January 2009. . . Calling all Snowbirds ~ Part III !!!

[sunshine43]

We have a summer house not to far from Canadaguia... it is over on Honeyoe Lake.... it is such beautiful country there... great wineries... have you ever been to Sonnenberg Gardens?

no, I haven't. I've only been up that way once. She just had a brand new house built on the golf course her husband owns..I can't wait to see it.

robin

 

[jenjolt]

WoW to the picture of the snowstorm!! I'm glad to hear you got your power back and you're able to enjoy a warm house and a nice warm dinner!!! Snow like that makes me cringe!! Just think you'll be one of those shorts people in January making fun of me and my sweatshirts LOL!!

 

[sarbah77]

My DH actually has a friend who is a NE fan and he thinks the costume is funny. Let's just say that it involves crutches.

So I replied to your post, got distracted, and wandered off, hitting send without replying.* I'm sorry, it sounded terribly curt.

That said, if you're dressing as what I think you are, that IS funny. Buffalo is my back-up favorite team (you know, canNOT root for the Jets. Nor Miami) (and DH says I shouldn't root for another team in the division but what does he know)... so New England isn't bad this year, but they're not great. That said, woo Buffalo.



*The boss brought in bags and bags and bags of Halloween candy. They were kept in my coworker's desk (she's got the main reception area desk). When she stepped away, someone stole it all, leaving her desk (with her purse, but that's my inconsiderate coworkers for you, though the rest is funny) unlocked. The likely coworkers left for the day and once the did, we went on a mission. We found the candy again and left a new ransom note for it and then stashed it in two different locations. One of the locations is the desk of the person who had keys to the original coworkers desk. The other is truly hidden.

My boss caught us at this, and we didn't mean for her to find out, so I think she's just going to go buy more!!

Thus, I got distracted.

And now, I've got my new p&s digital camera! Shiny new distraction.

Also, to answer my own question: I'm going as a Financial Wizard. I was dubbed as such by a faculty member. I need to create cut-out dollar signs and other things and attach them to my witches hat. I have a freebie calculator I'm going to tape to a ruler. It's SO nerdy!!

 

[sarbah77]

I went to a party last weekend and dressed as one of 5 Deal or No Deal models. We had a Howie Mandel and the five of us dressed alike and wore wigs and carried little briefcases (they came with a DND card game). Way fun. I won't be dressing up for Halloween though.

DnD? Really! My husband still games weekly!! Once he even ran a game in the cities when he was visiting some friends for a weekend!

 

[Dancegrl624]

I still can't believe we're on Part III and on page 38!!!! I wonder how many pages I'll need to catch up on tonight when I get back from practice! To those of you who will be asleep by then, have a great night and stay warm (if you're experiencing weather like me!).

 

[Dancegrl624]

So I replied to your post, got distracted, and wandered off, hitting send without replying.* I'm sorry, it sounded terribly curt.

That said, if you're dressing as what I think you are, that IS funny. Buffalo is my back-up favorite team (you know, canNOT root for the Jets. Nor Miami) (and DH says I shouldn't root for another team in the division but what does he know)... so New England isn't bad this year, but they're not great. That said, woo Buffalo.

No, it didn't sound curt at all. No offense taken! Wow, I can't believe Buffalo is your back up team! Around here, you can't even mention the Pats without getting booed. I can't believe my DH bought a Brady jersey, even though it's for a costume. He plans on selling it after Saturday though.

 

[trixiequilts]

Hello Snowbirds! I haven't checked in a while but with this mention of weather, I just had to add my frustrations. Today's high is going to be a sunny 93! Yes, we are still running our AC during the day. I can't believe how warm it is still. Earlier this year, it didn't get unbearable until the end of May and so I guess we are now paying the piper!
Dreaming of rain and 60 degree weather....

You make me want to wish we had moved to AZ when we talked about it...I even had a job lined up...

Today I'm taking my Girl Scout troop (11 girls) to the local food pantry to stock the shelves. I'm so proud of my DD she collected 25 bags of food! The entire back of my car is filled! Anyway last night I spoke with the lady who runs the pantry and she said that they also take travel soap, shampoo,and conditioner from hotels. I told DD and she mentioned that we should give all our mickey soap and shampoo. She loves to pull those out and pretend that she is in a hotel....a WDW hotel! I said "are you sure you want to get rid of them all?" She.."yes, daddy said we could go every 2 years to disney, so I'll get more" Me..." that's true but we just went last December and it hasn't even been a whole year." Her in a kinda wistful voice..." That's okay...at least we get to go." I hugged her so hard! I wished I could have told her that we are leaving in less than 3 months! Keeping this secret is getting so hard!

I'm off to help Girl Scouts!

Way to go!!! The Girl Scouts do so much good. I've been nothing but impressed with the whole program!

So for all of you snowbirds taking kids out of school, do the kids miss a lot? Does it hang over your vacation like a big black cloud? My parents always made it sound like such a bad idea, I feel bad about it now.

My DDs go to private school, so I figure if I'm paying tuition, I can take them out as much as I want! But they are both very good students, and if they weren't, I probably wouldn't take them out for 6-7 days (which they'll be out for this trip).

I'm hoping (and will be very pushy) to get the girls' schoolwork before Christmas break so they can have it done before we go! It will take a bit of work, because they'll actually have to work a couple of weeks ahead, but it will be worth it!

So one of the few franchied Earl of Sandwich shops opened up here in my town (pssst Trixie!) so I can have it whenever I want, now. This might well mean I don't need to go there in DTD! It's pretty good stuff but it is pretty expensive, here in town. And since their sandwiches aren't true HOT sandwiches (like a local grill might make), more like Quiznos-style, it's hard to justify the price. I can go to Jimmy John's across the street and get two (cold) sandwiches for the price of one warm EoS!

Where is it located? I may have to try it out next time I'm over there!

We've talked about our kids and their Halloween costumes. Did any adults dress up or are you going to dress up? What are you wearing?

I'm going to be a tiger (NoTigger), with just a headband with ears, a tail, and some awesome fake eyelashes. DH is going to be a pirate inspired by Captain Jack. My MIL made this part of his costume, he's spent a lot of money on it already, though.

 

[overthemoon4mickey]

Well Here it is not even November yet and we had our first snow storm This picture was taken outside my office early this morning. Around 10:15 the power went out and at about 11:45 we closed up and called it a day Came home and had no power, no phone, no heat, no internet...no nothing. Couldn't even work on my cross stitch project cause it wasn't light enough in the house on this dreary day. Power came back on about 3:45 and now it is toasty warm in here, dinner is cooking and here I am catching up on all I missed.

It is still snowing lightly and we have about 7 or 8 inches of heavy wet snow. Trees and limbs down everywhere, parts of the interstates closed cause of accidents and man is that wind blowing.

Life in the Poconos....

robin

Okay! You win for the worst weather! As I read this I tried to imagine how you got warm at home. We have a fire place but we have gas logs and I imagine that would cost too much to run 24/7. I woke up this morning and it was 69 degrees in the house and I was freezing....I can't imagine not having the heater on when it's that cold outside. Ya'll are a tough bunch! We southern gals would have turned into popsicles! I will say that this winter does seem to be earlier than I can remember in a long time. Down here in N. Houston I woke up this morning and there was frost on the roofs and on top of DH's car. It did warm up nicely but that was cold! Man, you Dis'ers with below zero weather....I don't know how you do it! I tip my wooly hat off to you!

Thank you all for the nice comments about my DD and the food pantry. It was so wonderful! Our troop of 11 girls brought in 200 brown bags of groceries! The Pantry was so happy! They are going to post a photo of our troop in the church news letter. I think one of the reasons we got such a huge haul of food was that people had stocked up on canned goods for Hurricane Ike and were more than happy to pass the excess can goods along.

 

[Northern Disney Girl]

Good Evening Snowbirds! DD5 did very well at her Dr's appt today! 2 needles (1 in leg;1 in arm) and DID NOT CRY A SINGLE TEAR! She is amazing! Our Docter thinks she is a "super" kid! When we gor home she said "Mommy, could I have a little bit of medecine, my arm hurts!" What a girl!

Took DD7 to her Halloween Party at Brownies tonite! She dressed as a hula girl, complete with lei, grass skirt and flip flops! Can't remember who posted about filling the food pantry but what an AWESOME idea! Need to recommend that to our group! Such a wonderful act of community service!

Well, need to go get DD5 ready for bed, she is very tired tonite and has school tomorrrow! I shall try to check in later! Hope everyone has a great evening!

 

[west&east]

I am getting so excited now that I have some ADRs. The IPOs at AKL CL rock. They have arranged everything for me with just an email. Here is our plan so far:

Jan 22- arrive at AKL am.
Jan 23- Chef Mickey's for Dinner followed by Wishes cruise!
Jan 24- kids go to Simba's Clubhouse while DH and I go to California Grill for dinner at 7:55 just in time to watch wishes from there!
Jan 25- Sunrise Safari at AK
Jan 26- depart

I have 4 or 6 spots on the wishes cruise 1/23 if anyone is interested in joining us.

 

[distherapy]

My kids and I have hunkered down inside because it was 50 out today... Hats off to those of you who were literal 'snow'birds today!

 

[danceintherain]

Ok... time to respond to my day's worth of quotes. I actually decided to work "hard" this morning... which means I rode around in the truck with somebody else at work. I ended up getting fewer tickets than if I would have walked, and spent 2 hours DISing... figures...

I thought about doing that too on our last trip. DS was 18 mo. at the time and I didn't think he would be into it.....I was SOOOO WRONG! He loved getting the characters to sign his book. I have this picture of piglet standing hext to DS and he has his pen and book in hand....the look on DS face is like...NO WAY...They are real!!! His mouth is in a giant "WHOA" shape and his eyes are huge! My favorite pic of him....ever!

After the characters would sign his book he would "add" to it with his own autograph. I think it's a nice memory of his age.

One night at dinner at Chef Mickey there was this sweet older gentleman CM greater/table seater. DS handed him his Autograph book and implied that he would like this CM's signature...the CM looked really happy to have been asked and signed his name with a little note that DS was a good boy and he hoped we had lots of fun in WDW. DS was so pleased that he had all the nearby CM's sign his book that night.

That is what I love about WDW...you know you are going to have a magical time....and sometimes you find magic when you least expect it.

So in response to your post, I would get them each their own Autograph Book. Mine still like to look at them together and talk about who signed each page.

Awww yeah... I agree about getting them both their own. I love mine from when I was little. We even all decided to "autograph" each others....

So, here's my question for your experts. My boys keep talking about riding race cars. But I'm not thrilled with what I read about the race cars in Tomorrowland. Read they are kind of anticlimactic and boring for most.

Will Test Track make my boys happy and satisfy their desire to ride a race car? Or should I suck it up and take them to the other cars?

I think somebody said if they want to "drive" then take them on the cars in Tomorrowland... if they just want to ride, then Test Track should be fine.

Well first of all for those of you intersted in the weather in FL at the moment well its COLD LOL (Well it is cold for me LOL)!! High 61 degrees and Lows in the 30s...not ideal for October in Florida!

Anyways for the QOTD: My last evening I will be re-riding some of my favorite rides at DHS and in the morning hitting up MK for one more ride on the Haunted Mansion (I adore that ride it is MY FAVORITE!!) I probably will make a stop at DTD and buy some snacks for my student's birthday party when we return.

It is really cold here, too. Probably in the 60's - but that's so cold to me!!!!

BBBBBBRRRRRRR!!!!!!​

Hmm... when I woke up and left for work this morning it was 25 degrees out. However, it jumped up, and by the time I was done with Biology it was over 60. That's Kansas weather for you though... apparently the rest of the week it's supposed to be pretty warm... maybe up into the 70s... I hope it holds out through next week, because I hardly ever get a nice warm sunny day on my birthday.

Snow.
Is it really that time of year? Really?
Urgh. I still can't believe it. It's like winter arrived here already and it usually doesn't untill about late November! Granted, we just have a rain mix, so it's nothing as bad as my upstate friends, but come on! I have a feeling it's going to be a nasty winter! Although it would be loverly getting a white Christmas for a change!

I posted this in the general Resorts messageboards, but wanted to come to my "peeps" who are also planning a January trip! I can't believe that after doing all of the planning, there is a major glitch

Here goes:

"So, to make a long story short, H tells me just the other day that he cannot possibly take time off at the end of January after all, due to his job situation (too long and too involved to go into, but his hands are tied). We have a few options and I will have to call AAA in the next day or two to get the ball moving and rebook the trip, which has been planned for January 22-26th. Here are my options:
1) Reschedule to January 1-5 (D and I are still on school break, except for the 5th for me, but I could work around that one day)
2) Reschedule to April 4-8 (the week leading up to Easter)
3) Keep our original dates and leave H at home

The difficult part of this is that D is in college and her breaks are different than mine now (I teach). We always had to travel on school vacations, and we were excited about going to Disney when the crowds would be much lighter, even though the January weather can be "iffy". I had originally looked in to the week between Christmas and New Years, but the price of that was outrageous, so that is why we went with later in January. I would have taken personal time, and D would have flown back to school directly from Orlando while H and I would have flown home. Flights have been booked, but on SW, so I know that I can change them, but may have to pay a bit more.

I am leaning towards the Jan. 1-5, as I feel that the week before Easter is going to be very crowded. We have always gone mid-April during our school vacation, and the two times it bordered Easter was very crowded. When I told D, she didn't see a problem leaving Dad behind , but I feel that it wouldn't be fair to spend money on a long-awaited vacation and not take him with us.

So, I am just looking for some advice from all of you Disney experts before calling the travel agent tomorrow morning. My other consideration is to try to keep the price comprable to what we already had planned for. Thanks in advance for any help on this situation."

Unless you want to make it a girl's trip, which could be fun, then I would switch to the first week of January. You might hit some lagging New Year's crowds, but you still can utilize the extra long park hours and extra extra magic hours. In addition, the Christmas decorations will still be up.
Also, I've save the TouringPlans crowd calendar from time to time (for times when I don't have i-net access on my laptop, but want to Disney plan) From looking at it the last one I have saved, as TouringPlans is down right now... the first week of January is still better than the week before Easter, even with leftover New Year's crowds. Besides, January would still put you in value season which could help with any budgeting problems.

Today I'm taking my Girl Scout troop (11 girls) to the local food pantry to stock the shelves. I'm so proud of my DD she collected 25 bags of food! The entire back of my car is filled! Anyway last night I spoke with the lady who runs the pantry and she said that they also take travel soap, shampoo,and conditioner from hotels. I told DD and she mentioned that we should give all our mickey soap and shampoo. She loves to pull those out and pretend that she is in a hotel....a WDW hotel! I said "are you sure you want to get rid of them all?" She.."yes, daddy said we could go every 2 years to disney, so I'll get more" Me..." that's true but we just went last December and it hasn't even been a whole year." Her in a kinda wistful voice..." That's okay...at least we get to go." I hugged her so hard! I wished I could have told her that we are leaving in less than 3 months! Keeping this secret is getting so hard!

I'm off to help Girl Scouts!

Awww... that's so cute! I used to love to play "hotel" when I was little. I even had a "hotel" birthday party one year, where I had the girls check into "rooms" and there were hotel soaps in the bathroom. The party favors might have even been hotel soaps. I used to LOVE staying in hotels when I was little.... actually I still LOVE staying in hotels... I am constantly manipulating my Mom into taking trips and using my Dad's hotel points to stay in Hiltons.

So for all of you snowbirds taking kids out of school, do the kids miss a lot? Does it hang over your vacation like a big black cloud? My parents always made it sound like such a bad idea, I feel bad about it now.

I'm trying to talk my uncle into letting my 2 cousins 16 & 13 come, but beside $$ one of the issues I worry about is taking them out of school. They also aren't the best students in the world. Not because they're dumb but because they are lazy and have two of the most disgusting parents in the world who don't care. Which is why I think they could use a little Disney in their lives!
I think it would be a great incentive for them to do well, but I don't know about missing 5 days.
I know there are a couple of teachers here too, so how do you feel about kids, who aren't your best, missing work?

Maybe you can strike a deal with them, where they have to pull their grades up and show that they're really trying in school, and then you'll take them back.... though I guess you don't have a lot of time to do that if your motive is for the trip in January. It would be hard for them to miss time, and if they aren't dedicated to doing well before the trip, then they probably will be even less devoted to making up work when they get back. It IS doable. I've missed high school before, and made up the work, but it can be very stressful...

So one of the few franchied Earl of Sandwich shops opened up here in my town (pssst Trixie!) so I can have it whenever I want, now. This might well mean I don't need to go there in DTD! It's pretty good stuff but it is pretty expensive, here in town. And since their sandwiches aren't true HOT sandwiches (like a local grill might make), more like Quiznos-style, it's hard to justify the price. I can go to Jimmy John's across the street and get two (cold) sandwiches for the price of one warm EoS!

Of course, I do live in a college town/work for a large U, so I'm pretty spoiled by my food options (for not being in a major city). Today my coworker and I debated between two fast Italian, two kinds of sub places, two sit down and 1 counter service Chinese restaurant, and a small handful of burrito joints!

So, we've talked about our kids and their Halloween costumes. Did any adults dress up or are you going to dress up? What are you wearing?

I'm invited to a Halloween party on Friday, and part of the reason I don't think I'll go is because I don't have a costume... the other part is that I have 2 tests and a paper due next week, plus a church trip up to Nebraska on Saturday, so I won't have a lot of time to do much on the weekend.

to the snowbird family!

Is it just me or do we have an awful lot of new members this past week? I bet word got around how much fun we are and people decided they just had to book a Jan trip!

I think everybody is hoping they'll catch some codes....

 

[danceintherain]

So, I've been reading some of the books I checked out of the library for research for my Walt Disney World as a Bureaucracy paper, and most of them are books about Walt Disney.
The first one I've been reading is called Building a Company: Roy O. Disney and the building of an Entertainment Empire by Bob Thomas. I've been trying to skip a lot of the stuff about the Disney Studios portion and stuff, because I'm supposed to be writing about the bureaucracy, and I really wanted to focus on the parks.
Anyways... I read about both Walt and Roy's deaths, and it made me so sad. Both incidences just seemed so horrible, and apparently the last conversation that Roy and Walt had before Walt died was about the structure of Walt Disney World. It's just such a touching story... I think I'll probably keep the book after I finished the paper, and try to read the whole thing, though I have no idea when I'll have the time.

 

[Remmy]

A great big thank you to all the snowbirds who responded to my question about pin trading. I will definitely use those ideas and look at the websites. I have note paper and a pen beside the computer and have all sorts of notes from the snowbird posts.

Shelly--Thank you for the CS menu from Sunshine Seasons. That is exactly where we were thinking of going. I think it has more of a selection for the children. I have heard you have to stand in different lines and it is a very popular spot. We will have to see when we go how difficult it might be. It will be worth the try, as I think my children might become tired of chicken nuggets or burgers for CS. I also liked seeing the menu for Chef Mickey, as that will be our last stop before we have the long drive home.

Thank for all of you that commiserate with our love (?) of snow. I am glad that I didn't look out my window and see all that snow. We had a few light flurries but it melted off very quickly. I was at work all day and customers were telling me that it was very cold and windy. I am very much looking forward to the warmer weather of Florida.

 

[danceintherain]

As far as the QOTD: I don't really have any specific thing I like to do on our last night there. I'm just hoping to not wear myself out while I'm there, so I can really enjoy the trip. It seems that I always get slightly sick... I don't know if it's the excitement, or the rides, or the food... but I'm hoping that having some down time scheduled might help me to not be completely tuckered out by the last day we're there. I would love to go see Spectromagic from one of the beaches, take a leisurely walk on the Boardwalk, or through the World Showcase.

 

[Remmy]

I think we will skip this ride as they have a similar one at Canada's Wonderland in Toronto and they went on that ride there.

My question, and this is out of curiosity, not to upset anyone, is if there seems to be many people that it isn't a favorite ride, will they change it to a Cars themed ride? I am looking at a map of MK right now, and it seems quite a large area. I only ask as I have a DS who loves everything Cars and we would love to have some ride, in any one of the parks themed this way.

As a disclaimer, I have never rode the ride just walked by.

 

[danceintherain]

I think we will skip this ride as they have a similar one at Canada's Wonderland in Toronto and they went on that ride there.

My question, and this is out of curiosity, not to upset anyone, is if there seems to be many people that it isn't a favorite ride, will they change it to a Cars themed ride? I am looking at a map of MK right now, and it seems quite a large area. I only ask as I have a DS who loves everything Cars and we would love to have some ride, in any one of the parks themed this way.

As a disclaimer, I have never rode the ride just walked by.

Hmmm.... I think that would be a decent idea. It's one those rides that you can pretty much ride at any theme park. I wouldn't have a problem with it.... it might attract more people....

 

[crzyred]

Good evening everyone. I'm so glad to finally be at home. Today was a living h-e-double toothpicks at work. We have(well not any more) an assistant manager, who basically is a moron, and yes that is the nicest term I can come up with for her. She would never do things that we need her to do. Most of the time it was things that would need to be changed for the customers, so when she wasn't responding and doing her job the customers would get mad and then take it out on the associates.

She often made inappropriate comments to the associates around the customers ( she once told a gentlemen that if he bought a table, I came with it). So then today "slept through" her alarm and was 5 hours late to work and laughed it off. So she is no longer with us.

So now we have to try and find 2 more assistant managers, ASAP, since she's gone and another is pregnant due Dec. 18. Score.

So the general manager asked if me and another girl could split the managerial duties she had. Sure, for a raise during this time period. Well no raise because it wouldn't be official. Um, well what would I get out of this? Nothing. Ok. I told them I'd have to think about it and I'd let them know tomorrow. It wouldn't be anything major, but still.

Ok, I think I'm done complaining now. I need to run to the fabric store now and get flannel to make recieving blankets for the pregnant assistant manager.

Hope everyone had a good day.

 

[danceintherain]

Good evening everyone. I'm so glad to finally be at home. Today was a living h-e-double toothpicks at work. We have(well not any more) an assistant manager, who basically is a moron, and yes that is the nicest term I can come up with for her. She would never do things that we need her to do. Most of the time it was things that would need to be changed for the customers, so when she wasn't responding and doing her job the customers would get mad and then take it out on the associates.

She often made inappropriate comments to the associates around the customers ( she once told a gentlemen that if he bought a table, I came with it). So then today "slept through" her alarm and was 5 hours late to work and laughed it off. So she is no longer with us.

So now we have to try and find 2 more assistant managers, ASAP, since she's gone and another is pregnant due Dec. 18. Score.

So the general manager asked if me and another girl could split the managerial duties she had. Sure, for a raise during this time period. Well no raise because it wouldn't be official. Um, well what would I get out of this? Nothing. Ok. I told them I'd have to think about it and I'd let them know tomorrow. It wouldn't be anything major, but still.

Ok, I think I'm done complaining now. I need to run to the fabric store now and get flannel to make recieving blankets for the pregnant assistant manager.

Hope everyone had a good day.

Wow. I'm sorry you had such a crazy day. It's good she finally did something that got her fired though, because that's just insane. I'm sorry that they're trying to load more work on you though. They wouldn't even agree to any kind of bonus? Even if they didn't up your hourly wage, you would think that they'd be able to give you a little extra until they found someone else....

 

[pamouselover]

OMG Sunshine you keep that stuff up there in the Moutains where it belongs.
I only saw flurries when leaving work today. Heavy wind and rain here. I am so not ready for winter. The sunshine state is calling me to come and STAY!

Well Here it is not even November yet and we had our first snow storm This picture was taken outside my office early this morning. Around 10:15 the power went out and at about 11:45 we closed up and called it a day Came home and had no power, no phone, no heat, no internet...no nothing. Couldn't even work on my cross stitch project cause it wasn't light enough in the house on this dreary day. Power came back on about 3:45 and now it is toasty warm in here, dinner is cooking and here I am catching up on all I missed.

It is still snowing lightly and we have about 7 or 8 inches of heavy wet snow. Trees and limbs down everywhere, parts of the interstates closed cause of accidents and man is that wind blowing.

Life in the Poconos....

robin