My first PTR! Surprise! We're going to WDW!

[inigomontoya]

Hi everyone! Welcome to the PTR for our (rapidly) approaching WDW trip. This is kind going to be more of a PTR trip report as I only discovered these boards a couple of weeks ago and have been planning this trip for almost six months. The main purpose of writing this is to incentivize me to write a TR when we get back. I have really loved reading about all of your visits; and it seems like a fantastic way to re-live a vacation.

With that out of the way, allow myself to introduce...myself(and my family's selfs).



I'm Jason, on the top left. Clockwise from there are DW - Jessi, DS - Ephraim, and DD - Aeris. This picture was taken last year; we went down for our once-in-a-lifetime trip...kind of. We knew going in that it was going to either just be a nice vacation; or we were going to turn into Disney-aholics. I knew as soon as it started snowing in DHS after the Frozen Fireworks on our first night which way it was going to end up.

Next up, booking and planning!

 

[inigomontoya]

Having recently moved into a new house in March, DW and I had resigned ourselves to the fact that we weren't going to be able to make WDW happen this year. I would check the packages every time I got an email about a new discount to see if there was some way we could fit it into the budget; but it just wasn't happening...all along thinking to myself that I have to keep an eye out on for free dining; and that depending on how it worked out...that just might be our ticket.

Flash forward to late-April. I was walking through the lab at work and ran into a former CM that works for us, and knows of our newly discovered love of WDW. She mentioned that she was looking at booking a trip in December and asked if we had anything planned. I said that we don't; but that we were waiting for the free dining promotion to go live to see if we could make anything work. She looked at me funny and said something along the lines of "Get your butt in gear then...they're live right now!". I immediately turned and headed for my office in the most professional way possible(read: just shy of running) to look it up.



After a little more back and forth, we got to:



A few quick clicks later, and we were booked for an 8-night stay at SSR with Memory Maker(best value in all of WDW imo...I'd pay double what they charge) and the Standard dining plan. Flying in late on 9/17 and back home mid-morning on 9/25.

Once it was booked, I realized that we were already in our ADR window. Last year, we stayed offsite, and ate in our room mostly. This obviously wouldn't be the case this year as we were on the Dining Plan. So, I spent most of the next couple of days researching which restaurants we might want to try. I knew we wanted to do Be Our Guest, it was thoroughly booked, however. The rest of our wish list looked like:

Sci-Fi Dine-in - DHS was our favorite park last year; and this seemed like the best place to eat there.

Teppan Edo - The kids had a hibachi dinner for the first time a couple of months before we booked and loved it, so this was a no-brainer.

Yak & Yeti
O'hana
Whispering Canyon

Crystal Palace Breakfast - did this last year and everyone had a blast; so I knew we would be running it back if possible.

PPO at Akershus - I knew we would want to ride Frozen Ever After at least once...so this seemed like a good ADR to ensure we could possibly do a standby ride of it as well.

That seems like a good chunk...I'll continue with which ADR's we were able to get in a bit!

 

[Gondingl]

Welcome to the Dis! And congrats on getting Free Dining! I heard that was super hard to get this year! And don't tell Disney you'd pay double for the Memory Maker cause they might just listen to ya!

My Tip for getting Be Our Guest: the week of your trip people will cancel to avoid the cancellation fee so lots of places open up so check religiously then! And Teppan Edo is by far the best hibachi I've ever had, I'm sure you and the kids will love Disney's version!

And a tip for Frozen without a FastPass if you don't want to wait hours - be at Epcot, in line for rope drop and walk/run to Frozen. It will be the shortest wait time that day!

Sounds like you guys will have a great time! Looking forward to hearing more!

 

[inigomontoya]

After a couple of days of research, it was time to do the ADR booking! I was able to get everything on our wishlist booked except O'hana and Be Our Guest. I resolved myself to keep trying those two periodically to see if something opened up. So, our dining plan at that point was:

Sunday dinner at Sci-Fi Dine-in.
Monday dinner at Teppan Edo.
Tuesday dinner at Yak & Yeti
Wednesday Breakfast at Crystal Palace (no PPO available, but I was able to get 9:25, so we can see the opening show then head straight to breakfast).
Thursday dinner at Whispering Canyon.
Friday PPO(World Showcase is listed as opening at 11am?) breakfast at Akershus @ 8:20

That accounts for six of our eight TS credits. I figured I'd leave the other two open until we had a more concrete plan around our FP+ booking day.

At this point, we had also decided that this trip was going to be a surprise to the kids(hence the title of the PTR); and spent most of the Spring convincing them that we wouldn't be taking a family vacation this year because we bought a new house. They took it surprisingly well and I'm happy to report that this is still the plan. We are 11 days out and have somehow managed to make it through a little over four months of whispered discussion and just pure excitement without letting it slip. We haven't developed the exact plan for the reveal yet; but we are going to push it as far as we can. I think we have a workable plan that will get them on the plane without know we are going to WDW...we will see how it goes though.

Once the ADR's were booked, it pretty much just turned into a waiting game. I'm pretty sure not a day went by that I didn't open up the MDE page and just look at the plans. We had to stretch the budget to make the trip work, so that meant no eating out and saving as much money as possible. Constantly checking in on MDE made it easy to stay on track.

Next up, FP+ day and a couple of adjustments to the dining plan.

 

[inigomontoya]

Welcome to the Dis! And congrats on getting Free Dining! I heard that was super hard to get this year! And don't tell Disney you'd pay double for the Memory Maker cause they might just listen to ya!

Thank you! I must have gotten lucky with Free Dining, as I've heard the same. I'm guessing it must have just gone live the day my co-worker told me about it.

My Tip for getting Be Our Guest: the week of your trip people will cancel to avoid the cancellation fee so lots of places open up so check religiously then!

Spoiler Alert! I was able to book for breakfast about a week ago. Still trying to get in for lunch on another day. Thank you for the tip though!

And a tip for Frozen without a FastPass if you don't want to wait hours - be at Epcot, in line for rope drop and walk/run to Frozen. It will be the shortest wait time that day!

This is the plan for our Akershus ADR day. Though, with World Showcase not opening until 11am, I'm guessing we'll still have some time to burn.

 

[buddha112]

Nice trip planned

 

[inigomontoya]

So..as I was typing up the ADR post, I realized that I didn't do an excellent job introducing everyone. So, let's remedy that!



Here is Aeris in a dress she made earlier this summer, in one of the few pics where she actually looks somewhere close to her 8 years of age.

Favorite Park: Magic Kingdom
Favorite Ride: 7DMT
Favorite Disney Character: Aurora currently



This is Ephraim on his 1st day of 4th grade. He is 9.

Favorite Park: DHS
Favorite Ride: Tower of Terror
Favorite Disney Character: BB-8, non-Star Wars would probably be Phineas.



And here is DW Jessi and I from earlier this summer. We have no pictures of us individually apparently.

DW Favorite Park: DHS
DW Favorite Ride: Tower of Terror
DW Favorite Disney Character: Eeyore

As for me, I am the primary planner of our trips.

Favorite Park: Currently DHS...I have a feeling it may be Epcot by the end of this upcoming trip. We spent very little time at Epcot last year and I'm looking forward to remedying that this year.
Favorite Ride: Splash Mountain
Favorite Disney Character: Wall*E

So, there you have it! Now back to our regularly scheduled PTR'ing.

 

[inigomontoya]

To FP+ Day and beyond!

I sat down on FP+ day with the loosest of plans in mind. I had an idea of which parks we wanted to be in on which days, based on our ADR reservations; but even that was somewhat flexible. I mainly wanted to make sure we were able to hit up 7DMT, Tower of Terror, Frozen Ever After, and Splash Mountain. We didn't get a chance to do Test Track or Tomorrowland Speedway last year; and we more or less didn't ride anything at Epcot.

Since we were booked at a less busy time(right after Summer Break ends in the US), I was able to book everything without incident...most things still have FP+ bookings available as I type this, actually.

So, the loose plan at this point was:

Saturday, 9/17 - Afternoon flight in. Arrival to SSR around 10pm. Possibly head over to Disney Springs for a late dinner if everyone is feeling up to it.

Sunday, 9/18 - slow morning at the hotel/Disney Springs. First FP+ of the day is Toy Story Mania at DHS, followed by Tower of Terror, then Star Tours. Dinner at Sci-Fi at 6:55, which should get us out in time to see the Star Wars Fireworks show. We loved the Frozen Fireworks at DHS last year and are all Star Wars fans; so saying expectations are high for this would be an understatement.

Monday, 9/19 - Tentatively planning to start the day at Typhoon Lagoon. The kids have never been to a waterpark before, so this should go over well. We will then move on to Epcot in the evening with FP+ reservations at Test Track and Spaceship Earth; and dinner at Teppan Edo. If we get out of dinner in time, we'll catch IllumiNations; I doubt that will happen though.

Tuesday, 9/20 - AK day. Depending on how chipper everyone is, we may head down early for Rope Drop. We have FP+ booked for Expedition Everest, Meet Disney Pals at Adventure's Outpost, and Kali River Rapids. We will likely squeeze in at least one extra ride on Everest; as well as a Safari or two. We have a dinner ADR at Yak & Yeti, so this will be a full day at AK unless we decide to come over later.

Wednesday, 9/21 - MK day. Breakfast ADR for Crystal Palace, so the plan is to arrive early and watch the Welcome show, then head over for breakfast. Not sure if the timing will work out; but it isn't the end of the world if it doesn't. After breakfast, we have FP+ booked for Tomorrowland Speedway, 7DMT, and Splash Mountain. We'll probably try to add a Peter Pan's flight after we use up the first three since none of us has been on that before. My intent is for this to be a full MK day; capped off with Wishes and the Electric Parade at the end of the night. We may shoot back to SSR for some rest in the middle of the day if energy is flagging though.

Thursday, 9/22 - No plans this day except for dinner at Whispering Canyon. I figure we'll spend most of this day at SSR lounging around the pool. We'll need a day to recoup after the marathon MK day on Wednesday. I plan to let the kids dictate how this day goes. If they want to hit up a park, then we will.

Friday, 9/23 - Epcot. We have Akershus Breakfast at 8:20. My hope is to get over to Soarin! before the standby line gets too bad. We have FP+ booked for Frozen Ever After and Mission Space. We'll add a 3rd at some point. We will definitely be meeting Anna and Elsa, as we weren't able to get a FP+ for them in MK last year and no one was interested in waiting 2+ hours for a Meet and Greet. We will then spend the afternoon browsing Food and Wine! I didn't realize that we would be catching that when we booked the trip and man, am I glad we are! I am a bit of a foodie and am totally looking forward to trying as much as I can get everyone to put up with.

Saturday, 9/24 - Absolutely zero things booked. I figure we'll sit down Friday evening and decide this one as a family. My gut says we'll end up back at MK...but who knows?

Sunday, 9/25 - Tragical Express at ~6am for an early flight back home in time to get laundry done before we head back to work on Monday.

One more post to fill in the gaps between FP+ day and today!

 

[inigomontoya]

Nice trip planned

Thanks!

 

[inigomontoya]

Ok. So, to catch us up to current day. We have had a super-busy summer. We made it through with next to no complaining about the lack of a summer vacation. I'm guessing this was due to having primed the kids since Feb/March that it wasn't going to happen. It helped that this summer saw the return of their babysitter from two years ago that they both adored. We also tried to sprinkle in little outings that were free or close to free throughout the summer. We went to a couple of Brewers' games on free tickets from one place or another. The kids also participated in the Summer Reading Program at the library, which resulted in free tickets to a variety of things as well.

On the planning front, there were very few changes to the plans I outlined in my last post until about a week ago. That would be when I found the DIS and its wealth of Trip Reports. You folks are some amazing people. Special shout-out to @chunkymonkey . Her most recent TR is amazing and really started to get me amped for our trip.

After reading over a variety of reports, I doubled-down on my efforts to get something booked at O'hana and Be Our Guest; and was rewarded nicely. We now have a breakfast ADR at O'hana on 9/22 and a breakfast ADR at Be Our Guest on 9/18. So, new plan for the start of our trip is MK right away on day one! We will then either head back to SSR for some pool time or hang at MK until it's time to head for DHS after lunch.

We also cemented our plan to open 9/19 at Typhoon Lagoon and I reserved one of their Umbrella stations so we have a place to put our stuff without needing to worry about it.

The other major addition to our plans, which came about after reading @chunkymonkey's TR is we bought tickets to the Star Wars: A Galactic Spectacular Dessert Party on 9/22. We're really looking forward to it as the desserts look fantastic!

One last thing I did after reading the wealth of info on the DIS was to make a spreadsheet! I work with the things all day, every day; so I don't know why it never occurred to me before...but here it is, in all of its color coded glory!





I'm still pretty new to this WDW planning stuff, so feel free to let me know if anything looks or sounds not right.

I appreciate you taking the time to read through all of this and get to know us a little bit. I'll probably post a few more updates between now and next Saturday. We're still considering MNSSHP, doubt we'll end up pulling the trigger as it's $$$; but stranger things have happened.

11 days and counting!!!!

 

[inigomontoya]

Just a little...minor, update. SINGLE DIGIT DAY! 9 days left until we jump on a plane; although probably not literally...guessing the TSA would take issue with that. We've started finalizing our packing list. Jessi is going to make a Belle dress for Aeris to wear to BOG this weekend, so that should be awesome. Just as an aside...my wife is quite amazing when it comes to that kind of thing; as evidenced by this pic from last year.



I seriously CANNOT wait to surprise the kids. Speaking of that; here is the tentative plan. We have told the kids that I have to go on a business trip next week. This will be our cover for getting everyone to the airport with luggage in the vehicle. We have a layover in Chicago, which is where my parents live. So, I think we're going to tell the kids that we're using this opportunity to give them a taste test, so to speak, of flying; as they have never been on a plane before and the trip to Chicago is only like 45 mins. We'll tell them that we're all going to fly to Chicago; and that my mom will pick them all up at the airport for a weekend at Grandma's house. Then, when we're sitting in Chicago, I will get a 'phone call' saying that my business trip has been cancelled. At that point, we'll say something along the lines of "well, we're here at the airport; if you could go anywhere right now, where would it be?" Then, when they reply with WDW, which I'm pretty confident they will, we will pull out the Magic Bands and be like, "If we were going to do that, you would need these Magic Bands...and you would also need these plane tickets to Orlando!".

I know...it's kind of convoluted...but it's the closest we can get to having the surprise be driving under the WDW arch. Anyways, I intend on recording the whole thing and including it on my TR.

9 days!

 

[Meandnevaeh]

Sounds amazing! I really want to do a PTR and TR for our upcoming trip, I need to get in gear

 

[inigomontoya]

Sounds amazing! I really want to do a PTR and TR for our upcoming trip, I need to get in gear

Thanks; and you totally should! A PTR is a great way to kind of organize your thoughts on everything that you're planning.

 

[inigomontoya]

Hi everyone! 72 hours until flight time! These next 2.5 days of work are going to be tough to focus on! We made a few minor changes to the plan. Since we have to be at MK early on Sunday for our ADR at BOG; I think we're going to try to rope drop 7DMT to get a ride in before breakfast. I was also able to get DD's Bippity Boppidi appointment rescheduled for Thursday; so we're just going to make the first half of Sunday an MK day. We'll likely try to hit up some of the smaller rides that we missed last year. I'm guessing we'll try to do standby for Voyage of the Little Mermaid and Pirates. We'll probably grab a ride on the People Mover as well.

The other change, which isn't so much of a change really, is to rope drop at AK on Tuesday and hit up one of the first Safari's of the day. We may then try to standby at EE ahead of our FP+ for EE; depends on the crowds.

Overall, we have a much more leisurely planned schedule than last year and I'm really looking forward to getting to spend some time really exploring the parks. We still haven't made up our minds on MNSSHP yet. If we go, it will probably end up being on Tuesday. We have a breakfast ADR on Wednesday; but since we're going to be at MK for rope drop on Sunday, we could just sleep in a bit to recover from the late night and get to our 9:25 ADR on time instead of rope dropping MK again. Just tough to justify spending the $300 for a Halloween party; though I suppose it's better to spend the money on that than on more trinkets that will take up space at home. We shall see.

I got the notification that our Amazon deliveries have arrived at SSR; as well as one other surprise that I had shipped there for DW. In case you couldn't tell, I really love surprising people!