Hi all, I'd llike to start off with this is my first trip report so please be kind. I've enjoyed reading many reports over the past 2 years and hope you all enjoy mine 
I'll start off with a little info about my family. There is Chris (39) my husband, myself Lisa (34), Christian (14), Ben (7), Sam (5) and Emily (2, will be 3 in September). I have been to WDW as a child, my grandparents used to take me to visit family in Florida alot and they took me. My dh's first visit was with myself and our older son in 2002, he is not a crazed Disney fan like myself but I can tell that I am wearing him down, lol. When we went to WDW in 2002 I was pregnant with our second son and I promised Christian (then 6) that we would go back when Ben was 4, well then Sam came along and then Emily so our trip kept getting pushed back. Finally last year I decided we couldn't wait any longer so we went when the kids were 13, 6, 4 and almost 2. My kids quickly became Disney addicts and now we are planning to take a trip every year if possible.
Here's a picture of us from trip.
I should note that throughout this report you'll notice that there are very few pictures of my children all looking at me at the same time, I was frustrated at first because of course I wanted to get that perfect shot but by the second day I gave up and just took what I could get, lol.
On with the report, we had to decided to drive this year because we wanted to have our car with us while in WDW and our kids seemed to do really well driving back last year. Last year we took the autotrain down to Florida but our return train was cancelled due to flooding caused by Tropical Storm Fay so we had my mil and oldest ds fly home and dh and I drove home with the little ones. That worked well for us so we had my mil and ds fly again and dh and I drove. We left on Thursday August 13th around 9am, dh wanted to miss the rush hour traffic around DC and it worked well for us, we didn't encounter any traffic at all on our way down.
Sam and Ben
Emily
DH
My dh likes to drive while I entertain the kids so he drove the whole time, we stopped a few times for lunch, dinner, gas and potty breaks and thought we might make it down to Orlando but dh was tired so we finally stopped for the night around 10pm about an hour and a half outside of Orlando. We got a room at The Quality Inn, $40 for the night, figured it couldn't be too bad as it was a Quality Inn. Wasn't horrible but definately could not do more than one night there. I was awoken by my cell phone ringing at 5am, it was my ds to tell me that their car wasn't at the house yet to pick them up to go to the airport. I had arranged for a towncar to take them to and from the airport with a friend who owns a limo business. My mil had called the guy and got no answer and I then called the guys home phone and got no answer as well. So panic is setting in at my house because my mil hates to fly and she's stressing that they will miss their flight which was at 6:50am. Finally the guy gets there around 20 after 5am (a very long 20 minutes late), luckily we live only 15 minutes from BWI airport so they got there in plenty of time. At this point my 3 younger ones had woken up from dh and I talking and since we were all so excited to get to WDW we all got dressed were on our way by 6am.
We got in to Orlando about 7:30, stopped at Perkins and had a good breakfast. Then although it was only around 8:30 we decided to head over Pop Century. I checked us in, they told us they would text us when our room was ready, so we decided to tour the grounds a little and take a swim in the Hippy Dippy pool.
My ds called us around 9:15 to let us know that their plane had landed, we told them that we were at the pool and to call us when they got on the ME. They got to Pop about 10:00 (they had a hard time finding the ME at the airport), after my mil checked in we went to the food court because my ds and mil hadn't had time to eat at the airport, so they ate while we got the kids a snack and got our mugs. By the time we were done we got a text letting us know our room was ready so we all headed over there. We had requested adjoining, ground floor rooms, in a preferred location close to food court and parking lots (my ds Ben is physically delayed so he just started walking on his own this past year and cannot walk too far without needing help). We got a great location but our rooms were not connecting ( I never knew there was a difference between adjoinging and connecting), but we were happy with what we got because we were close to everything, we were in the 70's right across from the playground, very close to the 90's parking lot, foodcourt and Hippy Dippy pool. I was a little worried about hearing alot of noise from people passing our room being on the ground floor but it was actually pretty quiet.
My mil and ds got into their swimsuits and we went back to the pool for a while, then we went back to our rooms, showered changed and relaxed a little, then it was off to DTD!
I'll start off with a little info about my family. There is Chris (39) my husband, myself Lisa (34), Christian (14), Ben (7), Sam (5) and Emily (2, will be 3 in September). I have been to WDW as a child, my grandparents used to take me to visit family in Florida alot and they took me. My dh's first visit was with myself and our older son in 2002, he is not a crazed Disney fan like myself but I can tell that I am wearing him down, lol. When we went to WDW in 2002 I was pregnant with our second son and I promised Christian (then 6) that we would go back when Ben was 4, well then Sam came along and then Emily so our trip kept getting pushed back. Finally last year I decided we couldn't wait any longer so we went when the kids were 13, 6, 4 and almost 2. My kids quickly became Disney addicts and now we are planning to take a trip every year if possible.
Here's a picture of us from trip.
I should note that throughout this report you'll notice that there are very few pictures of my children all looking at me at the same time, I was frustrated at first because of course I wanted to get that perfect shot but by the second day I gave up and just took what I could get, lol.
On with the report, we had to decided to drive this year because we wanted to have our car with us while in WDW and our kids seemed to do really well driving back last year. Last year we took the autotrain down to Florida but our return train was cancelled due to flooding caused by Tropical Storm Fay so we had my mil and oldest ds fly home and dh and I drove home with the little ones. That worked well for us so we had my mil and ds fly again and dh and I drove. We left on Thursday August 13th around 9am, dh wanted to miss the rush hour traffic around DC and it worked well for us, we didn't encounter any traffic at all on our way down.
Sam and Ben
Emily
DH
My dh likes to drive while I entertain the kids so he drove the whole time, we stopped a few times for lunch, dinner, gas and potty breaks and thought we might make it down to Orlando but dh was tired so we finally stopped for the night around 10pm about an hour and a half outside of Orlando. We got a room at The Quality Inn, $40 for the night, figured it couldn't be too bad as it was a Quality Inn. Wasn't horrible but definately could not do more than one night there. I was awoken by my cell phone ringing at 5am, it was my ds to tell me that their car wasn't at the house yet to pick them up to go to the airport. I had arranged for a towncar to take them to and from the airport with a friend who owns a limo business. My mil had called the guy and got no answer and I then called the guys home phone and got no answer as well. So panic is setting in at my house because my mil hates to fly and she's stressing that they will miss their flight which was at 6:50am. Finally the guy gets there around 20 after 5am (a very long 20 minutes late), luckily we live only 15 minutes from BWI airport so they got there in plenty of time. At this point my 3 younger ones had woken up from dh and I talking and since we were all so excited to get to WDW we all got dressed were on our way by 6am.
We got in to Orlando about 7:30, stopped at Perkins and had a good breakfast. Then although it was only around 8:30 we decided to head over Pop Century. I checked us in, they told us they would text us when our room was ready, so we decided to tour the grounds a little and take a swim in the Hippy Dippy pool.
My ds called us around 9:15 to let us know that their plane had landed, we told them that we were at the pool and to call us when they got on the ME. They got to Pop about 10:00 (they had a hard time finding the ME at the airport), after my mil checked in we went to the food court because my ds and mil hadn't had time to eat at the airport, so they ate while we got the kids a snack and got our mugs. By the time we were done we got a text letting us know our room was ready so we all headed over there. We had requested adjoining, ground floor rooms, in a preferred location close to food court and parking lots (my ds Ben is physically delayed so he just started walking on his own this past year and cannot walk too far without needing help). We got a great location but our rooms were not connecting ( I never knew there was a difference between adjoinging and connecting), but we were happy with what we got because we were close to everything, we were in the 70's right across from the playground, very close to the 90's parking lot, foodcourt and Hippy Dippy pool. I was a little worried about hearing alot of noise from people passing our room being on the ground floor but it was actually pretty quiet.
My mil and ds got into their swimsuits and we went back to the pool for a while, then we went back to our rooms, showered changed and relaxed a little, then it was off to DTD!
