stephielela
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Sep 5, 2009
- Messages
- 2,534
Hello! I'm hoping this is the right place... this is my first Disneyland PTR!
First a bit of background...
The Who: Mommy and Jack...
I'm the one with the ears on, not the one in the middle of running the WDW marathon...
Jack is my 5 year old, about to turn 6, Disney loving son. He has been to WDW 5 times and DL once. The DL trip was only one day after our Mexican Riviera cruise on DCL, and Cars Land wasn't open yet. He was only 3 so he doesn't remember that much anyways, this trip will be much more memorable! This was from our last trip...
Also probably joining us is my dad. He hasn't booked his flights yet but plans too when we get back from Florida on Monday
This is my dad and Jack after Jack finished the Mickey Mile during WDW Marathon Weekend last month. My dad had just completed the WDW Half and still ran with Jack for his 8 minute mile... Poor dad!
The Why: People who know me know I can come up with pretty much any reason to take a vacation. We spent my 30th birthday in January at WDW and on DCL. In April (the 11th), Jack turns 6! He usually ends up with a pretty extravagent birthday weekend since all of my aunts and uncles and granparents and cousins want to come. With that many people he usually has a seperate birthday party for his friends to come. Up until now they have all been daycare friends, a realtively small group of 10 ro fewer kids. Since he has started kindergarten, things are a bit different. There are 23 kids in his class, and I don't know any of their parents. At daycare now, he is in with the "schoolers" who range from 5 years old to probably 8 or 9. None of the other kids in his class have had a big party where they have all been invited and I definitely can't afford that on top of the family party. And I don't want to have a party with a ton of older kids either. So I decided maybe for this year, we could take a little weekend trip... and it just snowballed from there!
The When: This is truly going to be a weekend trip, we leave first thing in the morning on Saturday, April 12th, and land at SNA at 10:30 am. We leave Monday night, the 14th at 6 pm, so we have most of the day Saturday, all day Sunday and a good chunk of time on Monday. This really helps with the surprise, since we will have a family dinner Friday night on his actual birthday and then I can wake him up early Saturday morning and surprise him with the trip! The bonus to this is that my dad's birthday is the next weekend, so I offered to pay for his ticket as his present if he wanted to join us.
The How: The only way this trip is feasible is because I had enough points with Southwest to cover both our tickets. My dad also has enough points for his ticket, or at least he will after our flights this weekend. Add to that the fact that my dad is retired military and can get our 3 day park hoppers for $129 each and it becomes a lot more reasonable.
The Where: Well obviously we are going to Disneyland! But we are staying at the Desert Inn right near the entrance rather than staying on-site. We used to live in CA and have been to DL a bunch and I LOVE the Disneyland Hotel, but I just can't spend that kind of money on a hotel these days. The Desert Inn got pretty good reviews, is very reasonably priced, is very close and has free breakfast. My first choice was the Anaheim Fairfield Inn and Suites which we stayed at last time, but the prices were way too much. I work for Marriott and can get employee rates but so far they haven't released any for our dates so unless they do, we will stick with Desert.
First a bit of background...
The Who: Mommy and Jack...
I'm the one with the ears on, not the one in the middle of running the WDW marathon...
Jack is my 5 year old, about to turn 6, Disney loving son. He has been to WDW 5 times and DL once. The DL trip was only one day after our Mexican Riviera cruise on DCL, and Cars Land wasn't open yet. He was only 3 so he doesn't remember that much anyways, this trip will be much more memorable! This was from our last trip...
Also probably joining us is my dad. He hasn't booked his flights yet but plans too when we get back from Florida on Monday
This is my dad and Jack after Jack finished the Mickey Mile during WDW Marathon Weekend last month. My dad had just completed the WDW Half and still ran with Jack for his 8 minute mile... Poor dad!
The Why: People who know me know I can come up with pretty much any reason to take a vacation. We spent my 30th birthday in January at WDW and on DCL. In April (the 11th), Jack turns 6! He usually ends up with a pretty extravagent birthday weekend since all of my aunts and uncles and granparents and cousins want to come. With that many people he usually has a seperate birthday party for his friends to come. Up until now they have all been daycare friends, a realtively small group of 10 ro fewer kids. Since he has started kindergarten, things are a bit different. There are 23 kids in his class, and I don't know any of their parents. At daycare now, he is in with the "schoolers" who range from 5 years old to probably 8 or 9. None of the other kids in his class have had a big party where they have all been invited and I definitely can't afford that on top of the family party. And I don't want to have a party with a ton of older kids either. So I decided maybe for this year, we could take a little weekend trip... and it just snowballed from there!
The When: This is truly going to be a weekend trip, we leave first thing in the morning on Saturday, April 12th, and land at SNA at 10:30 am. We leave Monday night, the 14th at 6 pm, so we have most of the day Saturday, all day Sunday and a good chunk of time on Monday. This really helps with the surprise, since we will have a family dinner Friday night on his actual birthday and then I can wake him up early Saturday morning and surprise him with the trip! The bonus to this is that my dad's birthday is the next weekend, so I offered to pay for his ticket as his present if he wanted to join us.
The How: The only way this trip is feasible is because I had enough points with Southwest to cover both our tickets. My dad also has enough points for his ticket, or at least he will after our flights this weekend. Add to that the fact that my dad is retired military and can get our 3 day park hoppers for $129 each and it becomes a lot more reasonable.
The Where: Well obviously we are going to Disneyland! But we are staying at the Desert Inn right near the entrance rather than staying on-site. We used to live in CA and have been to DL a bunch and I LOVE the Disneyland Hotel, but I just can't spend that kind of money on a hotel these days. The Desert Inn got pretty good reviews, is very reasonably priced, is very close and has free breakfast. My first choice was the Anaheim Fairfield Inn and Suites which we stayed at last time, but the prices were way too much. I work for Marriott and can get employee rates but so far they haven't released any for our dates so unless they do, we will stick with Desert.
