Let me start off by saying that its been several years since Ive attempted to do what I am about to undertake. Excuse me if Im a bit rusty after all of this time. I really enjoy reading everyones trip reports and go back and even read my own to relive previous trips before we take off on a new adventure.
Its been several years since weve been to Disney World. I love the thought of having annual passes and going several times each year, but with three kids and living in the Midwest its just not meant to be. Sometimes life has a habit of getting in your way. Much like this trip. The trip that almost wasnt. You see our story goes like this: I had started planning this trip immediately after returning from San Antonio last summer. It wasnt that we didnt enjoy the heat of Texas in the middle of the summer, it just wasnt Disney. On the drive back home as we were talking about where we wanted to go next summer, I didnt even have to mention the D word, everyone else did it for me. So with the proper family approvals, I started planning in earnest immediately and we quickly decided to go the beginning of June. Our oldest would be home from college, and the other kids would be done with high school and elementary for the summer. That would get us in before hurricane season and before a lot of the east coast schools let out I reasoned. Crowds would be low and we would dance merrily from ride to ride with no wait whatsoever. Now all I had to do was get everything set over the next ten months. Things changed though over time. I was right on top all of the planning to start with and then I just ran cold. I just wasnt into it. Yea, I made a couple of reservations here and there but for some reason it just felt different. It was like we actually werent going and I was doing this entire exercise for nothing. Time continued marching forward and I forced myself to continue to fill in the gaps and eventually had an acceptable plan in place. It seemed as if the rest of the family wasnt quite ready for this trip either though. Had the magic somehow faded?
About two weeks before we were leaving, our oldest son managed to get bitten by a brown recluse spider. We still arent sure where he managed to tangle with this little critter but trust me when I say that you dont want to. I think it was when he spent the night at his friends house and his dad later confirmed that he had seen brown recluses in his house before. Always nice to know after the fact. Ill spare you all the gory details, but lets just say after numerous doctor and emergency room visits it finally seemed as if he was on the mend and was given a green light for our trip. Our middle son did something similar to us a couple years ago on the day before we were leaving decided to come down with meningitis. That immediately cancelled all of those plans. I have threatened all of the kids that they are no longer allowed to mess up my vacation plans. Ive worked too hard on them to have them ruined by their little pesky illnesses. It was now only 3 days prior to us leaving and we all needed to get ready in a hurry. We packed. We stopped the mail. We delivered the dogs to my mom 200 miles away so she could watch them while we were gone. We were actually going to get to go! After all, we leave tomorrow morning and its now 9:00 at night and everyone is getting ready to go to bed so they will be ready to travel tomorrow.
Our oldest son, who we will now call Debo walks through the kitchen where I am standing. He says hes exhausted and is heading up to bed. Hmmmm I thought. He sure does look yellow. Not quite tan, but yes, definitely a bit yellow. Maybe its the fluorescent lights in the kitchen. I tried to convince and reason with myself that I really wasnt seeing what I thought I saw. I told him to go ahead and run up to bed and Id be up in a few minutes. Now Mitchy (DW) was upstairs finishing up the last few things and as soon as I heard her yell my name I knew things were about to change drastically ..
Its been several years since weve been to Disney World. I love the thought of having annual passes and going several times each year, but with three kids and living in the Midwest its just not meant to be. Sometimes life has a habit of getting in your way. Much like this trip. The trip that almost wasnt. You see our story goes like this: I had started planning this trip immediately after returning from San Antonio last summer. It wasnt that we didnt enjoy the heat of Texas in the middle of the summer, it just wasnt Disney. On the drive back home as we were talking about where we wanted to go next summer, I didnt even have to mention the D word, everyone else did it for me. So with the proper family approvals, I started planning in earnest immediately and we quickly decided to go the beginning of June. Our oldest would be home from college, and the other kids would be done with high school and elementary for the summer. That would get us in before hurricane season and before a lot of the east coast schools let out I reasoned. Crowds would be low and we would dance merrily from ride to ride with no wait whatsoever. Now all I had to do was get everything set over the next ten months. Things changed though over time. I was right on top all of the planning to start with and then I just ran cold. I just wasnt into it. Yea, I made a couple of reservations here and there but for some reason it just felt different. It was like we actually werent going and I was doing this entire exercise for nothing. Time continued marching forward and I forced myself to continue to fill in the gaps and eventually had an acceptable plan in place. It seemed as if the rest of the family wasnt quite ready for this trip either though. Had the magic somehow faded?
About two weeks before we were leaving, our oldest son managed to get bitten by a brown recluse spider. We still arent sure where he managed to tangle with this little critter but trust me when I say that you dont want to. I think it was when he spent the night at his friends house and his dad later confirmed that he had seen brown recluses in his house before. Always nice to know after the fact. Ill spare you all the gory details, but lets just say after numerous doctor and emergency room visits it finally seemed as if he was on the mend and was given a green light for our trip. Our middle son did something similar to us a couple years ago on the day before we were leaving decided to come down with meningitis. That immediately cancelled all of those plans. I have threatened all of the kids that they are no longer allowed to mess up my vacation plans. Ive worked too hard on them to have them ruined by their little pesky illnesses. It was now only 3 days prior to us leaving and we all needed to get ready in a hurry. We packed. We stopped the mail. We delivered the dogs to my mom 200 miles away so she could watch them while we were gone. We were actually going to get to go! After all, we leave tomorrow morning and its now 9:00 at night and everyone is getting ready to go to bed so they will be ready to travel tomorrow.
Our oldest son, who we will now call Debo walks through the kitchen where I am standing. He says hes exhausted and is heading up to bed. Hmmmm I thought. He sure does look yellow. Not quite tan, but yes, definitely a bit yellow. Maybe its the fluorescent lights in the kitchen. I tried to convince and reason with myself that I really wasnt seeing what I thought I saw. I told him to go ahead and run up to bed and Id be up in a few minutes. Now Mitchy (DW) was upstairs finishing up the last few things and as soon as I heard her yell my name I knew things were about to change drastically ..
