:20pm at Ohana. What a way to sum it all up, huh?
Sunday. 2/1. D-Day. Dangit, Depressing Departure Day. Icky-poo. Booooooo! Breakfast is slated for 8:15am at Chef Mickey's. Our flight home is at 2:30pm. We will NOT use Magical Express back out to the airport. Tracey and I didn't like waiting for our scheduled bus which is so far before the flight. We didn't like the depressing ride back to the airport. The video on the bus made me cry. So we'll be taking a limo. Yeah, it's money we don't have to spend but we feel like it'll be more bearable if we can leave when we want to, not make additional resort stops, not watch depressing videos, have a treat with a cool limo, and have that quiet transition time out to the airport to disconnect from Disney-time and start moving back to reality. We should be arriving back in Houston by 4:30pm which puts us back in our Texas home by 6:30pm.
So there ya have it! I'll be updating more as our departure approaches. For now I better get my booty in gear and start cleaning up the Christmas explosion in our house and start ramping up with the pre-packing, organizing, etc.
Wow. 3 weeks from today we'll BE home again! Yaaaaayyyyy!!!!!
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