A Whole New World!!! (well for my parents!) Update July 1

[Oodalally13]

Hello all! I’m fairly new to the DISboards and decided maybe I would like to do a TR. I thought about doing both a PTR and TR as separate threads, but then realized I am not that witty and wordy and picture-y to fill 2 threads. SO I am going to combine them into one.

Here is the Table of Contents so you don't have to read through EVERYTHING to find new posts and what not. A HUGE thanks to aacvacation for teaching me how to add the table of contents!!!!

Pre-Trip Planning Report

New Disney Shoes

Our Room Decorations

Starting to Stress!-Questions

Still Stressing!-Randomness

Update-Starting to Pack

Question

Check Out the Merch!


Trip Report Part 1

Magic Kingdom Day PT 1

Magic Kingdom Day PT 2

I’m Samantha (29) and I am taking my Disney Father (DF—51) and my Disney Mother (DM—53) for their FIRST EVER trip to WDW. I have been 3 other times and the info is in my siggie, but I will also list here. I teach at the high school where I graduated from. Although not a band/choir teacher, I am close friends with all the directors and frequently help out with their events and trips. That led me to being the first chaperone always signed up for the trips. No, it isn’t free. I still pay the same package fees as everyone else.

March 2003---Senior in HS band trip to WDW/Universal
March 2010---Chaperone for HS band trip
March 2014---Chaperone for HS band trip

So back to this trip….we WERE planning on going to Vegas this summer, but then one day I decided we NEEDED to go to Disney. I told my parents that they could get “old” and still go see Vegas. Mom and I have been about 3 times, but Dad was never able to go with us. I told them with the extent of walking with Disney, it was something we should do soon so they weren’t “too old” to experience it physically. They both laughed at my reasoning. I looked into prices and packages and here we are today!
I have never stayed at a Disney resort, but knew this was going to be a big trip and we wanted to do it up big. We are booked for 5 nights at Pop Century, 4 days of tickets WITH hopper and DDP. We talked about Universal, but they aren’t really into thrill rides and I cant justify buying tickets to do maybe 3 things in the park.

Here is our plan thus far
Day 1
Travel to Biloxi
Dinner at Hollywood

Day 2
Travel to Orlando
Check-in to hotel
Dinner at Trail’s End
Electrical Water Pageant

Day 3
Magic Kingdom
Lunch at BOG
Dinner at Liberty Tree Tavern

Day 4
Epcot
Dinner at Biergarten
Illuminations

Day 5
Animal Kingdom
Dinner at Boma

Day 6
Hollywood Studios
Dinner at Hollywood & Vine
Fantasmic

Day 7
Check out of Pop
Travel to Daytona
Travel to Tallahassee
Check in to Tallahassee

Day 8
Check out of Tallahassee
Travel to Baton Rouge

Day 9
Check out of Baton Rouge
Travel home


Magic bands came in recently and we celebrated by having Mickey Pancakes for supper.

I have a space in my house where I have been stocking up on what we need to pack for the trip: decorations for the window at our resort, Clorox wipes, sling bag, ponchos, etc. I will keep you updated as things get rolling!

I still have a few days of work to get through (banquets, graduation, cleaning up room) before I can throw myself into packing full force! Glad to have you aboard our magic carpet ride!!!

 

[Quasialamodo]

Subbing in and those pancakes look delish! No Mickey head chocolate chips? Your trip sounds really fun and low-key and I hope everybody has a good time!

 

[CarlaLovesDisney]

Subbing!

 

[ashleighbass06]

Subbing! What days are you going? I'll be down in June as well.

 

[tinkerbell615]

So glad that you shared the link to this thread. I love your pancakes. My DS also teaches at one of the high school in the district where he graduated. I think that's pretty cool.

It's very sweet that you are going with your parents. My DD is 22 and My DS and DDIL are 28 and we always travel together. I love it! Now we have grandsons to take along too!

I am looking forward to reading your report!

 

[bjscheel]

Hi! I'll join in. We leave on Tuesday!

 

[Dreamport]

Subbing as well, fellow June-y! It's awesome you're taking your parents to see the World along with you. If it's anything like when we brought my parents to stay on site for the first time then you'll love staying at a resort.

 

[Oodalally13]

Subbing in and those pancakes look delish! No Mickey head chocolate chips? Your trip sounds really fun and low-key and I hope everybody has a good time!

I didnt even think about chocolate chips! Most of the time I put honey on my pancakes and I had some new orange blossom honey I wanted to try. (We usually only get clover honey down here!)

Subbing!

Welcome! Glad to have you aboard our magic carpet!

Subbing! What days are you going? I'll be down in June as well.

June 23-27

So glad that you shared the link to this thread. I love your pancakes. My DS also teaches at one of the high school in the district where he graduated. I think that's pretty cool.

It's very sweet that you are going with your parents. My DD is 22 and My DS and DDIL are 28 and we always travel together. I love it! Now we have grandsons to take along too!

I am looking forward to reading your report!

Thank you! I taught somewhere else for a year and then a job opened up and I jumped at the opportunity. Sometimes it can be hard because people still see you as the kid and not the adult, but it IS handy living in a small town and if a kid misbehaves I can say, "Oh, you want me to tell your mom/dad that when I see them at the track/grocery store/game later???"

Hi! I'll join in. We leave on Tuesday!

CONGRATS!!! Have a blast!!! Enjoy being a kid again!!!

Subbing as well, fellow June-y! It's awesome you're taking your parents to see the World along with you. If it's anything like when we brought my parents to stay on site for the first time then you'll love staying at a resort.

Im glad to hear that! I am kinda freaking out to make it PERFECT. Ive only been during March so Im a bit concerned about crowds. One of my coworkers goes EVERY year and I figure, if it was unbearable and you accomplished NOTHING, then he wouldnt go every year, right?

 

[Oodalally13]

Whew, well I made it through our awards banquet last night. Now just have to finish up End of Year tests, cleaning up classroom and graduation! Woohoo!

Today I decided I needed to wear my new Disney Park sneakers to make sure they were broken in. When I went in March I took my Sperrys, Converse and flip flops. I never wore the flip flops to the parks, but with the other shoes my feet were SCREAMING. I guess Im getting old

I saw advertisements that Skechers now had sneakers that had Memory Foam insoles so I picked up these

I've only had them on a couple hours but I can already tell they are AMAZING!!!!!!

The most important things I learned I needed at Disney were REALLY awesome walking shoes, a hat, and SUNSCREEN. I'm really fair skinned but never wore sunscreen because of a reaction I had to it as a child. I would get the occasional bad sunburn, but it was ok with aloe vera. Well, this trip I was at Blizzard Beach and actually IN the sun for maybe 30-45 minutes and I got cooked to a crisp. It was HORRIBLE. Well, as it turns on, medication I am now on makes me more sensitive to sun. Now I wont even go to a backyard BBQ without coating myself. I have this spray on kind that is more like putting on OFF, but it works well for me.

That's all for this update!! Not too Disney related but still important!

 

[chocolateMinnie]

Have a great trip and hope your Mum & Dad enjoy their trip as much as you do

 

[Oodalally13]

Just sharing some other prep stuff with you about our trip. In my research for our first RESORT stay, I saw people sometimes decorate their resort window. I decided to go all out with this and bought little doo-dads specific to each of us. They are below with our MBs!

Dad has a fireman Mickey, firetruck (Toys R Us) and I added Goofy, Donald & Minnie (Dollar Tree!). His should be self explanatory, he is a fireman.

Mom has Snow White & the 7 Dwarfs (anyone ever notice it isn’t dwarves??) Mom has told me she had several bdays where it was all Snow White. I think she even has the characters from the cake! Seems Dopey got tangled in the MB and Grumpy isn’t very pleased! Whoops and if you look really, really closely in a corner, you will see my Disney VHS box collection. Back in college my roomie told me that Half Price Books was THE place to help fulfill my dream of the ultimate Disney VHS big box collection.

Of course, I have the princesses. Aurora and Ariel were always my favorites. Ariel was actually the very first Disney movie I saw in a movie theater. Is it just me or does Cindy’s face look a LOT like Tink??? Maybe it is the hair.

The 2 books on the left Mom brought home one day and told me she got some books about Disney. I asked her, “Oh did you want to study up?” Her answer was that she thought they might be helpful to me. Uhhhh, I’ve been there 3 times, I kinda know what it is. 

The book on the right is one I bought before my last trip. My co-chaperone buddies and I are big Disney nerds and we liked playing the trivia games and scavenger hunts while we were waiting in line. There was another book I used to have that I need to buy again. I loaned it to one of my above mentioned buddies to read after our trip back in 2010. Well he had left it on the table, his oldest found it and started reading it and was engrossed with it. I told him that his son could have it. It was a really cool trivia type book. I remember learning from it that at Muppet 3-D where it says the box office is closed and key is under mat, if you pick up mat there IS a key there! I started screaming like I had found either a million dollars or a six foot scorpion!!!

That’s all I got for now.

Coming soon…..how to pack all your phenomenal cosmic powers into an itty bitty driving space….

 

[Oodalally13]

If anyone can tell me how to make a table of contents link, I would gladly throw that in the first post so it makes reading easier!!!!

 

[tinkerbell615]

Love your window decorations! We like to decorate our windows too. I absolutely love the Birnbaum Guides. We get one each year we go. This year I bought the kids version for my DGS. In 2012 my DD bought me one for Christmas and we weren't even going in 2013. She just knows how much I love them!

 

[thetorit]

I love the Birnbaum guides! My 2013 trip was so easily planned after reading that!
Cute window decor! DD has the princesses and gets a kick out of putting them in each others dresses and watching me get OCD about it!

 

[Oodalally13]

I love the Birnbaum guides! My 2013 trip was so easily planned after reading that!
Cute window decor! DD has the princesses and gets a kick out of putting them in each others dresses and watching me get OCD about it!

I found those at Family Dollar stores and the first thing I did was re-arrange their dresses and it looked SOOOO weird. I thought I broke the first dress of the first one I opened because I thought that came apart in the middle, so I pulled it apart. THEN I realized that they open and close like a laundry clothespin!!!

Can you say blonde moment? HAHAHAHA

 

[Quasialamodo]

How was the orange clover honey on the pancakes? I'm not sure chocolate chips would work, but how about blueberries?

 

[thetorit]

I found those at Family Dollar stores and the first thing I did was re-arrange their dresses and it looked SOOOO weird. I thought I broke the first dress of the first one I opened because I thought that came apart in the middle, so I pulled it apart. THEN I realized that they open and close like a laundry clothespin!!!

Can you say blonde moment? HAHAHAHA

I did the same thing! And DDs had clear plastic bands holding the dresses closed so I was really struggling until I noticed them. I felt ridiculous!

 

[Oodalally13]

How was the orange clover honey on the pancakes? I'm not sure chocolate chips would work, but how about blueberries?

The honey on the pancakes was sooooo good. I've added chocolate chips to waffles before. I actually use my same pancake mix as my waffle mix. There was a recipe in one of my books that suggested adding cooked bacon and shredded cheese to waffle mix and I tried that too. It was different, but good. I just prefer my pancakes to be a sweet meal and not savory. I haven't tried blueberries but always wanted to. Summer is when I go through Pinterest and cookbooks and try new things. Last night I made a baked frito pie casserole thing. It was NOT healthy at all but SOOOOO delicious!!

How are wedding plans coming along?

 

[Quasialamodo]

The honey on the pancakes was sooooo good. I've added chocolate chips to waffles before. I actually use my same pancake mix as my waffle mix. There was a recipe in one of my books that suggested adding cooked bacon and shredded cheese to waffle mix and I tried that too. It was different, but good. I just prefer my pancakes to be a sweet meal and not savory. I haven't tried blueberries but always wanted to. Summer is when I go through Pinterest and cookbooks and try new things. Last night I made a baked frito pie casserole thing. It was NOT healthy at all but SOOOOO delicious!!

How are wedding plans coming along?

One tip for even distribution of anything in the pancake is that you shouldn't mix it in the batter, just sprinkle it in while the first side is cooking and then it'll lock in when you flip it. Kind of amazing to do. I can never taste the bacon when I add bacon to my pancakes, so I just put it on the side. Bacon's too expensive not to taste.

Speaking of bacon, I have bacon rice krispie treats from last night to eat.

Wedding plans are fine. We're trying to get engagement photos done so I have them to act as links on the wedding website. Still have a year and six months to go, so not much to do. Some music stuff I could possibly do for the wedding favors, but the budget is kinda all planned out, won't even do my second run-through of the guest list until September when I will hopefully have engagement proofs.

 

[Oodalally13]

Our countdown is almost in the teens. I am actually sooo nervous! I want my parents to enjoy Disney and I am getting all worked up.

Questions running through my head....
--Will there be storm in the Gulf causing problems?
--Will the weather cooperate?
--Will it be as hot there (or hotter) than it gets here?
--Will our room be nice (or at least decent)?
--Will all the luggage fit in the car?
--Will our MBs work?
--Will we have to wait extensively for our ADRs at the TS places?
--Will the TS places we picked be any good?
--Will we be in lines soooo long that my parents will HATE this trip?

I know I should be calm because this is VACATION, but Im just worked up and stressed.