Escaping winter and kitchen renos!: PTR for May 2008 **UPDATED 4/3 - SHOES! **

[Valjean13]

Hi everyone! This upcoming trip will be my third trip to Disney World, and so I decided it's time for my first trip report!

First off, I should introduce ourselves. Me, 27, a Star Wars fanatic who also loves Disney (isn't it nice how the two go together?)

and DH, 30, who claims that he comes along on these trips merely to please me. But once we get to Disney he has a great time Here he is in 2007, with his giant refill from Whispering Canyon:

We live in Ontario, and so far it seems like winter will continue far into April The snow in our front yard is usually gone by now, but this year we've had a record amount of snow, and we can't see any of our lawn yet. In fact it is lightly snowing tonight....which makes me even more excited about going to Florida in less than 2 months

We decided to take this trip because we have two travel credits to use on Jet Blue. We have to use them sometime this year, so we started checking out the cities they fly to. The closest airport to us that Jet Blue flies into is Buffalo, and they only offer direct flights to 3 places: Boston (which we went to in January, hence why we have the credits), New York (I've been there twice, and DH isn't too keen to go unless it's for New Year's eve) and a couple cities in Florida. We don't want to visit Ft. Lauderdale, and we weren't sure about another Disney vacation (DH thought 3 times in 3 years would be too much ) so we were thinking of checking out Ft. Myers. FYI, because of the hassle we had with Jet Blue canceling our flight to Boston at the last minute for no apparent reason, DH decided that we can't depend on them for connecting flights. In fact he was so fed up with them that he said he'd never fly them again, but then we got the travel credits....so he agreed to take one last flight, as long as it was a direct one.

As we were mulling over where to take our vacation, a friend of mine, who lives in British Columbia, called and said that her and her boyfriend would love to take a trip to Disney World, and wanted us to go with them. That settled it, we were going to Disney again!

So we decided that going in May would be best, because we'd get a slightly better price for our hotel rooms than going in June or July, and the weather is not too hot. Last year DH and I went at the end of May / beginning of June and thought it was great. And who can pass up Star Wars Weekends? I was so excited......until I found out they are in June this year. I kept thinking they were in May, because last year we went in May - but we actually were there in June as well. My mistake. I enjoyed them so much last year!

But with airfare being more expensive in June, we all agreed that going in May would be more affordable for everyone. Not to mention less crowded.

You may be wondering why my report only introduced two people, if our two friends are going with us. Well, the answer to that is coming up.....as well as our ADR list!

 

[Valjean13]

I left off with my friends calling and asking us to join them in Disney World. As if I could say no
My friend has never been to The World before, and she is quite weary of booking travel online. She swears by using travel agents - of course she tends to pay a lot more for her vacations because of this. She looked at the prices on Disney's website and agreed they looked good, we set our dates: May 14-21, and she told me to go ahead and book. Disney had just released the free ticket upgrades for those dates, so DH and I were happy - water parks and DQ here we come I made our reservation, paid the deposit, and immediately started looking for flights on Jet Blue, so we could use our travel credit. We decided to use Southwest on the way to Orlando (7:30am direct flight!) and fly Jet Blue home (4:30pm direct). We like the early morning flight down, as it allows us to be in the parks by NOON! Our Jet Blue travel credit only covered the cost of two one way flights, so we knew we'd be paying for the other half. $72 each going to Orlando on Southwest, not bad at all, and FREE on the way home - can't beat that!

Of course the next thing I do is call to make ADRs! We decide to try Ohana for dinner. I've heard so many good things about it on these boards. I also booked Coral Reef, DH and I have been there before but we figured our friends would love it. We also booked Jiko, Flying Fish, and Captain's Grille. We chose the restaurants based on what our friends might like, not where we really wanted to go. However we did book a dinner just for DH and I at Blue Zoo
I wanted to go somewhere special, we both like seafood, and it has great reviews! I am proud of myself for making sure we have ADRs for 4 people, because my friend is really not a big planner....she's the kind of person who would arrive at Disney and go "I didn't know you needed to book the restaurants ahead of time..."

In the meantime my friend contacts her travel agent, who gives her a package price based on the airfare and hotel (tickets and dining plan extra). When she first sees the package price she is happy....until she sees how much extra she has to pay for tickets and dining She has to fly from Vancouver, BC (or possibly Seattle) and the flights from there are quite expensive. Of course travel agents do not tell you the fares on discount carriers like Southwest or Air Tran, so she is getting quoted almost $700 pp for their flights, which also have long stopovers. My friend is not impressed, and decides that the trip will be too expensive for them.

I try to help her out, by searching for flights online and convincing her to drive to Seattle to fly ($300 pp). But she won't purchase anything online, and unless her travel agent can offer the same price.....she's not buying it. How on earth she can still complain about high airfares when she's not willing to pay for the cheaper ones is beyond me

So a few weeks ago she decides they are not going DH and I are disappointed, but we know we'll enjoy the trip on our own
We decide to book a day at Discovery Cove - LOVE the idea of doing the dolphin encounter! These tickets give you a free day at Sea World too, so we are planning on checking it out.
We also changed our ADRs, since we don't have to worry about our friends. The new list is:
14 - dinner at Ohana
15 - dinner at Rose and Crown (hoping for outdoor seating to watch Illuminations)
16 - breakfast at Chef Mickey's dinner at Jiko
17 - dinner at Spoodles
18 - Discovery Cove day, all food included
19 - dinner at Blue Zoo
20 - dinner at Flying Fish

Chef Mickey's and Blue Zoo will be OOP, the rest are on the dining plan.
Coming up - the fantastic DIS groups I joined that will help us save $$$$!

 

[Valjean13]

Ok, since I am a 27 year old obsessive planner (good thing, as I just became a teacher and when I get a full time job it will involve a ton of planning!) I enjoy Disney vacations as much for the planning as for the trip itself. So every day I look through the DIS boards and learn new things. DH thinks I am crazy, but he loves the fact that we have a touring plan, therefore avoiding wasting our time in line-ups that could have been avoided. The number of people I've talked to who did not have a plan, and complained about the line-ups.....

So a few weeks back I was on the budget boards and saw the sticky for fridge swaps. Since we are staying at POP, I thought it might be a good idea this time to get a fridge and have some groceries delivered. We do have the dining plan, but having cold drinks and breakfast food is always good. Of the dozen or so swaps, one swap had my dates open, so I quickly joined and now we are all set DH is lactose intolerant, so we will make sure to have lactose free milk as part of our grocery order. That way he can have cereal every morning - his favourite breakfast. We'll also order bagels, cream cheese, juice, bottled water, apples, bananas, cereal bowls, and granola bars. We have to get a minimum of $40 worth of food, but that works out to only $5 per day for two people. Not bad for breakfast, snacks, and water. Last year we used our snack credits for breakfast - muffins or fruit cups. This year, we decided to save all our snack credits for ice cream and popsicles.
BTW, I would like to say a huge THANK YOU to everyone who has been generous enough to put money towards buying a fridge, and then letting others use it for free. My DH is constantly impressed with my stories of generosity on the DIS. He frequents a few MySpace and Facebook groups, but he has never encountered a group of people so willing to give / help out / do things for free for strangers. Maybe our mutual love for Disney makes us DISers nicer people? We decided that we'll be giving away our extra bottled water (we are getting a case and probably won't need it all) as a sort of "pay it forward" type thing. The next person in our fridge swap is 2 days after me, so I might leave the water for them with the fridge, or else find some nice people at POP who want it. Either way, we are trying to do our part!

A few days ago I decided to find out about joining a photopass share group. Luckily I found one that was willing to take one more person, so the cost of my photo CD has gone from $99+shipping (to Canada - which is about $25 from Disney) down to about $16+shipping (aprox $5). How great is that? Last year we ended up buying 3 prints in the park so we didn't have to pay for shipping, but we didn't have enough photos to justify the high cost of the CD. Our camera is ok for daytime shots, but evening, fireworks, moving pictures (like on the safari) do not come out so well. It's a cheap camera, I'll admit it, and we'd like a digital SLR, but until we can afford it...photopass it is! We have a great shot in front of the castle at night that we were so glad we bought. This year we'll make sure to use photopass at the water parks too, I think we could get some fun pics. Can't wait!

 

[Valjean13]

Sad news to report: the fridge swap I joined is temporarily suspended because POP luggage storage seems to have lost the fridge. Plus, they refused to give the person who left it a claim ticket. Isn't that strange?
A very nice person who is going in mid-April has offered to buy a new fridge, if 10 people after her would like to chip in $10. Of course I don't mind doing that, but I have expressed my distrust towards the luggage storage. I know some fridge swaps have lost their fridge, and then found it days or weeks later - so hopefully that will happen to ours. Strangely enough another fridge swap lost their fridge for 5 days, then found it the same day ours could not be found....coincidence? I hope so....or else POP screwed up. But even if they gave the other swap our fridge, that means they lost the other fridge a week ago.....
anyway, enough of my rant. On to the good news!!!



I was driving home the other night and mentally going through our packing list, and I remembered that we bought Mickey rain ponchos on our last trip - and I remember where I stored them! No need to buy new rain gear

Plus, I found waterproof disposable cameras on sale. I bought one for our day at Discovery Cove, we can take pictures of the fish while we snorkel. Oh yes, and I booked the day at Discovery Cove! May 18th It must be pretty popular, almost all of April was sold out, and already a few Saturdays in May.

 

[Valjean13]

I figured I should tell all my readers rotfl: ) why we wanted to take a vacation in May. Even before we received a Jet Blue travel credit, we knew we'd be going on vacation sometime in April or May. The REAL reason: our kitchen renovation!

When we decided to renovate the kitchen part of the budget was to be used to go away/stay somewhere else during the messiest part of the reno. We could leave the work to the professionals, and try to avoid living in the mess. DH had suggested we go to Disney for a week during it - but I was not so sure about leaving town during the reno, even for a trip to Disney!
Here's a few before shots of our kitchen:

Then we decided that to save money, we needed to do a lot more of the work ourselves - like ripping out the walls and floors, the electrical, insulation, making baseboards, painting, etc. Originally we were only going to do a bit of the demolition, but the cost of the reno was getting too high, so we had to save $$$ somewhere. This meant that we could not go away on vacation, which was fine with me - I didn't really trust workers to always show up and get the job done when they say they will. Sometimes you need to call them and call them before they show up.

Here's a shot of DH working on the electrical and insulation:

We started the renovation in mid-February, and as of the end of March...it's got to the stage where the kitchen is functional again! It's not finished, we still have to get the plumbing hooked up and the backsplash put in, and paint the baseboards, but it's almost done!
Here's a picture from earlier this week. You can't see our lovely faucet, and the floor is covered by a blanket, but you get the idea. The window trim is going to be re-done, we realized it is too big. It matches the rest of the house, but it just doesn't fit in that space.

DH has been making baseboards and window trim from MDF, because the old ones were in such bad shape. We wanted to keep the large size (9 inches high) but it's too expensive to buy them pre-made at that size.

We agreed that living through a kitchen reno is quite the stressful time. And we agreed that we deserve some sort of treat (as if a new kitchen isn't enough? ) so that's why we were looking at going on a vacation when the reno was all finished. So this vacation to Disney is well deserved, after all the hard work we have put in!
Our renovation was not limited to the small kitchen area, it also included the large eating area, front hall, and dining room. We ripped out the tile that was in the front hall - that took forever, trying to chisel it out! Hard work. We needed a pipe replaced behind the dining room wall, so had to cut a chunk of it out, and we made the baseboards and window trim for that room. When it's all said and done, our main floor will be completely finished (we bought a fixer-upper)

 

[Valjean13]

Whoo hoo! Just got word that our fridge was found! Another swap had our fridge, and delivered it to our swap member!
I think I'll still wait a bit before placing my online order for groceries, just to make sure the fridge does not get lost again. Still, so glad the swap is back on!

 

[Desiree]

Wow your kitchen looks fantastic! I don't blame you one bit for taking a remodeling break to WDW either!!! Looks like you guys put alot of time and effort into it and it is really paying off!

We're also huge SW buffs in our family too. My mission this trip is to get that Yoda backpack (it looks like the scene with Luke carrying Yoda in Episode 5) as a gift for my dh!

We will be going to Disney at the same time that you'll be there. We're staying at CSR from May 19-24 (but we may extend our stay a little too). Can't wait to read more about your trip!

 

[Valjean13]

We're also huge SW buffs in our family too. My mission this trip is to get that Yoda backpack (it looks like the scene with Luke carrying Yoda in Episode 5) as a gift for my dh!

That sounds awesome! I am going to check that out. I saw pictures of Disney Star Wars playing cards, they come in a two pack set, with the Dark side and the good side. I think they're only $5, I might have to buy a few sets for some friends!

Thanks for the comments about the kitchen! We are getting our sink and dishwasher hooked up today and we just picked out the tile for our backsplash. It's getting so close to being done, we can't wait....

 

[Disneychix]

Nice Kitchen job!! We are trying to re-tile our bathroom. We haven't even bought anything with 4 trips to Loews/Home Depot. I'm sure we will NOT be done before our next trip in Sept! Kuddos for getting the job done!

Trip sounds great! Jetblue direct out of Buffalo should be fine. I usually use SW as it's usually cheaper but have done JB.

 

[Valjean13]

Nice Kitchen job!! We are trying to re-tile our bathroom. We haven't even bought anything with 4 trips to Loews/Home Depot. I'm sure we will NOT be done before our next trip in Sept! Kuddos for getting the job done!

I can totally sympathize. Between the bathroom reno we did two years ago and the kitchen this year, we've spent more time in Home Depot than we care to admit. And most of the time we either can't find anything we like, or the two of us can't agree (that happens ALL the time)

Sometimes I think we are too picky, but in the end it's worth it to wait and find what you really like. We had 4 different boxes of tiles ordered in for us before we found the right one for our kitchen!

 

[Valjean13]

On my last trip I walked by a few rooms that had lots of decorations in the window. I checked out a thread that had pictures of decorations people have done to their doors and windows, and they were really great! It seems a little strange to me to decorate your hotel room door, but then I saw a bunch that advertised they were from the DIS boards, or asked fellow DISers to sign their name to a paper or leave a note. That seemed like a great idea.
So a few days ago I picked up a bunch of the "Alien Green" Mickey head paint chips at Home Depot - the official DIS colour. I am debating whether to put them on the door, or in the window. I thought of leaving a pen and asking people to sign, but I assume there might be a few people who would write rude things and ruin it. But it would be nice to have notes from fellow DISers. Has anyone else done something like this? Any suggestions?

 

[Desiree]

I've never done anything like that but I do think it's a neat idea!!!

 

[Valjean13]

I have heard lots of good things about Crocs, and so many people wear them, but I have to say.....I am just not fond of the look. I am not keen on wearing clogs, so I haven't bothered to buy a pair. I know the Crocs brand sells different styles, but they seem harder to find in Canada.

A while ago I saw an ad for Skechers, but made out of the same type of material Crocs are made from. Except they have cute Mary Jane styles, like this:

So I tried on a pair, and I loved them....but a size 6 1/2 was too big. And of course I could not find a size 6 anywhere. Even on the Skechers website. Everywhere I went, size 6 1/2 was the smallest. Finally I found size 6 on the Sears site -

They arrived a few weeks ago....and they are a bit too tight
I am hoping I can stretch them....perhaps I will be trying on the 6 1/2 again and seeing if they will work.... shoes that are too tight are much worse than being too big. We shall see.....they are so light and comfy, I love them....but after a while my feet get red marks on the top, because they are tight. I hope this works out, otherwise it's back to my Birkenstocks for this next trip!