My Wedding/Honeymoon Planning Thread is Bonkers but All the Best Ones Are!UPDATE 5/31

[MotoWifey185]

Hello and WELCOME!!to my
wedding journal // trip report! ​

​

So you have been warned, I've made up my mind, changed my mind, and lost my mind. It happens when you're a bride with an entirely too big family and everyone is watching and judging your every move. For now, this thread is focused on the amazing trip I had to DL in April and I'm posting some wedding details along the way. It is no longer a Disneyland Honeymoon Planning thread because after pricing it out and doing some research and talking it over, we've decided to have our honeymoon at

Aulani!!!

Anyway my name is Ashley and I am a full time student taking online courses now, and going to Chandler-Gilbert Comm in the fall. I am going to be a teacher! I am engaged to my high school sweet heart Matt and we are getting married on September 15, 2012! My colors are Navy Blue & Grey with pops of color in various decorative items. My bridesmaids have their dresses and their bouquets already and I have my dress as well! I am so excited for this event in my life and I would love to share my experiences with you, and well as hear all of your thoughts/suggestions/advice and even ask me some questions! As a Bride my every move is being watched and analyzed (is this normal for everyone?) so this forum will be nice for me to collect my thoughts before they are said aloud. I am sure there are lots of people out there who know what I'm going through and are willing to offer me some support because we all know I need it!


TRIP LINKS!

Seaworld January 2012, Our first time together!
-Long boring drive and rainy morning!
-Show time!

Disneyland April 2012

First Day-Travel day and Hotel Tour!
-The long drive, and an extensive tour of the GCH! Most amazing views ever.
-GCH Tour continued, and heading over to the DLH.

Second Day- FINALLY at Disneyland!!! After a long 8+ months.
-The Wildest First Ride in the Wilderness!
-Flying through space, sailing through pirate territory, and then visiting a Haunted Mansion, all within 30 Minutes.
-Time to ride some new rides and scarf down delicious corn dogs.
-Taking a train around the land and then back to DCA... so much walking!

NEW
-A Goat, a Duck, and a Spittin' Waitress!
All Rides Should have Firework Shows... In Fact Everything in Life Should.

 

[Minnie Sue Oz]

Hi there Ashley!

Sounds like you have a good idea on what you want to do for your big day! And you really couldn't pick a better spot to honeymoon!

We were in the USA in 2010 for Christmas and had the best time ever. I am a Disney fanatic and we spent 3 weeks at Disneyland Yes, I wanted to make sure I crammed as much time at the parks as I could as we live in Australia!

Looks like we will both be looking forward to October as you have your wedding and I have a trip planned to Disneyland for Halloween! I need to keep busy too to try and make the time go a bit quicker!

We also went to Knotts berry farm to ride the bigger coasters. It was quite busy the day we were there but we had a good time. Not the same as DL though, but some scary coasters that were great! We all went on the Ghost Rider wooden roller coaster and I swear all my bones rattled for an hour after getting off it!!!!

I will be keen to know what you think of the 3 Disney hotels as I want to spend our last 4 nights on property and am unsure which one to stay at. I agree with you though on the way we could spend more time at the DLH or PP for the price it would cost at the GCH.

I have spotted your "Show me a picture thread" and have joined in! I thought that was a great idea and alos a fun way to pass spme time until October! Just waiting on another member to post a pic and ask for a new one!

Take care

Sue

 

[MotoWifey185]

Hi there Ashley!

Sounds like you have a good idea on what you want to do for your big day! And you really couldn't pick a better spot to honeymoon!

We were in the USA in 2010 for Christmas and had the best time ever. I am a Disney fanatic and we spent 3 weeks at Disneyland Yes, I wanted to make sure I crammed as much time at the parks as I could as we live in Australia!

Looks like we will both be looking forward to October as you have your wedding and I have a trip planned to Disneyland for Halloween! I need to keep busy too to try and make the time go a bit quicker!

We also went to Knotts berry farm to ride the bigger coasters. It was quite busy the day we were there but we had a good time. Not the same as DL though, but some scary coasters that were great! We all went on the Ghost Rider wooden roller coaster and I swear all my bones rattled for an hour after getting off it!!!!

I will be keen to know what you think of the 3 Disney hotels as I want to spend our last 4 nights on property and am unsure which one to stay at. I agree with you though on the way we could spend more time at the DLH or PP for the price it would cost at the GCH.

I have spotted your "Show me a picture thread" and have joined in! I thought that was a great idea and alos a fun way to pass spme time until October! Just waiting on another member to post a pic and ask for a new one!

Take care

Sue

Welcome to my PTR Sue! I saw your TR for your Trip of a Lifetime but I got tied up and didn't read it yet, but I would love to see how your trip was! What a great experience though, and so cool that you are able to come back so soon! I hope time goes fast so your trip can be here too!

Yep I will post back on here right away which hotel we decide. Right now he thinks PPH and I'm thinking GCH. I just would love to be that close but we'll see what we think of them in person! I will take lotttts of pics on that research trip too.

Yep I love any picture thread on here so I thought this would be a fun one! I would post a new pic but I don't have any of Minnie's House! Let's hope someone does and posts soon.

 

[MotoWifey185]

Seaworld January 2012, Our first time together! Trip Report

Long boring drive and rainy morning!

Well on my fiance and my visit to Seaworld we decided to ask if my brother (17) wanted to go, and when he said yes my parents decided to just buy all three of us tickets, sweeet! It pays to be a good big sister. We left on Friday January 20th after DF got off work. We took my little Ford Ranger, which has basically two full seats and a middle seat. I am the smallest so I always have to sit in the middle!

We got to our hotel (The Goodnight Inn) at around 11pm or so. I got 2 pics off google of what it looked like. Nothing special, and pretty icky!

The next morning we woke up at 7am. We all got ready and were out the door by 8am. We went to Chick-fil-A for breakfast. It started sprinkling on the way there and we were curious to see how the park would be. Dbro and I both got chicken biscuits. Sooo yummy!! DF got a chicken breakfast burrito, they are his favorite. We got our lemonaids refilled and got on the road to Seaworld!

You can see it was pretty grey outside! I love that weather here in AZ but we weren't so happy to see it here. But we knew all we could do is make the best of it so we did!

When we were let in the park we grabbed a park map and headed towards the arctic area. I wanted to ride the helecoptor ride but we got in the wrong line, so we missed that ride. I love this exhibit. I would like to do the beluga encounter one day!! DF's favorite are the penguins.

Next up was the Nautical Exhibit. I really liked the Sea turtles part. You so totally rock, squirt!

And then we saw the shark encounter.

Next we went to see the sea lions or seals or both... I don't know! But they are so funny and cute!!

 

[MotoWifey185]

Then we went to go see the tide pool, and I picked up a starfish!

Taken off google.

Next we went to the Orca exhibit. We got to see two of the orcas up close and got a little extra information from an employee. I can't remember much of the convo now but I remember it being fairly interesting. The first One Ocean show was going to start soon so we decided to go take our seats. We used our ponchos to sit on because the benches were wet. I highly recommend ponchos, they saved our butts. I thought the show was great, it's amazing what you can teach them!

Gooogle.

Next we went to ride Journey to Atlantis before the first Pets Rule show. It was fun! I wore my poncho but the boys didn't get too wet at all. I love coasters so I was glad this was open.

And then we went to Pets Rule. Due to the weather, they were unable to do the regular show with all of the stunts. So they showed us how they teach the dogs and I admired the fact that they take the animals out of shelters. They told us that when a dog has a certain habit (i.e jumping) they teach the dogs tricks based off that. One dog can jump rope and another can jump on his hind legs back and fourth between trainers. It was so fun to see and now we have some new tricks to teach our pup! By this time the sun had started coming out too.

Next we hustled over to Blue Horizons. This show was pretty neat, but it was hard to tell which birds were part of the show and which weren't. But I love dolphins so I loved the show. We sat to the left though so we didn't see much of the onstage performances. But it was still really cool!

After this, we rode the Sky Tower, and then we decided we were done, it was easy to get everything done in the park because there were no crowds! We kept seeing all of the same people. Hope you enjoyed this, next time, there will be a DISNEYLAND trip report to read.

 

[MotoWifey185]

ignore

 

[MotoWifey185]

The ball is officially rolling on this March or April trip! We are going to do the parks for one day, get a parkhopper, and just do as much as we can. It will be pretty different because we haven't been in a while! The next day before we head home we will check out the 3 hotels. Sounds like a good time to me.

As far as wedding planning goes, the venue is booked and invitations are bought, just have to send them out! Things are starting to come together. Thanks for reading, even if you are too shy to post!

 

[MotoWifey185]

testing the link

 

[MotoWifey185]

Gahhh, triple post! Sorry!

 

[MotoWifey185]

Hey guys, just thought I'd throw in an update. We leave this Sunday morning for DL! That first day we'll be checking out the hotels, and then hitting the parks on Monday, and leave Tuesday afternoon. We've decided to get pizza the first day at Naples with our certificate, and that's all we know for sure, we're not big "plan aheaders" when it comes to food. We are staying at Days Inn Anaheim West, we've stayed there before and it is walking distance for us! I will be writing a TR on that and I have a new camera that I am planning to take lots of pictures with!

I CAN'T WAITTTT!!!!!!!

Oh and I'll be adding links to this TR so it looks neat, and so far I am still trying to figure it out, just so you know why this thread has gone mad!

 

[MotoWifey185]

Disneyland April 2012, with a cute surprise at the end!! Trip Report

We left home around 5:30am on Sunday April 1st. I woke up at 3am and I couldn't go back to sleep so I just got up to take a shower. DF woke up a little later and made us bagels and got all of our bags together. We were out the door 30 minutes ahead of schedule!

Some pics along the way...

This storm made it so windy and made our gas mileage drop.

Yay, Ball road!!

We parked in the DTD parking lot by 11:45. We were going to stay there for the three free hours and then go to our hotel to try and check in a little early. Right now we were hungry!! So we decided we wanted to walk clear across DTD and the esplande and get Quizno's for a cheap filling lunch. We both got a Turkey club bullet.

I just love the colors of the trees here, our trees at home just aren't as green!

Next we checked in to our hotel.... Kidding, I WISH! We went to tour the GCH first. At the end of the tour DF made me smile by saying he really wanted to be able to surprise me at the end of the tour by telling us we can check in. But he knew he couldn't afford it. It warmed my heart though just that he even thought of that. But anyway, we got a great tour of the GCH, we got to see 4 different rooms!

The lobby.

First we went to a standard view room, I didn't take pics of the view but it was just of Disneyland Drive and I could see the DLH.

Next was the pool view with bunk bed.

And then the park view room, looks the same inside so I just took pics of the view, I ABSOLUTELY LOVED IT! I totally want to stay here!!

And then next was the DTD view. Just a tip for anyone wanting to stay there, just know that it is pretty loud in the room. The noise quiets down a bit at 11 but the places don't close until 2am so you may have some noise issues. The tour guide said they get lots of calls about this.

Naples! Where we were scheduled to eat that night.

Next was the one bedroom suite. I didn't get a pic of the view, but I think it was a standard view, I don't remember!

Continued On Next Post

 

[MotoWifey185]

After we were done with the tour we had just a little bit of time before we had to head back to the parking lot so we walked around the hotel a bit.

Closer to the pool.

The workout room.

I love this light!!

The Napa Rose.

And then we went to go check into our hotel, Days Inn Anaheim West. It definitely was hard to look at after being inside the GCH! I didn't get any pics of the hotel, but it's just your average hotel and the bedding was red and the floors were black brown. LOL. After we rested up a little bit, we walked back to DTD to finish touring. It was about 3:45 or so.

We saw this float through the fence along the way.

Next up, Disneyland Hotel!

Tea Cup chairs, how cute are those?!

We were taken to see a pool view room.

And that's all I got because this tour was very quick.

We went over to the PPH, but it was still check in time and no one had any time to take us for a tour. And tours ended at 5, so we never did make it to this hotel. But this doesn't leave it out of the question!

We were hungry after this, and although our reservations weren't until 7pm and it was only 5pm, we decided to head over to Naples and see if we could eat early. We were seated immediately right smack in the middle of a crazy loud restaurant. We had a $30 off $30 purchase for his birthday. Or mine, I don't remember which one I printed out but our birthday's are less than one month apart from each other. Mine is on Easter this year.

He got a pepperoni pizza and I got the Catandino Salad. His pizza was good but my salad was so-so. We got a tiramisu to go and our total was only $17. Score! We were glad we didn't have to pay any more because it wouldn't really have been worth the full price.

I guess I put my camera away for good because I have no pics, but after dinner all we did was go buy our tickets and then headed back to the hotel to get a head start on sleep for the next day at the parks!


Coming Up Next---- DISNEYLAND!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[MotoWifey185]

Sorry about the sideways pics. I fixed them in Photobucket but it's being dumb and slow right now so it may take a while for them to straighten out.

 

[kaoden39]

Hi there!!

I love how in the GCH they show you a room with an amazing view. Same with the DLH. Are you set on stone to stay onsite or are you considering other hotels?

 

[MotoWifey185]

Hi there!!

I love how in the GCH they show you a room with an amazing view. Same with the DLH. Are you set on stone to stay onsite or are you considering other hotels?

Hello and welcome!

Yeah it was a great opportunity and we were so glad to be able to see it! Yes we are set to stay onsite, we've stayed at DLR many times but never wanted to spend on the onsite hotels. We've always wanted to so we figured what better reason than our honeymoon? I am excited to be able to stay so close and in such nice hotels.

 

[Minnie Sue Oz]

Sounds good so far!

I have always wanted to stay onsite too................I am sure I will get to do it one day!

Looking forwrd to more

 

[kaoden39]

We have stayed in the DLH a few times. I love the upper levels to me even a parking lot view is fun. I think it is because of where I am when I stay there.

 

[MotoWifey185]

Sorry it's been a little while! I've been swamped with school work! Well when I last left off the DF and I were done with our day of hotel touring and we were wiped out. We went to bed and I tossed and turned for a good part of the night. We had really loud neighbors and there were kids running around or something outside of our window. But finally I fell fast asleep and the alarm to wake up finally rang.

I woke up first to get ready and DF slept in a while longer. It was 6am and we wanted to be at the parks by 7:30. DF woke up at about 6:45 and hopped in the shower while I went and got us breakfast from the lobby. I had a coffee and blueberry muffin and I got him an orange juice with cinnamon roll and blueberry and chocolate muffin. We left the hotel at around 7:10 and walked to the parks!

We got there about 7:45am and got our bag checked and went to wait in line! From what I saw, the parks didn't look like they were going to be crowded, but that wasn't the case later on. I didn't realize that spring break was still going on at this point. But to me it really wasn't all that bad, I'm not sure if it's just because I haven't been in forever and nothing was going to get me down or what but the crowds didn't bother me at all this time around. Sweet!

The standard "first picture"

YAYYY WE ARE HERE! I wish that were the case right this minute!

Annnnd the standard second picture.

Walkin' down Mainstreet USA!

Where's the crowd?

There they are, I guess they moved rope drop more forward, which is nice because you are now able to stroll down main street.

I noticed the Matterhorn looks like it has a new fresh coat of paint! I can't wait to ride it when it opens back up, all brand new!

And finally the announcer told us we could go enjoy the parks, so DF and I followed the lesser of the masses and headed to Indy for FP's.

I waited here while DF went and grabbed them, the line for Indy was sticking out all the way to Jungle Cruise already!

We decided not to ride because of the line, so we walked out into a nearly empty NOS and head towards BTMRR! This is my favorite ride so what a perfect one to start with!

ba-a-a-a-a-aaaah!

And by this time it was almost ready for us to get more FP's, so we headed right to Space to get our next round.

We debated riding the new Star Tours today but since we were short on time we decided to save it for next time. Motion rides give me a headache, but I put up with it for Soarin' because it is his favorite, I just close my eyes and enjoy the breeze.

---Continued on Next Post---

 

[MotoWifey185]

---Continued from Last Post---

A very sunny day, weather was PERFECT by the way!!!

We grabbed some FP's and hopped in line, which was only 25 minutes still.

Matterhorn and all it's bandaids!

After Space we decided to head back over to the left side of the parks (yes we create lots of walking for ourselves!) and we rode POTC. I was looking forward to this ride because I got the Nikon s8200 (advertized for not needing flash because it works well in low light) and I wanted to get some great shots of the ride. Well I really needed to play with the settings because the one I used it didn't work very well when the ride was moving. Anyway, this is the best of what I got of POTC.

Next we decided to go to the Haunted Mansion. This was the first and only time we rode this this trip, because the line got insanely long and we just had a lot of other stuff to cram in to the day.

Never really noticed this.

When candle light flickers.... where the air... is deathly still!

Kinda cool shot!

Next we decided to grab FP's for Splash, but when we got there the line was crazy long so we just went to use the ones we had for Indiana Jones!

We went and grabbed another set of FP's for Space and headed out to DCA to get in line for TSMM. It was about 10:30 at this point, I love the morning rush!

I am sooo excited to see the final result of the entry way and Carsland and all of the other DCA progress.

I love this area.

---Continued on Next Post---

 

[MotoWifey185]

---Continued from Last Post---

The Little Mermaid! We had yet to ride this so we were excited to ride. Yes, he even gets excited too. He loves riding new rides with me no matter what they are.

I made a quick stop to get Screamin' FP's and he saw the wait time for TSMM and decided he didn't want to ride. I put up with this one for him also but it gives me a headache. It is at the top of his favorite list so I felt bad but he assured me he didn't want to ride.

At this point we were starving so we walked over to Corn Dog Castle.

It was still only about 10:40 at this point so we had a little time to kill before it opened for lunch, so we went to ride something we hadn't ridden before, Silly Symphony Swings!

Love this pic, I wish I knew her so she could have it! She looks like she is having so much fun!

We liked the ride, he thought he was going to get sick on it from spinning in circles but it didn't. He loved the view and we vowed next time we would get outer seats to be able to see better.

And finally, time for some fooood! We decided to share a corn dog so we could get something else in an hour or two because I wanted an ice cream sunday!

We ordered the regular corn dog with a side of apples and a Coke to drink. It was soo yummy!

Next we rode the Little Mermaid! The line was 5 minutes at the most.

Loved it!! Next we went to ride Screamin'! and headed back toward the entrance for some Soarin' FP's and go back to DL. We did a lot of these hops back and fourth.

At this point the park was getting to be very crowded. I snapped a quick picture of this when we headed back to BTMRR to grab FP's for it.

We were hungry again already so we decided to get out of the crowd for a bit and grab a sundae from The Golden Horseshoe, another first. We had never even been inside so ordering was a bit confusing, and there was nowhere to sit! These guys were pretty funny though, I would have liked to stay and watch if we could have sat somewhere!

After we got our sundae we headed to the NOS breakfast restaurant and found a seat there. We got a ton of compliments about how good our sundae looked!

I didn't get a pic so here is one I found on Google. I know I'm a cheater.

Annd that is 25 pictures. I must get started on my final project for school now but I won't wait so long to update next time! Hopefully everyone is enjoying this TR and I hope to find time to enjoy more of yours! Thank you so much for reading.