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Hi! I’m Lois and this is my first attempt at a pre-trip report.

OUR PARTY:
Me: Lois, age 38. I grew up in a Disney family. Our first trip in 1974 was via an Amtrak train from Boston. Very memorable trip. We went as a family every couple of years. I went with my youth group every year in high school and continued to drag my friends throughout college. I have previously stayed on site at the Contemporary in 1976, the POFQ in 1995 and The Dolphin in 2000. In 2003, I took my first trip as a Mom and cried as my DS and I approached the castle to see Cinderella on stage singing “A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes”, the song I sang to him every night before bed. He put up his hands for me to pick him up, put his head on my shoulder and sang to me with a huge smile on his face!!

DH: Kevin, age 39 (Will be turning 40 nine days before our trip!). He had never been to Disney before he met me. 6 months after we were married my parents and I took Kevin to Disney World and introduced him to the Magic! He was hooked! We returned with his whole family in December of 2003.

DS: Jacob, age 7 (turning 8 fourteen days before our trip). Jacob has been to Disney World once, when he was 2.5. He loved it and still brings up things that we did on the trip. He is SUPER excited about this trip. Jacob is an insane Star Wars fan (We are a little sad we will miss Star Wars Weekend by a couple of weeks but Star Tours and Tatouin Traders will still send him into a tizzy!) He will be finishing up 2nd grade the day before our trip starts.

DD: Meghan, age 5. This is Meg’s first trip and she can not wait to see everything. She has taken on her mother’s habits and is planning and researching (Via her Birbaum’s Kids Guide) about all the things she wants to do and see! Meghan will be starting Kindergarten in the fall.

DS: Ian, age 2 (In April). He’s our Imp! He is so different from the other two and so funny to watch. He LOVES Mickey Mouse and jumps up and downs and squeals every time he sees a picture of him. He will be so much fun in the World!


OUR TRIP:
We will be going June 20-27, 2009 staying at the Caribbean Beach Resort thanks to the Buy 4 get 7 promo! We have the Disney Basic Dining Plan and 7 day Magic Your Way Base Tickets. We will be getting to Orlando via plane (If Southwest would drop their fares!!)

OUR CELEBRATIONS:
We have a lot this trip…As mentioned above, DH and DS will be celebrating birthdays just a little before our trip. Also, June 10th is DH & My 9th Wedding Anniversary. And, of course, Meghan and Ian’s First Visit Celebrations!


BACKGROUND:
This trip has been a long time coming. DH & I had decided to take this trip in 2006. We were going to go in 2007. Well, nature had another plan and I found out I was pregnant with our third. He was born in April of 2007. We set our sites on December 2008. Plans were in the works and we had my parents timeshare booked (At the Sheraton Vistana) then the economy started to turn and I lost my job unexpectedly. We waited as long as we could to make a decision but in the end decided to postpone to June. I watched and waited to see what would come available for the timeshare (Now we had banked the week and it was slim pickings or what we could get in Orlando for June.) We had even been saving up Disney Gift Cards and had accumulated $225 worth from various incentive program’s at DH’s company!

Enter Disney’s Buy 4 get 7 Promo. I had seen an ad on TV and decided to pop onto the Disney site and give it a look. It was a reenactment from the Disney commercial…me on the computer at night, the kids in bed. I price out the trip, call DH over to the computer and say “We can do this!” LOL! He agreed and we booked it. We used gift cards or our deposit!