Grand Villas, Victoria & Albert's, Star Wars, & More! Anniversary PTR! NOW the TR!!!

[waitomo]

I am enjoying your Pretrip report a lot--thanks!

 

[AAshleySEG]

It is funny that we may be there for the same October time frame and birthdays!! I took a peek at Jeremey's PTR, haven't said hi yet, trying to not seem like a stalker and that I spend so much time on the disboards... (I have a life I swear!)

Buahaha! You can't read it, thats gonna be so hard sometimes!

lol, love the changes! I'm so boring with no changes, although I think once I get the chance to make FP+ ressies that will change.

Your SWW day looks sooo busy! Good call dropping dinner rez, atleast one less thing to have to worry about arriving on time for!

I think we are all sort of Disboard stalkers, I love checking the updates people make on their trips...It reminds me of the slogan of the town I live in...and it really is this..."Southport, we don't have a town drunk, we all take turns" So basically Disboards, we don't have A stalker, we all take turns

Yeah, it is definitely going to be a challenge to keep from clicking on his PTR...I think I can do it though, I have other trips to plan so it is nice that he is giving it a whirl this time around!

I think all of my changes have something to do with me being a Libra and being indecisive. I can always talk myself into something new and out of something that I thought was good the day before

You think that SWW day is busy I thought I made it less busy I feel like any Disney day with free time isn't busy...HAHA

I am enjoying your Pretrip report a lot--thanks!

Thank you so much! I am glad you are enjoying it!! Thanks again for reading along!

 

[MidnightParade]

I think we are all sort of Disboard stalkers, I love checking the updates people make on their trips...It reminds me of the slogan of the town I live in...and it really is this..."Southport, we don't have a town drunk, we all take turns" So basically Disboards, we don't have A stalker, we all take turns

Yeah, it is definitely going to be a challenge to keep from clicking on his PTR...I think I can do it though, I have other trips to plan so it is nice that he is giving it a whirl this time around!

I think all of my changes have something to do with me being a Libra and being indecisive. I can always talk myself into something new and out of something that I thought was good the day before

You think that SWW day is busy I thought I made it less busy I feel like any Disney day with free time isn't busy...HAHA

That is an awesome town slogan!!! Oh goodness! And you are so very very right, it works very well for the Dis!!

 

[Raven0207]

I think we are all sort of Disboard stalkers, I love checking the updates people make on their trips...It reminds me of the slogan of the town I live in...and it really is this..."Southport, we don't have a town drunk, we all take turns" So basically Disboards, we don't have A stalker, we all take turns

Yeah, it is definitely going to be a challenge to keep from clicking on his PTR...I think I can do it though, I have other trips to plan so it is nice that he is giving it a whirl this time around!

I think all of my changes have something to do with me being a Libra and being indecisive. I can always talk myself into something new and out of something that I thought was good the day before

You think that SWW day is busy I thought I made it less busy I feel like any Disney day with free time isn't busy...HAHA



Thank you so much! I am glad you are enjoying it!! Thanks again for reading along!

I am having fun as you can tell in the phone calls that I am really getting excited about all the trips coming up. After looking at yours (a few of them actually) and Midnight's I can tell my PTR is plan and DULL !!!!!! I need to do something about that. I wonder who is going to hold out longer. You not clicking the PTR or me spilling the beans !

DISNEY WORLD 23 DAYS AND COUNTING !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[AAshleySEG]

I am having fun as you can tell in the phone calls that I am really getting excited about all the trips coming up. After looking at yours (a few of them actually) and Midnight's I can tell my PTR is plan and DULL !!!!!! I need to do something about that. I wonder who is going to hold out longer. You not clicking the PTR or me spilling the beans !

DISNEY WORLD 23 DAYS AND COUNTING !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Probably you spilling the beans!

You were feeling dull so you decided to Magenta Up my PTR?

 

[AAshleySEG]

Well...I went outside yesterday in the garden with Bear and Saghani taking photos of them to do the two remaining Puppy Posts. I got some really awesome photos I thought, then when I got inside to take the SD Card out of the camera....there wasn't one in there. FAIL

So anyway, I did want to let you know that there will be another puppy post in the very near future!

 

[AAshleySEG]

So for everyone following along here with me, I want to thank you for sticking with me during this PTR so far! To reward you guys I wanted to give you a little MINI TR from our last trip back in March. I don't have any notes or anything just a few photos since it was a super quick last minute trip, however, I do remember most of what was happening etc. So until my Anniversary TR, I am hoping that this can tide you over for a little while!

We left on Thursday the 27th of March and drove the long drive to Walt Disney World. By the time we made it to the HESS station at Downtown Disney our car was dinging at us to fill it up with gas! Oops! We did make it though. For this short little trip we were staying at Art of Animation in one of the Little Mermaid Rooms! Neither of us has stayed there yet, so it was a real treat to get to explore a new resort!

We arrived at the resort by about 4:45pm. Our room number was 9717. The rooms are adorable!

Since we were both newbies to this resort, before we went to dinner we wanted to take a walk around and look at everything! Kind of take it all in!You can always count on Jeremy to make some fun photos!

Is it just me or does King Triton have crazy eyes? He looks a little psycho I think!

We walked around the entire resort, the Lion King area, The Finding Nemo area, and then finally made it over to the Cars area! Jeremy decided he wanted to lie down across Guido's arms but when he tried to get up...he went down instead!

The theme of this resort is just plain amazing! If you ever get a chance to stay here, I don't think you would be disappointed!! I mean for a Value resort, it is just fantastic! They put so much detail into all of the characters hanging about! Just phenomenal!

At 6:55 we had dinner reservations at Kona Cafe over at the Polynesian! We got there a few minutes early and leave it to Jeremy to act a fool while we were waiting for our buzzer to go off!

We love Kona!! We ordered our drinks, I had the Tropical Macaw and Jeremy the Kona Longboard! He loves the Hawaiian Bread and Macadamia Nut Butter...just yum! For an appetizer we had the Sticky Wings. For dinner, I had a Caterpillar Roll, Jeremy had the steak and for dessert we split the Banana Creme Brulee!!

On Friday we spent the first half of the day at the EPCOT Flower and Garden Festival! It is definitely a great time to go to EPCOT!

I always get such great ideas of things to try in my gardens at home! We even wrote down different types of flowers to attract butterflies! After taking a few more gorgeous shots of the flowers we went over to the Festival Center!

Matt Muenster from the HGTV show Bath Crashers was giving a talk today, and we definitely wanted to see it! We watch that show all the time! We headed over there early and made sure to get seats for the show, we were the first ones there waiting and got great seats right up front!

After the talk and before we left EPCOT for the day we headed over to world showcase to sample some of the food available at the Flower and Garden Festival this year! Our favorite hands down was the Ghost Pepper Dusted Tilapia! It was delicious!!

That is it for my little MiniTR, I hope you enjoyed it! Let me know your thoughts!

 

[MarbleBob]

Cool! Loved the photos, especially of Jeremy goofing off.

But... Now and I'm really hungry. That Tilapia looks heavenly

 

[AAshleySEG]

Cool! Loved the photos, especially of Jeremy goofing off.

But... Now and I'm really hungry. That Tilapia looks heavenly

I never have dull photos with him, that is for sure!

I am ALWAYS hungry when I think about Disney World food. That is what we are looking forward to the most right now I think

 

[MidnightParade]

Mini TR!! Yay! Totally makes up for late Puppy post!

I just watched the Mousesteps video on AoA. It looks pretty neat, how did you like the room? Not too overwhelming with the color/animation?

Oh man, yeah I'm starving now reading about that food! Banana creme brulee?! Must go make dinner now! lol

 

[AAshleySEG]

Mini TR!! Yay! Totally makes up for late Puppy post!

I just watched the Mousesteps video on AoA. It looks pretty neat, how did you like the room? Not too overwhelming with the color/animation?

Oh man, yeah I'm starving now reading about that food! Banana creme brulee?! Must go make dinner now! lol

We really enjoyed AoA!! It was definitely not too overwhelming for us, although we are Disney freaks, so for some people I could see it being that way...maybe...but we LOVED it! We will probably stay there again sometime, I wanna try out one of the suites, they look really awesome!

 

[AAshleySEG]

We are now officially less than 3 weeks away until our Anniversary Vacation!! We are so excited, it is getting closer and closer and we are getting everything finalized and I am starting to assemble things that may need to be packed!

As some of you know, some may not, Jeremy has a very busy work schedule...most of the year. At the moment, he is working 4 hours away from home, 6 days a week, 13-14 hour shifts. Which means this vacation will be a very welcomed one. His day off every week is on Thursday, he does however get back and forth travel time, so this week on Wednesday, I drove the 4 hour trip up to the Charlotte, NC area to spend some time with him!!

So now that I am back, and back in action on the Disboards again, I wanted to give you another little Pre-trip, Trip Report I know it isn't to Disney...YET...but people put non-Disney things in their TRs all the time, so I figured I was allowed to as well

So I drove up Wednesday, and made it there about 12:30 or so. At 1:15 we went to the movie theater and watched a DISNEY movie Million Dollar Arm to be exact! We enjoyed it, and will definitely get it for home when it comes out! For baseball fans it is a great movie, for Disney fans it is a great movie, so since we are both, it got big points for us!

After the movie we went back to his Sister's house, where he is staying while he is out of town this time, and changed clothes because we had a dinner reservation at Fleming's Steakhouse in downtown Charlotte that night. Dinner was great and then we made our way back to the house for bed because we had a big day on his day off Thursday!

I woke up at 5:30am because I am a weirdo. I can't help it, I just wake up early. I did make sure not to wake him up, but he slept until about 7:00 or so, we got up, dressed and ready to go and went out to breakfast at Panera Bread!

We love Panera, and go there often when we are around there because the closest one to us here is about 45 minutes away Jeremy got a Cinnamon Crunch Bagel with Honey Walnut Spread, and I had a Breakfast Power Sandwich!

Once done with breakfast we headed out to the car and made our way over to Northcross Lanes in Huntersville, NC to go Bowling!! We have not been bowling in a while but we always have a blast doing it!! We even decided that while we are at Downtown Disney this trip we are going to try and go bowling there since we have not had a chance to yet!

I think we bowled 5 games total!! The first two we bowled correctly. The third game we decided to try and bowl left-handed, just to see how we would do, and actually we didn't do that bad The fourth game we bowled 1 frame left, then 1 frame right, the whole game, again not bad, then the last game we bowled normal again! We had a great time! After bowling we made our way across the street to the Bakery where we got our wedding cake!

If we are in the area around the time of our Anniversary we tend to stop in there and get two slices of the cake that was our wedding cake! It is a hazelnut mousse and chocolate ganache with Venetian Creme!! It is THE best cake I have ever had, and I think the BEST cake I will ever have.

After having our cake...and eating it too, we went over to the mall to get some new batteries for our watches and then over to the jeweler. I inherited my grandmother's pearl necklace when she passed away and I wanted to have some pearl stud earrings to go with it, so I went and picked those up, plus they were on sale

We left there and went to lunch at Panera, I know, but hey it is awesome! Jeremy had the Pick 2, Caesar Salad and Black Bean Soup, I had a Pick 2, Strawberry Poppy Seed Chicken Salad, and Turkey Avocado BLT. Both definite winners!

After lunch we headed back to the house for a little rest and some relaxation while it was nice outside! First we played a game of pool...I won by default when Jeremy hit in the 8-ball by accident

After playing pool we went to another type of pool outside!

While having fun swimming and relaxing by the pool we were trying to decide something fun to do for this evening! Recently the Charlotte Knights, which are a Triple A affiliate of the Chicago White Sox baseball organization, got a new stadium in downtown Charlotte. We used to go to Knights games all the time when they were in Fort Mill, SC. We had not however, been to the new ballpark yet. I went online grabbed us some tickets to the game and we made a plan.

We finished up swimming got showered and dressed and decided that we were gonna go over to Moe's to grab a quick little dinner. We shared the Art Vandalay Burrito, and some Queso, Guac, and Chips!

We made it to the ballpark with about a half hour or so to get find our seats and get settled in! It was so cool being inside the ballpark and being able to see skyline of Charlotte at the same time!

One of Jeremy's favorite breweries in in Charlotte, it is called Old Mecklenberg Brewery or OMB, and he really loves their OMB Copper. So he got himself one and we grabbed our seats, luckily in the shade!

Next we took the requisite goofy ballpark photo, we have one like this for each of the baseball stadiums we have been to together!

After the game we went back to the house because it was way past bedtime. This morning we woke up got dressed and ready had Panera for breakfast, then he was off to work, and I had the long 4 hour drive back to Southport!

 

[AAshleySEG]

I checked the mail and it was another Mickey Mail Day!

Our Memory Maker Card came in the mail? Now, am I supposed to use this as a photopass card? Or should I use our magic bands, or a regular photopass card? I am not quite sure exactly?

I also got another set of Magic Bands while I was out of town! I now have two yellow ones, so I decided to try my hand at a little Magic Band customization. For my first attempt I went with a very easy and cheap trick since I already had it on hand! Nothing like a little pixie dust on your Magic Band eh?

 

[AAshleySEG]

So, when I go on trips I like my family to know that I am thinking about them. At Disney world, it is so much fun to pick up a little postcard and deposit it in the mailboxes on Main Street!

This was from a trip in August of 2012

I had recently run out of stamps for my postcards, so I went onto the USPS website and ordered two sheets of new ones! One cannot go to Disney World and mail postcards with normal stamps! So anyways this time around I got 2 different sets of the PIXAR stamps from a few years back. They still sell them online even though my local post office does not anymore.

Another good thing about them is that they are forever stamps, So for those of us who live in the US, they will always be available for use when mailing postcards!

So my question to you guys! Do you ever mail postcards back home, or to anyone? I know my grandmother loves to get them! She always gets really excited to know that we remembered her on our travels!

18 Days!!!
​

 

[MidnightParade]

Oooh we love Panera too! Its soo yummy and delicious and good for every meal of the day! I love the chocolate chip bagel with the honey walnut spread! And the only sandwich I get is the chicken frontega and the mac and cheese, its just sooooo delicious! /drool

Sounds like you had a wonderful mini trip! I have to ask though what Jeremy has tattoo'd on his back? Looks like a nice big scene!

Love your goofy ballpark pic!! You guys are so cute!

Yaahoo Mickey mail! I think they send out the Memory Maker card automatically, its attached to your MDE, not your resort reservation(I think). So someone staying offsite wouldn't/might not get a magic band to link it to. Plus handy to have as back up? As with many things Disney their are multiple ways to do something and everyone does it differently it sounds like.

Love your MB! I plan to bring some gold glitter polish with me to dress mine up(since they don't mail them to Canada ahead of time)

When we went in 2010 I sent postcards out to all our family. DBF didn't understand this and said his family wouldn't care...which he was mostly right about, lol, sigh. I might send 2-3 when we go in October( to my family/friends), maybe, not sure. I'll probably feel bad if I don't though. Blah!

 

[scottmel]

subbing!

 

[AAshleySEG]

Oooh we love Panera too! Its soo yummy and delicious and good for every meal of the day! I love the chocolate chip bagel with the honey walnut spread! And the only sandwich I get is the chicken frontega and the mac and cheese, its just sooooo delicious! /drool

Sounds like you had a wonderful mini trip! I have to ask though what Jeremy has tattoo'd on his back? Looks like a nice big scene!

Love your goofy ballpark pic!! You guys are so cute!

Yaahoo Mickey mail! I think they send out the Memory Maker card automatically, its attached to your MDE, not your resort reservation(I think). So someone staying offsite wouldn't/might not get a magic band to link it to. Plus handy to have as back up? As with many things Disney their are multiple ways to do something and everyone does it differently it sounds like.

Love your MB! I plan to bring some gold glitter polish with me to dress mine up(since they don't mail them to Canada ahead of time)

When we went in 2010 I sent postcards out to all our family. DBF didn't understand this and said his family wouldn't care...which he was mostly right about, lol, sigh. I might send 2-3 when we go in October( to my family/friends), maybe, not sure. I'll probably feel bad if I don't though. Blah!

The tattoo on his back is a large full back pirate scene, it is unfinished at the moment, but it is like a tattered pirate ship with clouds and mist in the sky and if you look closely a little Disney secret...HAHA The UP house with balloons is in there too I circled it in red so you could see it!

 

[AAshleySEG]

subbing!

Welcome! Welcome!! I hope you enjoy reading along, and thanks for coming!!

 

[scottmel]

Logon to your Disney experience account and link the number from the MEMORY MAKER card and that way it shows up in your reservtions and will be tied to your magic band.

 

[AAshleySEG]

Logon to your Disney experience account and link the number from the MEMORY MAKER card and that way it shows up in your reservtions and will be tied to your magic band.

My MDE page showed the Memory Maker as soon as I purchased it online, does that mean I still need to link it again? I thought that if it showed up there it was already linked?