Hi everyone! I am so excited to finally be writing my trip report! The Christmas hustle & bustle has just been crazy since we got back and I'm still struggling to catch up!! We just had the most wonderous, glorious, magical, Disney trip! This trip was myself, my husband, and our daughter Sage. Sage was just a few weeks shy of her 4th birthday for this trip. We were there from Saturday 11/29 through Sunday 12/7. My husband Nick and I have been twice together prior to having Sage, once in 2008 and once in 2009, but this was her first trip!!
A little bit of back story- I work as a dance teacher and as a nanny so I am with little kids (especially girls) all day long. I see the change in girls around when they go to Kindergarten, they start to lose that 'everything is magical' , princess loving attitude and are much more influenced by older kids/shows/products. After Sage was born, I told my husband it was super, super important to me that we make it to Disney before her 5th birthday. I just really wanted to experience a magical trip through her eyes. We went through a bit of a financial struggle right after she was born (we have terrible health insurance and the bills we got from my pregnancy, labor and delivery were unbelievable) but we worked really hard to save for this trip. This trip was literally, five years in the making.
Finally, last March, we officially booked our trip. I had always wanted to go around Christmas time to see the decorations and special offerings so picking our dates was easy. The hubs only request, that we stay on budget as much as possible! I really wanted to stay at Art of Animation in a Little Mermaid room but, hubs said no, so, in an effort to save some money, we went with Pop Century.
Another way we tried to save money was by packing our own food from home. I packed bread (in a shoe box so it wouldn't get crushed), PB & J, Nutella, granola bars, dried fruit & nuts, small cereal boxes, juice, drink mix ins and tons of snacks. I also bought us all Hydro Flask water bottles so we could pack our own icy cold drinks every day. And, once again with our budget in mind, we left SUPER early on our arrival day, because that flight was the cheapest. Which brings me to.....
Saturday 11/29: Day 1
Our flight was leaving Providence at 6:05am (!) We let Sage travel in her PJs so we literally rolled her out of bed and into the car. We thought we gave ourselves plenty of time but the airport was surprisingly busy. We waited for quite a while both checking our bags and going through security. We had a mid B boarding pass for Southwest, but when we got to the gate, they had already loaded A's and B's and were almost on the C's. We basically ran (well fast walked) from security straight onto the plane. Thankfully, we found 3 seats together.
This was Sage's 1st flight and she handled it like a pro. I had bought lots of small toys, crafts, books etc at the dollar store and walmart before we left, both for the plane and for waiting in line. My mom also bought her a Kindle Fire for her birthday and gave it to her before we left. So she had books and games on there too. She never once complained or whined and just happily played. So that was a relief!
We actually landed a few minutes early, which is always awesome! Everyone has this picture, right?
Even though we were taking the Magical Express, we decided to get our bags ourselves. I just knew that if I had a certain outfit for Sage in our carry on, once we got to the hotel, she would suddenly change her mind and insist on something else. I'm sure anyone with a 3 year old understands Now, getting our bags, and getting to the Magical Express was ridonkulous. Longest walk ever. Tram rides, down escalators, up elevators. All while pushing Sage in a stroller, carrying 3 carry ons and eventually, pulling 3 big suitcases. Holy cow. We were exhausted.
So, we finally get to Pop Century a little before 11am (not bad at all!!) Stepping off the bus onto Disney property is just the best feeling ever. The Pop Century cast members were blowing bubbles and waving their giant Mickey hands. Everyone was so friendly and happy. I got in the check in line, Nick wandered a little with Sage. I was super excited to get the exact location I requested, 50's building, lake side. Look at our gorgeous view-
Sage was so excited to check out our comfy beds!
I will talk more about my overall Pop thoughts later, but I have to say, we LOVED it!!! It's so beautiful. The grounds, the attention to detail, the larger than life statues. So welcoming and kid friendly. The pools are gorgeous. I miss Pop Century....
So, we got Sage dressed (finally) and first off, we needed food!!! We had left our house around 4:30am, thinking we would have plenty of time to grab some Dunks at the airport but with all the rushing, we had no extra time at all. So here it was 11am, and the only thing we had eaten was the pretzels on the plane! So we made our way to the food court.
Stopped to see Lady
So our room was actually in the building behind Tramp and sadly, I never got a picture of him! So weird too, cause I take pictures of everything Every morning walking to the elevator we would say good morning to Tramp's butt. And then good night to Tramp's butt on our way back. So sad I never got a picture!
Sage with the Pop Christmas Tree
So we got our lunch, and our refillable mugs and then went back up to the room. I unpacked our stuff and then the plan was to rest, but crazy enough, our FP times were fast approaching so we pretty much had to get ready to go. We were planning on heading to MK that day. We knew it would be busy, being the Saturday after Thanksgiving, but Sage of course really wanted to go there first. Our 3 FPs were for Splash, Thunder (Sage's picks, she wanted to ride them first!) and Haunted Mansion (my pick since it would be closed the rest of our trip). My goal was the accomplish those 3 things, see the parade, meet Tiana, and maybe do one other thing in the Frontierland/Liberty Square area.
So before we left, we had to do a few things with our tickets. It's kind of confusing but basically, we bought a 6 day base ticket for each of us. We have a family member who works for ESPN and he was able to get each of us a one day park hopper. My husband works for CBS and he was able to get two 1-day media passes. So, myself and Nick had a total of 8 days but Sage only had 7. So we had to add an extra day to her ticket, and we also had to assign the hopper pass to the last day of our trip. We were told we could do that either at guest relations in any park or at the hotel concierge. The line for the concierge was so, so long and of course, they had no clue how to do what we needed.
So, we went out to the bus stop as luck would have it, the MK bus took FOREVER. I forget what time it was, but I remember I was really nervous we wouldn't have time to do our ticket business and make our first FP time. I wanted to do the ticket stuff first because I didn't want our band to use the hopper ticket on our first day when I knew we would not be hopping.
So, I got on my phone to try and change our FP times. A note that I discovered at this time, the Disney wifi would only work in our room at Pop Century. I tried many times throughout the week to use it at the bus stop, and in the parks and it NEVER worked. So frustrating. Also frustrating, I wish there was an option to bump all 3 FPs back by one hour. I couldn't move our Splash FP without first moving the other 2. I was able to bump back HM, but there were no times left for BTMR before like 9pm. So, I had to keep all 3 of our original times.
So, we finally get to MK (yay!!) and the guest services line is like a mile long. There's no way we would make our 1st FP if we waited. So we had to risk it, and enter the park.
Gorgeous!!
I had a plan to surprise Sage the first time she saw Cinderella's castle. So Nick went in a little ahead of us, I carried Sage, covering her eyes. Once we were on Main St, I uncovered eyes to reveal the castle. Nick took a video so here is a screen grab from it
Awesome right? We were jumping up and down screaming, we're here, we're here! We finally made it!!!! It was all so surreal. The entire trip was actually. I had literally been planning this trip, financially, in my mind, on paper, for five years. It was so strange that it was actually HERE. If that makes sense
I'll add more in a little bit!
A little bit of back story- I work as a dance teacher and as a nanny so I am with little kids (especially girls) all day long. I see the change in girls around when they go to Kindergarten, they start to lose that 'everything is magical' , princess loving attitude and are much more influenced by older kids/shows/products. After Sage was born, I told my husband it was super, super important to me that we make it to Disney before her 5th birthday. I just really wanted to experience a magical trip through her eyes. We went through a bit of a financial struggle right after she was born (we have terrible health insurance and the bills we got from my pregnancy, labor and delivery were unbelievable) but we worked really hard to save for this trip. This trip was literally, five years in the making.
Finally, last March, we officially booked our trip. I had always wanted to go around Christmas time to see the decorations and special offerings so picking our dates was easy. The hubs only request, that we stay on budget as much as possible! I really wanted to stay at Art of Animation in a Little Mermaid room but, hubs said no, so, in an effort to save some money, we went with Pop Century.
Another way we tried to save money was by packing our own food from home. I packed bread (in a shoe box so it wouldn't get crushed), PB & J, Nutella, granola bars, dried fruit & nuts, small cereal boxes, juice, drink mix ins and tons of snacks. I also bought us all Hydro Flask water bottles so we could pack our own icy cold drinks every day. And, once again with our budget in mind, we left SUPER early on our arrival day, because that flight was the cheapest. Which brings me to.....
Saturday 11/29: Day 1
Our flight was leaving Providence at 6:05am (!) We let Sage travel in her PJs so we literally rolled her out of bed and into the car. We thought we gave ourselves plenty of time but the airport was surprisingly busy. We waited for quite a while both checking our bags and going through security. We had a mid B boarding pass for Southwest, but when we got to the gate, they had already loaded A's and B's and were almost on the C's. We basically ran (well fast walked) from security straight onto the plane. Thankfully, we found 3 seats together.
This was Sage's 1st flight and she handled it like a pro. I had bought lots of small toys, crafts, books etc at the dollar store and walmart before we left, both for the plane and for waiting in line. My mom also bought her a Kindle Fire for her birthday and gave it to her before we left. So she had books and games on there too. She never once complained or whined and just happily played. So that was a relief!
We actually landed a few minutes early, which is always awesome! Everyone has this picture, right?
Even though we were taking the Magical Express, we decided to get our bags ourselves. I just knew that if I had a certain outfit for Sage in our carry on, once we got to the hotel, she would suddenly change her mind and insist on something else. I'm sure anyone with a 3 year old understands
Now, getting our bags, and getting to the Magical Express was ridonkulous. Longest walk ever. Tram rides, down escalators, up elevators. All while pushing Sage in a stroller, carrying 3 carry ons and eventually, pulling 3 big suitcases. Holy cow. We were exhausted.So, we finally get to Pop Century a little before 11am (not bad at all!!) Stepping off the bus onto Disney property is just the best feeling ever. The Pop Century cast members were blowing bubbles and waving their giant Mickey hands. Everyone was so friendly and happy. I got in the check in line, Nick wandered a little with Sage. I was super excited to get the exact location I requested, 50's building, lake side. Look at our gorgeous view-
Sage was so excited to check out our comfy beds!
I will talk more about my overall Pop thoughts later, but I have to say, we LOVED it!!! It's so beautiful. The grounds, the attention to detail, the larger than life statues. So welcoming and kid friendly. The pools are gorgeous. I miss Pop Century....
So, we got Sage dressed (finally) and first off, we needed food!!! We had left our house around 4:30am, thinking we would have plenty of time to grab some Dunks at the airport but with all the rushing, we had no extra time at all. So here it was 11am, and the only thing we had eaten was the pretzels on the plane! So we made our way to the food court.
Stopped to see Lady
So our room was actually in the building behind Tramp and sadly, I never got a picture of him! So weird too, cause I take pictures of everything
Every morning walking to the elevator we would say good morning to Tramp's butt. And then good night to Tramp's butt on our way back. So sad I never got a picture!Sage with the Pop Christmas Tree
So we got our lunch, and our refillable mugs and then went back up to the room. I unpacked our stuff and then the plan was to rest, but crazy enough, our FP times were fast approaching so we pretty much had to get ready to go. We were planning on heading to MK that day. We knew it would be busy, being the Saturday after Thanksgiving, but Sage of course really wanted to go there first. Our 3 FPs were for Splash, Thunder (Sage's picks, she wanted to ride them first!) and Haunted Mansion (my pick since it would be closed the rest of our trip). My goal was the accomplish those 3 things, see the parade, meet Tiana, and maybe do one other thing in the Frontierland/Liberty Square area.
So before we left, we had to do a few things with our tickets. It's kind of confusing but basically, we bought a 6 day base ticket for each of us. We have a family member who works for ESPN and he was able to get each of us a one day park hopper. My husband works for CBS and he was able to get two 1-day media passes. So, myself and Nick had a total of 8 days but Sage only had 7. So we had to add an extra day to her ticket, and we also had to assign the hopper pass to the last day of our trip. We were told we could do that either at guest relations in any park or at the hotel concierge. The line for the concierge was so, so long and of course, they had no clue how to do what we needed.
So, we went out to the bus stop as luck would have it, the MK bus took FOREVER. I forget what time it was, but I remember I was really nervous we wouldn't have time to do our ticket business and make our first FP time. I wanted to do the ticket stuff first because I didn't want our band to use the hopper ticket on our first day when I knew we would not be hopping.
So, I got on my phone to try and change our FP times. A note that I discovered at this time, the Disney wifi would only work in our room at Pop Century. I tried many times throughout the week to use it at the bus stop, and in the parks and it NEVER worked. So frustrating. Also frustrating, I wish there was an option to bump all 3 FPs back by one hour. I couldn't move our Splash FP without first moving the other 2. I was able to bump back HM, but there were no times left for BTMR before like 9pm. So, I had to keep all 3 of our original times.
So, we finally get to MK (yay!!) and the guest services line is like a mile long. There's no way we would make our 1st FP if we waited. So we had to risk it, and enter the park.
Gorgeous!!
I had a plan to surprise Sage the first time she saw Cinderella's castle. So Nick went in a little ahead of us, I carried Sage, covering her eyes. Once we were on Main St, I uncovered eyes to reveal the castle. Nick took a video so here is a screen grab from it
Awesome right? We were jumping up and down screaming, we're here, we're here! We finally made it!!!! It was all so surreal. The entire trip was actually. I had literally been planning this trip, financially, in my mind, on paper, for five years. It was so strange that it was actually HERE. If that makes sense
I'll add more in a little bit!
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