Katie and Kellan's Disneymoon PTR - Updated 8/16

Sunstar

Mouseketeer
Joined
Apr 10, 2006
Hello, and welcome to my very first pre-trip report! I’ve been lurking on the DIS for quite some time, making comments and occasionally asking questions, while planning my family’s last couple of trips (I’ve been the family travel agent ever since high school) but I’ve never thought about doing a PTR or TR until now.

One of my favorite things to do on the DIS is to read other people’s trip reports, so I thought, hey, I should just go ahead and do one for this trip, which is going to be an extra special trip for me. Why, you ask?

Because it’s going to be my honeymoon!

I’ve been working so hard to make this the most special trip for both of us. Of course, as my DH often reminds me, I’m prepared for things to go wrong and just go with the flow. :goodvibes


(Me with Summer Glau at last year's Dragon*Con)
My name’s Katie. I’m a 30-something high school English teacher from Upstate New York. I’m lifelong Disney lover, thanks to my parents who grew up watching The Mickey Mouse Club, Spin and Marty and The Hardy Boys. We went to WDW for the first time in spring of 1989 and fell in love. Being from New York, it’s a little more difficult for us to get to the World, but it’s our place to go whenever we have something to celebrate! We’ve gone when I graduated from middle school, high school and college. I’ve also been to Disneyland Paris and Disneyland in California.


(Kellan with Adam Savage at last year's Dragon*Con)
My DH’s name is Kellan. He’s 25, studying full time to be either an English teacher or a lawyer (still hasn’t decided fully), works as a part time butcher, and is originally from Chattanooga, Tennessee. He grew up with almost no knowledge of Disney, except for the fact that Bambi scarred his mother (didn’t it scar everyone?) and a love of The Lion King, because of the connection with Shakespeare. As soon as he moved to NY, I set about to change that and now he proudly says his favorite Disney movies include Sleeping Beauty (mine too!) and Beauty and the Beast. Obviously, he’s never been to WDW before and I’m so glad I get to be the one to experience it with him for the first time!

Here’s a couple pictures of us from our engagement photo shoot.

We were going for a Mad Men-type style in the photos.

How did this NY girl meet a TN boy? At the country’s second largest Science Fiction and Fantasy convention, Dragon*Con! We’re both huge geeks and had so much in common. We discovered we both loved Firefly, Star Trek, comic books and movies. :love:

After we left the con, we stayed in touch and eventually, Kellan moved to NY to be with me and go back to school. We currently live in the Southern Tier area of NY, with our three kitties:

River - Our first kitty. Once we got her, we had to have more. :) She and her brother are almost two years old.


Jayne - River's littermate. He's a big, lazy boy. And no, Jayne is NOT a girl's name.


And Kaylee - She's our baby, only seven months old and very cute!

Kellan and I dated for almost two years when he proposed on a beach in Maine and I said yes. The next day, we got to planning a wedding. :bride:

Table of Contents
The Wedding
Our Plans So Far...
Our ADRs
Cake!
Day 2 & 3 Plans
14 DAYS!
9 Days!
Final Update!
The Trip Report
 
I'll definitely follow along!

The fact that you guys met at Dragon Con is the most awesome thing ever! Me and my fiance are both huge nerds. We met at a game night at a friend's home. The fact that I am going to be spending the rest of my life with my favorite person to geek out with is an amazing feeling.

I also have to mention that I adore your dress in the engagement photos. Congrats! :goodvibes
 
Congratulations! I honeymooned at WDW also! Instead of spending an arm and a leg for a lavish wedding we used all of our money to get away for a month. We had an intimate wedding with a few friends and family at the Polynessian. We took a month off and road tripped it to Florida. Spending 3 weeks at Disney/Universal/Sea World/Beaches and took a Disney Cruise. It was the most magical, unbelivable time of my life. No vacation has ever lived up to my honeymoon!! They are all great in their own way, but your Honeymoon will never compare. I'm so jealous, wish I could do it all over again. ;)

Your Engagement photos are terrific, you look so pretty.

Good luck and have fun planning the best day and vacation of your life.
 


We were married on 1 May 2011 at the Poughkeepsie Grand Hotel in Poughkeepsie, NY. Choosing a date was more difficult than we expected. We knew we didn’t want to get married in the summer (too hot and too expensive.) We also knew we didn’t want to get married in the fall and then have to wait nearly a year for our honeymoon. Originally, we picked 9 April, as it fell during my spring break, but I’m the co-adviser of the Drama Club and we were planning a trip to London I would need to chaperone during spring break. We moved the date to 16 April, but mom reminded me that tax day was 18 April. Since she’s a tax processor, she would have been too busy to help with the wedding and would be stressed. The weekend after that was Easter and my family is super Catholic, so that was out. All of this really only left one weekend before most of the places in NY went to season pricing (as opposed to off-season). 1 May became our day. It ended up being a gorgeous day, despite some sketchy weather earlier in the week, and just the absolutely most perfect wedding. Everything went so perfectly (despite some bumps in the road the week before the wedding) and people are still telling us it was the best wedding they’d ever been to!


Some pics of us getting ready. Yes, my hair was partly purple (it's bright pink now.)

I'm helping my mom with her jewelry.

Kellan's brother helping him get ready.

Kellan and I did a first look instead of trying to cram all our photos into the hour between the ceremony and the reception. It was the best decision we made and our pictures came out so nice.

Kellan and his guys heading to our picture spot.

My girls and I heading there after the guys are already in place.

My first look at Kellan.

Kellan’s first look at me.

A very handsome group of men. ;)

All my ladies.

I stole this idea from Lurkyloo. My grandpa died when I was a senior in high school and my grandma has alzheimer's and couldn't be with us. This was a locket that belonged to my grandma when she and my grandpa were courting.

I love this picture of us. Yes, that's a lightsaber on Kellan's belt. Told you we were geeks!


Our ceremony

First kiss as husband and wife! :love:


Our tables were all named after planets in the Firefly universe, instead of numbered. We also made programs for everyone designed after The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. They helped to explain all the geeky touches to our less than geeky families. :teacher:

I designed our cake and my dad made our cake toppers – Princess Leia and Han Solo dolls.

Our first dance was to Ohne Dich by Rammstein. You can see I’m concentrating very hard so I don’t trip on my dress. :-)
 
One of the first things we started talking about after our engagement was our honeymoon! At first, Disney wasn’t one of the options Kellan wanted. He wanted to rent a cabin in the middle of the woods away from everything for a couple weeks. For me, I’ve always dreamed of not only honeymooning at Disney, but getting married there too. Well, Kellan put his foot down about getting married at Disney and so acquiesced to spending our honeymoon there. Plus, my married last name is Potts, so I’m Mrs. Potts! With that how could we not go to Disney on our honeymoon?

Because I’m a school teacher, I wasn’t able to take any time during the school year for our honeymoon. We decided to plan it when my family would normally go to Disney, the end of August before school starts for us. We’ve found the much smaller crowds and normally offers of free dining make the heat and humidity bearable for us. I started trolling the Disboards more regularly watching for information about free dining offers and, as soon as one popped up, called our travel agent and book Coronado Springs with an upgrade to Deluxe Dining for 19 August – 28 August. My family considers this our “home resort” and it’s where we always stay.



Now Kellan and I are both huge movie buffs and even HUGER Harry Potter fans, so I knew we would be going to Universal Orlando at least one day.

We couldn’t go to Orlando and not head over to see the Wizarding World of Harry Potter! I figured on taking the Mears shuttle over from WDW for one day. Well, these plans changed pretty quickly!

I had planned a surprise mini-Disneymoon to WDW for Star Wars Weekends (Star Wars is another passion of ours) during my Memorial Day break. Free dining was being offered and I had booked us into Pop Century for a couple of days. Then we had to give back one of the days from Memorial Day break (originally a four-day weekend) because of snow days and suddenly we would only have two days at Disney instead of three. Fortunately, I hadn’t bought airfare yet. Canceling this trip meant I could now book an actual stay at UO instead of just a day visit. :cool1: We’ll be staying at the Royal Pacific hotel from 16 August – 19 August.


We’re flying Jetblue out of Syracuse, NY on 16 August at 7 am (so early… we have to get up at 3:30am to be at the airport by 5:30 am) and arriving in Orlando at 10. Because we’re starting our honeymoon at UO and then going to WDW, the Magical Express wasn’t an option for us. We’ve hired Ed Korgan to drive us from MCO to Royal Pacific (with a grocery stop for water and breakfast goodies) and then to take us three days later to Coronado Springs. We’ll be using the Magical Express to go back to MCO, though. His price was by far the most reasonable ($85) and only about $15 more than taking the Mears shuttle.
 
Shut the front door!

Purple hair with matching tights. The parasols and hats. An awesome industrial first dance. A freakin' lightsaber and a Leia/Han cake topper.

I want to marry you guys! :rotfl:

Btw, I just noticed you mentioning that your man is a butcher. So is my future Mister. If I would have known how well I'd be eating, I would have tried to bag a butcher years ago :rolleyes1
 


I'll definitely follow along!

The fact that you guys met at Dragon Con is the most awesome thing ever! Me and my fiance are both huge nerds. We met at a game night at a friend's home. The fact that I am going to be spending the rest of my life with my favorite person to geek out with is an amazing feeling.

I also have to mention that I adore your dress in the engagement photos. Congrats! :goodvibes
Welcome! Congrats on your engagement! The best thing about Kellan is how much we have in common. We went to the midnight Harry Potter last week and it was so cool to have someone to geek out as much as I did during it. That dress was a $20 Target special. I saw it and it looked like the dresses Joan wears on Mad Men and I had to have it.

Congratulations! I honeymooned at WDW also! Instead of spending an arm and a leg for a lavish wedding we used all of our money to get away for a month. We had an intimate wedding with a few friends and family at the Polynessian. We took a month off and road tripped it to Florida. Spending 3 weeks at Disney/Universal/Sea World/Beaches and took a Disney Cruise. It was the most magical, unbelivable time of my life. No vacation has ever lived up to my honeymoon!! They are all great in their own way, but your Honeymoon will never compare. I'm so jealous, wish I could do it all over again. ;)

Your Engagement photos are terrific, you look so pretty.

Good luck and have fun planning the best day and vacation of your life.
Thank you! Wow that sounds so amazing. We were lucky enough that my parents thankfully paid for a good portion of the wedding so we had the money to spend so much time at Disney. I would have loved to have gotten married in the World Showcase though!

I'm in also! Congratulations on your wedding! You're pictures are amazing. :wizard::cutie:
Thanks!

Shut the front door!

Purple hair with matching tights. The parasols and hats. An awesome industrial first dance. A freakin' lightsaber and a Leia/Han cake topper.

I want to marry you guys! :rotfl:

Btw, I just noticed you mentioning that your man is a butcher. So is my future Mister. If I would have known how well I'd be eating, I would have tried to bag a butcher years ago :rolleyes1
Lol! Purple is my favorite color. When I first suggested green and purple as our wedding colors to my DH, he said, "Awesome. DC villains colors." We're such geeks! :rotfl: I do love that Kellan is a butcher. We get so much meat at good prices. I was practically a vegetarian before he got this job. :laughing:
 
Once we had the dates of our honeymoon set, I put Kellan in front of Allears.net and told him to make a list of places he’d like to eat at. I did the same, we compared lists and came up with a huge list of restaurants we wanted to eat at. We also wanted to do the Wishes Dessert Party. Here’s our current list of ADRs and tentative plans for each day:

Day 1 – 16 Aug, Travel day
Lunch at the hotel somewhere
Dinner at Bice

Bice is an upscale Italian restaurant at Portofino Hotel that has gotten some really good reviews on the UO sections of the DIS. I got a $25 Restaurant.com gift certificate for only $2.50, also and the only restriction is that we order two entrees. Not a problem! So fancy dress up meal for almost half price? Yay!

Day 2 – 17 Aug, IOA
We plan on getting stuff for breakfasts at the grocery story before we get to UO. That way we can do quick breakfasts in our room on days we want to get to the park quickly, like this day. We’re going to take advantage of early entry into WWOHP for resort guest today.
Lunch at Mythos


Dinner at Margaritaville


Day 3 – 18 Aug, US
Lunch at Bubba Gump

Dinner wherever looks good

Day 4 – 19 Aug, WDW, finally!
Lunch at Cinderella’s Royal Table, 1:15 pm


I had originally planned to have a snack in the evening and then go to the Wishes Dessert Party. However, neither I nor my travel agent have had any luck getting a reservation for ANY day during our trip. :headache: I’m super disappointed about this because I thought it would be the most magical way for my DH to experience his first Disney fireworks. I’m going to keep checking, especially on the day before we wanted to go, to see if anyone cancels. However, just in case we totally strike out on the dessert party front, we have a dinner ADR at The Wave at 6:35 pm


Day 5 – 20 Aug
Lunch at Restaurantosaurus

Dinner at Jiko, 5:30 pm


Day 6 – 21 Aug
Breakfast at Crystal Palace, 8:15 am (So excited to show Kellan an empty park!)


Dinner at 50s Prime Time Café, 7 pm


Day 7 – 22 Aug
Sunshine Seasons maybe for lunch


Dinner at Teppan Edo, 7 pm


Day 8 – 23 Aug
Lunch at Le Cellier, 11:35 am


Dinner at California Grill, 9:10 pm


Day 9 – 24 Aug
Lunch at Sci-Fi Dine-In, 11 am


Dinner at Restaurant Marrakesh, 7 pm


Day 10 – 25 Aug
Breakfast at Kona, 9 am


Tea at the Garden View Tea Room, 2:20 pm


Dinner at Artist Point, 7 pm


Day 11 – 26 Aug

Dinner at Yachtsman, 5:50 pm


Day 12 – 27 August
Lunch at Tutto Italia, 11:30 am


Dinner at Kona, 5 pm


Day 13 – 28 Aug
Travel Day – Not sure yet what to do since our ME departure will be around 3pm.

 
Joining in! I loved the cute little touches in your wedding to allow your true self to shine!!

I love that you are Mrs. Potts, that is too cute!!

Can't wait to read more about your plans and follow along with you!!
 
I'm in! Your plans sound great so far, as do all of your ADRs! Yum! Can't wait to hear more! :cool1:
 
Joining in! I loved the cute little touches in your wedding to allow your true self to shine!!

I love that you are Mrs. Potts, that is too cute!!

Can't wait to read more about your plans and follow along with you!!

That was so important to us. We actually got into a fight with our wedding coordinator. She was so used to working with brides who want cookie-cutter weddings that our slightly offbeat requests really threw her. In the end, it all worked out and was perfect.

I'm in! Your plans sound great so far, as do all of your ADRs! Yum! Can't wait to hear more! :cool1:

Thanks!
 
I love that you didn't let anyone tell you know about your wedding plans. The star wars characters were such a wonderful addition to your wedding plans and it would have been a shame if your wedding coordinator changed your mind. The beans on the grooms are adorable haha! Happy planning, can't wait to read more.
 
I loved your engagement and wedding pictures! It's so nice to see something different every once in a while, and I love your purple hair. I wish I had the guts to do that :goodvibes
 
Oh honey, I am totally snagging your idea for how to plan where to make ADR's!

Every time that we try to sit down together and make lists of places that we would like to eat, we end up drooling over menus and then walking from the computer to the kitchen in search of delicious snacks :confused3. Your way sounds much more productive!
 
I love that you didn't let anyone tell you know about your wedding plans. The star wars characters were such a wonderful addition to your wedding plans and it would have been a shame if your wedding coordinator changed your mind. The beans on the grooms are adorable haha! Happy planning, can't wait to read more.

We had a whole geek extravaganza for our wedding. The overall theme was a show we both love called Firefly (<--wiki link). The hats and the parasols (not sure if they can been seen in the pic) are both from there. We were also both wearing the grape soda pins from Up, which we had unknowingly bought for each other for Valentine's Day and my DH was wearing his lightsaber on his belt.

I loved your engagement and wedding pictures! It's so nice to see something different every once in a while, and I love your purple hair. I wish I had the guts to do that :goodvibes

Thanks! I was a little nervous to do the purple hair originally, but I had colored hair in college so I figured it wasn't much different now. Take the plunge and do it, but be sure to go to a salon. It's so much better than trying to do it yourself. Plus, if you really don't like it, you can always dye it back!

Oh honey, I am totally snagging your idea for how to plan where to make ADR's!

Every time that we try to sit down together and make lists of places that we would like to eat, we end up drooling over menus and then walking from the computer to the kitchen in search of delicious snacks :confused3. Your way sounds much more productive!

My family has always done something similar. We would each go through the Unofficial Guide and put our initials next to restaurants we wanted to eat at. Then we would see what we all wanted to do and pick those, then ones two of us wanted and so on. Each of us would get one "must do" that everyone else had to go along with, but usually someone else had picked it too.
 
We’re flying out of Syracuse Airport at 7 am on Jetblue. My dad is spending the night before with us so he can pick up our cats and then drive us to the airport before taking the kitties to my parents’ house for the honeymoon. We’ll have to leave our house by 4:30 am in order to get to the airport by 5:30 am. (This is the recommended be at the airport time. I hate being rushed when I’m flying so we always arrive extra early.) This means getting up about 3:30 am so we can shower and grab something quick to eat. We’ll have packed the car the evening before so there won’t be much to do except the usual unplugging and double checking.

I booked us extra legroom seats as my DH is quite tall and very muscular (read: broad shoulders). These seats usually give him enough extra room that he doesn’t feel like a sardine in a can. If everything goes as planned (knock on wood), we should arrive at MCO at 9:49 am. We’ll collect our luggage and meet our town car driver for the ride to Universal Studios. We requested a grocery stop on the way to the hotel and plan to get water, breakfast stuff and some snacks. Hopefully, we’ll be checking into the Royal Pacific by 11:30 and be at the pool by noon or so.

The plan for this day is to spend it all at the pool.
I thought it would be a great way to start an action packed vacation by relaxing poolside. I did look into renting a cabana, but it was more money than I wanted to spend. We can use that $200 better elsewhere! We have a dinner reservation at Bice at 6:30 and then we’ll wander through the CityWalk before coming back to our hotel for the night.

 
Just a quick update - I've been struggling to figure out some kind of surprise for Kellan and then I found the cake thread on the food board. I'm having Chef Brian at the CR recreate the top layer of our wedding cake for our first lunch at WDW! I'm so excited!
 
Just a quick update - I've been struggling to figure out some kind of surprise for Kellan and then I found the cake thread on the food board. I'm having Chef Brian at the CR recreate the top layer of our wedding cake for our first lunch at WDW! I'm so excited!

Yum! I've always wanted to order a Disney cake, but I've never really had an excuse to!
 

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