Caution Pies!! A 25th Birthday Celebration in July and a super belated Trip Report

[maggiemoos]

Yes you read that correctly. This trip report is about a trip that was taken in July. Why did it take me so long to post it? I’ve been a lurker on the boards here for a long time and debated about posting it but never sat down to do it. Then we decided were going back in March of next year. Instead of waiting until then to do a trip report for that trip I decided to flashback and post a trip report for my birthday trip (That’s why you saw my name flash by a lot within the last 24 hours).

Just wish me luck on finishing this trip report before I go in March. Luckily, I still remember this trip and I have my notes still, otherwise this would be difficult.


Before we go any further let me introduce myself.

I’m Margaret

-I’m 25 according to my drivers license
- I teach Pre-k for a living. It’s exhausting but the most rewarding job ever.
- I have a serious caffeine addiction
- I’m a major sports fan
- I put a smiley face in almost every text message or email I send



That’s my awesome Mom, Laura

-She will kill me if I tell you how old she is
-She hand makes cards in her free time
-She is extremely competitive when it comes to Words with Friends and Scrabble

So how did this trip happen?
I decided that I wanted to go for my 25th birthday. Well my birthday is July 5th, which meant going then would be going during an extremely busy season. I talked to by best guy friend and he said he would go with me. I booked the trip in December on my Disney Visa and told him he has 6 months to pay me back. Yeah you can tell where this is going. Well 10 days before we were going to go, he tells me he can’t go. My Mom says she will go, she gives me as much money as she has saved up, I come up with the rest and off we go.

When did this trip happen?
July 2nd – July 9th 2012

Where did we get only 5 hours of sleep a night?
All Star Movies

Here are two of my favorite pictures from some of our past pictures

Oh my gracious don't we just look so happy

So the reason for the title. When went, no surprise here, it rained. Well when we got back to the hotel, we noticed that there were “Caution Wet Floor” signs all over the place. Well I only having had about 9 hours of sleep over the course of 2 days found it hysterical that the Spanish version looked an awful lot like “Caution Pies”. Well for the rest of the trip, every time we saw a wet floor sign we couldn’t help but laugh.

I hope some of you tag along on my first belated but super picture filled trip report ​

 

[maggiemoos]

Table of Contents
How this trip went down

July 2nd
Travel Day​

 

[maggiemoos]

Day 1: July 2nd

I will get through our travel day as fast as possible, I promise.

Since I live in Arkansas and my Mom in New Mexico, we were going to meet in Orlando. We both had 6:00am flights. The closest ‘international’ airport is in Tulsa, which is 2 hours away. I didn’t want to drive that far at 2:00am so I flew out of Northwest Arkansas Regional Airport. The only reason we have an airport here is because of Wal-Mart headquarters being here and the University of Arkansas being down the road.
I was up and ready to go at about 3:30. Clearly, I was practicing my picture taking skills.

The last thing to do, put my DME tags on my suitcases. But where were my tags?

hey hey Staalzy, don't eat those!

My ride picked me up at 4:00am I got to the airport at 4:14am and walked up to American Airlines check-in desk. Only to find that the desk doesn’t open until 4:30am. So I plopped myself on the ground next to my suitcase and waited. I checked in and made it through security with no issues, then again we only have 2 metal detectors. At 5:30am they called my flight. I got my seat and before take off was asleep. After a very boring and quick flight I get to Dallas. I stop for some caffeine (my 2nd coffee that morning) and to update facebook. Originally I wasn’t going to post pictures and things, because of my friend who couldn’t afford the trip. However, that idea only lasted until I landed in Dallas, I posted like 4 pictures.

After yet another boring flight and quick because I slept through it all, I landed in Orlando. Now the fun part, find my Mom, did I mention that she has never traveled by herself. I had feared that I would land in Orlando and get a voicemail from my Mom saying she missed her flight. Luckily, I found her. We gave each other hugs, it has been 4 months since we’ve seen each other. Then we were on our way. I studied and studied the map of MCO. I knew where I needed to go to get to Magical Express, but I’ve also heard stories of people getting lost, and I was determined not to. We got on the elevator with some people that had clearly become lost, they were going to the same place we were. They asked me where to go and I told them to follow me, now cross your fingers that I don’t get lost. Luckily, all the studying paid off. We were checked in, in line, and on our bus to All Star Movies in less than 10 minutes. Would we be this lucky with buses for the rest of the trip?
We get on the bus and shortly later this magical thing starts. A little bit of Disney on the bus before you actually arrive there.

I sent this picture to my Dad to make him jealous

What seemed like 5 minutes later we arrive at ASMovies and check in, I did online check in before we got there, therefore checking in only took as long as it took the CM to write my name on my birthday button.

Our room was ready so we walked to the Mighty Ducks section. I picked this section because I love the movies and I honestly think that is where my love of hockey comes from and 2 it was a way to save some extra money.
We get to our room unload our stuff and head to the bus stop. Since we are so close to ASMusic we decided to just use that bus stop from now on, but tonight we would use the ASMovies bus to get to DTD and do some shopping before our ADR.
After waiting 18 (yeah I wrote it down) minutes, we get on a bus and head to DTD. We did more window shopping then anything else.

hey crowds don't look that bad. Then again DTD shouldn't be my guide

Our ADR was for 8:30 so at about 6:45 we get on a bus to Wilderness Lodge.

We arrived at about 7:30 and I check in an hour early, they give me a buzzer and now we sit and wait. At 8:30 on the dot, they call us back. I get the platter and my Mom got the meatloaf. I’m not sure if it was good because it was good or if it was good because we were starving.

We get our dessert to go and head back to the bus. We go DTD to ASMovies in under 35 minutes. We arrive in our room at about 10:30 to our suitcases. We shower and plan for tomorrow.

Up Next: Hollywood Studios and the first of many off key serenades (and many more pictures I promise)
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