WDW Throw the budget out the window- March 2020

ninjamicmic

Earning My Ears
Joined
Apr 30, 2013
This trip has been a long time coming. It all started with a food adventure to Chipotle almost two years ago. My best friend Chara and I were joking about what I wanted for an upcoming birthday. I, of course, said that I wanted to go to Disney. My birthday being only a couple weeks away and financial troubles in both of our courts made that impossible. What I wasn’t expecting was for her to say completely casually, “Yeah we could do that, it would need to be next year though.”

And pandora’s box was opened. The rest of the afternoon was scheming, Disney videos, and way way too many snacks.


So, for those just like the quick overview, here it is. Any insights and thoughts would be very welcome. For those of you that like the pictures and details, links galore will follow.​


Who

  • Myself- Mickey! Yes, that’s right folks, I’m named after the big cheese himself! And my parents wonder why I’m so Disney obsessed…

  • The hubby- Curtis. Despite his crippling fear of flying, he supports my Disney adventures and will pretend to listen as I go on and on and on about all the changes and happenings with the world.

  • My best friend- Charalane, really just known as Chara because who has time to type that out fully every time. This will be her first time in Disneyworld as an adult.


What

  • I think we're up to twelve days now. Two days for travel, and 1 day for Universal


When

  • Tricky Tricky, I haven’t decided on an exact date yet. No crowd calendars have been released yet and Galaxy’s edge is going to make any predictability go out the window. Originally, we were thinking end of January, now I’m pretty sure it’ll be toward the end of February to hopefully give us a bit more of a buffer from the new land opening.


Where

  • Currently the plan is a preferred room at pop century and halfway through switch to Port Orleans French Quarter. It's a nice balance between cost and hopefully after being together 24/7 the French Quarter room will give us a little bit of extra space. Also, I just really want to stay there.
Who We Are

Plans so Far

Disney Crafts

Updates-Daily Plans
 
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So, I guess now its time to introduce the players in the game. Like I mentioned before, there’s me. I’ve loved Disney all my life but my family were never vacation people so as soon as I got out on my own, of course I started to plan a trip… until I saw those prices. Holy cow! I put it on the backburner and eventually when life slowed down and money went up, I planned a trip for Curtis and I in 2015. Don’t worry, Chara was there to. I fondly remember her holding my hand as I panicked from excitement and the fact that I was spending a small fortune as I spoke to the very nice cast member on the phone to book the trip. She had the job of squeezing my hand when my voice went to screechy. Good Job Chara!

Favorite Park: Epcot

Favorite Ride: Peter Pans Flight
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There’s the hubby Curtis. Now Curtis has a terrible time on airplanes. He gets claustrophobia, he despises heights, has the bad luck of always managing to get the flights that has turbulence and doesn’t do any kind of rollercoasters what so ever. But he knew Disney was going to be a major part of my life before he put that ring on my finger so he’s usually a good sport about it. As long as he only has to get on a plane once a year maximum. Although he doesn’t like to ride any coasters, he absolutely adored the cards at magic kingdom

Favorite Park: Magic Kingdom

Favorite Ride: Sorceress of the magic kingdom

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AWWWW isn't he adorable? Here's another.
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Charalane or better known as Care Bear/ Chara is the best friend, cosplay partner in crime, and general sense of reason. She’s letting me have complete control over this trip and is just happy hand over the money when I tell her to. She’s technically been to Disney before but that was when she was a child and doesn’t remember much. She’s down for anything and mostly there for the food. Like seriously, we added an extra 500.00 to her food budget and wouldn’t be surprised if she used it all.

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Fair warning, I'm very new to posting so bear with me as i figure out all the tips, tricks, and how tos.
 
Alright, so now to the real reason your reading this…The plans so far.


Originally this trip was only supposed to be over a weekend. Then Chara and I looked at airline prices and laughed ourselves silly instantly changing our minds to seven days. Soon after Chara found out about Universal and Harry Potter so she asked if we could add in a day for that.

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Now that we we’re up to eight and everyone was happy, I mentioned that we should probably build in rest days and if we didn’t want that to cut into our park time then we might want to add a couple extra days. So now we’re at 10. That was the agreed upon number. It stayed there for months until a fateful day when Chara was talking about our trip to someone else and asked how long it was and I had mumbled 10 PARK days…see that distinction, Its very important. I managed to get them to not count our travel days as part of the vacation, therefore bumping it up again by two. And why yes, I do embrace the evil genius side of me because no one blinked an eye and it still hasn’t been disputed to this day.

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Logical next step now that we knew how long we were going for but when were we going to go? We could try for 2019 but I knew that being able to see Galaxy’s Edge was gonna blow Chara’s mind, especially since she was the only Star Wars fan in the group. And that has the added bonus of having someone who can explain what I’m looking at and why I should be excited when I see it when we get to the land, so 2020 it is. That also gave us a lot more time to save up which was crucial. Remember my husband who hates flying? Well he also hates crowds, loudness, bright sun, and being outside in general. Yeah…

But that’s ok! Why? Because it gives me the excuse to float the idea of dessert parties and special events to the others. Both of them were excited for them and that’s how this trip report title came to be because currently we are planning on

Star Wars dessert party

Happily Ever After dessert Party

Rivers of light dining package

Early Morning Magic at Hollywood Studios

After Hours for Magic Kingdom

And basically, any other special event/ less crowded thing we can work into our plans. I know that there is a good if not great chance that these will change or not even be there at all by 2020 but a girl can dream right? Originally, we were going to do our dates at the end of January because in my naivety I thought Late fall would totally mean in September but after listening to many podcast and blogs it sounds like the date will probably be in December. Its not for certain but it’s a lot of people’s best guess. Since I really didn’t want to be in the parks possibly less than a month after it opened, we thought about other months. March (super busy on normal years) April (same) May (great weather, sometimes mild crowds) but ultimately settled on February because I really don’t want to wait (We started planning over 600 days out…I really don’t want to add more to that) and were gonna have to deal with crowds no matter what. Might as well add some mild weather into that.

Alright, were off to a great start. We know how many days were going, we know a general estimate of when were going now where to stay? This one was the easy one. I’d already stayed at Pop Century in 2015 and LOVED it. Although I did have a list and goal of eventually staying at all the resorts, I knew that this would be a safe choice for all involved. But then I waffled because during all of the research the rooms at the French Quarter were gorgeous and the resort has beignets! Also, a hot tub which could come in handy for sore muscles. Since staying the entire vacation at FQ would push our already enormous budget higher I figured a nice compromise would be adding a split stay to an already crazy packed vacay. The only hiccup I’ve found in this is that neither of these rooms have a microwave and our plan for breakfast is going to be the leftovers from the night before.

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So, for the fun updates so far, until I can start booking things, I keep myself busy by planning my Disney bounds/outfits, crafts, and other fun planning things. So far, I've managed to come up with a planning board. It has a budget goal for all the necessities like hotel, transportation, tickets, etc. I have a fun planning reminder that I can put all my important dates on like what exact day is 180, 90,60, and 30 days out. I have a calendar so when its closer I can literally write what park were going to be in on what day. There’s a shadowbox that I keep all my gift cards/ monetary savings in. I have a resort checklist so I can slowly mark off all the different resorts I stay in and a clear folder with laminated sheets that can keep track of fast passes,dining reservation, flight and hotel information. Also, the all-important countdown (were down to the 300's! when I started this board many moons ago it was in the 700)

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When I started to plan Disney outfits I of course went on Etsy and started to favorite things and put items in my cart. After a short two hours later I went to check out and almost died. I had managed to put over 300.00 of stuff in the cart. Obviously, that wasn't going to work so I started researching how to make my own Disney shirts and crafts and was introduced to the world of Cricut, yes, I know, I’m very late to the game. After showing the hubby the price of a Cricut and the cost of stuff for just me, he agreed (after 2 months of badgering, begging, complaining) and my newest crafts were born. It took a weekend to figure out but by the end I had these beauties and much more knowledge/ideas of things to make going forward.

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So, I have two major goals that I want to accomplish in time for Disney. The first, I want to grow my hair longer (ugh, curly hair). The second is that I want to lose weight. I had a really realistic nightmare that I had gone to Disney and no matter what ride I chose to try and ride I was always turned away from it because I was too heavy. Now most of you would know that in reality, that’s a bit ridiculous. Disney does a wonderful job of taking size and accessibility into account when they make rides but the illogical side of my brain won out. It was the kick in the pants I needed. To give me some inspiration and to remind me why I was suddenly doing cardio when the only time I ran before was to a taco stand, I decided to make some Disney inspired gym shirts.

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You and your husband are so cute! ♡ it sounds like your planning is going great. Can't wait to follow along!
 
Well its been a while, and in that time, we have dates, and plans, and extra events! It’s a miracle!!

So, we nailed down some dates, we are officially going to WDW from March 4-17. Yes yes, our trip did manage to get longer…again. We decided on a split stay, the first 6 nights at Pop century and the other 8 at Port Orleans French Quarter. And in keeping with the split stay theme, well split our park days between two different parks each day. Here are some of the plans and highlights for our dates, buckle in because it is WORDY. We’ve decided on afternoon breaks between parks and taking a lyft to and from them to help save on time.

March 4: Fly out of SLC at 10:55 and land at MCO around 5:05 am. Originally, we were supposed to fly out closer to 5pm but Delta ended up cancelling that flight and automatically putting us on a red eye. I’ve never flown Delta before so I’m a bit nervous about it. If any of you have flown the airline before please feel free to let me know how it was.

March 5: Take Magical Express from MCO to Pop Century. Check in at the counter to make sure that everyone’s cards are connected to their magic bands and leave our luggage with bell services and promptly head to HS. As soon as they start letting people past security, we’ll stop by guest services and upgrade Chara and I’s park tickets to annual passes because we’re taking a girl’s trip two months later in May. After that we’ll head to Galaxy’s Edge and kill some time between our reservations at the Droid Depot and Savi’s Workshop. After Savi’s, well head into Toy Story Land and get some lunch. Hopefully our room will be ready and we can take a quick nap, if not we’ll just head to Epcot and start checking out Japan-Canada. We’ll finish the night by riding living with the land, eating at Garden Grill and hopefully get in line for Soarin before the park closes.

March 6: Early morning start to get to Epcot Future World (at least until the construction is finished) with lunch at sunshine seasons. We’ll head back to the hotel for a couple hours for a break and then hit Sci-fi Diner for Dinner and see what we can get done in Toy Story until the park closes.

March 7: This one is a tossup, if we need to sleep in then well just hit World showcase around 11 and if we don’t and are still running on that Disney adrenaline well get up early for Frozen ever after and Meet and greet before snacking at Les Halle until the rest of the showcase opens up. In the evening We’ll have dinner at Yak and Yeti (purely for the firecracker shrimp and wontons) and then we’ll explore Dinoland and the Asia section minus the raft ride because I HATE being wet.

March 8: This is a rest day. Chara and I will start out with getting massages at Saratoga springs while Curtis gets to sleep in and we’ll meet up at Homecomin in Disney Springs for brunch. After we’ll do some window shopping, possible the character balloon or the void until we Minnie Van to Hoop Dee Due that night.

March 9: Early morning for MK. Well window shop and eat our way through Main street and Liberty Square. We’ll play Sorcerers of the Magic kingdom and ride random rides. We have a dinner reservation at The Wave and the Happily Ever After Fireworks Dessert Party Garden View later that night.

March 10: This is our resort switch day, so well drop our bags off at bell services to have them transferred and spend the day at Universal Studios.

March 11: This is a sleep in day…sorta. We have breakfast at Trattoria Al Forno and then a late lunch at Be our Guest. We’ll kill some time in Tomorrowland. Later that night we’ll explore the Flower and Garden booths and eat around the world.

March 12: AM in AK. We’ll do Kilimanjaro safaris, the animal trails, and the lion king show. We’ll eat lunch at satulli canteen and leave the park early for a long nap because that night we have dinner at Tusker House and AK After Hours.

March 13: This morning Chara and I will hit HS thrills like Tower of terror and rocking roller coast which Curtis will avoid like the plague so he’ll sleep in and meet up with us later. Once we’ve done those well head over to wait in line for Trader Sam’s before our Ohana dinner and early bedtime.

March 14: Rope dropping Adventureland with lunch at Crystal Palace. After the afternoon break, we’ll take the boat to Disney springs, explore some more and have dinner at Morimoto Asia where we’ll put our gift cards for declining Mouse keeping to good use. If were not in a food coma after, well do the character balloon or the void, whichever we hadn’t gotten around to doing yet.

March 15: I’m super excited for this day because we have tickets to Early Morning Magic. Of course, I’m excited to have a mostly empty land and riding a LOT of rides but I’m mostly excited to experience it without being hit multiple times in the ankles by strollers. To be absolutely fair, the last time I went to fantasyland was leading up to the fireworks so it was dark and people were in a rush to get out and get a spot but after spending a couple hours there I said no more and we never went back. It was literally the only part of our last trip that wasn’t magical so this is my chance to fall in love with it.
We’ll have lunch at Casey’s Corner and after our break go and explore the world showcase some more with dinner at Via Napoli.

March 16: We’ll sleep in a bit and then repeat our favorites at AK and have lunch at flame tree BBQ, after we have a dinner reservation at Cape May Café and a late-night reservation for Oga’s Cantina. A nice relaxing day which by that time we will desperately need.

March 17: Since this is our departure day I have scheduled our traditional character breakfast with Lilo and Stith at the Polynesian. We’ll spend a bit of time in Disney Springs and maybe do Chicken Guy before heading back to the hotel to be picked up for tragical express. It’s sad, but not as devastating as normal because Chara and I will be back in a couple months for a girl’s trip.
 



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