What Was I Thinking Inviting all the Inlaws? An SSR GV Trip Report

[DisneyRegulars]

Here we go! One hour of evening office hours, let's see how much I can get typed. Last week I actually had students, so I only got one sentence in. We'll see how this week goes.

So I left you last with Grizzly deathly ill, our last morning, and trip summary left to cover. Since Grizzly had actually locked the door to our bedroom I was unable to pack anything the night before our departure. Our flights were both around 2pm, so Maggie and company had a leisurely morning while I somewhat frantically packed everything that had somehow gotten scattered around the whole villa. How does this happen? We had stuff EVERYWHERE! Grizzly emerged from his room at some point, and just sat looking miserable with his head leaning on his hands. Poor guy. We hung out until 11am and then headed straight to the airport so Grizzly could continue being miserable and sedentary. Maggie and company decided on one last stop at Downtown Disney before heading to the airport. Prior to their departure they gave us a cute little picture frame magnet as a thank you, and gave Tigger the perfect Tigger present, some Disney Racer Cars for his birthday.

Overall I think this trip went great. I loved having the whole family there, and I think it was especially special for MIL to get to see Amy having such a great time. I got to live for a week with little Amy and learn some of the ins and outs as to why her parents do some of the things they do. It was very enlightening. We definitely do things differently, but different is okay. I was surprised to see how much Amy loved the thrill rides, and even more surprised to see how much Tigger DID NOT like the thrill rides this trip. I know that Maggie had a fantastic trip because you don't buy souvenirs from a vacation that you hate, and by the end of the trip she had amassed quite a number of them including a snuggie, hoodie, hat and earings. Yeah, I'm pretty sure she loved it. Roger too had a nice time. He works long hours between his job and his beloved fire house, and it was nice to see him walking hand and hand with his daughter in the parks. That gave me the warm fuzzies. After this trip I would definitely LOVE to invite Maggie and company back again. I think it would be fun to do a trip just with them. Don't get me wrong, I loved having MIL there, but it would be nice to not have to worry about negotiating crowds in a scooter, or having poor MIL waiting while we go on yet another thrill ride. So maybe when the kids are a little older and Tigger is no longer quite so wussy we will be able to go back together.

We managed to make it home in one piece. Two days later I woke at 4am with Grizzly's bug. What a horrible bug! We have a quarantine system though, and I managed not to give it to Tigger. Thank goodness for small miracles, because 5 year olds and stomach bugs are not my cup of tea.

Since returning from this trip we have planned 2 more Disney trips to make use of our annual passes. We will be going back in August for an epic resort hopping trip, 5 nights, 5 different resorts all in studios. We are very excited about trying BLT and the Poly for the first time on this trip. We will also be going back starting December 27th for 7 nights. First 2 nights in a studio at AKV, followed by 5 in a Tree House. But first up we have our anniversary trip with just Grizzly and I in July. I cannot wait for that.

Thanks for following along and all your kind words. By the way, it took me three weeks to finish this last post. Turns out my students do like the late night office hours. I've already had 2 visitors tonight. Cheers for now! See you in July.

 

[quandrea]

April! Only a month away now. I bet it must be so much fun watching your twins together down in Disney!

Saw your update was was thrilled. So glad the trip was a success. I'm heading down with my best friend, her girls 7 and 13 and my three, 5, 5 and 11 next month. Hoping for a fun time. We haven't bought as much bacon as you guys.

Lucky you with three trips coming up. Isn't DVC great? There is always another trip on the horizon. We have April, then two weeks in October an two more in January. Never gets old. My twins are fun to watch at Disney. Not a day goes by here where we don't reminice or look forward to coming trips. I'll be on deck for July!

 

[CarolynK]

Well I just found your report and read it all the way through. It sounds like a very enjoyable trip with extended family. We've done trips with both parents, they were not fun. And both moms were in scooters. Just wait until you don't have a stroller anymore, it's so liberating to walk through crowds unencumbered by wheels!!

 

[florep1]

Enjoyed your writing and your sense of humor. Thanks for sharing.

 

[Nanajo1]

Thanks for reporting. It was the Disney fix I needed.

 

[MomBird]

I just read your trip report and loved it!! The silly face pictures of Tigger were too cute and it sounds like everyone had a great time!

I leave in 2 months for my son's high school graduation Disney trip! We've taken family to Disney before, but this is the first time the kids are taking friends and my son gets to "own" his vacation completely even down to the lock-out unit studio. (Okay, well, with the fam just on the other side of the door! I think you may have inspired me to write my own trip report!)

p.s. Late evening office hours at an on campus bar/restaurant....you're probably getting A+ reviews on Rate My Professor for that!

 

[DisneyRegulars]

I just read your trip report and loved it!! The silly face pictures of Tigger were too cute and it sounds like everyone had a great time!

I leave in 2 months for my son's high school graduation Disney trip! We've taken family to Disney before, but this is the first time the kids are taking friends and my son gets to "own" his vacation completely even down to the lock-out unit studio. (Okay, well, with the fam just on the other side of the door! I think you may have inspired me to write my own trip report!)

p.s. Late evening office hours at an on campus bar/restaurant....you're probably getting A+ reviews on Rate My Professor for that!

Your son is going to love that!!! I'm so excited for him. I will never forget the weekend my parents let my friend and I "play tourist" and stay in a hotel for a weekend and do all the touristy things in our city in high school, we had such a great time.

I'm not even on Rate My Professor yet , although two weeks ago I had a group stop by just to have a beer, so at least for sure some of the students don't hate me.

 

[Fastpassminus]

I am planning a trip to SSR for Nov-Dec of this year. I loved your TR. You seem like a laid back fun Mom! I am also in upper ed. ( admin).

I was wondering how you got to the parks? Did you drive or take Disney Transportation? How would you rate the busses at SSR?

 

[DisneyRegulars]

I am planning a trip to SSR for Nov-Dec of this year. I loved your TR. You seem like a laid back fun Mom! I am also in upper ed. ( admin).

I was wondering how you got to the parks? Did you drive or take Disney Transportation? How would you rate the busses at SSR?

Thanks! Because of my MIL's scooter we mostly drove to the parks because it seemed like less of a hassle for us, and less scary for MIL. However, my little beast is obsessed with busses, so we rode them back from the parks often. We also caught busses a couple of nights. I thought the service was fine. We usually were on a bus in only a few minutes, and never longer than fifteen. We played lots and lots of eye spy on the busses this trip.

 

[Fastpassminus]

Thanks! Because of my MIL's scooter we mostly drove to the parks because it seemed like less of a hassle for us, and less scary for MIL. However, my little beast is obsessed with busses, so we rode them back from the parks often. We also caught busses a couple of nights. I thought the service was fine. We usually were on a bus in only a few minutes, and never longer than fifteen. We played lots and lots of eye spy on the busses this trip.

Thanks! We will rent a car to make things easier but H likes to ride the busses sometimes too!

 

[quandrea]

So Grizzly and I went back to the Lego store to see just how many Legos we could fit in the $15.99 Lego cup. My son used the same strategy that everyone else was using, he simply put Legos into the cup until he could shove no more in there. Here is a better way if you want to increase your Lego yield. Note this took about 45 minutes for 2 adults to do.

Step 1: Fill the bottom section of the cup with small pieces.
Step 2: Create a solid tower that sits in the center of the cup. The first shape you need to make is a sort of like an * shape, and about halfway up the cup you can change it to a full square. To keep your sanity, DO NOT put several large flat pieces together or you will have a heck of a time taking them apart.
Step 3: Fill in all around the edges of your center stack.
Step 4: Before putting the lid on, fill the nub in the lid with Legos too, this is a great place to put the flowers.
Step 5: Purchase Legos and feel superior to all other Lego purchasers in the store.


Here is what it looks like:

The full cup with flowers from the lid nub on top:

Removing the top layer you can see the solid center core:

Here is everything taken out of the cup with the solid center core sitting upside down so you can see the bottom star shape:

All the pieces laid out on a cookie sheet and above the cookie sheet. Looks like we have way more rims than tires!

Another view of all the Legos:

Next we filled the cup back up as best we could without stacking any Legos together. Look how many Legos didn't fit in the cup!!!! About 1/3 of the Legos didn't fit back in.

So by stacking Legos we got a full cup AND a full baggie full of Legos.

Happy Lego cup filling!

We did this yesterday! Hubby said you did slightly better than I did with the kids but what can you do? It was a lot of fun and the kids love having Lego for the room.

 

[DisneyRegulars]

Amazing!!!!! And Legos for the room are always great!

Did you buy the people separately, or do they have people in the bins now?

 

[quandrea]

Amazing!!!!! And Legos for the room are always great!

Did you buy the people separately, or do they have people in the bins now?

Bought the people separately. That is a must do every trip for the kids. We were at the Lego store over an hour.

 

[kboo]

...

Overall I think this trip went great. I loved having the whole family there, and I think it was especially special for MIL to get to see Amy having such a great time. I got to live for a week with little Amy and learn some of the ins and outs as to why her parents do some of the things they do. It was very enlightening. We definitely do things differently, but different is okay. I was surprised to see how much Amy loved the thrill rides, and even more surprised to see how much Tigger DID NOT like the thrill rides this trip. I know that Maggie had a fantastic trip because you don't buy souvenirs from a vacation that you hate, and by the end of the trip she had amassed quite a number of them including a snuggie, hoodie, hat and earings. Yeah, I'm pretty sure she loved it. Roger too had a nice time. He works long hours between his job and his beloved fire house, and it was nice to see him walking hand and hand with his daughter in the parks. That gave me the warm fuzzies. After this trip I would definitely LOVE to invite Maggie and company back again. I think it would be fun to do a trip just with them. Don't get me wrong, I loved having MIL there, but it would be nice to not have to worry about negotiating crowds in a scooter, or having poor MIL waiting while we go on yet another thrill ride. So maybe when the kids are a little older and Tigger is no longer quite so wussy we will be able to go back together.

....

I just found your trip reports and loved this one! We did a smaller family reunion with my parents and sister and I think you are right, these trips are about seeing the memories being made. I wish i'd seen this TR when planning activities to do with my elderly parents (no scooters, but my mom has dementia) and my sister's family ("we like to just go with the flow" HAHAHAA) since I would have planned the trip a little differently. Also, I can totally relate to the 4-5yo "planning" - one morning we made it as far as the Goofy statue on the bench at the beginning of Main St. It's a nice reminder that sometimes it's the shared time and it doesn't have to be all about rides or park time.

 

[Disneybuckeye]

Thanks for sharing. Aside from the minor blip sounds like a great trip. We have been going once or twice a year with (and now sometimes without) our kids for 28 years. Enjoy the priceless memories you are making!