Celebrating 12 Years with 11 Days of Magic - UPDATED 5/2 COMPLETE About This Page:

[mcc0313]

Celebrating 12 Years with 11 Days of Magic

So someone asked me the other day "so when is the PTR starting?" and I realized I am 45 days away from our trip, which is pretty close in terms of PTR starting for me.

Now it wasn't like I had not thought about it, but I have been crazy busy lately and when I did think about it I just could not figure out a title, so I put it on the back burner and figured sooner or later a name would come to me.

Ok....still no name so I asked the PTR requestor for some ideas, I mean she is going to play a big part in this trip (and I have already stipulated that I am fully expecting her to chime in to the PTR / TR as well).

So she tells me that her creative mind was not working well but she offers some suggestions anyway, of course "Ms. My Creative Mind is Not Working" came up with the perfect title....so I cannot take credit for the title of this PTR but I can take credit for the reasoning behind it (Hey I need to take a little credit don't I).

So how did I contribute to this wonderfully named PTR, well I bore the child who will be celebrating 12 wonderful years (I know not much of a contribution in comparison to the wonderful TR title but at least I made a donation ).

A little backstory: So after our first two summer trips to WDW (one being in May and the other in June) we fell in love with free dining and the low crowds of the last week of August. My youngest daughter Angel's birthday is August 3rd so we always made it a late brithday celebration for her and she being a Disney Loving Fanatic like her mother was in her glory...but she often mentioned how it would be wonderful to be at WDW on her actual birthday but the thought of missing out on free dining was hard to resist, so of course I used the reasoning that all the money we save on food could be used for other special things...so that worked for two years and actually afforded us some speacial treats for the girls. I was perfectly happy with our travel week and so were the girls....until....

Fast forward to last year when her sister Jasmine started college, and classes started the 3rd week of August, well nice way to mess up my last week of August travel plans. So we needed to find a new week for our summer vacation...and I am sure we can all guess what Angel's recommendation was.

So last year we planned a trip to coincide with her actual birthday...and it was magical. My sister came for a few days with my nephew to celebrate with us, we got to spend some time with Jill (Jillybean) and Mary Devall (who was celebrating her birthday), and even one of Angel's school friends (who was visiting her aunt) came to celebrate with us for a day. All in all it was a wonderful trip for all of us and we had found our new summer vacation week.

So here we are again...45 days from our next celebration. Angel is turning 12 this year, still cannot believe my baby is not only going into her third year in double digits but she is really becoming so much of a little pre-teen (not sure if I am enjoying that change but we are surviving). So as the title states we are celebrating 12 wonderful years of Angel....with 11 days of magic at the happiest place on Earth.

Up Next: Plans, Plans and more Plans (and of course changes, like I could ever plan a trip without changes )

[disneyfreeeak]

Great start! I hope you all have as magical of a trip as your last one .

[tammyd_rn]

So glad you made your donation so we can enjoy your PTR.
What would any PTR be without changes...is it even possible?
Looking forward to reading the plans

[Nimros]

Yay!!! SO glad you started.

Can't wait to hear about all your changes....I mean plans!

[Colexis Mom]

Great start Meg! Can't wait to hear about all the plans!

[chezp]

Great start!

[lexiemom]

Great start!

[Principessa_di_Fata]

Fabulous start! As far as changes - well, you're speaking my language there! I look forward to hearing about the evolution of your plans - as well as the execution of them once you return! 11 days sounds blissful to me!

[lazanya]

Great start!

[lauriep]

Wonderful start and a great reason to celebrate!

[bsblady01]

great start more please

[mcc0313]

So I guess the best place to start is the actual....when are we going?

Last year Angel's birthday fell perfectly in the middle of the week on a Wendesday. It was orginally going to be a short 3 night trip just me and her...well of course it morphed into an 8 night split stay but it worked out well as we were able to come home on a Friday giving me a weekend to recuperate before heading back to work.

This year her birthday did not fall so perfectly...it fell on a Friday. After going back and forth in my head I decided we would take a late night flight home on that Friday so the original plans were to leave on Thursday July 26th late at night after I came home from work, and flying back on the last flight on the evening on August 3rd...

Ok Angel was not too happy about flying home on her birthday and after considering it I realized I would not want to fly home on my birthday either. So I figured if I had at least Sunday to rest I would be fine and Angel would not have to spend her birthday on an airplane (even if most of the day was at WDW), it worked out well anyway because it seemed that the flights on Saturday were cheaper, plus it would give us an extra day at Disney.

Then I remembered that I hit my 5 year anniversary at work this year so I get an extra week of PTO, plus I had three days of comp time built up, so instead of taking that 9:30 PM flight out of JFK I would take the full day and fly out in the morning giving us a day to just relax at the resort, something the girls requested more time for this trip. So I thought we were set. Fly on July 26th in the AM, fly home in the PM on the 4th....everything was good until the darn AM flight on Thursday just would not come down in price. I watched it for weeks, until I was driving myself mad.

So as I was standing outside one day at lunch, people watching the tourists at 42nd Street stopping traffic as they took photos of random things that only tourists could love my wonderful DVC buddy came by and we got to talking about our trips as they are overlapping again So I was telling him my flight issues and he said well why don't you fly down Wendesday night instead?

Wendesday night you say? Well I have not even looked at the Wendesday night flights. So I checked and they were cheaper...way cheaper. I did not book yet but decided to wait just to be sure.

Alot of changes took place at work, namely my boss quitting. Not a bad thing...but neverless a lot of changes going on so I talked to the project manager that I work with and mentioned leaving on Wendesday instead, of course he said go for it so I went back to my trusty Jet Blue site and booked. I had enough points for one RT flight so I purchased two other tickets leaving at 3 PM on Wendesday July 25th and leaving Orlando on August 4th at 8 PM. I would still go into work for a few hours on Wendesday morning and then will head home to meet the girls and my dad who will drop us off at the airport. Best part - the total savings leaving on Wendesday over Thursday.....$275 - quite a savings if you ask me and I get an extra evening at WDW, can't go wrong there.

The only issue was I did not have enough points to cover the extra night. A bit of backstory for those that have not read about my adventures, after my wonderful DVC friend let me use some points back in 2010 for part of our trip the DVC bug had bitten me bad. I held off but after losing our ability to travel during the end of August Free Dining...well DVC sounded better and better so as a late Christmas gift to me and the girls we became members in January 2011. Now my DVC friend, well a lot of changesin his life prevent him from traveling often and he often ends up with points that will expire...until he met me. So he happily allows me to use whatever points are expiring and as he said he feels good as they are not going to waste...point in case, he took care of my extra night, he truly is an amazing person and friend.

So we were set with our dates, July 25th to August 4th and we had our rooms...so what is next?

Up Next: So where are we actually staying?

[Grammy Grumpy]

Awesome start! Congrats on saving $$ and for having such a great friend to help with DVC points.

[Annabel]

Great start What an awesome friend you have

[chezp]

Congrats on the savings and the extra time!