A Very Lurkyloo Christmas is FINISHED! New 3/16: Last Day of the Trip!

[lurkyloo]

I only have 9 1/2 hours til my ADR window opens, and I am having a heck of a time trying to figure out where we'll be and where we'll want to eat 3 months from now. This is HARD!!!!

...That is all.

 

[LouDisney]

Good luck, can't wait to see what you pick!

 

[Becx N Gav]

OK, I am waaaaaaaay too excited about this, but I just discovered, like, last week that the DIS holds these amazing private parties every year around MouseFest time, and this year's is right during our trip to WDW.

Well, today they announced what this year's party is, and luckily for latecomers like me, it's a redux of last year's PRIVATE PARTY AT PIXAR PLACE!!!

It's after DHS closes and we get to ride Toy Story Mania as many times as we want and there will be carnival/street fair food and Woody will be there and also Sarge is leading us in from the front gate - WHEW!

And it's only 25 bucks! And there's no limit on how many people can attend! And this year they're letting us bring cameras!



So, I say if you're going to be in WDW on Dec. 12, we should all meet at the DIS party!

Hi there, I stumbled upon this thread when searching for dessert party threads I should have thought to check and see if you were doing a pre-trippy when I saw you on the Podcast board.

Still catching up but love the cake pics and the D23 tour (glad you managed to get on at least one)

You're gonna have a fab time at the party - last year was the first time the Dis Unplugged did a Mousefest event and it was awesome sounds even better this year.
Hopefully the sign up will be easy, last year they did it at (I think) 9pm east coast time so 2am here but we stayed up and I got DH signed up. However when I went to sign myself up it had closed and people were being waitlisted The Podcast crew came through though and got more sponorship allowing all the people waitlisted a place too

Will try and catch up on the rest of this thread tomorrow

 

[eandesmom]

You know....I subscribed, thought I'd actually posted but apparently not!

I think I was intimidated by the dessert porn, meant to find something worthy and then, well life. You know.

Love your PTR!

First of all

OK, something exciting happened, but it's not about my December trip, but it's exciting so I'm sharing it anyway:

Our wait list for our Thanksgiving trip to the Villas at Disney's Grand Californian came through! So we get to try out a brand-spanking-new DVC studio at Disneyland in November. Hooray!!!

VERY exciting! DH says that's his vote if we ever go the DVC route as we could actually drive and use it more. Not sure it's my vote though and good to know you made it in on the wait list!

Second, LOVE the D23 tour and pictures, how fun to read!

Third, OUCH on the CP prices! I would want to do CP myself if we ever make it during that time of year (which is about as likely as pigs flying but it would be really fun). But OUCH!

Looking forward to your ADR list.

I'll need to figure out my price of admission....DS9 has asked for a roller coaster cake for his party on Sat. It's my mom's job to figure it out, should be interesting!

 

[Charleston Princess]

Good luck making your ADRs tomorrow -- I am hoping divine inspiration strikes you before then, and you suddenly realize exactly where you want to eat on each day of your vacation!

 

[Pooh_Girl]

Good Luck on your ADRs!! I can't wait to see what you pick!! Whatever you pick will be great though, just as long as there is a hilarious TR to go along with it!!

 

[lurkyloo]

Good luck, can't wait to see what you pick!

Thanks! It's 3:45 am and I'm sitting here drumming my fingers waiting for the call center to open cuz the online ADR system isn't working for me...

Hi there, I stumbled upon this thread when searching for dessert party threads I should have thought to check and see if you were doing a pre-trippy when I saw you on the Podcast board.

Yay! Good to see you in this neck of the woods!

Still catching up but love the cake pics and the D23 tour (glad you managed to get on at least one)

You're gonna have a fab time at the party - last year was the first time the Dis Unplugged did a Mousefest event and it was awesome sounds even better this year.
Hopefully the sign up will be easy, last year they did it at (I think) 9pm east coast time so 2am here but we stayed up and I got DH signed up. However when I went to sign myself up it had closed and people were being waitlisted The Podcast crew came through though and got more sponorship allowing all the people waitlisted a place too

My goodness, the times we get up/stay up til for Disney! I keep asking all over the podcast board and keep being assured there are many more spots than last year. I hope so!

You know....I subscribed, thought I'd actually posted but apparently not!

I think I was intimidated by the dessert porn, meant to find something worthy and then, well life. You know.

Love your PTR!

First of all


VERY exciting! DH says that's his vote if we ever go the DVC route as we could actually drive and use it more. Not sure it's my vote though and good to know you made it in on the wait list!

Yeah, I'm of two minds about the usefulness of a West Coast DVC to West Coasters myself... I love the idea of "owning" at my fave Disneyland hotel (so far ) but DH is right that it's sorta more important to have prepaid lodging at a destination that's farther away, like WDW.

I'll need to figure out my price of admission....DS9 has asked for a roller coaster cake for his party on Sat. It's my mom's job to figure it out, should be interesting!

Ooooh! I hope we get to see it!

Good luck making your ADRs tomorrow -- I am hoping divine inspiration strikes you before then, and you suddenly realize exactly where you want to eat on each day of your vacation!

Thank you so much - it did! It seriously took about 6 hours of stewing and setting it aside and going back and stewing some more, but I finally got at least a solid rough draft to start with and hopefully tweak a little later!

Good Luck on your ADRs!! I can't wait to see what you pick!! Whatever you pick will be great though, just as long as there is a hilarious TR to go along with it!!

That makes me feel a lot better. I am getting unreasonably worked up over the fact that I'm not able to book online, so it's nice to remember that heck, anyplace we end up will be fun (well, with the exception of Hollywood & Dine, according to the folks on the Restaurant boards...)

 

[Becx N Gav]

Morning Carrie (well afternoon here!) - hope you get all the ADR's you want Looking forward to hearing what you guys are planning on your relaxing trip

Will you be tweeting/blogging from the TSM party? I will try and stay up (get up early) to hear and see all the goings on, it's gonna be so cool
I'm sure there won't be any problem with getting a place this year. The Podcast crew were really upset they couldn't get everyone a place that wanted to go (and then on the night there were quite a few no shows which I think will be avoided this year by charging people for a space - I mean who wouldn't want to go )

Do you think you would ever want to do a Disney cruise? If so you HAVE to sign up for Podcast Cruise 2.0 (12/12/2010 - 4 night cruise), 1.0 in May was the best ever - our first cruise too DH now says he won't do WDW without a cruise for part of it - gotta love that man

I will be very interested in hearing about the D23 Expo too. I really wanted to join but the shipping charges for overseas about doubled the cost and it's unlikely we'll ever be able to do one of the tours or anything cool like that I just couldn't justify the cost for 4 (I'm sure very nice) magazines, pin, membership card and over priced exclusive merchandise (which we would also have to pay extortionate shipping and duty on)

 

[JoJo1980]

I only have 9 1/2 hours til my ADR window opens, and I am having a heck of a time trying to figure out where we'll be and where we'll want to eat 3 months from now. This is HARD!!!!

...That is all.

I totally feel your pain - planning is only fun once you've done your ADR's I've gone through a full notepad changing everything around soooo much, gives you such a headache We're finally sorted 100% now, at long last Just try and take a break from it now & then so that your head doesnt completey pop, as that could be very messy to clean up I hope you manage to get sorted and everything you want Cant wait to hear all about it

 

[MyMuse]

I only have 9 1/2 hours til my ADR window opens, and I am having a heck of a time trying to figure out where we'll be and where we'll want to eat 3 months from now. This is HARD!!!!

...That is all.

I hope it went well!

I was able to get online this morning, but then again, I was only making 1 ADR. Ahhh...the joys of off-site!

I kinda like the 3 month window vs. the 6 month window....that'll be even harder, though I understand the reasoning.

Good Luck!!

 

[LittleStinkerbelle]

I only have 9 1/2 hours til my ADR window opens, and I am having a heck of a time trying to figure out where we'll be and where we'll want to eat 3 months from now. This is HARD!!!!

...That is all.

How'd it go? Can't wait to hear what you got!

 

[NeverlandClub23]

How'd it go? Can't wait to hear what you got!

I'm envisioning her still passed out with her ADR list stuck to her face and her yelling out "Le Cellier! 5:30 p.m.!!" when Patrick calls to tell her she overslept

 

[mrsksomeday]

I hope your ADR's went smoothly and you got what you wanted.

 

[LittleStinkerbelle]

I'm envisioning her still passed out with her ADR list stuck to her face and her yelling out "Le Cellier! 5:30 p.m.!!" when Patrick calls to tell her she overslept

 

[eandesmom]

Yeah, I'm of two minds about the usefulness of a West Coast DVC to West Coasters myself... I love the idea of "owning" at my fave Disneyland hotel (so far ) but DH is right that it's sorta more important to have prepaid lodging at a destination that's farther away, like WDW.

Exactly! I agree with your DH So if we ever do it....it will be there.

 

[Donald'sGirl]

I'm envisioning her still passed out with her ADR list stuck to her face and her yelling out "Le Cellier! 5:30 p.m.!!" when Patrick calls to tell her she overslept

I might be that way tomorrow when I have to go through the same thing

 

[HebeJebe]

How fun you are staying at the villas at the Grand Californian!!

We will be in Disneyland in a few weeks and I hope to sneak a peak!

 

[NeverlandClub23]

I might be that way tomorrow when I have to go through the same thing

I'm always that way! Our trip in November 2008 we were there for 9 days. I woke up at 6 a.m. (because I had to have an hour to prepare ) every day for 9 days to make ADR's (as we didn't have resort reservations until a month before our trip) AND I had another phone dialing to try and get an IllumiNations cruise at the same time. It was a nightmare (and such an adrenaline rush)! One of those days I passed out after making them and I was two hours late for work! Bosses sure don't understand the importance of ADR's!

I can't imagine what it'd be like living in another timezone!

Good luck tomorrow!

 

[lurkyloo]

I’m going to have this cross-stitched on a pillow: Never wait until the day before your ADR window opens to pick your ADRs.

If you’re like me, you need to plan out exactly which parks you think you’ll be going to and when in order to figure out how to fit in all the restaurants you want to visit, and then some restaurants are only open for dinner, so it’s like a big puzzle with a bazillion pieces. I’d work on it for 20 minutes or so, get blocked, and then put it aside and come back to it later. By early evening, I still hadn’t figured out anything besides Kouzzina on the night we arrive at BoardWalk Inn, and the midnight ADR deadline was looming.

So I decided to spread all my papers out on the coffee table and start over using a big tabloid-sized December calendar I’d printed out, with highlighters and different colored ink (yes, I am that nerdy).

I wrote the park hours and fireworks-show times on each day of our trip and color-coded them according to TGM’s recommendations. Then I marked which area of WDW we’d be staying in and the tentative park or parks we’d see each day. I also typed up the names of all the restaurants I wanted and cut them out so I could arrange and rearrange them on the big calendar (even nerdier!).

It worked! It was so much easier for me to see our options and make tentative itineraries for each day when I had it all on paper and could move the pieces around!

Finally, about 9:30pm, I had a good first draft to use to make ADRs that can then be tweaked later, hopefully, and if not, I’d be happy with what we have. However, when I started playing around on WDW’s dining site, I kept getting an error code whenever I tried to associate our first hotel ressie # with the ADR account – which meant I wouldn’t be able to make up to 10 days’ worth of reservations at midnight, just the first day’s ADR.

After two hours of freaking out, downloading and updating various browsers, and frantically instant-messaging my tech-savvy pal Nate, it finally occurred to me to put in one of our other reservations numbers for later in our stay, and that one worked. Which meant that we’d have to wait til 90 days from the start of that ressie to make ADRs online.

I was sooooo disappointed, mostly because I’d been up since 4am and was very very tired and for some reason thought that waiting til the phone lines opened at 4am PT to make my ADRs was a fate worse than death. I guess because we’re going during Free Dining and it’s only 90 days out and I wanted not only Le Cellier but also a Candlelight Processional dinner package, so I worried the midnight ADR-makers would ace me outta everything (I blame DIS hype for that!).

So I got up at 3:30 this morning and got all my papers ready and phoned at 3:59:59 and pushed 1 a bunch of times and got an agent and blurted out “IneedtomakeaCandlelightProcessionalPackagereservationsandtheygoreallyfast!!!”

She was soooo patient with me, and we went methodically through everything over the course of about 20 minutes. I got everything I wanted within a few minutes of my desired times! In your FACE, Free Dining!

I’ll put the rundown in a separate post. While I am typing, please enjoy this photo I took of a super-cute cake when I was visiting my dad in Northern California this weekend:

... and its baby cake:

 

[JoJo1980]

I'm always that way! Our trip in November 2008 we were there for 9 days. I woke up at 6 a.m. (because I had to have an hour to prepare ) every day for 9 days to make ADR's (as we didn't have resort reservations until a month before our trip) AND I had another phone dialing to try and get an IllumiNations cruise at the same time. It was a nightmare (and such an adrenaline rush)! One of those days I passed out after making them and I was two hours late for work! Bosses sure don't understand the importance of ADR's!

I can't imagine what it'd be like living in another timezone!

Good luck tomorrow!

you passed out? I'm counting myself lucky now, I only felt like I was going to pass out but didnt I was getting sooo stressed before we made ours, I couldnt get the online thing to work and we are 5 hours ahead of Fl so I had to be at work and couldnt call until 5pm our time when back at home, which was lunch time in Fl Missed out on le cellier but luckily got everything else

Then we changed our plans and I had to re-arrange the adr's, grrr more stress - but its all done now