2 VS 1: Mom's first trip outnumbered

[cheap traveler]

Hi everyone !! I have finally gotten time to start on my trip report.

Let’s start from the beginning for any new readers.

The cast:

Me - the Mommy, Heather, turned 27 on the trip. This was my 6th trip to the world. I fell in love with Disney on my first trip in 1998.

Bella - 5 ½, wonderful big sister, starting kindergarten 2 weeks after our trip. This trip was a celebration of her starting school. Loves all princesses and Hannah Montana.

Hailey - 3, has the nickname “Bean” because she is tiny. Has asthma, this was my first time dealing with the illness away from home. Loves princesses and Pooh & friends.

We flew out of Stewart airport in NY on Wednesday August 19th, staying at POP Century, leaving Tuesday August 25th. We had 5 day base tickets and the free dining plan.

Since I have covered all the back story, packing, and preparation in my pre-trip report, I will start on the morning of the 19th.

My step-father picked us up at my house at 5:30am, and we drove the hour to the airport . We didn’t hit any traffic and the trip was smooth. When we arrived at the airport, we could see our plane sitting at the terminal already. Things are looking good.

We headed in, checked our 1 bag, and went over to security. I was traveling with aresols (asthma meds), and liquids (amoxocillin with ice), and sailed through security with no problem.

We headed the 20 feet to our terminal, picked a seat by the window, and prepared to wait the hour or so until we could board.

About 10 minutes before we were ready to board, we got an announcement that there was a little delay, and we would get more info when they knew something. So I decided to take the kids for a walk through the airport to burn off some energy. While we were walking, they announced that the problem was a flat tire on the plane, and they would be changing it. Our estimated delay at this point was an hour. No problem.

Once the hour was up, they let us know the next bit of bad news - they don’t know what caused the flat tire, so they have to change the other tire also. Ok, no problem, at least they are doing their best to keep us safe.

Now the best part, they only had one tire at this airport. They needed to transport a tire up from NYC for our plane. Then the tire got stuck in traffic.


Long story short, our flight that should have landed at 11:16am in Orlando, landed at 5:55pm. The weather was awful, so we had a bumpy flight. The good news - the kids were GREAT the whole time. The best news - we were finally within an hour of Disney!! We headed straight for the Disney Magical Express bus, got right on, and we were off!

First stop - Pop Century.



Up next... our first night. 8 hours of plans stuffed into 2 hours

 

[cheap traveler]

Hmm... I never realized this actually posted. It told me 3x that it failed. Strange.

So on with the trip report.

We left off about to get off the bus at POP - we were finally HOME!

So, about 15 minutes before we arrive, Hailey says in her most urgent voice, "I have to go potty. NOW!"

Great . Now what?

DME busses don't have pottys. I can't ask the driver to stop so she could pee in the grass, which she is very fond of.

So I dig through our bag, find one of the night-time diapers I have, and put it on her as descreetly as possible. This was not an extra diaper, I only had 6, one for each of our nights. So I told her to do her best to hold it.

...

Finally we arrived at POP. She is doing the best, most energetic verision of the pee-pee dance you have ever seen. She BEGS me to let her go in the grass, but we made it to the bathroom.

The rest of the night was pretty much the same rush. We checked in - nice and quick thanks to online check in. We headed over to luggage services to pick up our fridge (thank you fridge swap), they could not find it.
We went to drop off our bags in the room, went back to the food court for a dinner to-go, went back to luggage services, still no fridge.

We made it back to our room JUST in time for our grocery delivery. Thank you We Go Shop. I had to delay this delivery by 3 hours, and she was great about it. Very helpful.

After dinner we headed BACK to luggage services. This time, the man let me come in to the room with him to look at a fridge with no label. First box, bottom shelf, was my fridge. The swapper before me left their labels on the box, so the folks in luggage services couldn't see my name on the other side of the box.

So they brought it up to the room for me, set it up, and we went to bed.

Finally, the longest day of my life was over. It was after 10pm, but we were finally headed off to dream land. Through all of this running around, the kids were GREAT!

Oh, I forgot to mention, somewhere in between of all this, I met a wonderful lady with the stroller we were swapping.

Next up: Animal Kingdom

 

[mickeystoontown]

Oh my! You have had an eventful day just getting to your resort and then searching for your fridge. Bless you little one's heart. Had to pee-pee and couldn't go. to her for being able to hold it!

Looking forward to reading all about your Disney adventures!

Lisa

 

[cheap traveler]

Hi Lisa!! Welcome aboard. I hope to keep you entertained along the way. Now that I realize the post is here I will be trying to update quickly.

 

[cheap traveler]

Ok, lets get this trip report underway.

So our first “real” day, we were headed to Animal Kingdom. The kids love Animal Kingdom! We usually don’t manage a full day here, but a solid 6-7 hours. This year it was about 5, but we still had fun.

We reluctantly got out of bed, after all the running around the night before, and got ready. The kids got dressed while laying in bed, and we took our breakfast to-go. Squeeze yogurt and cereal sticks for the kids, bagel for Mommy.

We got to the bus stop to find a bus ready and waiting, and how lucky can we be? It was a cruise line bus! The driver stowed our stroller underneath, and we got nice comfy seats for our first ride!

We got to the park just after the 9am opening, and of course headed straight to the safari. Lines were light, and the animals were very active. The park employees were out feeding them, so we were able to see more animals than ever. We had a baby giraffe 10 feet from the safari vehicle! Too cute.

Next stop was Finding Nemo: the musical. Great, just like last year. Hailey was scared of the loud noises (I think they really need to turn down the volume of these shows), and we were treated to the pleasure of watching a woman lose her breakfast. Luckily for her son, she made it to a garbage can and didn’t have to use his hat!!

Next up was the favorite ride of the day - Triceretop spin - twice. It’s always the simple things that win the kids over.

We made it over to our 11:50am lunch reservation at Tusker House, and after 3 months of worrying about what the kids would eat, we all enjoyed it completely. I can’t tell you now what we ate, because we had a bite of everything, but Bella especially enjoyed the make-your-own PB&J sandwiches. . I was so glad I didn't pay for this meal, thank you free dining.

After lunch we rode Kali River Rapids. Hailey was SOOO happy that she was tall enough. In reality, I think only her hair touched the bar, but the guy saw how excited she was and let her ride!! He made my day. As always we headed over to see the Festival of the Lion King, and enjoyed it as much as always.

We (I) decided that we had enough for the day, so we made our way to the exit, stopping along the way for Hailey to buy her first pair of Mickey Mouse earings. We had dinner at the hotel again, and enjoyed the food again. We also swam in 3 pools before heading to our room for baths, Hannah Montana, and bed.
Overall, this was a very good first day, and we ended the day with no stress.

Up next: Our first glimpse of the castle

 

[goofy's_gurl]

aww that sounds like a nice relaxing day. hope day 2 goes great as the first

 

[cheap traveler]

We are on the "official" day 3, but only day 2 in the parks. Friday August 21st. We are headed to the Magic Kingdom today, and all 3 of us were so excited that NOBODY was grumpy about waking up early!

After our quick routine of getting dressed, teeth and hair brushed, sunscreen on (very important for these pasty northerners), and a quick breakfast, we headed out. About 20 feet from our door, Bella spotted a bunny. She of course bends down and puts her hand out, like it's a cat or something. Surprise for Mommy, the bunny hopped over and sniffed her hand!! I have pictures, but photobucket isn't cooperating today. I will post as soon as it lets me.

So Bella is thrilled, and so is Hailey - who promptly jumps up and down, and scares the bunny away. I guess we can be on our way now

Because we are very lucky this trip, we have no wait for our bus again today. It isn't a cruise bus, but you can only get that lucky once.

We made it to MK before the morning show, but miss the show because it is too hot to stand there without a drink. NBD, we are coming back later in the week.

First stop - the potty. This is a recurring theme all week, so I will try to keep the potty reports to a minimum. Basically, every time we got to the front of a long line, Hailey needed to go potty.

Fun

Got to love the bladder of a 3 year old

The park opened at 9am today, and here is the list of things we were able to do before our 11:50am lunch reservation:
Dumbo
Snow White's Scary Adventure
Cinderella's Golden Carousel
Peter Pan's Flight
It's a Small World (amazing how the kids always remember this ride)
The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh
the Teacups
and we saw Ariel in her Grotto

All of this and we still made it to the Crystal Palace just before our reservation time.

The short version of our lunch - Hailey wanted nothing to do with Pooh or his friends, Bella only wanted to take my picture with the characters, and the food was good, like always. They had the Mickey confetti on the table (which we kept), and I got my second birthday cupcake of the week.

We headed over to Monsters Inc Laugh Floor after lunch. Last year we missed out because they were having trouble with it, so it was almost like a new ride for the kids. They liked it, but a lot of the jokes are aimed more at the adults. I love the movie, and I love the ride. The stupid jokes get me every time.

At this point it started to rain, so we looked for a indoor ride. The line for buzz was too long, so we ducked into the Carousel of Progress. We all kid of like the ride, and the song is catchy. It was a good way to get out of the rain mostly.

We got to Pirates of the Carribean just before the rush, and waited less than 10 minutes. When we were leaving the ride, the wait was close to an hour.
Then we headed to Haunted Mansion, but the line was outrageous, so we got on the train, circled 1 1/2 times, and then headed to the hotel. The bus was almost empty because it was pretty early. We had a snack in our room, and the kids sat outside our room and built a house for the local snails out of woodchips. A woman with her baby stopped to talk to us, and the baby loved the snails. I remember when I was a kid, girls didn't play with snails. My daughters LOVE slimy little critters. The poor worms at our house never get a moments peace

We all donned our ponchos and walked across the Generation Gap bridge at Pop. I have never walked this bridge before, but it is beautiful. The views of POP are amazing from the other side. Of course the "new" section of the hotel still looks like a ghost town. It would be great if they ever opened it.

Anyway, the rest of the night was food court dinner (3 in a row now, and still enjoying it), baths, and Hannah Montana.

I'm sure it is coming across pretty clear, but my main aim on this trip was to SLOW DOWN. I know, everyone says they are going to take it easy and enjoy themselves. It was really important for me, because if I had the kids running until exhaustion every day, I would have 2 tired, cranky, miserable kids, and only one tired adult to handle them both.

So that is why we spent so much time playing with the wildlife, eating at the hotel, and watching Hannah Montana.

Trust me, it was worth it. Every single second of "wasted" time was worth it. Try it next time you go, you will be amazed how much you enjoy yourselves.

And the best part - I didn't need a vacation from my vacation like I usually do!!

 

[mickeystoontown]

Morning Heather,

I think your style of park touring is fine and dandy. We like to take our time going to and from the attractions and take breaks. We normally don't go back to the resort but we do find a semi-quiet place in the parks and just rest and people watch.

I love how your girls aren't scared of worms and snails and bugs. That's my kinda girl!