Double the Anniversaries, Double the Fun! Jan 2013 PTR | TR HAS STARTED! 2/13

[danimaroo]

I just let out a little SQUEEEEE!!! Not only do you get an extra day at Disney, but you also get a night at BC - HOLLA!!!!! I'm really glad y'all were able to make it work!

ETA: Yes, I really did say "HOLLA." Yes, I'm almost 41.

Pretty sure I yelled out a squee as well when we got this all settled! And I know, this is why I love going in January! It's way slower and easier to make last minute changes to your reservation. Or well, last-minute for a DVC stay.

And you know how I feel about that holla...

Wo-Hoo!! Bummer on the flight cost going up so fast. Thats always the gamble when you are undecided! It's also why I love southwest. No change fees! Bad side about SWA is no direct flights across the country!

Woohoo indeedie! Definitely was a bummer, and I wish we'd known 100% we were going Thursday when the price was lower.

The GOOD news is, I've already been refunded $27 from the fare dropping and filling out the form. It's nice that Alaska does that so basically even though I bought it at a higher price, if it goes down and I catch it, I get my money back.

1 more day at Disney and a extra Dole Whip! I'm so jealous! No really I'm glad you work for an awesome place. My boss is a Disney fanatic so I kid you not its easier to get time off for Disney than it is to get a sick day But I love it that way.

I know, it's pretty much working out for the best! And yeah, I'm glad I work at a good place, too! Haha, it helps to have a boss as a Disney fanatic! Mine isn't, but he's very good about granting vacation... and especially because Matt and I both work under him!

Funny enough though, my whole company knows I LOVE Disney, to the point that my CEO actually chatted with me quite a bit about Disneyland because they were going. It's really funny to be known as the Disney nerd, but I don't mind.

Yay! Sounds perfect!! Glad it worked out the way you really wanted!
Oh and thanks for the tip about Yapta.com. I will have to check it out!

Thank you! I am so glad it worked out, too! And yes, definitely check out Yapta. It's great for when you're trying to figure out the best time to buy a flight, but don't want to constantly stalk airlines sites. Yapta does it for you!

That was funny!! I went to check out YAPTA.com... I get there and I'm like hmmm... That looks a lot like kayak! (Which I currently use to track flights).

So I looked in the address bar and it is kayak.yapta.com lol No wonder it looked like kayak!

Hahaha, that is really funny. I didn't know they're linked at all! You were already on top of it.

An extra day at Disney is always a good thing
Eeeeeek how exciting for you guys!!

Thanks for the tip about YAPTA!

Heck to the yes it is! We're very excited and think this plan will work out a lot better. I have to admit, after the past 2 years of arriving at 6:30am, it'll be nice to be well-rested on our first full day in the parks!

And no problem; that site is bombdotcom!

I just have one question...

What's a YAPTA???

Juuust kidding. (I mean, I don't know the answer. But still.)

Hoooooray for more time in Disney! There is NOTHING BETTER. Oh wait, yes there is. More Disney food and an extra night in your favorite Disney resort. Yeah, that's better.

Flying is the most ridiculously expensive thing. As if going on vacation wasn't expensive enough already? Hopefully your YAPTA will work it on out for ya! (I seriously keep wanting to say 'raptor.' MY MIND???)

Hahaha, I've always thought that was such a random website name. I do wonder what Yapta means! I just tried to look but couldn't find anything.

Yeah, basically, I'm super pumped aaaand can't wait. It'll be really nice to be well-rested for our first day in the parks. Though Matt already mentioned that we will probably have a very hard time falling asleep that night, both because we'll be so excited we're finally there AND because our internal clock will be 3 hours behind. So if we go to bed at 10pm, it's only 7pm in Seattle. It's always kind of a shock to our sleep schedule the first day.

Flying is out of control expensive! LAME! But the good news is I've already got back $27 from Alaska Airlines because my fare dropped to $457! I'd love to see it go down another 70 so I can pocket that money and get the best fare that I originally saw... but we'll see.

 

[Fantasyland Mom]

Did not know about YAPTA! Not that I ever fly anywhere anymore, but when I go to the northwest someday, I'm totally using it.

I am excited about you decision! Really I'm excited for an extra day of TR!

 

[smile4stamps]

Thats awesome that Alaska gives you the money back if there is a better price! Most airlines will only credit you back if you find a lower price in the first 24 hours after booking!

 

[danimaroo]

Did not know about YAPTA! Not that I ever fly anywhere anymore, but when I go to the northwest someday, I'm totally using it.

I am excited about you decision! Really I'm excited for an extra day of TR!

Haha there you go! Come visit and use Yapta and bam, you're savin' yourself money!

I am super excited about it, too! And yes, an EXTRA day for my TR! How could I not even think about that?! I swear, half the fun of going on a trip is writing the TR for it!

Thats awesome that Alaska gives you the money back if there is a better price! Most airlines will only credit you back if you find a lower price in the first 24 hours after booking!

Well you know what's weird? I THOUGHT Alaska would be giving me credit, which was fine since we'll fly them again when we go back to Disney World, but after I filled ou the form, it gave me $27 back to my card! I was past the 24 hour limit by a few hours, so yeah... I'm betting if I find it any lower in the next few days I'll only get credit... but I'll gladly take that for our next trip!

 

[danimaroo]

Oh you guys! I just love being able to come in here with a fun update for so many reasons! AND even better, this update has a ton of photos! YAY!

I guess I'll start off first with non-Disney stuff (but OMG, I'm very excited to share a few other Disney gems I've been working on over here with you!)...

Yesterday we went to the big fair around here, the Puyallup Fair. We try to go every year, and enjoy eating terrible fair food (thank GOD Saturdays are our cheat days, haha!) and walk around seeing all of the animals and rides and stuff. It's always fun, and we usually go in the morning to avoid the crowds and the heat.

I thought I'd share some of the photos I took with you guys. It's pretty clear we're DISers when we take photos of all of our food! Hahaha.

This is the Extreme Scream, typical fair ride. Matt and I decided that we thought ToT would be much scarier than this.

Funnel cake! This was our first fair food of the day. We both enjoyed it, and we were definitely glad we split this between the two of us.

This display was awesome because it was all Toy Story related! It made me happy.

So they have this section for "Hobbies" and it's basically a display of different types of collections. This was Disney plateware, and it was pretty awesome:

DISNEY PINS! It made me so happy to see this display! But also gave me the idea that Matt and I should totally display all of our pins in this manner, then frame it. I think that would look SO neat in our house! So I think that'll be our next project we work on, starting to basically form this with our pins from our past trip (and add to it with future trips!)

Oh and yes, there was definitely discussion that I should probably try to enter next year with my Vinylmation collection. I mean, I already have over 100, I'm sure by next year I'll have many more than that... I just might see about displaying them at the fair next year!

Our next snack of the day were Krusty Pups! Or, for those of you not from around here, corn dogs. But let's be honest, FAIR corn dogs are the best!

We then went and visited our cow friends. This one was just chillin' and being cute:

Next snack was for Matt, called the Candy Cone. This was a new food at the fair this year.

It was a waffle cone stuffed with sweet potato fries, then topped with marshallow and caramel sauce. I know, it sounds really bizarre, but Matt loves sweet potatoes and we'd heard good things about it.

As Matt put it, it was "Thanksgiving in a waffle cone".. I tried a bite, and I have to say, this was delicious:

We then walked over to the rides area to check things out. It was SUCH a beautiful day! The clouds were pretty amazing:

FAKE HAUNTED MANSION?! NOOOOOO!

Last few snacks included the Apple Wallup. This was only okay; the dough was kind of flavorless, but everything else on it was tasty!

We later shared a block of fries, which is always a fair favorite:

We had a really fun time but by the time we headed out, it was starting to get really hot and crowded, so we left at the perfect time.

We ran some errands on the way home, and stopped by JoAnn Fabrics because I had a fun craft project in mind.

I wanted to try my hand at making a headband/hair bow for our Disney trip. I know there are places online that I can buy these from, and they are much fancier ones, but I wanted to try to making my own!

I'm a craft nerd, so this seemed right up my alley. I decided to start with Mickey, with future plans to do Minnie, Pluto, Donald, and Goofy... and then probably even more!

Anyway, this is how Mickey turned out, and I'm not going to lie.. I'm very happy with it!

I am SO excited to wear these during our trips. I'm already planning out what I want to do for each character's headband/hair bow. I'm sure I'll be working on more of them in a few weeks, and will definitely post them here!

Okay, the OTHER thing I have been VERY excited about sharing with you all are the luggage tags I made for our Disney World trip.

I actually did these entirely through Microsoft Word, and I think they turned out awesome! I finally got them printed and laminated last night at Kinko's, and well yeah, here they are!

This one is obviously mine. I chose Splash Mountain just because I love it so much and it seemed pretty perfect for our trip (even though I have a feeling it'll be closed while we're there, wah)..

Mine, of course, was the only one that didn't print correctly, and part of the side got cut off... HOWEVER, I don't really care that much since the front looks fine, and all of my info is on there, so no biggie:

This is Matt's. Of COURSE I made him a Haunted Mansion-themed one. I LOVE the way his came out, especially the back/info side with the creepy wallpaper background:

I made this one for Bruce. Bruce loves Bruce the shark and Finding Nemo, so this just seemed perfect for him.

I found the Finding Nemo font but it won't work on a Mac, so I stuck with the Disney font for his.

Last but not least, this one is Amy's. She LOVES Maleficent, so it only made sense to make this one for her.

This is the closest font I could get to the Sleeping Beauty font, and I think it works well!

Sooo yeah! I've been keeping myself busy with lots of fun little projects to pass the time until our trips.

It's been really fun, and I'm probably going to look for even more to do. I'm sure my next project will be creating a big countdown calendar for our trips, haha.

In trip-related news, as I mentioned last update, we now have an extra ADR we need to make because we're arriving a day earlier during our trip.

We're moving Cape May to the night we arrive, because it's at the resort and will be super easy to get to.

In turn, we'll be canceling our OTHER Cape May ADR for Saturday and will be looking to fill in that spot.

The question is, where do we want to eat?

I have a few ideas, but we're trying to make an effort to go to a place we don't have an ADR for yet, and we will not want to eat in Hollywood Studios or Animal Kingdom, as those two parks we'll have already done earlier in the day... Anywhere else is pretty much free game!

I'm thinking about perhaps an Epcot or MK restaurant of course, but I've got some research to do!

If you guys have any recommendations though, please do share!

Okay, I think I've blabbed enough in this update as it is, but I just had so much fun stuff to share, I couldn't help it, hahaha.

 

[smile4stamps]

Love your Bow headband!

the luggage tags are really awesome! Want to make me some?!? lol

Love the food items from the fair!! can't go wrong with yummy fried goodness!

 

[sunnysideup3]

Okay, so I'm so glad you were able to add on the extra day! Work flexibility is always iffy, I was worried when we added on our Thursday that work would be weird about it, but they were just happy that I was able to get away--so YAY!

LOVE the headbands! I would totally wear something like that. I want something like that that isn't TOO much but still is Disney spirity. You should sell them...

And the luggage tags look great. I think I will do something crafty this fall to help pass the time...aside from scrap book prepping

 

[407-W-DISNEY]

LOVE the headband!! Cant wait to see the others you will make
Those luggage tags are sooo cool. You did such a good job and really personalized them to each person.
So jealous you can do this stuff, i am soo not crafty, but i may have to try, its definitely a great way to pass the times between trips!!

 

[marDgreen88]

The fair skeeeeves me out, let me tell ya. That fair looks pretty cute though! (Except that Haunted Mansion wannabe. I still think that's LAME.)

OH MY GOOOOOSH. Your Mickey bow is amazing! Listen, I love Magical Ribbons, but there are some that I feel like I could try making for myself to save some money and I've been wanting to see about doing it! So it's good to know that someone had a successful attempt! That is freaking precious.

HOLY CRAP. Can you make me a luggage tag? I'm not even kidding. I'll like pay you or something. Or maybe I can try to figure it out for myself... however, that seems quite difficult. Those are amazing.

I would honestly suggest 'Ohana, but I just have no doubt whatsoever that it'll be booked. I don't know! There are so many places to try! Hmm... maybe Garden Grill!!!

 

[onelilspark]

I love the bow/headband! It's adorable!!

As a Maleficent fan, I totally dig the luggage tag.

Also: have you ever tried the corn dog nuggets at Casey's Corner? Because they are probably one of my top Disney foods.

 

[beachphotog]

Squeeeeeeee!! Love the headband! Now I wanna make some!

 

[DanniDeer]

1. I love that headband, but you already knew that.

2. Displaying those pins...I'm totally working on a project for ours, which I'll probably finish Tuesday, because I am a craft-aholic, too.

3. There was a third thing....I think. I don't remember. I'm sure I will approximately .938 seconds after hitting "reply".

 

[Fantasyland Mom]

You already know I love that headband, but those luggage tags are amazing, as well! Look at you, Little Miss Craftypants!

 

[Twoboysnmygirl]

LOVE LOVE LOVE your nerdy-craftiness!! Those are so cute!! I cannot wait to see the other headbands. What a fun day Saturday, I was drooling all over the food shots. You should totally enter your Vinylmation! Do you have any ideas of unique ways you could display them?

 

[danimaroo]

Love your Bow headband!

the luggage tags are really awesome! Want to make me some?!? lol

Love the food items from the fair!! can't go wrong with yummy fried goodness!

Thank you! I love it, too! I just picked up a bunch more ribbon and am planning on working on a few more tonight!

Haha, well I cooooould design some for you! Actually, if I have time I wouldn't mind designing them for people at all, haha.

The food was delicious, though my stomach may have disagreed later on, haha... Hence why we only go once a year.

Okay, so I'm so glad you were able to add on the extra day! Work flexibility is always iffy, I was worried when we added on our Thursday that work would be weird about it, but they were just happy that I was able to get away--so YAY!

LOVE the headbands! I would totally wear something like that. I want something like that that isn't TOO much but still is Disney spirity. You should sell them...

And the luggage tags look great. I think I will do something crafty this fall to help pass the time...aside from scrap book prepping

Me, too! It all worked out for the best... and fortunately we're so far out from our dates that it definitely helped with requesting off an extra day. I'm glad your work was good about giving you an extra day off!

Yeah, exactly! I am trying to make ones that aren't too insanely overboard, but are cute and have a little Disney spirit to them, haha. Ya know, if these end up coming out nice, I may just end up deciding to sell them! Just as a little fun side project, of course.

Thank you, the luggage tags were really fun to make! Sometimes a little frustrating when Word didn't want to cooperate, but otherwise really fun coming up with the designs unique to each person.

LOVE the headband!! Cant wait to see the others you will make
Those luggage tags are sooo cool. You did such a good job and really personalized them to each person.
So jealous you can do this stuff, i am soo not crafty, but i may have to try, its definitely a great way to pass the times between trips!!

The fair skeeeeves me out, let me tell ya. That fair looks pretty cute though! (Except that Haunted Mansion wannabe. I still think that's LAME.)

OH MY GOOOOOSH. Your Mickey bow is amazing! Listen, I love Magical Ribbons, but there are some that I feel like I could try making for myself to save some money and I've been wanting to see about doing it! So it's good to know that someone had a successful attempt! That is freaking precious.

HOLY CRAP. Can you make me a luggage tag? I'm not even kidding. I'll like pay you or something. Or maybe I can try to figure it out for myself... however, that seems quite difficult. Those are amazing.

I would honestly suggest 'Ohana, but I just have no doubt whatsoever that it'll be booked. I don't know! There are so many places to try! Hmm... maybe Garden Grill!!!

Haha I hear you. This fair is fun though! Well, mainly because we don't go on the rides and eat food and look at all of the fun 4H/other displays. Then it's not so bad!

Thank you! And I agree! I mean, I thought about buying some but then I was like, "Nope, I want to try this myself!" I think I also don't feel like waiting for them to come in the mail, hahaha. This one turned out pretty cute though! It's so easy to make, you definitely could make them yourself. I'm going to work on more tonight actually, and I'll be sure to post them!

Honestly, once I'm done with these headbands, I'll have free time and could probably make you a luggage tag no problem! I'll let you know and for real will make you one. The only thing you might have to do is print it and laminate it, but you can do it at Kinko's and it's really inexpensive!

So, 'Ohana sounds good except like you said, I'm concerned about the whole part of it being booked... But funny you mentioned The Garden Grill, because that is on our list as a finalist! We ate there during our honeymoon and really adored it. It's kind of a hidden gem honestly, if you think about it. Between the rotating restaurant, meeting the wonderful characters, and the family-style pretty fantastic food, it's one I don't know why we overlooked in the first place! I'll let everyone know what we decided on in the next update.

 

[danimaroo]

I love the bow/headband! It's adorable!!

As a Maleficent fan, I totally dig the luggage tag.

Also: have you ever tried the corn dog nuggets at Casey's Corner? Because they are probably one of my top Disney foods.

Oh yay, thank you! I had no idea how it'd turn out, and it's better than I expected, which is always great!

YAY! Amy really likes it! She is a huuuuge fan so I'm glad it turned out well.

Ohhh yes, I most definitely tried those nugs during our last trip.. They were so good! I will definitely get them again, not even a question.

Squeeeeeeee!! Love the headband! Now I wanna make some!

You totally should! They're crazy easy to make! And if you do, you must show them off to me!

1. I love that headband, but you already knew that.

2. Displaying those pins...I'm totally working on a project for ours, which I'll probably finish Tuesday, because I am a craft-aholic, too.

3. There was a third thing....I think. I don't remember. I'm sure I will approximately .938 seconds after hitting "reply".

Hahaha, yes I did... and I'm glad you <3 it! Oh, you must show me your pin display!! I am very excited to start working on ours.. That'll probably be something we start once we're back from our trips.

Did you think of what the 3rd thing was?!

You already know I love that headband, but those luggage tags are amazing, as well! Look at you, Little Miss Craftypants!

Haha, I put in my craft pants this weekend, I swear! I love it though, it's way too fun and it's super relaxing, honestly! The luggage tags were my first time designing something like that and I'm pretty happy with them!

Let me know if you make the headbands for the girls!

LOVE LOVE LOVE your nerdy-craftiness!! Those are so cute!! I cannot wait to see the other headbands. What a fun day Saturday, I was drooling all over the food shots. You should totally enter your Vinylmation! Do you have any ideas of unique ways you could display them?

Haha I'm a mega craft nerd.. and proud of it! Saturday was such a fun day, but went by tooooo fast. Wompwomp. (I realize I totally said slow when I meant fast, bahaha).

I might try and enter them... though I have no idea how I'd display them... Maybe I can find an awesome way to make a Mickey head with them or something! Hmmm, I'll have to start thinking about this..

 

[Stringbean&Wingnut]

The fair looks like so much fun!!! That sweet potato fry concoction looks really awesome!

I LOVE your hair bow!!! And your luggage tag!! I wish I were crafty and creative like that!!

 

[wuzzy6]

Aaaaahhhhh, it's like excitement overload! The pins - the headband - the luggage tags - the FOOD!

 

[danimaroo]

The fair looks like so much fun!!! That sweet potato fry concoction looks really awesome!

I LOVE your hair bow!!! And your luggage tag!! I wish I were crafty and creative like that!!

It was a lot of fun! One of our favorite annual traditions, fur srue... And that Candy Cone was seriously tasty! I wasn't sure about it but then I had a bite and it was super tasty.

Hey, it's actually not too hard to be crafty, I promise! I actually just made 3 more headbands last night (and I will be posting those here in the next few days!) that came out pretty adorable. Maybe I'll post how to make them at some point!

Aaaaahhhhh, it's like excitement overload! The pins - the headband - the luggage tags - the FOOD!

Hahaha I know, when I went to post that update I was like... WHOA I have SO much awesome stuff to show off! I'm looking forward to in a few days showing off some photos of more headbands I'm working on, too! I think this might be my new addiction, making these headbands!

 

[smile4stamps]

Can't wait to see the new head bands!!