3 sisters + 2 worlds=5 days of Orlando fun! An Aug. '10 TR...final thoughts p. 45

[wdwgirl03]

Congrats on the job. I am starting to be a sub this week since I graduated in May and I wasn't able to find a job. Any advice for a sub just starting out?
I love the ME bus ride too. Listening to all of the excited people and getting your first taste of disney music. It's great! Saratoga Springs looks like a really pretty resort. I look forward to hearing more about your trip.

Thank you! After going almost 3 years without something full time I guess the best advice I can give you is to get into a district where you would like to find a full-time job. And try to make contacts with the other teachers and principals. That is how I got a long-term job in the district I'll be working for and that principal referred me to another principal where I had another long-term job. It really is all about who you know. Good luck!

SSR is a beautiful resort...eventually I did get some pictures of it when the sun was shining!

Glad you made it to Disney, and I love that you got the WDW sign from three different perspectives

Glad you enjoyed our different pictures.

I think the cartoon after the welcome video must be new. We've never seen that before either.

Great pictures of the signs! Once you see those it's like you're REALLY THERE!

Yeah, they must've just added that within the last couple months then!

What the heck! We were there the same time and he didn't get to see the cartoon on ME???

Hmm, really?! That is weird!

Aw........OKW. I miss it! Thanks for thinking of me.

Ugh, darn rain! Couldn't it have waited until AFTER you found your room?!

You're welcome! How could I not think of you when we stopped there?

No kidding. Atleast it wasn't lightning, then I think we might've had to wait a little longer!

 

[wdwgirl03]

I'm hoping that we get a real ME bus too! Do they not play the video on the cruise buses? What's the big difference between them? I know I used to read about it a lot on TRs, but I guess I never really paid that much attention to it because it never applied to me. Now I'm curious to know! How long is the ride? Oh, and is the bus driver tipped?

Hehe, any chance the people behind you were just playing around? When I'm on the ferry going to Manhattan, I like saying to anyone I'm with, "Look over there, it's the Statue of Liberty!" with a British accent

I really like your pic of the sign. Since the focus isn't on the sign like other pics, it looks like you were purposely going for the "we're-on-the-bus-going-to-WDW" feel. Haha, like you purposely wanted to capture the moment of being on the ME bus!

Haha, how cute are you putting those "courtesy of" notations!

WOW! Look at that rain! I love when people take pics of the rain instead of just mentioning that it rained. Really adds something extra!

They do still play the video on the cruise buses. And I think they might've just added them to the regular boring Mears buses because I know when we left on our May '08 trip we got one of the Mears buses and they didn't have it. Then on this trip they did. The ride is about half an hour to get to the WDW grounds and then the rest depends on how many stops you have to make. But really, even if we are the last stop I don't mind because I like to see the other resorts!

No, I don't think they were joking. When we were in line to get on the bus their dad saw our McDonald's bag and asked where we got it and he had a British accent too.

LOL, Emma was kind of mad at me for "stealing" her picture so I felt I should give her her proper dues.

It was just pouring so hard I had to take a picture of it! At one point too my sister took a video.

Woo-hoo! You've made it, Florida rain wet and all! Your pictures on the ME drive are great, especially the three pics of the WDW sign. Oh and I love those outdoor light fixtures at OKW!!

Yeah, it was rainier than I would've liked but oh well. Not a huge deal. Glad you enjoyed the pictures!

hmmmm sister trips = rain Hope the rest of your trip wasn't as wet as ours.

I got goosebumps seeing "your" (okay, your sisters ) pictures of OKW - 10 day! Yeee!

We did have rain every day but it never really lasted that long. I think if you go in expecting rain it doesn't make it so bad.

YAY for 10 days until OKW!

Great update! I'm glad you got a room near where you wanted to be; will we get to see more room pics?

No, sadly I didn't take any room pictures, just a couple of the view from our room. I am so bad at taking actual room pictures.

congratulations on your new job, I hope you enjoy your last few days of vacation.

You sure look like you got pretty wet on your walk to your room. I'm sure it will be a fun memory for the three of you.

Thanks...can't believe school starts next week already.

Yeah, it sort of stunk getting wet since we didn't have our luggage with us yet and I didn't have an extra set of clothes in my carry-on. But it wasn't that bad actually.

Great pictures of all the welcome signs!

It's so fun overhearing people's conversations There are some I wish I could have heard more of because they were so good!

SS looks so pretty despite all the rain.

Thanks!

Hearing other people's conversations is one of my favorite parts of going to WDW. You hear some hysterical things and some adorable things.

It is definitely pretty! That's partly why I love it so much.

I LOVE all the different pictures of the sign. It'll be fun to see the trip from 3 different perspectives.

I'm sorry about all the rain. Of course, it just couldn't wait until you found your room. Blah.

Yeah, and we will have plenty of pictures too!

Don't be sorry about the rain...it was to be expected going to FL in the summer. I might've been more upset if it was my first time. We have for the most part had such great luck with weather on our trips. And atleast there were no hurricanes!

I hope the rain doesn't last too long! I love how you were all troopers though and just ran for the room and then adventured out to DTD! Rain or no rain, you were in Disney!

Ahhhh...SSR....we stayed there last summer and I loved it....we were in the Grandstand Section....

Can't wait to hear about your night at DTD...that's what we do on arrival day too!!!

Cool! How did you like it at SSR?

We used to always go to DTD on our first day but then we started going to a park right away. It was nice being so close to DTD that we could go there, and plus since we got there later we didn't want to waste a day on my sisters' tickets.

 

[jojosmom23]

sarah do you guys have any pictures of the treetop houses? wanted to see what they looked liked, so,e time I want to stay i the treetop villas!

Jenn

 

[mickeysmyboy]

Your pictures of the archway are fabulous! DH and I are renting a car in Oct, I'm going to make him stop on the side of the road to take a picture!

I hate that it rained on your first day! But that it's great that you didn't let it stop you!

 

[meeko_33785]

That's cool that they showed a cartoon on the ME bus. Looks like a pretty fitting one too for starting a vacation.

Too bad your trip got off to a rainy start. That's Florida in August for you though.

 

[wdwgirl03]

sarah do you guys have any pictures of the treetop houses? wanted to see what they looked liked, so,e time I want to stay i the treetop villas!

Jenn

No, sadly I don't have any pictures of the Treehouse Villas. Even though they are considered part of SSR they are kind of in their own little area...in fact if you want to get there you have to get off at one of the SSR areas (The Springs) and then transfer to one of the internal shuttles that goes to the Treehouse Villas.

Your pictures of the archway are fabulous! DH and I are renting a car in Oct, I'm going to make him stop on the side of the road to take a picture!

I hate that it rained on your first day! But that it's great that you didn't let it stop you!

Thanks! I always feel like I have to get a picture of the gateway and just arriving.

It does sort of stink but oh well, we survived!

That's cool that they showed a cartoon on the ME bus. Looks like a pretty fitting one too for starting a vacation.

Too bad your trip got off to a rainy start. That's Florida in August for you though.

It was definitely fitting for the start of a vacation. I wish I could've seen the whole thing.

Exactly, that's why I wasn't really disappointed that it rained.

 

[wdwgirl03]

Sunday, August 8, 2010 cont'd (part 4)

Once the rain had stopped we headed over to Downtown Disney. One of the reasons we requested Congress Park was because it is the closest section to DTD so we took the walkway over there. If you have never stayed at Saratoga Springs the walkway sort of wraps around the waterway and comes out near the bus stops at the Marketplace…right near the Days of Christmas store and the Design-a-Tee store. It only takes 5-10 minutes or so.

A couple shots from the walk over there:

The balloon is grounded, surprise surprise!

Another SSR building. I just love all the soft colors. So pretty!

It was also really weird, as we were walking Claire and I saw these random splashes in the water, like there was some sort of animal that jumped in. It was sort of freaky actually.

Since we were on that end we just made our way through all those stores that are right there: design-a-tee, Wonderful World of Memories, and the Art of Disney store. We really had no intentions of buying anything since we just got there but we did keep an eye out for potential souvenirs. Haha

I remember at one point Claire said something about how one of the things she loves most about DTD is how they play Disney music and Disney music only. She said it just makes you so happy and I have to agree. You just sort of want to sing along, which I definitely did…mostly in my head though. I’ll even admit to singing along to one of the High School Musical songs. Hehe

Remember we weren’t at Downtown Disney to shop that night. I know that sounds kind of funny since that’s pretty much why you would go there but whatever. We wanted to get some dinner so I made my suggestion. Any guesses? Yep, Earl of Sandwich. Apparently Claire had never been there before which kind of surprised me. I thought they ate there in January but I guess not! So Earl of Sandwich it was! Since it was right around dinner time it was pretty crowded but fortunately the line moved fairly quickly. The sandwiches are so big that we all ended up getting the kids’ turkey sandwich. One thing I learned from eating there again is that DVC members get a 10% discount! We pretty much paid for everything with our room charge and when the guy saw on my card we were DVC members he informed us we got that discount. Nice! Maybe Claire will come out of lurkdom and tell you how she liked it there (come on Claire!!!).

After our sandwiches we browsed around some more of the stores: World of Disney, Tren-D, and Team Mickey. Emma had a little fun in the Team Mickey store…haha!

I also liked how my sisters got pictures of some of the details that I had really never noticed before. I saw them pointing their cameras up and was like what the heck could they be taking pictures of?! Here's what they got:

We also went into the Once Upon A Toy Store. This is where we ended up caving and buying our first souvenir of the trip. As you all know, we are kind of obsessed with the vinylmation figures. Well, one of the new things now is what they call Vinylmation Jr. They are mini figures that are also keychains. They just came out with a new set a while ago and when Emma saw them she said she had to get one. Claire and I soon followed so we went to check out and then went back outside to see which one we got. Remember, they are all blindboxed so you don’t know which design you’ll end up with (part of the excitement and also disappointment of them). The good thing about this set is that they were all really cute so we were going to be happy no matter which one we got. Yeah, there were a couple we each preferred but we loved them all. We just hoped we wouldn’t get any doubles!

Emma opening her box...

So now the burning question is which ones DID we get? Well, Emma got this one…

Claire got this one…

And I got this one…

Bambi, the Genie, and Pooh! Isn’t it cool how you can pretty much tell what the character is just by the colors? So cute.

After making our purchases and exploring a bit more we decided to head back to the resort. But first Claire and Emma had to stop and get some ice cream from Ghirardelli. Geez, that place smells so good it was hard to resist not getting something for myself but I figured we’d be back. Plus I knew my sisters would let me have a couple bites of their sundaes.

Love the fountains too!

And a couple Emma got. The balloon is back up! haha

The quiet pool near Congress Park...

When we got back to SSR we went back up to the main building to stock up for the week at The Artist's Palette. We are not big breakfast eaters so we’ve always just gotten cereal to eat in our room. The nice thing about the DVC rooms is that you have the refrigerator too. So we got a box of cereal, some milk and orange juice, and a box of donut holes. Our grand total spent on breakfast for the week then? $19. I’d say that’s pretty good for three people! haha

The last thing we did before going back to our room was check out the Community Hall. It was on the way anyway and I had never seen it at SSR. Basically it’s a place to hang out and do recreation activities. They had Wii games, board games, I think a pool table and then they also have different crafts projects. That night they were doing character magnets, which if we hadn’t just been to the Artist's Palette I would’ve stayed to do since it was free! Just one more of the nice things about being in DVC.

We didn’t want to waste all our energy on our first day there so we decided to just take it easy for the rest of the night. Our luggage was already there by the time we got back. Yay! Then we just hung out and watched TV (Stacey and the Disney Channel of course!) before going to sleep. It took us a while to actually get to sleep. Whenever we go on a vacation, for some reason our first night there we are always giddy. We’ll have the lights off and everything and say we’re going to bed but then we always end up talking about nothing in particular. It just becomes a random conversation and most of the time we start cracking up for no apparent reason at all. It’s so funny because we’ll say “OK, I’m going to bed for real now” half a dozen times. We’ll be quiet and then someone will start talking again. LOL! But eventually we did get to sleep because we were all looking forward to our first full day and our first visit to the MAGIC KINGDOM!

Up next: Another rainy start…

 

[MickeyisBeast]

Yumm, EoS! Their sandwiches are huge, but sooo delicious
Love the Vinylmations on the key chains- I like the Pooh one the best
SSR looks really pretty

 

[dismagiclover]

A great first night! SSR is really convenient to DTD so that worked out great! Love the details from the Team Mickey store. I'm going to look closer next time I go in there.

 

[Cat0727]

Vinylmations on key chains is a brilliant idea! I love the surprise of not knowing what you're going to get when you buy it.

I agree with you on Ghiradelli- I could sit in the shop and smell chocolaty goodness all day!

 

[Jennifer48]

Congrats on the new job!

I love people watching and listening to their conversations. Glad you do too!

Man lots of rain so far. I hope that doesn't last the whole trip!

I love me some EoS!!

 

[dawnbu40]

How nice to have a 5 minute walk to DTD

Those keychains are adorable! I'm sure Caitlin will be purchasing 1 or 2 of those next week

 

[RachelNinja]

Ooo, I love the closeness to DTD! That's one thing I thought about in terms of choosing a DVC place. I was interested in having it close to something. However, I think for our Disneymoon, it'll be fun to have a resort that's a bit more secluded and exotic!

Haha, you were singing along to the HSM songs? Were you with Corbin Bleu???

Oh cool! I saw the decorations in Team Mickey, but I didn't see Tigger all the way at the top about to dunk the basketball! I think Matt would really like that since he's obsessed with the sport.

I had to look at the Disneystore site to see what the other Vinylmation Jr series looked like. You're right! Every single one of them is so cute! I think I'll get one of those next time! Of course, when I was looking at the Vinylmation page, I saw this one: http://www.disneystore.com/vinylmation-vinylmation-urban-4-series-9-figure-sushi/p/1266549/70998/ OoOo, sushi! Haha, love it!

Woohoo for $19 on breakfast! When I was checking our breakfast platter prices at Mara, I was like, whoa, that's a lot of money! Weird and I will probably split something and then eat an earlier lunch and snack in the park instead of spending so much money on breakfast. Then I'm sure I'll have leftovers from places that we can munch on the next morning because I think food-food tastes better in the morning and breakfast food tastes even better at night!

 

[OhioDisneyLover]

First, congrats on the new job!!

Oh, I love SSR so much. We stayed there once. I'm totally enjoying your pictures and your TR.

 

[TinkerbellLuvr7]

ahh!! How did I miss 9+ pages so far?! I'm off to read now!

 

[praisehisname]

And I got this one…

Ooo, I didn't realize the Jr.'s were keychains... I like yours best!

Wait a minute, first no room pics and now no food pics?

 

[TinkerbellLuvr7]

Yay, I just finished reading!!! I wish that we had SW near us The closest airports are nearly 2 hours away. After a 2 hour flight, the last thing I want to do is get into a car for another 2 hours Glad to see you went to DTD on the first night. I wondered if you ended up there or YC/BC!!!

I'm trying to think of the rain that day?? I think it rained in the afternoon when we were inside Coral Reef but I think that's it?? Maybe it rained while we were at YC that afternoon too haha.

 

[DevonsDisneyMom]

Loving the DTD update!! The new Vinylmation shop is so cool!!! the Balloon was grounded when we were there on Sat the 14th too!

 

[brookelizabeth]

That little walk from SSR to DTD is SO nice. I love that about that resort!

The Farve picture made me laugh out loud. What is the status of him anyway? Is he returning to football this year or did he retire? I OBVIOUSLY don't keep up...

I meant to tell you too, one of the "99 cent and up" stores in my neighborhood sells fake Vinylmation Jrs! When I saw them I instantly thought of you. They are not as cute as the real thing, but still cute and only a buck!

 

[tinkgurl]

Ugh. That balloon drives me nuts!! I gave up on it.

I'm so confused. Is Brett playing or retiring? He needs to make up his mind!