So the night before we were leaving for our trip, I was overnight sitting for some cats. Since our flight didn't leave until 1pm I didn't think this would be a problem when I took on the job. However, the owners of the cats were in Nova Scotia. And there was a chance Tropical Storm Earl would hit Nova Scotia the day they were scheduled to fly home! So they were worried they'd be stuck in Canada at least 1 more day and if so, they'd need a sitter at least 1 more day. Problem was... I was leaving for Florida the same day they were scheduled to fly home!
So the day before our trip, I contacted the agency I work for and they found a back-up sitter that would be "on-call" in case the clients couldn't make it home as scheduled.
But... the agency's dispatcher was out of town that weekend, so it would have to be my job to keep in contact with both the clients and the on-call sitter until the clients knew if they could go home or not.
This did add quite a bit of extra stress to my travel plans... but it could have been a lot worse! At least Earl wasn't affecting my plans to go to Disney!
So Sunday morning I woke up around 7 am! I got up, got dressed, fed the cats, gave the cats their medicine, packed up all my stuff and drove home! When I got home, I was surprised to see that The Boyfriend was already awake and up and about! I expected he'd be sound asleep! I guess he was just as excited as I was to go to WDW!
We ate a yummy Cinnabon breakfast
My suitcase was pretty much entirely packed... I just had to pack whatever was in my overnight bag that I took cat sitting with me! (Stuff like my hairbrush, deodorant, toothbrush, toothpaste, cell phone charger, etc.) After I was done packing, I double, triple and quadruple checked to make sure I had everything for my trip!
At this point we were way ahead of schedule! So The Boyfriend said, "Let's just hurry up and get to the airport as early as we can!" So we said goodbye to Rosie, Ziggy and Walter and gave Rosie an extra special bone so she'd have something to do while we were gone! Then we took our suitcases down the three flights of stairs to our apartment and loaded them up in the trunk of my car!
My parents live pretty close to the airport so they were going to give us a ride. And I was just going to leave my car at their house while we were gone. My parents both have old cars that are falling apart, so they appreciated being able to use my car for the week! So we drove to my parents' house and we all loaded up in my car and headed to the airport!
We pulled up at the terminal and The Boyfriend and I got our bags out of the trunk, said goodbye to my parents and headed to check-in! We checked our bags and got our boarding passes! We were in Boarding Group B! Then we headed to security. It was quick and easy and we didn't have any problems.
We were very early and had plenty of time to kill. So we walked around checking out the shops in our terminal. Then we decided to get some lunch!
We went to Godfather's pizza. I got the veggie pizza.
I don't remember what kind of pizza The Boyfriend got. Maybe pepperoni and sausage? I didn't take a picture of it because I decided not to bother him by taking pictures of his food until we were at Disney!
Then we went to our gate and sat down until it was time for our flight. I decided to text my clients to check in with them about their current situation. They said they were at the airport and they'd know by 4pm if they could get a flight home that night or not.
The Boyfriend and I played The Game Of Life on his iPod Touch to pass the time. Awhile later I heard from my clients. They were able to get a flight and they'd be home around 8pm! Hooray! So I contacted the back-up sitter to let her know they were going home and she didn't need to sit that night! I was so relieved when that whole situation was over! Now it was time to take work completely off my mind and just sit back and enjoy my vacation!
It wasn't long before they started boarding our plane! After people with disabilities, families and Group A boarded, it was time for Group B to line up! This was my first time flying Southwest so the system was totally new to me! The line was split up in two parts... the first part was for passengers assigned to numbers 1-30 and the 2nd part was for passengers assigned to numbers 31-60. Of course The Boyfriend was number 30 and I was 31! So we had to separate and get in 2 separate lines!
But we weren't in line long and soon we were on the plane together looking for a seat! We found an empty row and The Boyfriend gave me the window seat! Yay!
Then there was lots of sitting around until it was time to take off. Thank goodness for SkyMall!
The Boyfriend read the Southwest magazine.
Then finally we were up in the air!
The flight wasn't long at all. And it was a direct flight which was pretty awesome! I hadn't been on a direct flight anywhere since I was a baby! So this was basically a first for me!
During the flight I listened to ABBA on my iPod and read SkyMall. I did pull my camera out for a bit and took some pictures out the window using my Lensbaby.
When the flight attendants came around, I got a Sprite and some pretzels!
Then before we knew it, the plane started to descend and we were almost in Orlando! I loved looking out the window over Florida and seeing all the pools in everyone's backyards!
Pretty soon we were on the ground! Our flight was right on time!
We got off the plane and road the tram to the main part of the airport! Then we decided to stop by the
Disney store at the airport! We looked around for a bit, then made our way to the DME Welcome Center!