Aurora's Going to See Me for My Birthday - LEAVING SUNDAY!!!

[scoot241]

Alright, yesterday started the 30 day countdown!

Here's DD looking at the first calendar page:



Now, you would think she would get all excited just from the castle picture and the countdown. She was mildly amused until she saw (and you can barely see it even in the large size) that Aurora was in the picture. Then she starts exclaiming "There's Aurora! And her prince! And..." She proceeded to point out everything in the picture at this point, all because of Aurora being in it. Now on the actual calendar, Aurora is about 1.5 centimeters tall. I didn't even notice Aurora was in the picture until she pointed it out. The things kids notice!

Anyway, today obviously is 29 days until we leave. We got our Disney mail today! ME tags, luggage tags, everything's here. Now just about all we need to do is get through the next 4 weeks.

 

[scoot241]

Maybe I'm a little late to this party, but I was trying to look up online what the current Precious Moments theme park exclusive figurine was. My DW loves Precious Moments, so I was looking to show her what it was. I think it's the Mickey with a boy with the YOMAD ears on. Anyway, in addition to finding that, I found this link:

http://www.preciousmoments.com/content.cfm/wdw_sept

Turns out, they're releasing new figurines our last full day! Looks like these figurines will be holiday-themed.

Now, according to this link (never heard of Stitch Kingdom, so I'm not really sure how reliable this information is), the master designer is going to be at Uptown Jewelers from 11-1. Well, we were planning to be in MK anyway, how perfect is that? Someone's probably going to have to hang out there with all the PM maniacs early, but hopefully we can pick up one of the theme park exclusive figurines. All the other ones you can find at Hallmark.

27 days and counting!

 

[disneygirlinnj]

I've been eyeing the PM Disney collection but I've been trying to convince myself that I do NOT need another thing to collect! They're adorable though. Perfect timing that they're releasing new ones when you're down there!

 

[scoot241]

I've been eyeing the PM Disney collection but I've been trying to convince myself that I do NOT need another thing to collect! They're adorable though. Perfect timing that they're releasing new ones when you're down there!

Don't do it!

In actuality, we only have a few of the figurines. We have the original theme park exclusive with a boy and a girl sitting on a bench eating ice cream with a Mickey balloon, the one with the girl holding Tinkerbell, the one with the girl playing with a Sleeping Beauty doll and on the table is Sleeping Beauty Castle (got that one at Disneyland), and the bride and groom with the Mickey ears veil hat and the Mickey ears top hat.

So this one will only be our 5th. That's not too bad, right?

 

[scoot241]

Welcome to hurricane season...

We're three weeks out today, and the tropics have decided to remind us that it's the time of year for storms. Fortunately, the storms out there right now shouldn't be affecting much. Indications right now are that Ana will fizzle out, Bill is looking to turn north, and the depression in the Gulf is going to head into the Florida panhandle, probably as a low tropical storm.

Hopefully the tropics will calm down, and we won't have any trouble with hurricanes in a few weeks.

DD's had trouble with hurricanes around her birthday. She was born about a week after Katrina (we were living in Baton Rouge) and we had my parents, sister and grandparents all in the house with us. Was very helpful at the time, though. Last year, Gustav messed up her birthday party in Baton Rouge and we didn't go. We went to New Orleans before Ike hit Houston, and we had a birthday party for her then.

So here's hoping for good weather in 3 weeks.

 

[scoot241]

Quick update...

Well, Ana fizzled, Bill has a high probability of being a fish storm, and Claudette popped out of nowhere and gave the FL panhandle some rain. Overall, I'd say that's a pretty good outcome for having three named storms at once.

We're down to 19 days on the countdown. A week from Thursday I'll do online check-in. We made a request for connecting rooms on our reservation, but I'm planning to fax them for connecting rooms on the first floor since we'll have a stroller and that will make it easier for us not to have to go up and down the elevator.

The other night, I went out to a park that's under development not too far from our house. It's going to be called the Presidential Park, and along with a shopping center called The Waterlights is supposed to open in 2009 according to the signs. When the park's complete, a gigantic bust will be in the park for every president. Right now, six of the busts are on the site. Other than the lagoon that was dug and these six busts, there's no sign that this park will actually be complete in 2009 (and at this rate, 2010 looks unlikely too ).

Here are the six busts:


From left to right: George H.W. Bush, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, Franklin D. Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy

I really like this one of the FDR bust because of the sunset behind it:


The full set of these pictures can be found here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/scottoliver/sets/72157622060090340/

Well that turned out to be not so quick! The countdown continues...

 

[disneygirlinnj]

Wow, great shots of the busts! You'll have to keep us updated and show the final result after all the presidents are there.

 

[scoot241]

Wow, great shots of the busts! You'll have to keep us updated and show the final result after all the presidents are there.

Thanks Jenn! If and when the other presidents show up, I'll go back for more pictures.

These are the photos I was taking when I think someone called the police on me (you might have seen that mentioned on my Twitter). It was strange; I was taking my pictures and minding my business when I had that feeling someone was watching me, so I look to my right. Someone was stopped on the road next to the busts (I was parked off the road) and was standing outside their car on the phone for a while. Then they get in the car (gold, kinda looked like a Chevy Impala, but it was dark), turn around and drive by real slowly. The only conclusion I could come to was that they were calling the cops.

No one ever showed up after that person left, so I can't be sure that's what they were doing, but from the way the person was acting, it seemed like it. It was probably around 8:15 or 8:30 and these face a major highway, so there were lots of people driving by. It's not like I was out there in the middle of the night.

Anyway, nothing happened so I just went on with taking my pictures and then left.

 

[scoot241]

15 days left! 9 working days left (I work a 9/80 schedule which means I get every other Friday off)!

Some good news on the park hours front. MK will be open an hour later the night we arrive, plus it's EMH, so we could be in the park until 1:00 AM (well, not all of us; DD will be going to bed earlier I'm sure). EPCOT, after shortening its hours by one hour on Friday, has changed its hours back to the original posted time. It's EMH that night too, so we could be there until midnight. Right now I'm thinking EMH will be a good time to ride the big rides if DD can't go on them. She's just under 40 inches, but is right at 40 inches with her tennis shoes on, so who knows.

However, the best news comes from DHS: the park is now closing at 10:00 PM instead of 8:30 PM, AND a second showing of Fantasmic at 10:00 PM!

Just noticed Spectro was also added for the night we arrive. Looks like we should be able to see Spectro and Wishes all on our first night!

I am planning to twitter some updates from the parks and take a ton of pictures. I'm actually thinking I need at least another 8GB SDHC card; I have two which should get me about 1000 RAW images, but I think I could easily fill that up. So either I get another card or two, or I bring my laptop and unload the cards at night. Bringing the laptop is cheaper but more of a hassle.

Doing online check-in on Thursday. Also going to fax our requests in probably the Monday before we leave. Other than that, I think the only thing we really need to do is pack.

 

[disneygirlinnj]

Wow awesome updates on the park hours! I have to double check mine when it gets closer!

 

[scoot241]

Wow awesome updates on the park hours! I have to double check mine when it gets closer!

Jenn there is a thread in the Theme Park Strategies board that's called
Last Minute Changes for September (or something like that). I don't think much has changed for the end of the month yet, but you should check it out.

 

[scoot241]

I ordered two 8GB SD cards yesterday. This should give me about 2000 photos shot in RAW. I'm thinking this will be enough and it was only $30, instead of $120 for the Photo Safe II (an external hard drive with a card reader that dumps the entire contents of the memory card onto the hard drive) that I was looking at because I did not want to bring my laptop.

I also ordered the PhotoPass CD. My parents and I are going to split the cost; now we're going to also be hunting down the Disney photographers all trip so we can get a ton of pictures. Hopefully we can get DD to play along with the special shots like Tinkerbell in her hands.

13 days to go! Need to rerun RideMax soon, probably this week, to reflect the change in hours and perhaps other updated information they have.

 

[disneygirlinnj]

Thanks Scott! I saw that thread and noticed no one posted anything about the end of Sept yet either. I'll keep an eye out though.

 

[scoot241]

September 5 is the first LSU football game of the season. Last night I came to the realization that because we are playing Washington, the game doesn't start until 9:30 pm! The game won't be ending until about 1:00am and our flight to Orlando leaves at 8:20 the next morning. Looks like I'll be sleeping on the plane!

 

[scoot241]

So Jenn (disneygirlinnj) came up with a great idea to use a separate Twitter account to use while in WDW. So I'm going to borrow (ok, steal ) that idea. I also made a separate Disney account. Also, in an attempt to be even less original, the account name is scottinwdw.

Direct link: http://www.twitter.com/scottinwdw

 

[disneygirlinnj]

I think I'm your first follower

 

[scoot241]

I think I'm your first follower

Yep you are.

 

[scoot241]

Did online check-in this morning! Got my parents to check in online also. Tomorrow starts the single digit countdown!

In related news, my new memory cards arrived today. Tried them out in the camera and they seem to be working fine. The list of things to bring keeps growing, but that's alright because hopefully we won't forget anything!

Now it really seems like there's not a whole lot left to do except pack our bags. I'm also going to fax Pop Century on Monday to give them our room requests. We had already requested connecting rooms on our reservation, but when talking about it we realized we'd prefer 1st floor also. Hopefully they'll give it to us.

As I mentioned a few posts ago, I'll be live from WDW on Twitter. I've posted a few things there, but the real action starts a week from Sunday. http://www.twitter.com/scottinwdw

 

[scoot241]

Just found out TTA's reopening has been moved back to September 12 (the day we're coming home). We may be able to squeeze a ride in before we leave, but I thought the new color-changing LEDs looked cool. Better than the all-white lights that were previously up there. I have a feeling Space Mountain is causing the delay. I'm over Space Mountain not being open, but really wanted to ride the TTA.

We've been making a shopping list for things we still need to buy before the trip. Nothing huge: snacks, video camera tapes, small sunscreen to carry onto the plane, etc.

A week from tomorrow we'll be in Orlando!

 

[scoot241]

Ladies and gentlemen, announcing the 7 day countdown!

A week from now we should be sitting on a plane flying to MCO!

We've been washing clothes and straightening up the house. Soon the bags will be coming out and filled with all the stuff on the list.

Also have my fingers crossed that no tropical weather develops. There's one system of interest (that I haven't checked on yet this morning) but right now the tropics seem to be pretty calm.

I have a feeling it's going to be a LONG week at work.