First Family Vacation in 17 years...oh the fun 5 adults can have! *Updated 2/4*

[crzyred]

Our first trip to Disney World was in October of 1992. I was a mere 8 years old. It took us until Jan. 2006 to get back to the World.

(This trip was taken with my aunt/uncle and 2 cousins...so it wasn't just our family)

Since then, we’ve been to WDW 4 times. 2x in 2006, Jan, ’08 and the most recent – Jan. ’09. This last trip however, was our first family vacation since 1992. We’ve traveled other places, mainly visiting family out of state and we usually had friends come along with us. So this was a change of pace…just the family…yeah, this could be interesting !

Cast of Characters:
Dad
Mom
Kelly
Jim
Shelly (me!)


So a little more background regarding our trip. First, after doing a little research my sister and I discovered that we could rent DVC points and stay at a “nice resort” for the same price as staying at All Star Music in a suite. After looking at the resorts we could “afford” we chose Saratoga Springs. The only ‘problem’ was that there was no availability for the first 2 nights. So we stayed at ASMu those nights then transferred.

After announcing to everyone within earshot that we were going to Disney World, we discovered that a friend of the family had a conference in Orlando Wednesday – Friday of the week we were going to be there. So we invited her to spend the weekend with us in Disney World.

Ok, room is booked, flights taken care of, park tickets bought. We’re ready…right? Well we get to Christmas Day and we are literally on our way out the door to my cousin’s house when my mother starts having horrific pains in her lower back. Dad takes her to the ER (yeah no family holiday is complete without a medical emergency…) she is informed she has kidney stones. They needed to keep her over night to do something to her the next morning to get rid of the stones (yes…that’s as descriptive as I’m getting with it). Overnight the doctors found out she had pneumonia. So, off to ICU she goes for 2 days…..SCORE! At this point we are 13 days away from our trip. To make a long story short, she got moved out of ICU, was able to come home, and was able to get rid of the stone in a 2 day period….YAY!!!! So the only side effect she really had, was getting tired more quickly than normal.

One last thing for us to do – make t-shirts! After ironing on about a thousand transfers (in all reality it was about 22…so close enough), we are ready!

DISNEY HERE WE COME!

 

[tazdev3225]

I'm looking forward reading more. The shirts look great. I did them for DH and me in Oct. and it was fun having matching shirts. I may try them for our trip this year if I can find better transfer paper.

 

[coffeehousemom]

Umm were you guys in DHS on Sat the 10th cause I swear you walked past us by the ToT. What color were your shirts that day?

Kayte

 

[crzyred]

I'm looking forward reading more. The shirts look great. I did them for DH and me in Oct. and it was fun having matching shirts. I may try them for our trip this year if I can find better transfer paper.

Yeah it's fun to have matching shirts. It's also easier for people to know where your group is!

Umm were you guys in DHS on Sat the 10th cause I swear you walked past us by the ToT. What color were your shirts that day?

Kayte

We were at DHS in the morning. We had on the yellow shirts with the Sorcerer Mickey - 4 parks 1 world.

I wish I had known you were there that day, we could have arranged a quick meet!

 

[Mndisneygirl]

Hey, looking good! Love the shirts - we made some too. DH has the Experience the Magic one.
Looking forward to more of your TR.

 

[coffeehousemom]

Yeah it's fun to have matching shirts. It's also easier for people to know where your group is!



We were at DHS in the morning. We had on the yellow shirts with the Sorcerer Mickey - 4 parks 1 world.

I wish I had known you were there that day, we could have arranged a quick meet!

IT WAS YOU!! We werent even supposed to be in Florida yet due to an ice storm that was supposed to hit fri we left WI thu night instead. om our way done we called POP & changed our ressies for an earlier day.

When you guys walked by I was standing next to the ice cream cart by the ToT waiting for our friends to show up while Chuck & Morgan rode it. You guys walked on to the RnRC.

 

[crzyred]

IT WAS YOU!! We werent even supposed to be in Florida yet due to an ice storm that was supposed to hit fri we left WI thu night instead. om our way done we called POP & changed our ressies for an earlier day.

When you guys walked by I was standing next to the ice cream cart by the ToT waiting for our friends to show up while Chuck & Morgan rode it. You guys walked on to the RnRC.

Aw..dang it! Yeah we walked right into the video viewing thingy for RnRC. It was basically 5 minutes and then we were on the ride.

 

[Disneyfan71]

I'm loving the t-shirts. We have a Disney store where we live and always go to check out their $5.00 t-shirts!!! I'll have one for every day we're there

Can't wait to read more of your TR

 

[Dancegrl624]

Great start! Can't wait to hear more!

 

[jenjolt]

Loving it!! I love the t-shirts also...I think I'm going to order more shirts for my next trip...off to find me some great deals!!

I can't wait to read more!!!

 

[sarbah77]

We were at DHS in the morning. We had on the yellow shirts with the Sorcerer Mickey - 4 parks 1 world.

I wish I had known you were there that day, we could have arranged a quick meet!

Hey, i tried!

And to add to that, if you've read my trip report, you'll know that *I* was also in the park that day (though, afternoon), too!!


.... all these near misses!!

 

[crzyred]

Jan. 6 We drove to Milwaukee to spend the night. We figured we could save time and energy by doing this instead of fighting with traffic and weather conditions the following morning.

Jan. 7
The alarm went off at 4am (or some other ridiculous time of day) with me jumping out of bed to wake everyone else up by yelling “WE’RE GOING TO MICKEY’S HOUSE TODAY!!!!”

Our flight was supposed to leave around 8:30am. We sat on the plane for about 45 minutes after backing away from the gate so the front half of the plane could be de-iced, which was only supposed to take a minute. Finally we’re on our way, and a rather long 2 ½ hours later we are on Mickey Time! I was really tired; I never sleep well before going on a trip, especially when the destination is MICKEY’S HOUSE. I did get a little sleep though on the plane, but I still had to find something to do to occupy my mind for about the last hour….thank the Good Lord for Disney Word Searches at our Dollar Store!

I wish I could say it was sunny and warm when we landed, but it was rainy. The rain had just about stopped at this point though. But really who cares. The only thought in my head was….WE’RE IN DISNEY WORLD!

My sister was waiting for us at our gate as she arrived from Louisville, KY and we made our way to the Magical Express desk.

We got right on the bus and it left right away for All Star Resorts.

We had a suite at All Star Music for the first 2 nights of our stay. Our room was ready when we got there, but having not eating since dinner the night before, we were all starving.

After the detour in the cafeteria, we meandered to our room. Now this was my brothers first time staying on property, so we walked around and took pictures of All Star Music.

Continued...

 

[crzyred]

On arrival day, we always head to Magic Kingdom.

It just doesn’t feel like Disney until you see walk down Main Street smelling the popcorn, hearing the music, seeing the big bouquets of balloons, and of course “my future house” or as most call it, Cinderella Castle . We were quite surprised at the crowd levels. There weren’t any people there! So after taking about a thousand pictures of the castle…

*Sorry these pictures are "blurry". Some idiot... ...had her camera set on High Sensitivity and forgot to turn it off...

*Side note…this was one of the last days for the Christmas decorations to be up*

We headed off to Thunder Mountain and walked right on it 2 or 3 times (I really don’t remember at this point how many times it was as I was so sleep deprived I felt like a zombie…but I was at MICKEY’S HOUSE).

Next, on the list was Pirates of the Caribbean.

*see my sister's shirt and the wet spots. Well she was shocked that she got wet on PoTC and she then claimed that she got water in her ear and had "swimmers ear"...which was a nice little joke the rest of the trip.*

The final thing for today….SLEEP!

 

[coffeehousemom]

Confession time I just stole your pic of the castle. It was the awesome one that is pink, & purple. It now resides on my desktop at work as my background pic. Sorry but I had too!! Not only is it a great pic but Chuck still hasn't sent me any pics we took. Brat.


My DD will be quite happy to see the pic of your sister wet. She will now have proof that you do get wet on that ride. No one believed her when she kept saying everytime we rode it she got wet.

 

[luckytobeme88]

I am very happy for all of you.

 

[sherabby]

Can I ask you a question not related to your trip but your awesome shirts?
What brand of iron on transfer do you use for the dark shirts? I've tried the brand sold in Staples but it only makes a mess on the shirt. I have an iron on press too so I don't need to use an iron.

 

[crzyred]

Confession time I just stole your pic of the castle. It was the awesome one that is pink, & purple. It now resides on my desktop at work as my background pic. Sorry but I had too!! Not only is it a great pic but Chuck still hasn't sent me any pics we took. Brat.


My DD will be quite happy to see the pic of your sister wet. She will now have proof that you do get wet on that ride. No one believed her when she kept saying everytime we rode it she got wet.

Haha! Yeah, my sister was shocked! Maybe just for you I'll post a few more castle pics...we have A TON.

Can I ask you a question not related to your trip but your awesome shirts?
What brand of iron on transfer do you use for the dark shirts? I've tried the brand sold in Staples but it only makes a mess on the shirt. I have an iron on press too so I don't need to use an iron.

We use Avery. I think my mom got them from Walmart, but I'm not sure. We also just use an iron. The first time we made shirts...yeah it wasn't pretty. However now, we don't have a problem.

 

[pamouselover]

Hi checking out your trip report! Great photos of the castle at night!
How did you rent points?

 

[crzyred]

Hi checking out your trip report! Great photos of the castle at night!
How did you rent points?

My sister actually did some research here on the Dis. I believe there is a forum somewhere for renting points. She got in contact with a lady who worked VERY hard to get us what we wanted. We ended up paying $10/point. We were willing to pay what we were already paying for the suite for the week, so we had a few options. But ultimately it came down to, which one was available during our stay. It worked out really well, and we will definitely be doing Disney this way from now on.

 

[crzyred]

Jan. 8.

Our first full day at Disney Worldcool1: ) was spent at Animal Kingdom. So after a nice breakfast in at the hotel, where I finally had my Mickey Waffles! (it’s the only thing I ever eat for breakfast while there ) So AK here we come .

After walking in we noticed that the tree was still up. Since this was our first family vacation since 1992 my mother wanted a nice family picture to use as our Christmas card picture for 2009 (nothing like thinking ahead…right). *These pictures are on the PhotoPass so when we get that, I’ll upload those*


So after the obligatory Tree pictures, we made our way to Expedition Everest. My brother had never been on it, so the rest of us were very excited for this! I believe the wait time was less than 30 minutes and then we heading out to find The Yeti!

We grabbed fastpasses then headed over to the Safari. We literally walked onto it (which actually happened every time we rode it).

*shhhh...Simba is sleeping...*

After our 2 week safari trip, we maneuvered our way through the Pangani Forest Exploration Trail.

There of course are more things to do in AK that we love doing, however during the upcoming weekend we would be doing those things with our guest, plus we had dinner at Boma’s and wanted to have some time at AKL to look around.


We all wanted to Everest again, so back we go…across the whole park… Why is it that in AK you feel like you walk 3 miles to get to anything…

Mr. Yeti had apparently devoured all the crowds or something because the wait time was only 20 minutes, and yet we didn’t stand in line that long. So after whiplash from the stop of the train (seriously…do they not understand gentle stops??? ), look at wait time – 20 minutes – in line we go again. At this point, I think we finished and headed out of the park. *I say “I think” because during the trip we went on EE over 10 times, so really , I can’t keep straight how many times in one day we went on it.*

At this point the park was closing so we headed to the bus stop, walking slowly through the park since our dinner wasn’t for another 1 ½ hours. There was basically no one in the park at this point, it wasn’t “closed” yet but still basically no one there.

The Disney Transportation was waiting for us when we got to the bus stop and we stepped off at AKL about 5 minutes later.

We wandered around the lodge, (I have no idea why we have no pictures from this night…) waiting a few minutes before checking in for Boma’s. We got to our table and had a very nice waitress (can’t remember her name) and she explained the buffet and different foods.

So now, it’s time for my personal opinion of Boma’s. I probably won’t eat there again. If you like a wide variety of food, then you’d probably enjoy it a lot more than I did, especially considering that I walked away hungry . I am a very picky eater, and don’t do a lot of meats. My sister really wanted to eat here because my cousin and his wife really liked it, and even though I had voiced my concerns, I got over ruled. It cost too much for a picky eater (which rather angered me, that I had to pay that much and walked away hungry). They did have Mac and Cheese, which yes I did eat. I did try a few things, and was lucky that I made myself swallow them. The desserts were good, but I didn’t think anything else was overly spectacular .

Once we finished, we headed to the bus stop. We got on the bus for Downtown Disney, then on the bus to All Star Music.

*Up next...the move to Saratoga Springs and do we get the room we requested?*