Finding My Own Happily Ever After - November 2021 (UPDATED 10/26)

[Bama Mom]

So sorry about the loss of your dad. I lost both of my parents when I was young (my dad when I was 8 and my mom when I was 14) and it is still tough today.

Did you find your ears?

 

[RollTideinMD]

So sorry about the loss of your dad. I lost both of my parents when I was young (my dad when I was 8 and my mom when I was 14) and it is still tough today.

Did you find your ears?

Thank you, sweet friend. The kind words are appreciated.

The ears never turned up, but I have been fortunate enough to replace them! I'll have to share an update soon!

 

[RollTideinMD]

Critical update: there is a ring.



Boy, I am so glad that he doesn't read here.

There IS a ring and I think he may pop the question at Disney.

About two weeks ago, we were watching TV together on a Thursday night:

Mitch: "Hey, do you want to go to a jewelry store tomorrow night?"
Me: ::chokes on my water::
Me: composes myself
Me: acts totally cool
Me: "yeah, that would be cool"
Mitch: "okay"

So, yeah. We went ring shopping and I picked out a few that I loved and the store sized my finger and took some notes. I was torn between a solitaire with a simple band and a very ornate, almost vintage-y looking Pnina Tornai pear-shaped ring.

Y'all. I really, really think a Disney proposal is in my future.
​

 

[Bama Mom]

Critical update: there is a ring.



Boy, I am so glad that he doesn't read here.

There IS a ring and I think he may pop the question at Disney.

About two weeks ago, we were watching TV together on a Thursday night:

Mitch: "Hey, do you want to go to a jewelry store tomorrow night?"
Me: ::chokes on my water::
Me: composes myself
Me: acts totally cool
Me: "yeah, that would be cool"
Mitch: "okay"

So, yeah. We went ring shopping and I picked out a few that I loved and the store sized my finger and took some notes. I was torn between a solitaire with a simple band and a very ornate, almost vintage-y looking Pnina Tornai pear-shaped ring.

Y'all. I really, really think a Disney proposal is in my future.
​

EEK! How exciting!

 

[RollTideinMD]

Okay, so it looks like we may need a plan B



Literally me.

I don't want to get into the politics of what's been happening up in the skies, but suffice to say...this is bananas. B-a-n-a-n-a-s.

So now, we need a plan B.

Mitch and I have agreed that should the unfortunate happen, we would drive to Disney from Maryland. Not that this has been budgeted for, nor do my spreadsheets and agenda allow for such a thing, but it's a very real possibility.

I'm quite anxious over this and want to make this our plan A - let's just drive. Mitch would rather make the decision at the last minute based on what SWA decides. I, personally, can not live my life that way, so I am working on finding a happy medium.

It seems like the cancellations range anywhere for 1 days notice to..basically no notice. We're 21 days from departure and everything is still scheduled as intended for now.

Here's what I am thinking: If SWA is still reporting mass cancellations within 3-4 days of our trip, we'll pull the trigger and plan on driving. Wanting to preserve that coveted Homecomin' reservation, we'll plan on starting the drive down the day before and spending the night somewhere in south Georgia. Ideally, we'd have no more than a 5 hour drive on our Disney arrival day.

Not wanting the kids to miss any more days of school than they already are, we'd ideally leave late Tuesday afternoon, perhaps on the road by 3-4pm. Conversely, I'm also leaning on taking them out of school about an hour early, which would allow us to be on the road by 2:00pm, which would allow us to miss the worst of the rush hour traffic in the DC/NoVA area.

I don't know. I'm overwhelmed, but I know that we'll figure it out.


​

 

[Bama Mom]

The good news is the number of cancelled flights have lowered from the past few days. So hopefully Southwest is getting their crap together. We only fly southwest even though we have to drive up to Nashville since it's the closest airport that flies Southwest with low prices. We like getting two checked bags and the lower prices.

 

[RollTideinMD]

The good news is the number of cancelled flights have lowered from the past few days. So hopefully Southwest is getting their crap together. We only fly southwest even though we have to drive up to Nashville since it's the closest airport that flies Southwest with low prices. We like getting two checked bags and the lower prices.

Fingers crossed! We only fly SWA too - for me personally and professionally. I am loyal to them. I'm also considered pooh-sized and they're the most plus-size friendly airline!

 

[Bama Mom]

My husband and I are also pooh sized so we like them. I also like that most of our flights have never sold out so hubby can sit in the aisle seat and I can sit in the window seat. The only full flight I've had was on my daughters trip in March and It wasn't full but we had someone sit in our row on both flights. On the way down I had the window seat so on the way home I let my daughter have it and I sat in the middle It was the only time I experienced jet lag. So I definitely prefer the window seat.

 

[MrsSLF]

I hear you with the SWA cancellations as I had a flight scheduled to leave yesterday for my high school reunion (spoiler alert: it wasn’t cancelled) after the news of the weekend and I was a little stressed. Luckily, the worst of it was being delayed an hour (which did suck) and that’s it. *Supposedly* the cancellation problems are *over* but you may end up with a delay like we did. I agree with you, though, that you should make a plan and go with it as deciding a few days before would stress me out.

 

[RollTideinMD]

SINGLE DIGITS, Y'ALL



OH EM GEE - are we seriously just a smidge over a week away from our long-awaited vacation!?

Why yes. Yes we are.



I am feeling good about how prepared we are for this trip. The kids are with their dad & step-mom for the week until the night before we fly out, so I am seizing this opportunity to do all of their laundry and get their bags packed between the next two days. Mitch wants to handle his own packing (is it because he's packing a ring!? Dear God please don't let him check a ring in his luggage) and I'll pack early next week. As it currently stands, I've got some park essentials pulled out, organized, and halfway packed:



Starting at the top left and working my way to the right and down:

Disney trip binder, Anker battery banks, spare chargers
Ears, ears, and more ears
Power strip, disposable masks, hanging shelf organizer
Cooling towels, pop-up laundry hampers, in-park bag )with things like chapstick, meds, etc), and lastly all of the germx wipes
More cooling towels, mini laundry kit (wrinkle release, tide pen, lint roller)
Glow sticks, mini backpacks with carabiners for water bottles, first aid kit
Insulated water bottles, sun care kit, foot care kit

not pictured above is my trip journal:



With the release of Disney Genie+, I am letting go of my original plans of a detailed itinerary and I'm going to just make a simple list of things that we want to accomplish in each park - dining reservations, experiences, what our must-do attractions are, what our must-have snacks are..etc. I am still working through designing these mini agendas (and they'll be laminated) but here's what I have so far:



I've also done this for our Food & Wine game plan. Hey - if you like Type A planning, come sit by me!





Southwest Airlines seems to be back to business as usual, so we are still set to fly from BWI to MCO, but I do stalk the SWA app and Flight Aware multiple times a day just to be extra safe.

All of the gift cards have been purchased:
Food & Wine spending money
Dillon spending money
Delaney spending money
Experiences (Droid Depot)
Snacking outside of Epcot
Shanna & Mitch spending money

I bought them at BJ's Wholesale and saved a pretty good amount of money off the face value of the gift cards. It's one of my favorite hacks.

All of the above to drop a doozy..

Dillon, my sweet baby, was injured during a recent baseball game and is recovering from a mild concussion. He took a ball to the face - right smack in between his eyes. Fortunately, he was not knocked unconscious, no bleeding, and nothing fractured.

He's currently being treated by a concussion specialist who has cleared him for air travel, but he can not ride thrill rides while we are at Disney. This means no Space Mountain, no Expedition Everest, no ToT. Nothing that spins around in a circle. Nothing fast. Hope he likes boat rides!

We were not thrilled to get this news, but his health and safety is what's important and thank goodness he's okay. We're booked for the Droid Depot and he's excited to eat all of the food, so we'll make the best of it and still have a magical time. We're planning on utilizing parent swap at the thrill rides that way Delaney can still enjoy and we don't miss out either.

I'll be back with a picture of all of our shirts that I have been making
​

 

[SEAGULL59]

Hope you had a great trip!! Excited to read about it.

 

[RollTideinMD]

I GOT ENGAGED!


Come join me on my Trip Report here​