Happy 4th Mr. O! Our first Family Trip to the World! Sept 2014

[OasterP]

Ok I have loved reading everyone's Trip Reports and Pre Trip Reports, and I figured I would try this out! Hopefully I can organize my thoughts here as well as getting thoughts and suggestions from the Disney experts!

This is our first family trip to Disney World, and the first trip for my husband and I in about 25 years! I am BEYOND excited!

I don't have any fun Disney pictures to post (yet) but I figured I'll introduce the cast of characters who will be going along! We thought about taking other family members but we decided for our first trip - it will just be us.

First: Mr. OasterP. He just turned 40 this year, so we'll count it as a present for him too! He works with troubled youth, and I'm sure will be ready for a vacation! He is a SUPER picky eater, which will take some of the fun out of eating at Disney World, but we'll make it work!

Me: I am 34 years old, and I'll count this trip as a present for my 35th as well! For my day job I'm an AVP/Portfolio at a local bank Investment Dept, which means I spend my day buying/researching stocks/bond/fund. Fun times And for fun, I spent time with my favorite little man and I run races! I am NOT a picky eater and am amazed by the amount of fantastic food the World offers - if I wasn't going with the two Mr. Pickies - I'd probably try a lot more. I do try to stick to healthy eating most of the time, but I already know there are some yummy desserts in my Disney future!

Mr. O: He is 3 1/2 and will be turning four right before we leave for our trip! We were going to go ON his birthday but wanted to be sure we were there for the MNSSHP, so we are going at the end of September into early October.

Here is Mr. Oaster P and myself



Mr. O himself!

 

[OasterP]

I don't even know how we decided to take this trip this year, but we decided almost a year ago, so I'm so excited that it's finally the year!!

We don't have much planned yet, but there are a few things we have. First, our tickets are purchased and safely locked away!

There are a few things we do have planned: 1. Date 2. Location 3. Character Breakfast (hope to anyway - can't book yet)

When: We are going from September 24th - October 2nd. At least that's the plan now. We are considering extending our stay but haven't yet decided.


Where: Wyndham Bonnet Creek



We decided that a condo will work better for us because we like to have a little more room, laundry, and a full kitchen that will allow me to make some of our meals. None of us eat enough to make the Dining Plan worth it, so I figured we can cook some of our food, and save our food budget for those yummy snacks I keep seeing!!

Character Dining: We are only doing one, and I am REALLY hoping to get Tusker House in Animal Kingdom. I know Owen will love it, and the food looks pretty good! Obviously I'm still a month out from being able to make reservations, but I'm thinking we'll be able to get one at SOME point during our stay!

A little more about the family. We enjoy spending time together and have been lucky enough to get Season Passes to Hershey Park and have spent a lot of time there. We also got the opportunity to go to Sesame Place last year, which is where we learned of O's love for characters! I expected him to be afraid, so I was pleasantly surprised. I can't wait to see his reaction to his favorite Disney friends!

Me and O at Hershey Park for Halloween last year. Something tells me we will be dressed differently for our Halloween party at Disney!




Mr. OP and O goofing around - this will be a blackmail picture some day I'm sure.



Owen and his very best girl!! She is a perfect Disney Princess and I so wish her family could come with us. Some year it will happen!

 

[OasterP]

Oops - I need to make my pictures much smaller!

Anyway, so that is all we know for sure. One reason we might extend our vacation is so that I can run the TOT 10 miler. I love racing and I have never done a Disney race! I just need to decide if it's worth extending our vacation and spending all the extra money just so that I can spend MORE money to run a race We have some time to decide though! I WILL be running a Disney race at some point! Maybe if we don't do it this trip, I'll save my pennies and do Dopey 2015!!

Here are O and I at his first race - I hope he is a runner some day!



Right now I'm not running (and have time to write a PTR) because I just had surgery on my neck and I'm home healing. But the good thing is I should be healed and ready to run by the start of race season!

Ok, that's pretty much all about us. We also have a dog, but he won't be coming (he's so sad).

Next up: The foods I will be hunting down!

 

[OasterP]

Ok, now you would think I'd plan rides before food. BUT I found this website and the food blog website and let's face it - the food looks amazing.

As I said we aren't doing the Dining Plan, but are planning on one character breakfast/brunch at Tusker House. Other than that we don't have too many meals planned.

As I said - I live with the Mr. Pickeys. And the older Mr. P is worse than the toddler! I think I can count what he likes to eat on two hands. But here is an idea - it's not your typical bread and potatoes man thing - I could deal with that. He likes spaghetti, meatballs (but not with cheese and not hamburgers), cheese sticks, breadsticks, macaroni and cheese, and desserts. And yes - this is the 40 year old I'm talking about.

O likes a lot more food than his dad, but hates all things spicy (can not be my child). He's also not what I would call adventurous.

I typically eat healthy but I love just about everything. My favorite foods are spicy, and I especially like all things Thai and Japanese. I also love Korean food and Indian food, but it's definitely not something I get to eat as often. Other than that I really love cinnamon rolls. Like....cinnamon roll anonymous kind of love. I'm fairly certain they are a little piece of heaven on earth. So needless to say - a stop at Gaston's Tavern is happening.

I am also 100% certain will be stopping at Starring Rolls, and the Karamel place in Epcot.

So far that's all I really know, so anything thoughts/opinions are welcome!

Now that we have our tickets and our place to stay we will be looking for airfare. But first - I need to decide how long we are going to stay!

I also want to see if there are any other places we would like to eat that would need a reservation. We'll definitely be going to Downtown Disney, so we'll look there as well.

Well that's all for now! I am so excited to plan this trip!

 

[OasterP]

Ok for some reason I still can't get my avatar to work, but I'll continue to work on that. But I finally have my ticker up and running! Just over 7 months until our trip! It seems like a long time, but it will give me time to get some idea of what we might do!!

I had talked to good friends of ours who are Disney addicts, and mentioned that I would love it if they could come at the same time. Their daughter is the adorable little girl in the pictures I've posted with my son. He just loves her and has the best time when she's around. Well I'm not sure it will work out, but I have my friend looking at hotels and possibly planning!! I hope it works!

I figured it would be a good idea to have some idea of what's going on at Disney since at this point I don't know anything about the rides at the parks, or even what is where.

I think it will be easier as they release the hours - I signed up for touring plans, just to give us a better idea, so once they release the hours I can really start to plan!

And only one month, one week and one day until we can try for Tusker House!

 

[OasterP]

Well I go back to work Monday, but I've been off for quite a while, and I've been stuck inside, so I've had a bunch of time to plan for a trip that's still pretty far off!!

But it' been fun!

I was excited to learn that Epcot food and wine will be there when we go, so I'm adding an evening to do that. Most likely that evening the hubster and little man will go swimming or golfing and I will head back to Epcot to enjoy - it's definitely not something they would enjoy.

We are still trying to decide if we'll stay additional days or not, but right now we are leaning towards not. However I keep looking at deals, because I do think it would be fun to try On site for a few days too!

But anyway, as it stands now, here are our (very) tentative plans for our trip. I'm sure this will change quite a few times!

Wednesday: We arrive. We don't have specific plans for this day but will likely explore the resort and down town Disney. We are hoping to arrive some time in the morning or around lunch.

Thursday: Magic Kingdom!! I've got back and forth about starting here or no, but since we are going to MK several times - I think it will be ok and O will have fun at the other parks too.

Friday: Hollywood Studios

Saturday: Animal Kingdom and the Tusker House breakfast (hopefully). My plan is to plan for a late breakfast, or brunch.

Sunday: Day "off". This is the day we will take off and do other things, and then later head to MK for the MNSSHP. I can't WAIT for this. O has his Jake costume ready - it's going to be a great time I hope!

Monday: Epcot. I'm thinking that we will do Epcot in the morning/afternoon, then go back to relax, and then I'll come back later for the festival stuff and the boys can eat pizza for probably the 50th time.

Tuesday: Day off

Wednesday: Our last day and we will go to MK!!!

Our very VERY tentative thoughts are that most days we will get up early/normal time, go to the parks, and then instead of breaking at lunch - we'll eat lunch/snack in the park, and then most likely come back to the condo around 4:00 or dinner time. Then we can relax there and if we feel like going back for the parades and/or fireworks, we can. This can and will obviously change when we get there and find out how Owen reacts to everything. Or us for that matter!!

As for the all important food: Our only "must haves" at this point are Tusker House character breakfast, a cinnamon roll from Gaston's, and we will for sure be trying an assortment of goodies, which will certainly include caramel corn from Epcot.

We are planning on making a lot of our meals in the condo and will have breakfast there all but the one day, we will bring in snacks/food to eat for lunches, and allow money for snacks in the park. Then most likely we will eat offsite either in the condo or downtown Disney area (or Orlando area around WBC) for dinners. That way we aren't overspending on basic food we don't care about, allowing more money for the yummies we can't get every day!

 

[OasterP]

Look what came in the mail!!! I'm so excited. Granted I already started planning, and I had a 2013 version, but THIS is the version of the actual year I'm going!

I've got a ton of planning tools already which is crazy because don't think we are going to be commando plan type of people. I think I just have them because it's so exciting and fun to look at!

Only 210 days!! And though spring will come, we can't wait to get away from this!





I head back to work tomorrow, so I'll go back to the daily grind with less time to plan for Disney, but I suppose I CAN make time between now and then to plan!

Hopefully I will bounce back into shape after I recover from surgery, and I will get to race this year. Even if we don't stay the longer time to run in TOT - my friends are now talking about a group of us doing Princess weekend 2015! That would be amazing! I'm still on driving restriction and walking is about as much activity as I can do, but I'm healing nicely!

Edit: Ok I apologize I obviously still don't know how to do photos. I set the two above photos to the same size, and they obviously don't post that way - I'll work on it!