A Dream Is A Wish Your Heart Makes: A March 2011 Disney Wedding/Honeymoon Trip Report

Woo Hoo!

Wednesday, March 16: Travel

Between work responsibilities and last minute packing/planning, the week leading up to our departure was extremely hectic and crazy. In fact, since the first of the year our lives have been so crazy that by this point, I was just super excited to have 12 uninterrupted days to spend with Brett.

Due to Brett’s schedule we didn’t hit the road until 11:30am on Wednesday morning. A couple of hours later his parents called to tell us they’d checked into the Polynesian and were assigned the Samoa longhouse... with a view of the Nanea Volcano pool. Ahhh, it was killing me to be so close, yet so far away!

As we do with many of our trips, after booking our dates, we found a way to leave the previous evening and booked a stay offsite (via priceline) for the night. My parents pricelined a place as well, and we all ended up at the same Radisson in Kissimmee. They checked in a couple hours before us and I gave them directions to get over to Downtown Disney. Bear in mind this was my dad’s first trip and only my mom’s second (if you can call a quick two day jaunt a trip).

We checked in around 7:45pm, unloaded our stuff, and made our way over to DTD. My parents called to say it was incredibly packed, so we just pulled into the first parking spot we saw near Cirque and hightailed it through Westside, past the defunct Pleasure Island, and over to the other side of the Marketplace to meet my parents at the Rainforest Café. When checking in they were told the wait for a four top would be 1 hour and 40 minutes. I guess in my “everything revolves around the wedding” world, I totally forgot that we would be dealing with spring break crowds. Brett’s parents had the right idea when they decided to forego our offer of meeting up for dinner. To pass the time, the four of us wandered around the shop, where I found proof of the madness:



Eventually, after almost an hour, we bailed on the Rainforest because the line at the Earl had dwindled enough to where we could grab a table and actually sit down once we had our food.



We devoured our sandwiches and talked about how crazy packed DTD was, before Brett pointed out how hungry I must’ve been because I didn’t take a picture of our meals. :lol: I won’t let that happen again, my friends, not again.

Fighting our way through the crowds sounded like an exhausting way to spend the evening, and to be quite honest we were all tired from the long drive, so we decided to head back to the room and get some much needed sleep. The festivities would truly start the next morning!

erstwo said:

woo hoo!

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Yay!!!!

erstwo said:

Woo Hoo!

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I second that!!! :sohappy:

Thursday, March 17: Check in/DHS/Spirit of Aloha Dinner Show

We checked out of the Radisson by 7:15am and made our way over to the Polynesian Resort. I was so incredibly excited when we pulled up to the guard shack and told the security officer that we were checking in! Two stays at the Poly within seven months of one another is not to be taken for granted. I just couldn’t wait for my parents to experience it. It was one of those humid, muggy mornings, but you could just tell the sun was going to burn off the haze soon enough!



Things were kind of hectic as we were unloading our cars. Brett’s family was at the Poly entrance to greet us and provide us with a key, so we could store some things in their room if ours wasn’t ready yet (there was no way I was leaving my dress with bell services). As a wedding gift to us, they paid for our stay at the Polynesian and probably got sick of me thanking them profusely, but I just couldn’t help myself! Add to that, I was all flustered because they had breakfast reservations at GFC, and because I was running a bit late it meant that they might be late for their reservation. I absolutely hate to inconvenience others. All of this made for a rather stressful start to the morning, which is telling when I look at my pictures and see that I didn’t take a single one that morning until breakfast. Luckily my mom took a couple...



The personalized wedding dress garment bag is one of my mom’s creations... isn’t it just lovely?! It was kind of funny because Brett was carrying it at one point and yet he wasn’t allowed to look at it. Of course, I had taken precautionary measures just in case anyone got any ideas :lookaroun ... the dress was double bagged! We put the dress in the garment bag the bridal store gave us, and then put that bag into the homemade one backwards, so if anyone tried to peak they would only see the back of another garment bag, and to get to it from there you would’ve had to totally take it out of the exterior bag because the zipper for the secondary bag was facing the other way. :lol: I’m evil, but I didn’t want anyone’s curiosity to get the better of them.



Things seemed to be all over the place as we were checking in. Initially (probably because I was holding the wedding dress), the CMs were trying to find us a room that was already ready. I let them know they didn’t have to go to all that trouble, as Brett’s parents already had a room and we’d just store it in there until our room was ready. It continued to take a while as they were processing both our room and my parents. We overheard the two CMs, Duane and David, quietly trying to find an “ultimate” room – sounded promising, although I have no clue what it really meant. I guess that ended up not being a possibility because they assigned both my parents and us to rooms in Fiji right next door to one another on the ground floor. For some reason they just assumed we would want to be right next to each other.

We discussed the room arrangement as we were taking our stuff to Kathy’s room, and it didn’t really work for us for a couple of reasons. One, the plan was for me to get ready in my parents room while Brett used our room and two, being on the ground floor was going to really hinder the amount of natural light coming through the windows. With the Polynesian’s dark room décor, this wasn’t the best scenario for photography and makeup. Not to mention, being right next to your parents (or in-laws!) on your wedding night has its own implications. :lol:

So we did something that we’ve never done before... we went back to the desk and asked for a different room. Now, we’re of the “take what you get” mentality, and choose to let fate work itself out when it comes to room assignments at the World. I felt bad even asking, but when I explained that we would like to be on the second or third floor so there would be some natural light while getting ready, they went to work to find us a new room.



They moved us to a second floor room over in Tahiti, the longhouse closest to the TTC. Because they moved us and not my parents, we decided that I would be getting ready in our room and Brett would just have to take his stuff over to his parents room to get ready on the morning of the wedding.

At some point during all of this, the CM pulled out the “Celebrating” and “Happily Ever After” buttons to give us. We were in luck, because he followed those with the “Just Married” buttons I coveted. YAY! I was holding my breath in anticipation of these buttons because I had read that the Poly was one of the few resorts that still had them in stock. Sounds silly, but apparently they are being completely phased out and replaced with the “Happily Ever After” ones. I think this is crap, mostly because the term “Happily Ever After” doesn’t necessarily mean that you just got married.

So, here’s a quick visual reference on where we each were. Fiji – my parents, Samoa – Brett’s family, Tahiti – Brett and I:



With all the room arrangements settled, we headed off to Captain Cook’s for a quick bite to eat. Mmmm... Tonga Toast and Mickey waffles!

HOORAY! :sohappy: So glad you're posting this!!

I didn't want to mention it before, but I have been wondering if you're having the post-wedding/honeymoon blues at all...I know I sure did. Just know that you're not alone, my friend. :wave:

LOVE the garment bag. What a great idea from your mom! And all your precautions to make sure the dress stayed a secret are hilarious.

Needless to say, I CANNOT wait for more!

*dances*..

we leave for the Dream in 19 days..YAY!

HouCuseChickie said:

I second that!!! :sohappy:

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Woohoo!! :sohappy:

Ariel484 said:

HOORAY! :sohappy: So glad you're posting this!!

I didn't want to mention it before, but I have been wondering if you're having the post-wedding/honeymoon blues at all...I know I sure did. Just know that you're not alone, my friend. :wave:

LOVE the garment bag. What a great idea from your mom! And all your precautions to make sure the dress stayed a secret are hilarious.

Needless to say, I CANNOT wait for more!

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Oh yeah, Shannon, I'm totally there! It's really nice to hear that I'm not alone in it though. It's definitely why it's taken me so long to get the report started, and I knew I needed to have everything up through the wedding written before I put up the first post because I didn't want to get stuck and leave everyone completely hanging. :lol:

And yeah, my mom is a creative genius!

maggiegrace1 said:

*dances*..

we leave for the Dream in 19 days..YAY!

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Oooh, how exciting!!! I hope to be in the middle of the cruise portion by then, but if you have any Dream-specific questions before I get there, please ask. By the way, love the new avatar!

Hooray! It begins!

P.S. I can't wait for my cupcakes! NOM NOM!

Ahhhh....Tonga Toast. Makes me miss Kona Cafe.

I completely feel you on the letdown after a wedding. Just wait till you have a baby...it's so tough for the whole world to revolve around the pregnant woman, then all the sudden you don't matter at all! Not that I was jealous of the baby...he was of course so precious...but it's hard to know what to do with yourself when you are no longer the pregnant one.

We found that post-honeymoon, scheduling some fun weekend outings helped...like going hiking or taking a short trip. But knowing how hard it is to recover from a Disney trip, I can't even imagine how hard it is to go back to normal life after a Disney wedding! It took me at least 6 weeks to get over being down after our trip this year! Maybe the best therapy is obsessively planning the next trip. That's what got me through. Oh, and buying DVC. :lol:

Yay!! It started!! And I'm already fascinated!!

I'm so sorry you have the post Disney blues. They have got to be the hardest when it was that kind of a trip!

After breakfast the four of us hopped in the car and took off for DHS, where we found a long line of cars waiting to get through the gates and then an insanely huge line of people trying to make their way through bag check. Seriously, the back of the line was almost down at the boat dock. I’ve honestly never seen such a huge bag check line. The spring break crowds were really throwing me for a loop. I had to remind myself that this wasn’t a commando park hopping trip, but a wedding trip. Still it was hard to do, seeing as how my dad had never been before and I wanted it to be a good experience all around.

Once through the bag check we had to exchange our vouchers for APs. In the chaos that was Downtown Disney the previous evening we forgot to take care of this. It was rather quick and painless though.



The first stop once inside the park was Guest Services. Time to renew our trusty Tables in Wonderland card! We sorted that out quickly enough and then headed down Hollywood Boulevard. I’m certain I take this exact shot every time I walk into the Studios; however, even though I know this, it isn’t enough to stop me from taking it time and again...







Brett took the fastpasses and booked it to TSMM, while the three of us strolled along. His efforts were futile though because it was approximately 9:15am when we entered the park, and by the time he got to Pixar Place the FP return time was something like 2:00pm. Oh well... no Midway Mania for us on the first leg of our trip.

In an effort to avoid crazy ride lines, we decided to take it easy and head to the 10:00am showing of the Indy Stunt Spectacular. It had been way too long since I’d seen it and I thought it was a show that my dad would enjoy.

Brett was able to get in touch with his family as they were making their way over to DHS and they joined us for the show.









I love the one extra in the back; he was really into his role:





The “plant” is always so easy to spot, even at the very beginning... but we had fun watching him all the same.





After the show we all stood around kind of discussing what to do next, which tends to happen when you have a sizeable group. Normally I would “go with the flow,” but in this particular instance I had plans to meet up with a couple of very important characters. For quite some time I’ve had it in my head that it would be fun to have Minnie Mouse and Daisy Duck sign my wedding flip flops that I’d be wearing after the ceremony. And I had no intention of missing out on the opportunity, as it would likely be my only chance all day. Brett’s family wasn’t really interested in doing this, and I felt a little rude for splitting off from them just after we’d met back up, but there was no way I was leaving the park without my signatures. I think in this next picture I may have been trying to justify my reason for wanting to meet the characters, as I point to my flops that are in the bag Brett is holding.



Just a note to future brides... I chose the shirt I’m wearing specifically for its sleeves. And I’m really glad I did because the sun was out in full force and the last thing I wanted was to have crazy tank top lines on my wedding day.

We had some time before the next character set, but we knew with the current crowds if we wanted to meet both Minnie and Daisy we’d have to be the first people in one of the lines. So we took off for the hat...



We set up camp at the edge where Donald and Daisy usually do meet and greets, hoping they hadn’t switched them around. :lol: Funny, I know. It’s the only time I’ve ever wished that Disney NOT switch up the characters. How ironic would it be if this was the first time in years that they made a change? There was a family behind us who’s cute little 4-year old was whining and carrying on about meeting Daisy Duck. The father looked at my dad, sighed and said “That’s my little princess,” to which my dad replied with “That’s mine,” as he pointed at me. As if to say, “Don’t expect it to change anytime soon, my friend.”

I’ve never had anything signed by the characters so this was a fun new experience for me.



Donald was none too happy that he wasn’t involved in the shoe signing, and made one last play before I became a married woman.



Going so far as to dance with me...

HollyBelle said:

Oooh, how exciting!!! I hope to be in the middle of the cruise portion by then, but if you have any Dream-specific questions before I get there, please ask. By the way, love the new avatar!

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I may have some..Thanks....and yes,best part of our last trip..riding the teacups with Alice and the WR..I cried!..

After meeting the ducks, we quickly ran over to hop in Minnie Mouse’s line. Luckily we got there before the CM cut it off. Dad, who appears to have become our pack mule, went off in search of a coke for us and then found a nice railing to lean against:



Soon enough we were at the front of the line and Minnie was all excited to sign my flop.



However, she became even more excited when she noticed the Minnie Mouse camera strap around Brett’s neck as he was snapping photos. When we told her my mom made it she shooed me aside and gave all her love to mom. :lol:

“Forget you, Holly, this is my new BFF over here!”





Tell me I'm not mistaken... look who's getting all the love here, I'm just an afterthought:



I’ve just got to say, I’m so incredibly glad we took the time to get the flip flops signed. I adore them. Not that I’ll ever wear them again, but still, they’re just so darn cute.

We made our way to the Muppet Courtyard after that with plans of watching Muppetvision 3D. On our way we called Brett’s family to see if they wanted to meet back up with us for lunch. Turns out, they’d just left the Studios and were headed to the ESPN Club to get a bite to eat, so we decided to make our way out of the park and join them.

On the way out we noticed a little St. Patty’s Day love on the Streets of America:



We said goodbye to the Studios and hopped a tram. So long Studios, next time we see you we'll be married.

We met up with Brett’s fam outside the ESPN Club and wandered in to find a seat. Now, I’m not really a fan of the ESPN Club. I find the food to be just okay, and seeing as how I’m not a major sports junkie, the atmosphere doesn’t really appeal to me either. I think its greatest asset is its location on the Boardwalk, but that can be enjoyed with or without the ESPN Club. :lookaroun



Derek ordered a Guinness in celebration of the day. That’s one beer this beer snob won’t go anywhere near these days! It may or may not have something to do with one too many “car bombs” in college. :animwink: :lol:



Brett had the buffalo chicken sandwich:



And I think everyone else had burgers. Even though my mom and I split the meal, they brought us each a full basket of fries, which was nice:



Lunch kinda took forever. I think the server was taking her time because she assumed we would want to sit back and enjoy watching the NCAA basketball tournament. In fairness to her, that’s probably what the majority of people want to do at the ESPN Club, so I get it. Unfortunately though, by the time we got our bills and got out of there it was really too late for us to hit up another park. I wanted to go to the Animal Kingdom for a little bit that afternoon; however, there just wasn’t enough time. I wouldn’t normally have cared too much, but I wanted my parents to experience at least a little bit of each park. I guess it’s a good thing I talked them into buying annual passes.


Up next... we get settled at the Poly and have a "rehearsal dinner" at Luau Cove. :sohappy:

Brett said:

Hooray! It begins!

P.S. I can't wait for my cupcakes! NOM NOM!

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:lol: **evil laugh**
No cupcakes for you! :kiss:

becanya said:

Ahhhh....Tonga Toast. Makes me miss Kona Cafe.

I completely feel you on the letdown after a wedding. Just wait till you have a baby...it's so tough for the whole world to revolve around the pregnant woman, then all the sudden you don't matter at all! Not that I was jealous of the baby...he was of course so precious...but it's hard to know what to do with yourself when you are no longer the pregnant one.

We found that post-honeymoon, scheduling some fun weekend outings helped...like going hiking or taking a short trip. But knowing how hard it is to recover from a Disney trip, I can't even imagine how hard it is to go back to normal life after a Disney wedding! It took me at least 6 weeks to get over being down after our trip this year! Maybe the best therapy is obsessively planning the next trip. That's what got me through. Oh, and buying DVC. :lol:

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I can only imagine what it will be like after having a baby, especially after dealing with these post wedding blues. I can definitely see where you are coming from. I keep telling myself how we're the luckiest people ever for even having the opportunity to get married at Disney. But it's still hard to shake the fact that it's over.

It's funny you mention planning short trips and fun things to do on the weekends to help get over the letdown of such an amazing milestone. We did just that... just a couple weeks ago we booked a quick last minute trip back to Disney for the upcoming Pixar Weekend. :sohappy: I love that buying DVC got you through it - too bad we're not there yet financially. :lol: Because I'd be all over that suggestion!

As for the Tonga Toast... we do a lot of sit down meals and rarely do I think their counter service counterparts can deliver, but I have to say, the Tonga Toast at Captain Cook's is just as good as that found upstairs. And it's a few dollars cheaper. :sohappy:

Disneyfalcon said:

Yay!! It started!! And I'm already fascinated!!

I'm so sorry you have the post Disney blues. They have got to be the hardest when it was that kind of a trip!

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Definitely true. It's funny because I was bracing myself for it before we even left for the trip. I knew it was coming and yet that didn't really make it any easier... it still hit me like a ton of bricks!

maggiegrace1 said:

I may have some..Thanks....and yes,best part of our last trip..riding the teacups with Alice and the WR..I cried!..

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I can totally see why... that is a seriously magical moment!