"No Disneyworld, Stay home"..."Love Mickey Mouse, go to Disney World!" Staying Dec. 5-14 at the Beach Club About This Page:

[Colexis Mom]

More great plans

[DyanKJ130]

Looking good!!

[dizzparkmom]

Day 9: Thursday
12/13/07

The Plan: Our last full day in WDW. It’s off to morning EMH at MK again. We’ll be hitting our favorites in Fantasyland and Tomorrowland before heading over to Adventureland and Frontierland. Since we will probably have ridden most of the rides DS will enjoy, we’ll be spending a lot of time with DS at the playground areas this day (Pooh’s playful spot, Donald’s Boat, Tom Sawyer Island).

Lunch: Pecos Bill's or Pincochio's Village Haus (Depending on what we’re in the mood for…burgers or pizza). Once we’ve had our fill of the MK (as if that’s possible? ) or the crowds get too heavy, it’s back on the bus to the BC for our break.

Dinner: Le Cellier (CPP)

PM: Epcot (Candlelight Processional) I’ve been so excited to see the Candlelight Processional at Epcot for so long that I don’t think it even, not for a second, registered in my mind that this was exactly the type of experience DS will not tolerate well. (At least he hasn’t for every Christmas Eve Church Service we’ve attended in the last three years.) I’m really hoping and praying that DS will be in such a happy, joyful, Christmassy mood that he will enjoy the CP. DH has already offered, however, that if DS does not enjoy his CP experience that he will take him back to the BC for some cartoons and an early bedtime while I stay and enjoy myself. One other disappointment regarding CP, was when there was some shuffling of the narrators. We originally had Neil Patrick Harris. DH and I both love to watch “How I Met Your Mother” and love Barney. When he got moved to other nights, we were so disappointed. Now we have Chita Rivera. Nothing against Chita Rivera, we were just really looking forward to Neil Patrick Harris. (I've read some reports from his nights and everyone enjoyed seeing him ) This is probably the reason why DH isn’t too worried about offering to leave with DS if necessary. I still think I’ll have a wonderful time. Christmas is my favorite time of year and being able to hear the Christmas Story and listen to the beautiful music that accompanies it will certainly be one of the many highlights of my trip. Just recently, DS has become a fan of Christmas music on the radio - so I haven't given up all hope that he'll stay and really enjoy the CP as much as I do.

Day 10
12/14/07

The Plan: Our departure day…I plan to cry and pout all morning that we have to go home!

Breakfast: Cape May Café -- we decided to stick around close to the resort so that we don’t waste much time on transportation. So, breakfast at Cape May seemed like the logical choice.

AM: After breakfast, we plan on spending the rest of our morning either enjoying the scenery and decorations at Epcot (I definately want to spend some times admiring the fountains) or at the Epcot area resorts. We plan on heading back to the BC about an hour before DME is scheduled to take us to the airport. We’ll grab something for lunch in the BC Marketplace and do some last minute “I don’t want to go home, so I must take as much of it with me as possible” shopping. We’ll already be over-loaded with an impossible amount of bags to carry – so why not just add some more? (Don’t tell DH I said that! )

Next Up: Random thoughts from the planning process.

[dizzparkmom]

Random thoughts:

For souvenirs and out of pocket expenses, we’ll be using either our Disney rewards card or Disney Dollars. We’ve been using our Disney Visa card for about 30 months and almost exclusively for the last 6 months, thus, we’ve managed to collect about $250 on our rewards card. We asked for (and received) Disney Dollars for all of our birthdays, anniversary, and Christmas presents over the last couple of years. We’ve also had a couple of garage sales and turned part of the proceeds into Disney Dollars. So, most of our spending money is already set aside and accounted for. We hope to put very little on the credit cards on this trip. Debt is one souvenir I prefer not to bring home from a Disney vacation!

To get to MCO, we’ll be flying on 2 Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards tickets and 1 Southwest Ding fare. We were able to save up the Reward tickets over the last several years be putting all of our expenses on our SW Visa and them paying it off each month. Once we were able to earn our 2nd reward ticket (and it was obvious we would be nowhere near close to earning our 3rd in time for the trip), we switched to using the Disney Rewards Visa exclusively. The combination for these two rewards programs have saved us quite a bit of money on our vacation. (Did I mention we saved almost $500 on our vacation package by using a Disney Visa code? )

Packing: Packing has been the hardest part of this trip so far. Because of the time of year we are traveling, we don’t know if it’s going to be warm or cold. In Arizona, it’s pretty consistent from day to day and we rarely have huge temperature changes like they do in Florida. So, we’re packing a lot of clothes so that we’ll be prepared for whatever comes our way. Also, DS and DH are also dirt and spill magnets – so that’s even more. Throw into the mix that DS is only semi-potty trained (he can go days without any accidents and then have one everyday for a week and then back to nothing) so we’ll be bringing a big bag of pull-ups – I don’t think a Disney Vacation is the right time to worry about accidents. I’ve seen lots of trip-reports where people pack lighter and then plan on doing a load or two of laundry. I considered doing some laundry during our afternoon breaks, and then I remembered that I’m going on vacation too and don’t want to do any laundry on my vacation. So, we’ll be hauling lots of bags, loosely packed, along with a space bag or two for the dirty laundry on the way home. Also, we’ll select souvenirs and gifts wisely and if we think something may be an issue, we’ll ship it home from the store.

Counting down - when we decided to go to WDW this December instead of in 2008, we were 185 days out from our departure. It was a whirlwind of activity getting ready to make our ADRs at the 180 day mark in just 5 days. Before I knew it, we were at 100 days, then 75, then 50 and now it is TOMORROW! In order to help DS get excited about the trip and help him understand how long away it was, we made a countdown chain. We brainstormed all the fun things we were looking forward to and looked at picture books with DS. We wrote down all of our ideas on paper rings, hooked them together and stretched them across the living room wall. Each night before dinner, we take one down and that’s what we talk about during dinner. We’ve also got the special WDW programs on DVR so that we can watch them whenever we want. DS’s favorite is “Modern Marvels: WDW”. Every once in a while I try to create some Disney fun for DS by making Mickey pancakes, Mickey pb&j’s, or even Mickey hamburgers (available in the grocery freezer). DS really enjoys when I serve these items on one of the left over Mickey Mouse plates from his birthday party. We make frequent trips to the Disney Store – where I covertly pick up some toys for DS to enjoy on the flight. I’ve been very excited about this trip for a long time, but the closer its gotten, the more and more excitement I see and hear from DH and DS. I’m really looking forward to an amazing time, more importantly, an amazing time together.

Pictures: I pre-ordered the Photopass CD using the discount. I’m still researching how to get the most out of the CD – so any tips of suggestions are definitely welcome.

As I finish typing this last installment, I’m twiddling my thumbs and bursting in anticipation while waiting to check in at the 24 hour mark. I’ve got 15 minutes to go……..waiting, waiting, I guess this is good practice for those lines!

One last thank you to all of you Passporter experts out there who take the time to write up your trip reports and answer all of our questions – what I’ve learned from all of you will be the key to sharing a magical vacation with my family! Thank You!

Next Up: I’ll be back with details about how things actually happened! What worked, what didn’t and how I (as an obsessed, over-planner) coped with it all!

[janicelovesmickey]

All your plans sound wonderful!! Looking forward to the trip report. Have a wonderful time. And you are a picky eater like me, I dont like any peppers, onions, etc, so your not the only one. lol

[Colexis Mom]

More great plans Have a magical trip

[wayneava81]

More great plans! Have a magical trip and can't wait to read your TR.

[dizzparkmom]

Originally Posted by janicelovesmickey

And you are a picky eater like me, I dont like any peppers, onions, etc, so your not the only one. lol

Glad to hear I'm not alone - I'm becoming less and less picky as my son gets older and I make him eat more new foods (don't want to be a hypocrit ), but onions and peppers will always be on my "will not eat" list....and yet, I love Mexican food. Go figure!

Thanks everyone for reading! I'll be taking lots of notes and will hopefully be able to post a great trip report. I'll be reading up on how to include pictures - since I love to see pictures when I'm reading trip reports - I'm sure others do too!

[janicelovesmickey]

Originally Posted by dizzparkmom

Glad to hear I'm not alone - I'm becoming less and less picky as my son gets older and I make him eat more new foods (don't want to be a hypocrit ), but onions and peppers will always be on my "will not eat" list....and yet, I love Mexican food. Go figure!

Thanks everyone for reading! I'll be taking lots of notes and will hopefully be able to post a great trip report. I'll be reading up on how to include pictures - since I love to see pictures when I'm reading trip reports - I'm sure others do too!

I love Mexican too! but wont eat black beans yuk, I really end up either picking stuff out or if its TS ordering it very plain. Can't wait to see the TR.

[DyanKJ130]

Everything looks great!! Hope you're having a magical time!!

[dizzparkmom]

I've got a moutain of laundry, a 6" pile of receipts, and a Tinkerbell notebook full of details to turn into a trip report! Our trip was WONDERFUL. It had it's highs, it's lows, and it's....well, we'll just say we won't be returning to the Beach Club. Luckily our problems there didn't stop our little family from having a fabulous time and fulfilling our own magical dreams! I'm truly sad that it's over and I'm back to the real world - no future trips to WDW on the horizon, but one to Disneyland is in the works for DS's 4th birthday in June - so I've still got some planning to keep me busy!

I'll start a new report for our post-report details....still toying with names. One name that came to mind towards the end of the trip..."Look out honey - it's an exploding squirrel!" You'll have to look up the trip report once it's started to get more details on that one.

[Colexis Mom]

Can't wait to hear all about your trip

[DyanKJ130]

back! Can't wait to hear all about it

[mom to 3 princesses and 1 prince]

So sorry to hear that the Beach Club wasn't a big hit. Can't wait to read all about your trip!

[SouthernBelle]

Exploding Squirrel now my curiousity is peaked, hurry back can't wait to read your TR