Now a Trip Report!!! Will We Stay or Will We Go? A Thanksgiving Pre-Trip/Trip Report

[jillyb]

Howard died last night around 8:00 p.m. I'm with Katie right now and Madison is at her Dad's. Thanks for your prayers and thoughts.

 

[MeMom]

Howard died last night around 8:00 p.m. I'm with Katie right now and Madison is at her Dad's. Thanks for your prayers and thoughts.

So sorry to hear that your girls lost this good man from their lives. We sure don't understand the things life throws at us sometimes. You are in the thoughts and prayers of your many DIS friends.

 

[Charleston Princess]

I am so sorry, Jill!

 

[micandminforever]

prayers are with you and family.

 

[pooh'smate]

First of all my prayers are going out for your family right now.

We will just miss you at the World we are arriving on 11/28.

 

[jillyb]

I know that Disney will probably change things but I'm just ao excited to finally have something to work with so I can start planning! Now to just corral Clay and the girls so I know what ADRs I'm going to need. My window opens May 24 so I'm going to try to get us all together next weekend when we have Alison.

 

[Charleston Princess]

Planning for meals is always a highlight for me!!! Can't wait to see where you decide to eat!

 

[jillyb]

Clay has been traveling for the past two weeks so we haven't had any time together. My MIL called this morning and said that we could bring Hannah over there today so we could go to dinner and/or see a movie. Clay took Hannah over there late this afternoon and we watched Sherlock Holmes on DVD then went to Sticky Fingers for dinner. On our way to dinner we were talking about our trip. I was telling him about the offsite room I got and how it has bunk beds so the girls won't have to sleep in the same bed. He mentioned how they would be sharing a bed after that and I said "No, because they'll...." Then I realized I was about to let the cat out of the bag by saying there'd be a trundle bed. Fortunately I caught myself in time and said "Oh yeah...they will." Man! It's gonna be hard to keep this a secret!

 

[jillyb]

Planning for meals is always a highlight for me!!! Can't wait to see where you decide to eat!

I know that I want to do a breakfast at Kona (tonga toast!!!), a dinner at O'hana (thanks to MeMom and Jill for their pictures!) and breakfast at 1900 Park Faire. We had lunch at Coral Reef on our first trip and I know that we want to go back there. I'd like to go to Hoop-de-doo but don't know if it will work in our plans or not. If we go it would probably have to be a night when we're not planning on going to a park. I also want to do a Tusker House breakfast.

Clay has said he'd like to meet an Imagineer so I'm wanting to surprise him with a lunch with an Imagineer as an anniversary present. While he's getting his geek on the girls and I could just hang out and soak up the atmosphere in DHS.

 

[wigdoutdismom]

Guess who forgot to subscribe to this pre-trip report.
I'll give you three guesses.

 

[Charleston Princess]

Dining with an Imagineer would be such a cool gift for Clay!

 

[jillyb]

Guess who forgot to subscribe to this pre-trip report.
I'll give you three guesses.

It's OK...it's been mostly bad news anyway and not much fun stuff. LOL

I bought my first pairs of Yellow Box flip flops last weekend. I LOVE them! I'll have to take some pictures to post. A local store here called Belk had them on sale for $19.99 and then there was a 15% off coupon so I got two pairs.

 

[wigdoutdismom]

Jill, so glad I read everything and found out what had happened with Howard. I knew that he had passed away. Just didn't know details.
So sorry for the loss...

Time to get on with the happy for your family.
Trip planning will do that for you.
Oh my gosh, that binder is going to give you a hernia!
Looking forward to pics of the flip flops!

 

[jillyb]

Things have quieted down here and life is getting back to "normal". Katie and Madison are now just going through the grieving process, which is going to take some time. Madison started school on Monday. Her first day was a bit hard but the rest of the week went well. Katie said the teacher didn't send any notes homesss. I don't know if that's because Madison's behavior was that good or if she was just cutting her some slack! Katie starts back to work tomorrow. It will be a couple of weeks before she can transfer so in the meantime she will be staying with a co-worker during the week and going home on the weekend. It's not ideal but it's the only thing she can do right now.

Yesterday was a busy day for me. I had to get groceries for my Mom and plant some flowers for her. Then I had to get my own groceries and plant my own flowers. I wanted to get some housework done but it wasn't happenin'. While I got cleaned up, Clay grilled some BBQ pork ribs, put potatoes in the oven for baked potatoes and heated up some baked beans. Yummy!!!!! After the supper dishes were cleared I got the lap top and Clay got the Passporter. It was time to check out restaurants!!! While we're getting set up Alison asked when we were going and if we were going in February. Uhhhh...noooooo...we're going for Thanksgiving and will be eating Thanksgiving dinner in WDW. She got all excited because she didn't know we were going then. Child! Where have you been??!!! LOL

I went to allears.net so the girls could see menus of the restaurants we (meaning Clay and I!) were interested in. Unfortunately the laptop had other ideas and I wasn't able to show them much so they got bored and went to the living room where they picked up the 2010 Birmbaum Guides Walt Disney World for Kids and began picking out the rides they wanted to ride. At least they used their time wisely! LOL I bought this for Hannah, thinking Alison wouldn't be that interested in it, but she told me she liked the book and would like to have one too so looks like I'll be making another trip to the bookstore.

Here's the restaurants Clay picked out of the Passporter:

Coral Reef (ate there on our last trip and really liked it...the girls are excited about this one)
Rose and Crown (perfect place for dinner and Illuminations!)
Marrakesh (Alison heard Clay say "pot stickers" and said "I love pot stickers!" I had no idea!)
Le Cellier (I already had this one marked and Clay picked it as well. I let him know that it would be hard, if not impossible, to get an ADR here)
Sci-Fi Drive-In
Hollywood Brown Derby
Flame Tree
Tusker House
Hoop-Dee-Doo-Musical Revue (I was able to show the girls some pictures from a TR and they said it looked like fun!)
Boatwright's (Clay picked this one and said he'd really like to eat there. Little does he know! )
1900 Park Faire (We did the dinner for Hannah's birthday so I want to do breakfast this trip)
Nine Dragons
Yak & Yeti (table service)
O'hana
Columbia Harbor House
Liberty Tree Tavern
Kona
Cinderella's Royal Table (Hannah informed me that she wanted to have dinner at the Castle. Alrighty then!)

I know there's no way we'll be able to do all of these so I'll just try to get what I can.

Here's the attractions that Hannah and Alison picked so far (verbatim):

Tiki Room
Magic Carpet
Splash Mountain
Jungle Cruise
Big Thunder Mt. RR
Haunted Mansion
Donald's Boat
The Barnstormer
Cinderella's Carrousel
Mad Tea Party
Dumbo
Peter Pans Flight
Small World
Mickeys Philharmagic
Space Mt
Tomorrowland Speedway
Astro Orbiter
Spaceship Earth
Mission Space

That's as far as they got and have marked their place at The Seas with Nemo and Friends. LOL Clay and I had finished up with the restaurants so it was now time for Family Movie Night! We watched "The Jungle Book". The girls had blankets and pillows on the floor, Clay was on one couch and I was on the other. I popped some popcorn and we settled in to watch the movie. I fell asleep half way through! LOL Then it was off to bed and dreams of WDW dancing in our heads!

 

[jillyb]

Jill, so glad I read everything and found out what had happened with Howard. I knew that he had passed away. Just didn't know details.
So sorry for the loss...

Time to get on with the happy for your family.
Trip planning will do that for you.
Oh my gosh, that binder is going to give you a hernia!
Looking forward to pics of the flip flops!

My computer is being stripped clean and I should have it back on Tuesday. I'm using the lap top and don't have a way to upload pics so when I get my computer back and get everything set back up I'll take pictures and post them. I've loved wearing them though! They are so comfortable!!!

I have to have a hand truck for "the binder"!

 

[wigdoutdismom]

Sounds like you have some great eating planned, the only places we haven't tried are Boatwright's and Nine Dragons.
Can't wait to see what you end up with!

 

[Charleston Princess]

I am with Wigd -- we have eaten everywhere except Nine Dragons, Boatwright's, and the HDD. It will be neat to see where you end up with ADRs -- I don't think you can go wrong with any of them!

 

[MeMom]

I know that I want to do a breakfast at Kona (tonga toast!!!), a dinner at O'hana (thanks to MeMom and Jill for their pictures!) and breakfast at 1900 Park Faire. We had lunch at Coral Reef on our first trip and I know that we want to go back there. I'd like to go to Hoop-de-doo but don't know if it will work in our plans or not. If we go it would probably have to be a night when we're not planning on going to a park. I also want to do a Tusker House breakfast.

Clay has said he'd like to meet an Imagineer so I'm wanting to surprise him with a lunch with an Imagineer as an anniversary present. While he's getting his geek on the girls and I could just hang out and soak up the atmosphere in DHS.

Just wanted to be sure you knew our steak and pork chop pictures were from Kona dinner. We have done 'Ohana only for breakfast. If you were talking about our meals, they were Kona. We're doing a Kona breakfast this Sunday, and I have my sights set on some Pineapple Macadamia Pancakes.

The Imagineer lunch would be very cool.

 

[jillyb]

Just wanted to be sure you knew our steak and pork chop pictures were from Kona dinner. We have done 'Ohana only for breakfast. If you were talking about our meals, they were Kona. We're doing a Kona breakfast this Sunday, and I have my sights set on some Pineapple Macadamia Pancakes.

The Imagineer lunch would be very cool.

Thanks for the clarification MeMom! I know I've seen somebody's pictures from O'hana! LOL

 

[jillyb]

So I'd been seeing posts where people were getting pin codes for 20/30/40 to the end of the year and I was going crazy because at least 4 nights of our stay were covered. I read all the posts of what everybody else had done to get this pin code so I did it too. Nada...nothing...zilch. Then I read (might have been here or on TGM...can't remember) that someone had used another e-mail address and within a matter of days BAM! they had the pin code.

So, I set up an e-mail account for Clay then went to the WDW site, set up an itinerary and said that we weren't staying at a resort and didn't have tickets. I checked the account the day after I set it up and nothing. Then I forgot about it...until yesterday. There was no e-mail from Disney Destinations but there was an e-mail in the spam folder. I click on the spam folder and a chorus of angels began to sing because there was my pin code for the 20/30/40!!! I forwarded the e-mail to my TA and asked her if she would check to see if she could apply the 30% discount for November 20-23. I was busy last night but when I finally got the chance to check Clay's new e-mail account there was an e-mail from the TA saying that the discount was applied. The discount saved me 232.00. I know that's not a huge discount but it's better than nothing! And it's during Thanksgiving week!