FINALLY ON OUR WAY!
This trip probably classifies as the one with the most plan/date changes yet! Those of you who followed along on last year's trip report lived through most of the changes right along with me.
First we were going in October. Had the reservation made, ADR's done and I was planning costumes for the Halloween party! (I had great ideas too. I guess there's always next year, right?????) I made those plans in April, 180 days out. I was going to squeeze it in between potential Saturday Cross Country meets for Timmy. But as time went on, and we started thinking more about the logistics of Robbie commuting. I just liked the idea of a fairly new driver having someone at home who could help in the event of an emergency. Once we got the Rockhurst calendar and saw when finals would be done, the plans fell in place. I felt SO much better about the trip knowing Robbie would be done, or nearly done, with finals when we left town.
Through most of the planning, I wasn't sure if my husband Drew was coming. (He loves Disney, but shall we say........ not as intensely as Katie and I do.......) Additionally I knew Kim (my best friend and Disney buddy and mother of Katie's best friend McKenna) and her family were going to Disney the following week and we had kicked around the idea of overlapping a couple days. We had overlapped trips in December 08 and it really was special to be there with friends.
That all left too many unknowns to have a firm plan until fairly late in the game. In the meantime, I watched the Disboards for news of a December discount. And I waited. And I waited. They didn't announce the discounts until the very end of August. Once they did, Drew committed to going for a few days, but had to be home by Tuesday night for work. So we added a couple room only days to the beginning of the trip and our plan took form.
Soon after, Kim committed to flying in on the 15th with McKenna so we could have a couple days in the Magic Kingdom and a night at
MVMCP with them.
FINALLY! A plan! I had to wiggle some things around, but it was totally worth it to get to spend time in the Magic Kingdom with girlfriends!
The original plan had been to leave Saturday the 10th. When Drew decided to come, we added 2 nights on ahead of that. We would get to visit each park one day with him concentrating on rides before he left. We would then switch to character mode and do our girly stuff. It really made for a nice balance.
THURSDAY 12/8:
Katie went to school. Since she was already missing 6 days of school, the goal was to have her stay late enough that she wouldn't be counted absent. So she needed to be there until around 2:45. We were on the 5:20 flight, so that should have been enough time. But honestly, the closer we got to that date, the more I wavered on that timeline. We're a solid half hour from the airport. But I travel with a lot of bags (shocking, huh?) and with Drew coming along, we needed time to park and get the shuttle to the terminal.
Since Katie hadn't missed any school yet this fall, I ended up caving and picking her up around 2. What's one more day? She had been on a field trip to see "A Christmas Carol" and probably wouldn't be doing much the rest of the day anyway. We waited around a bit to see if Robbie might make it home before we left, but then I recalled he had to turn in his books after his last exam and would be home later than usual. So off we went.
It had been a long time since we actually parked at the airport. I seemed to recall that the turnoff to the lot was poorly marked, so I turned and crossed my fingers. Thankfully our travel angel was looking over my shoulder and we were in the right place. She kept looking over my shoulder when we pulled down an aisle to park, and the bus was waiting right there for us. No fuss, no muss.
We did curbside check-in and went in search of a bite to eat. I knew they woudln't feed us on the plane, so we'd need to eat enough to get us by until we got to the POP after 10 that night. The security line was longer than I had ever seen at KCI, but we usually fly out on a Saturday morning, and this was on a weekday. While we waited, I took my camera out to play, and lucky Katie pulled out some of the homework her teacher was kind enough to send along!
IMG_3420 by
mom2rtk, on Flickr
IMG_3422 by
mom2rtk, on Flickr
The flight took off on time and everything went off without a hitch. I had paid for early check-in on the return trip, but didn't do it for the outbound flight. I figured I would have easy computer access the day before and could easily take care of it. HAH! Around 7:30 that night it dawned on me that I needed to check in and we ended up in the B seating group. When we boarded, the only row of 3 left open was the very back of the plane. Thankfully we got to sit together. I mean, it's not like we were going to be in a hurry getting of in Orlando, right? OK, so maybe we were. But at least we all got to sit together.
IMG_3426 by
mom2rtk, on Flickr
IMG_3434 by
mom2rtk, on Flickr
IMG_3438 by
mom2rtk, on Flickr
I had hoped to sleep a little on the plane ride. I hadn't been sleeping well leading up to the trip, but hey.... I was on my way to Disney. Sleep would have to wait. We landed early and made our way through the airport.
Katie raced down the stairs while Mom and Dad took the escalator:
What'cha waiting on guys? Come on, we're going to Disney!
IMG_3448 by
mom2rtk, on Flickr
It was pretty disappointing to see the Earport closed, but we did quickly grab some of our tradional shots out front before moving along. There was no line for the Magical Express, and we were waved onto the bus that seemed to be just sitting there waiting just for us. It seemed our travel angel was looking out for us again.
IMG_3444 by
mom2rtk, on Flickr
IMG_3447 by
mom2rtk, on Flickr
IMG_3446 by
mom2rtk, on Flickr
We checked into the POP without issue and were on our way to our room. I had made my standard room request, building 5, ground floor, facing the pool. They did honor the request, but the location wasn't as great as I hoped, probably because we were so late checking in. We were in 5110, which is the back building near the Generation Gap bridge. So not quite as close as I had hoped, but still fairly convenient and certainly quiet.
It felt awesome to head back up to the food court and get a bit of food. For dessert, we shared....... my first ever piece of tiep-dye cheesecake! I always thought it was just cheesecake with color swirls, but that layer of cake just MADE it. My first "first" of this trip!
Can you believe I didn't take a single photo at the POP that night? Not even a shot of the tie-dye cheesecake?????
Gee, you'd think I was tired or something! Still, everything had gone as smoothly as we could hope. We were off to a great start!
I guess I just need to give up hope there.........
i said i HAD to get one before it moved! i also told my kids that if they didn't cooperate and i didn't get the image i wanted, they'd have to stand in line and ride it again! ha!
Thanks for joining in! 
