DemonLlama
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Jun 27, 2000
- Messages
- 4,021
(bear with me for a relatively brief build up here....)
When I joined the DIS boards in 2000, we were about 6 months away from the "once in a lifetime" trip that we'd scrimped and saved for for several years to Walt Disney World.
My name on the boards was WDWNovice and I felt overwhelmed at figuring out all of the ins and outs of our 4 day trip.
(Side note: Michael Cognovich, wherever you are, that extra reservation (pre-Priority Seating days) to Cinderella's castle for breakfast you gave me, thanks to this board, made you the hero of that trip!)
When we returned, my name changed to the terribly long "WDWNovice, Novice no More", which was not only terribly long, but just terrible all around.
When the boards changed servers, I was alerted by the tech guys the length of the name had to go and, if I would choose something shorter, I could keep my join date and post count, etc.
And thus DemonLlama was born.
(As you can tell by my post count, I'm not exactly a chatty cathy. Okay, each post might be a novel, but I don't write a million of them...)
And, like so many of you, "once in a lifetime" turned into "how often can we get back?"
From 2000 to 2010 every other year at Christmas we took our two kids, Nick and Sam, for about a week, the longest trip at 8 days, the shortest (in 2000) at 4.
By the third trip I was helping everyone we knew plan WDW vacations.
We always said we'd keep doing this while the kids were still at home.
My Nick left for college this year.
Sam, however, has made it known long and loud over our weeping and gnashing of teeth for his absence, that indeed SHE is still here and 2012 is the next cycle for a Disney trip, so let's get crackin'!
Since we moved to Colorado from Houston in 2007, the last two trips were decidedly more expensive on airfare and we began to allow the thought.... what about California? It's a different adventure for our newly changed family unit of 3 so it wouldn't be as hard to miss Nick at so many of "our" places around WDW.
So, last night we made the leap and booked a stay at Disneyland for Oct. 10-14. We'll fly in early Wed. and out late Sunday.
And suddenly I feel like a novice all over again.
I've already started reading threads, bookmarking and copying and pasting, like any good DIS addict.
But . . . .
I'd love to hear the ONE best thing you'd advise someone like myself, who knows WDW all over the place and has only begun to imagine a trip to Disneyland, what's the best thing(s) to do/plan/experience/not-miss?
thanks in advance!
When I joined the DIS boards in 2000, we were about 6 months away from the "once in a lifetime" trip that we'd scrimped and saved for for several years to Walt Disney World.
My name on the boards was WDWNovice and I felt overwhelmed at figuring out all of the ins and outs of our 4 day trip.
(Side note: Michael Cognovich, wherever you are, that extra reservation (pre-Priority Seating days) to Cinderella's castle for breakfast you gave me, thanks to this board, made you the hero of that trip!)
When we returned, my name changed to the terribly long "WDWNovice, Novice no More", which was not only terribly long, but just terrible all around.
When the boards changed servers, I was alerted by the tech guys the length of the name had to go and, if I would choose something shorter, I could keep my join date and post count, etc.
And thus DemonLlama was born.
(As you can tell by my post count, I'm not exactly a chatty cathy. Okay, each post might be a novel, but I don't write a million of them...)
And, like so many of you, "once in a lifetime" turned into "how often can we get back?"
From 2000 to 2010 every other year at Christmas we took our two kids, Nick and Sam, for about a week, the longest trip at 8 days, the shortest (in 2000) at 4.
By the third trip I was helping everyone we knew plan WDW vacations.
We always said we'd keep doing this while the kids were still at home.
My Nick left for college this year.
Sam, however, has made it known long and loud over our weeping and gnashing of teeth for his absence, that indeed SHE is still here and 2012 is the next cycle for a Disney trip, so let's get crackin'!
Since we moved to Colorado from Houston in 2007, the last two trips were decidedly more expensive on airfare and we began to allow the thought.... what about California? It's a different adventure for our newly changed family unit of 3 so it wouldn't be as hard to miss Nick at so many of "our" places around WDW.
So, last night we made the leap and booked a stay at Disneyland for Oct. 10-14. We'll fly in early Wed. and out late Sunday.
And suddenly I feel like a novice all over again.
I've already started reading threads, bookmarking and copying and pasting, like any good DIS addict.
But . . . .
I'd love to hear the ONE best thing you'd advise someone like myself, who knows WDW all over the place and has only begun to imagine a trip to Disneyland, what's the best thing(s) to do/plan/experience/not-miss?
thanks in advance!
