All I Want for Christmas is...A WDW Vacation!! UPDATE pg 35 - Leaving today!!

[wigdoutdismom]

Hi all!

Sorry I have been MIA for a few days - I am in Chicago visiting my brother, sister in law and new niece and so I have been busy holding and loving up my baby girl. But I promise later in the week I will have pictures to share!

But Disney is not far from my mind. There is still a Disney store here in the area, about 20 minutes from their house, and I am planning on hitting that up while I am in town. So I am sure I will have some good finds!

Take care, everyone!
Katie

Katie,
Enjoy that baby, she will grow so fast...
Anita

 

[Charleston Princess]

Katie, like Wigd said, enjoy all that time with your niece!!!

 

[PookieB]

Hi everyone! This is going to be a quick post, but I wanted to send along some pics of my niece Caroline She is the cutest peanut!! I just love her. I'll update in a day or so about the trip, but I wanted to share some of her pics! Enjoy!

Isn't she the cutest??!!

Me and baby Caroline!

My sister and Mom, the new Aunt and Grandma!

Congratulations!!! She is beautiful just liek her name.

 

[DWGal210]

Thanks everyone for the nice thoughts! I had a great time visiting them. It was so nice to be able to relax and just hold a baby for a few days...sigh...it was great!

Of course I have a few pictures and then we're back to our regularly scheduled trip report We are getting closer and closer to buying plane tickets. We're now considering coming back that Monday instead of Sunday since the tickets are like $200 cheaper if we fly back Monday so we'll see what we end up doing.

OK, here are some pictures!

Smiles! OK, they're probably gas smiles but we'll take it.

Caroline in her bouncy seat

With Aunt Katie

In her car seat

Hope everyone has a great day!!

 

[Charleston Princess]

She's getting cuter and cuter every day!

 

[DWGal210]

Thank you!!! It's so amazing to me how they lose that "newborn" look each day they are home - I think the more I look at her, she looks to me more like my brother, but time will tell!

 

[BippityBoo]

Hi Katie--I'm KATIE New to DIS and I saw you on Becky's thread so I followed you here! Great PTR..so jealous you are going during Christmas! I will hopefully be there during Christmas-2010! Can't wait to read all about it---Caroline is a sweetheart

 

[wigdoutdismom]

Awwww, Aunt Katie, you have a beautiful niece!

 

[DWGal210]

Hi Katie--I'm KATIE New to DIS and I saw you on Becky's thread so I followed you here! Great PTR..so jealous you are going during Christmas! I will hopefully be there during Christmas-2010! Can't wait to read all about it---Caroline is a sweetheart

Hi Katie!! Thanks for reading!

Thanks for the compliment on Caroline We love her, she is so sweet!

I am very excited to be going over Christmas. Some people poo-poo it because of the crowds, but that doesn't bother me at all. We're planning on having park time as well as relaxing-at-the-hotel time, so it should be great!! Thanks again for reading, have a great weekend!

 

[DWGal210]

Awwww, Aunt Katie, you have a beautiful niece!

Thanks Anita! She is precious!

 

[DWGal210]

OK, we are now back to our regularly scheduled PTR. On to more planning!!

So the saga of the plane tickets is nearly over....we are now thinking that we'll come home on Monday, the 4th, because the ticket is $99 versus over $250 for that one way so we figured we could come home a day later and save a lot of dough. My aunt is going to keep watching the tickets and probably buy them next week, so then we'll have our tickets and be ready to go! The final price will be about $325, which for flying over Christmas, doesn't sound bad to me at all - especially since in other cities we looked at it was more like $600-800!!! That is insanity!

And we are now under 170 days to go - woo hoo!

This weekend should be a nice one. I am going to do some journal-making for a few DISers, and then I desperately need to organize my kitchen cabinets. I have been guilty of just throwing things wherever and I need to clean that out! Good times, I know.

Have a great weekend, everyone!

 

[BippityBoo]

OK, we are now back to our regularly scheduled PTR. On to more planning!!

So the saga of the plane tickets is nearly over....we are now thinking that we'll come home on Monday, the 4th, because the ticket is $99 versus over $250 for that one way so we figured we could come home a day later and save a lot of dough. My aunt is going to keep watching the tickets and probably buy them next week, so then we'll have our tickets and be ready to go! The final price will be about $325, which for flying over Christmas, doesn't sound bad to me at all - especially since in other cities we looked at it was more like $600-800!!! That is insanity!

And we are now under 170 days to go - woo hoo!

This weekend should be a nice one. I am going to do some journal-making for a few DISers, and then I desperately need to organize my kitchen cabinets. I have been guilty of just throwing things wherever and I need to clean that out! Good times, I know.

Have a great weekend, everyone!

Your doing the right thing! I would never pay $800 for plane tickets! Seems like everything is coming together Can't wait for your trip!

 

[DWGal210]

So I have actual news tonight! WE HAVE PLANE TICKETS!!!

We bought them today, and the round trip was $310 per person. Not the cheapest tix around, but we looked at a few others cities nearby (Cedar Rapids, Des Moines, Dubuque) and their flights were anywhere from $600-800 EACH!! YIKES!! So we're flying Airtan out of Moline, which I typically do to Orlando. And the best part......we have a direct flight each way!!! That's not always something you get here in our part of the US!

So our itinerary is (and yes, it has been changed slightly):

Leave Saturday, December 26th; flight leaves at 10:53 AM and arrives 2:23 PM.
Return Home Monday, January 4th; flight leaves around 8:15AM and arrives 10:30AM so I'll still have about a 1/2 day at home before I go back to work the next day to do laundry, de-compress, write my TR etc.

We are also doing a split stay!! My aunt called today and unfortunately we couldn't add another night to our AKL stay. We had booked through Sunday, the 3rd, but the flight back was about $280 ONE WAY, so we said no thanks, we'll stay until Monday. So now we are staying for 6 nights at AKL in Kidani, Savannah view and then going to Saratoga for the last 3 nights.

So, to recap:

Flights? Check.
Hotel ressies? Check
ADRs? Well, not made yet, but we have a list

Now I am considering buying my park pass this week or next. Since the prices are going up, perhaps, I think I'll just buy it and get it taken care of.

WOO HOO! Things are happening! Only 165 days to go!

 

[ladybugmom]

Awwww!! Those pictures of Caroline are just precious!!!

Wow!! What a great deal you got on your plane tickets!! We paid around $1,000 for THREE tickets and the day after we bought them we got a deal that was HALF the price! Uggh!! And they wouldn't let us use the deal b/c we had already purchased the tickets. YAY for getting a great price!!

 

[DWGal210]

Awwww!! Those pictures of Caroline are just precious!!!

Wow!! What a great deal you got on your plane tickets!! We paid around $1,000 for THREE tickets and the day after we bought them we got a deal that was HALF the price! Uggh!! And they wouldn't let us use the deal b/c we had already purchased the tickets. YAY for getting a great price!!

Thanks, Becky! She is for sure a ton of fun!

I know, I was very glad just to buy them and get it done - both my aunt and I are now saying that we're not going to look at the website cause we know we'll be ticked if the price goes down, but it's going to be hard not to look!

 

[Charleston Princess]

Katie, what great news about your plane tickets! I would go ahead and buy your park ticket before they go up at the beginning of August. I think I am going to go ahead and buy ours for our October trip so that I am not kicking myself.

You stayed at Saratoga before your cruise, didn't you?

 

[wigdoutdismom]

Katie, I can't believe we are missing each other by a day.

 

[Flossbolna]

Dancing bananas for the plane tickets:

Having booked a flight always makes a trip much more real for me. And getting a direct flight is just great! I love direct flights!

I think you really should get park tickets now before prices go up. I don't think they will rise a lot, but still why risk it? You know for how long you are going to stay.

 

[DWGal210]

Katie, what great news about your plane tickets! I would go ahead and buy your park ticket before they go up at the beginning of August. I think I am going to go ahead and buy ours for our October trip so that I am not kicking myself.

You stayed at Saratoga before your cruise, didn't you?

I think I am going to go ahead and get them this week; I've read here on the boards that once you get there, they can add your already purchased tix to your KTTW card, so I think I'll do that and just have one less thing to worry about.

I didn't know you were going in October!? How could I have missed that on your TR?! Are you doing the MNSSHP again?

Yes, we did stay at Saratoga this last trip; that's my aunt and uncle's home DVC resort, and we really like it there. We're sure we'll love AKL too, but since we couldn't get AKL for that last night we added, we decided to do a split stay.

 

[DWGal210]

Katie, I can't believe we are missing each other by a day.

I know! That makes me mad! I would have loved to meet you in person! Maybe we'll be in Orlando around the same time again. I see you are going on a cruise next year - fun times!!! They are awesome!