We Get to Go Again? A March 2012 PTR

[oopsiDAISY]

Hi Everyone! I have been a Diser for over a year, but I have never done any sort of trip report. This is my first attempt, so be gentle with me.

Shall we start at the beginning? I grew up in Florida; so I spent most of my teenage years "hangin' out" at Disney since I always had friends and family members who worked there. To say I took this place full of magic for granted would be an understatment. My family moved out of state when I was 17 years old. I had not been to Disney for over 20 YEARS when my DH and I decided to take the children for the first time. DH had never been either. We booked over a year in a advance. We spent that year planning, having Disney movie nights, paper countdown chains, countdown calendars, and weekly countdown treats. Our trip finally came in March 2011, and we had the time of our lives. At that time we told the kids since it was rather expensive that we would not go back until about 3 or 4 years later. But then...free dining came along and changed EVERYTHING! DH and I booked this trip in October and vowed to make it a surprise for the kids. It has been so hard keeping the secret, and time goes by so much slower; but now here we are just 35 days away from our magical surprise trip to Walt Disney World!

Here is the cast:

Me- I am 40 years old and I work as an administrative assistant at a local, private university. I love my God, love my DH, love my children and love my job...in that order. I am an extrovert who loves to do fun things and loves to be around people. I enjoy cooking and reading in my "spare time" (whatever that is ).

DH- 35 years old and he works as an aviation electronics tech at an aircraft maintainance facility at the Nashville airport. He has an introvert personality, but he is friendly and can get along with ANYONE. He enjoys playing games on his beloved XBox 360 to wind down from a hard day's work. He is a great daddy and as long as I use the words "the kids will love it" I can talk him into just about anything.

DD 12- She is at that age where her lipgloss and eyeshadow match the Koolaid stains around her mouth. She is in 7th grade, not a kid anymore and not yet a teenager. She is a great girl, and still a lot of fun just to hang out with. She has inherited my love of cooking, but not reading. She is a daddy's girl and not a girly girl at all. She likes to play video games with Daddy and loves Star Wars.

DD9- She is my mommy's girl and quite the girly girl. We tease her and tell her if it is pink and sparkly she will love it. She is the life of the party and a BFF to every new friend she meets. She loves to paint her nails and play board games. Really, she would redo her nails everyday if I let her! She is our princess for sure and we love her.

Then we have DS 5- He is his own person. He is ALL BOY ALL THE TIME! Our girls are so sweet and kind, and he is rowdy and rambunctious! He has a great sense of humor and never ceases to make us laugh at the most random things. He is a Star Wars fanatic...his room is decorated Star Wars, he has a dozen light sabres (and will probably build another one on this trip), and has approximately 20,000 Star Wars action figures and space ships...give or take a few.


We hope you will join us on our little journey to our happy place and follow along with this PTR. If this goes successfully, I may be persuaded to do a full TR.

 

[Corrine 1973]

Whoo Hooo,I am number one!!!!

I am always nice Oopsi

OK, now I need to go back and read.

 

[Lidian]

Ugh, Corrine beat me. But I'm totally in! And I won't be gentle.

 

[Lidian]

Okay, I went back and read. I couldn't let anyone else beat me to signing up.

Your DD9 and my DD9/10 already have sooo much in common! I can see them being BFFs immediately!

Same with our DS5s! Mine loves SW! But he also loves Thomas and Disney characters. He's terrified of his own shadow, so I do worry that he won't be very social. But once SW is mentioned, I'm sure he'll sit down and have a blast with your DS!

What Xbox games does your DH play? We just got the Xbox for the kids, DH plays most of his games on the PC -- but I know lots of games come in many formats.

You have a lovely family and I can't wait to meet you all!!!

 

[sl_underwood]

Im in! I feel like I already know you (threadjacker!!) HAHAHA!!

 

[sjs314]

I'm here late but better late than never

 

[oopsiDAISY]

Whoo Hooo,I am number one!!!!

I am always nice Oopsi

OK, now I need to go back and read.

So glad you came! I wondered if anyone would show up. Hope I can keep it entertaining so you will stay.

Ugh, Corrine beat me. But I'm totally in! And I won't be gentle.

Yeah, I fear threadjacking paybacks now...

Okay, I went back and read. I couldn't let anyone else beat me to signing up.

Your DD9 and my DD9/10 already have sooo much in common! I can see them being BFFs immediately!

Same with our DS5s! Mine loves SW! But he also loves Thomas and Disney characters. He's terrified of his own shadow, so I do worry that he won't be very social. But once SW is mentioned, I'm sure he'll sit down and have a blast with your DS!

What Xbox games does your DH play? We just got the Xbox for the kids, DH plays most of his games on the PC -- but I know lots of games come in many formats.

You have a lovely family and I can't wait to meet you all!!!

DH is mostly interested in the Modern Warfare games. He likes to shoot people to reduce stress.

Im in! I feel like I already know you (threadjacker!!) HAHAHA!!

Feel free to threadjack anytime...but I have a feeling Liddy will beat you to it.

I'm here late but better late than never

Yay, thanks for coming over sjs! You do a great job keeping us all in line on the March threads!

 

[Lidian]

Hmm... I know DH has played them, as we were going through his games. He has them all on digital download (on the PC) so threw all the discs away since they were just taking up space. I don't know how often he plays them, though.

Right now he's all into SWTOR, Skyrim, and a handful of other games. I can't keep up with them. The kids are into Skylanders.

 

[cogero]

Joining in here.

 

[francis6306]

I can't imagine trying to keep Disney a secret!! My girls are tiny- but I just can't help but talk to them about it! My ODD is so excited to go back!

I'm sure you enjoyed living so close to the World growing up! I have a friend that lives near DL and she takes her kids all the time and they ask to go daily!

 

[oopsiDAISY]

Joining in here.

I can't imagine trying to keep Disney a secret!! My girls are tiny- but I just can't help but talk to them about it! My ODD is so excited to go back!

I'm sure you enjoyed living so close to the World growing up! I have a friend that lives near DL and she takes her kids all the time and they ask to go daily!

to you both!

cogero- thanks for joining in. I feel loved!

francis6306- it has been SOOO incredibly hard to keep the secret! So many exciting things I have planned. Every time I book a surprise for them I want so bad just to tell them about it. The reactions will be worth the effort it has taken to keep my big mouth shut!

 

[oopsiDAISY]

Let's learn the facts of the trip, shall we?

We are going March 8-14. The kids will miss two days of school, this will add even more excitement and shock value to the surprise for the kids.

We have a six night/seven day package with free dining. We will be staying here:

At the Port Orlean Riverside

This is our first time staying at a mod. Last year in March we stayed in a family suite here:

Since we are a family of 5 we know we will have a room in Alligator Alley.

I am REALLY hoping for one of the refurb rooms with the little alligator murphy bed. DS would really like sleeping on that.

We have many exciting things planned for the kids on this trip. We get to fly this time. Our kids have never flown before, so they will LOVE it! Yesterday at the breakfast table my oldest daughter, out of the blue asked "I wonder what it feels like to fly." "Where did that thought come from?" "Well Miss Julie flew here from Florida last weekend and it just made me wonder." WHEW! I thought she was onto us for a minute there!

This is a pretty short update, but there is more to come later. I can't just tell everything in one post, right? In my next update, we will be discussing DAY 1 plans...and I am going to be mean and only reveal ADR's on the day they are scheduled for. Maybe you will stick around longer if I do it that way...

 

[Lidian]

Well, since you're going to be mean, I'm outta here.













Okay, not really.

 

[johnsonginad]

Joining in! We'll be in WDW just a little after you guys, and staying at POFQ. Our trip is a surprise trip too!! Can't wait to read more!

 

[oopsiDAISY]

Well, since you're going to be mean, I'm outta here.













Okay, not really.

Hey, I learned my PTR skills from YOU, dear!

Joining in! We'll be in WDW just a little after you guys, and staying at POFQ. Our trip is a surprise trip too!! Can't wait to read more!

My next post will tell our surprise reveal plans. How will you tell your kids?

 

[oopsiDAISY]

Okay, before I go into DAY 1 plans I thought I would share how we plan to tell the kids about the trip. When we first started planning we were going to have to drive. So we had planned to tell them right after they got home from school on March 7th then hit the road for an all-nighter. Now we get to fly, so we had to come up with a different reveal.

Since we fly out at 8 am, we will have to get out of bed at around 4 or 4:30 am. Our kids are NOT morning people, so we have decided to tell them the night before. It will be a Wednesday night, which is usually a church night. DH and I will take the whole day off to do the packing, then stash the bags in the shed. On this particular night we are going to tell the kids we are too tired for church and want to stay home for a "movie night". We will get the kids settled in with popcorn and sodas in our refillable Disney mugs from last March. We will then pop in the Disney vacation planning DVD for 2012...huh? "Why are we watching this?"

Because tomorrow morning we are GOING TO DISNEY!!!!!!

We will tell them we are going AND we will tell them we are flying. DH plans to have the video camera rolling to capture all the craziness that is sure to ensue.

Will any of us get a wink of sleep that night? NO WAY! But at least everyone will be in a good mood the next morning instead of trying to wake a bunch of crabby patties and tell them the surprise hoping for a positive reaction...

Next update will be DAY 1...promise!

 

[DMGeurts]

I seriously can't believe I missed this!!! I wish you would have come over to my PTR and posted a link to yours!!!

I'll catch up this afternoon.

D~

 

[oopsiDAISY]

I seriously can't believe I missed this!!! I wish you would have come over to my PTR and posted a link to yours!!!

I'll catch up this afternoon.

D~

Sorry D~, I just didn't want to threadjack other friend threads to promote mine...besides, I am so new at this I didn't want a lot of folks coming over and then deciding it was too boring to follow.

 

[Lidian]

Hey, I learned my PTR skills from YOU, dear!

You are ready to fly young grasshopper.

Okay, before I go into DAY 1 plans I thought I would share how we plan to tell the kids about the trip. When we first started planning we were going to have to drive. So we had planned to tell them right after they got home from school on March 7th then hit the road for an all-nighter. Now we get to fly, so we had to come up with a different reveal.

Since we fly out at 8 am, we will have to get out of bed at around 4 or 4:30 am. Our kids are NOT morning people, so we have decided to tell them the night before. It will be a Wednesday night, which is usually a church night. DH and I will take the whole day off to do the packing, then stash the bags in the shed. On this particular night we are going to tell the kids we are too tired for church and want to stay home for a "movie night". We will get the kids settled in with popcorn and sodas in our refillable Disney mugs from last March. We will then pop in the Disney vacation planning DVD for 2012...huh? "Why are we watching this?"

Because tomorrow morning we are GOING TO DISNEY!!!!!!

We will tell them we are going AND we will tell them we are flying. DH plans to have the video camera rolling to capture all the craziness that is sure to ensue.

Will any of us get a wink of sleep that night? NO WAY! But at least everyone will be in a good mood the next morning instead of trying to wake a bunch of crabby patties and tell them the surprise hoping for a positive reaction...

Next update will be DAY 1...promise!

I totally love your plans! I can't wait to see the video!!!!!!!!!!

I seriously can't believe I missed this!!! I wish you would have come over to my PTR and posted a link to yours!!!

I'll catch up this afternoon.

D~

Someone doesn't follow all the cool threads very closely.

Sorry D~, I just didn't want to threadjack other friend threads to promote mine...besides, I am so new at this I didn't want a lot of folks coming over and then deciding it was too boring to follow.

If you don't go threadjack her, I will. And if you don't go threadjack me. I'll do it myself! Yeah. Take that! I'll threadjack my own thread.

 

[oopsiDAISY]

Day one begins in the wee hours of the morning on March 8th. We have to get up around 4:30 am... We need to get up and get our last minute toiletries items packed and the car loaded. We will head to the park and fly lot first to drop off our car for the week. They will drop us off at the airport. Once we get bags checked and get through security, we will need to find something to eat for breakfast. I wish they had one of these in the airport:

A Sausage McMuffin would be soooo good.

But alas all our airport has is one of these:

So I will have to settle for this:

WITH NO EGG!

After waiting an endless amount of time and trying to entertain three antsy children we will finally get to board our flight to MCO. Wouldn't it be great if our plane looked like this:

But I am sure we will be stuck with one that looks like this:

continued in next post...