Babymoon for Two! A Veteran and A First Timer...Feb 4-8.

[misskate]

I started this PTR once before but I got no readers and somewhere along the way I lost track of it...? I tried searching for it, but found nothing. Oops! I'm a newbie, please forgive. I'll start all over again and hope I get some readers!

Let's go over the basics...

My name is Kate. I am 24 and I have been to WDW around 13 times and DL once. My older brother was a CM in the College Program and then as his "job job" for 5 or so years. (He even met his wife while working at WDW...all together now...Awwwww!) We went frequently during that time period, that CM discount can't be beat! We lived (and still live) in a tiny town in NW PA. Our town is the icebox of PA, no lie. Aren't you jealous you don't hold that title?

Didn't think so.

ANYWAYS. I am self-employed. I own a dance studio. I've been dancing and it's as natural to me as breathing. I l-o-v-e Chinese food, Reese Cups and the Radio City Rockettes. (I'm one inch too short!) My favorite ride at WDW is Carousel of Progress and Haunted Mansion. I'm reallllly excited to try all the new rides that have popped up since I was last in the World. (umm...Animal Kingdom? What the heck. And what is this DHS nonsense? MGM for life!!) My favorite Disney character is definiiiiiitely Alice in Wonderland. She's a doll!

This is me,

I'm on the right, with the lighter hair. Excuse my sister's weird expression in the back. Also, I'm scrunching my nose. So all in all this picture was not a good choice. Hmm. Okay.


My DH, Dave, will be joining me in the World. He's a WDW Virgin! He has a large family, 5 brothers and sisters, and there wasn't much of a chance to travel anywhere when he was growing up. Boy has that changed!! We've made it our goal since we started dating that we needed to TRAVEL. (I've been to 47 of the 50 states, Canada and Russia.) I've really enjoyed showing Dave part of the world in the last 4 years. I can't wait for him to get to WDW. He'll LOVE it, I know he will. He's very excited but left the planning to me, because "Kate, you know more about that stuff than I do." His favorite Disney character is up for debate..He likes Dug from UP. That's all Dave can think of as I type this. haha

Here we are on our Honeymoon. We look super young, but that's all that's on my Photobucket.


We have a fur baby, Millie. A black and white cracked out Lhasa Poo. Millie is a NUT JOB and will not be joining us in the world. If I had to guess a character for her, I would definitely pick Stitch. Always up to no good!!


We also have the STAR of our show!! RORY!! She's 6 months old (in a few days) and the light of our lives. She's a doll baby and we are helplessly in love with her. She will not be coming with us to WDW this February. I have a big thing for making sure her first trip is one she remembers. (Not criticizing others, of course!!!) Also, I want Dave to be able to experience WDW with me first so we can jam in as much as possible. Rory will go, and she will go soon, but just not yet. Our first trip as a family will be a Grand Gathering, I'm sure. Grandpa and Grammie (my parents), my sister, her boyfriend (husband by then?? ), Aunts and Uncles...I'm stressing thinking about it now! hahaha
Her favorite character will probably be...Woody from Toy Story? I'm not sure. She'll probably like someone from Toy Story at first, because we already can't wait to see #3 next summer!! (Rory of course saw UP in the theater...she slept. )
Here's the baby girl!


Continued in the next post...

[misskate]

Here's the run down so far...

Dates: Feb 4-8
Unfortch, my DH started a new job in July of this year. It's actually a FANTASTIC thing. Dave is working for a county wide school district near our house, taking care of all the sports fields, grounds at the school, etc. (He has a degree in Turf Grass Science...WE ARE PENN STATE.) It's a great job. (Getting in with a school district versus a private golf course is awesome. Retirement, benefits, the works!) The only downside is he accumulates only 1/2 a vacation day per month for the first year. So we don't have a TON of time to take off, but we are just thankful we get to go at all!

We will be flying out of Buffalo on Wed, Feb 4 super early in the morning. (7:15 I believe) and arriving at MCO around 10:30. Yayyyy!! We leave around noon on the 8th. Booooo!!

Hotel: POFQ!! On recommendation of several of my students, I knew this is where I wanted to stay. I toyed around with AKL, Pop and a couple others, but POFQ came out on top.

Dining: We are on the DxDP. Since Dave has never been and we are celebrating our anniversary, we are doing several "signature" meals and the Hoop De Doo. When I worked out the numbers, DxDP was a savings...significantly so!

I have all our ADRs and a basic touring plan laid out...I'll go over all of that in the next post!!

Lurkers, say HEYYYYY!

Kate

[ptcrn]

Great start! Your daughter is adorable! I understand about not wanting to take her until she is a little older. You are going to have a great time just showing your DH everything! He's never been to Disney... !

The deluxe dining plan looks awesome! And I have never stayed at POFQ, but it looks really nice. I hope to stay at POR on our next trip.

Looking forward to reading more!

[Cafeen]

The little one is very adorable!

Jumping aboard myself. Should be interesting to see the TR after the fact... since I'll be there at the same time (though, I get to stay longer )

[stacopp]

Looking forward to your report. Your daughter is absolutely stunning- so cute!!!

[chrisw127]

Your daughter is adorable. Congrats on taking some couple time. It's important. Have fun!

[misskate]

Originally Posted by ptcrn

Great start! Your daughter is adorable! I understand about not wanting to take her until she is a little older. You are going to have a great time just showing your DH everything! He's never been to Disney... !

The deluxe dining plan looks awesome! And I have never stayed at POFQ, but it looks really nice. I hope to stay at POR on our next trip.

Looking forward to reading more!

Thanks!! We're really excited for DxDP. Especially considering we won't be taking Rory to California Grill any time soon. (ha!)

Originally Posted by Cafeen

The little one is very adorable!

Jumping aboard myself. Should be interesting to see the TR after the fact... since I'll be there at the same time (though, I get to stay longer )

Totally jealous you get to stay longer! Maybe we'll run into each other! I'll be looking for you PTR and TR!

Originally Posted by stacopp

Looking forward to your report. Your daughter is absolutely stunning- so cute!!!

Thanks! She's a doll baby, but I'm a little partial.

Originally Posted by chrisw127

Your daughter is adorable. Congrats on taking some couple time. It's important. Have fun!

It's definitely important to take couple time. We work opposite schedules so we take as much family time and couple time as we can get!

Next installment coming soon!

[Cafeen]

Originally Posted by misskate

Totally jealous you get to stay longer! Maybe we'll run into each other! I'll be looking for you PTR and TR!

My PTR basically comes as part of the TR I have down below. There isn't much to it really, since I've already got (just about) everything set, and I'm going solo so there's no "Will she go? What else do I need to bring?" and all that stuff. Would make for a very boring independent thread . (I do have links to the PTR stuff in the first post too, just for convenience sake).

However, I will, of course, be TRing the Feb trip .

[Jenvenza]

Rory is so cute!!!! That is such a cute age she is at right now!

Enjoying your PTR!

[misskate]

Let's discuss our ADR's...

Here's what I have scheduled!

Thursday February 4th:
4:00: Yak and Yeti
9:30: Hoop De Doo Review (My FAVORITE when I was younger!)

Friday, February 5th:
1:25: The Plaza
7:15: California Grill (Wishes is at 8!! Can't wait. Happy Anniversary to us! )

Saturday, Feburary 6th:
1:30: Le Cellier
7:45: Tony’s (Spectro's at 7:00 this night! Woop!)

Sunday, February 7th:
8:30: Boma
1:30: 50’s Prime Time Café

You may notice there's no ADR for Dinner on the 7th. The black and gold, Steelers lovin', Pittsburgh-ese speaking blood that runs through both Dave and I will NOT allow us to make an ADR until we are certain the Steelers won't be in THE game. (Let's face it, they will be. ) If they don't, say for example Troy Polamalu just up and quits, then we will pacify ourselves by eating too much at wherever we can get an ADR 2 weeks before our trip. If the Steelers ARE in the Super Bowl, then we will head to one of the ESPN Zone/Club and watch the game in true style.

Such is life when you live 2 hours north of Pittsburgh! WOOP.

Dave didn't really care where we ate. The only place he wanted was Coral Reef, because he's huge into seafood. But alas, there was nothing available on our EPCOT day. I might try again later, but really can we give up Le Cellier? I don't know. Something to consider.

I'm getting really excited for some good food...I'm dieting like a mad woman right now in order to be able to gain a few pounds over our trip! Fuzzy Disney Logic at it's best right there.

[lbuzz52]

sounds great so far!
you made good choices for the food...
and my comment on coral reef- the food was okay, the desserts were really good. but i've heard so much better about le celier.
congrats on the Kate and Dave time- but it sounds like a good excuse to make another trip soon! baby girl is adorable and she'll be as big a fan as you are, i'm sure.

[MEK]

Great start to your TR!

You baby Rory is just adorable. When my son (who is now 16) was about that age, my DH and I left him to go skiing. We brought him home a present who he got to meet about 9 months later. Need I say more!

Anyway, I think its good to go on a childless trip because once you have a second and they get older, its a long wait until you get your next adult trip, so enjoy.

I think you will really like POFQ. It's my fav mod, even though I only stayed there one night before a DVC trip. It's really, really pretty.

I also think you will love the DxDP. DH and I just did the DxDP during our recent anniversay trip. Of course, ours was a 20 year anniversary, so we are quite a bit older than you. We got lots of special little treats at the signature places. We even got balloons one night. It was really a great trip. I hope you enjoy your anniversary trip as much as we enjoyed ours.

Your ADR's look great. I love the Cali grill (ate there last December). You will probably get a table right up near the window. The view is spectacular. Le Cellier is also one of my favs.

Looking forward to reading more!

[misskate]

It's been a while...

sorry!! As I said, I'm a dance teacher and I've spent the last 2 weeks solid dealing with sick students, costume orders and a baby. The swine flu ran rampant through our town last week and I had less than 50% attendance in all my classes! (This of course was costume ordering and sizing week. Of course.)

But I'm getting back in to Disney planning mode, of course!

DH just found out yesterday that there is a problem with his vacation days. He thought (and I did too) that he accumulated a half a day for each month he was there the first year. That's what we both understood from his contract. This is not the case. He started his job on June 24th, 2009. The school district's fiscal year rolled over on July 1, 2009. Therefore, he gets no vacation build up since he began in one fiscal year. (If he had started in January, he'd have 3 days now.) He will have 15 days beginning July 1, 2010. I immediately got paniced, thinking of the 2,000 bucks I already spent on our trip. He spoke with his supervisor though, and he assured Dave he could take his personal days in a row. (Luckily he has 4, and we only need 3!) Thank goodness.

Crisis averted for now!

As far as planning goes, I'm working on coming up with some suprises for DH while we are down. He looooves chocolate so I'm sure I'll do something with that. Not really sure exactly what though...thoughts?

I'm also shopping around for personalized shirts for us! Any recommendations?

Thanks! Enjoy your weekend. I'm having my first girls weekend in a LOOOONG time.

[portocall]

I am so excited for you! As someone who once brought a baby to the Magic Kingdom for a daytrip I like your thinking! There is plenty of time to get your sweet one to the World.

Your post about the football game has me cracking up. We are die-hard Black and Gold fans as in the Saints and I so wanted to go to the ESPN club to watch the game (to become 10-0), but alas, I was outvoted and I had to put up with my mother texting me the score every half hour or so.

Animal Kingdom was new to me too, and I found it to be an amazing place although a little confusing to get around at first (got the hang of it by the end of the day)