"Oh no! My shoe is floating away!" AKA our 25th anniversary trip

Bama Mom

Disney Dreamer
Joined
Dec 13, 2017
Hello all of my fellow Disney lovers. I had every intentions of starting this trip report already, however carpal tunnel surgery has set me back a bit more than I had hoped (plus due to plumbing issues, my MIL has been staying with use for 2 weeks now and she keeps me busy when she is here). I am finally getting some relief on most days and am able to type two handed so its time to get this party started!

First off introductions and a bit of general info.

This trip was a 25th wedding anniversary trip for hubby and I. We honeymooned at DW back in 1994. When picking a resort to stay at I was going to pick a value resort to save money, then changed my mind to POFQ. However I have wanted stay at Wilderness Lodge for a long time (and oddly enough, it opened on our actual wedding day - May 28th, 1994) so hubby said "book it!" He didn't have to tell me twice.
This trip was originally booked for September and would double as an anniversary trip and a birthday trip since we would be there on my birthday on the 17th (we would be leaving this Saturday) but because of conflicts with hubby's work, we had to change it to August. The final dates ended up being August 3rd-10th.

So, who are we?
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I'm Sandy. A WAHM wife and mom. I own my own business doing vinyl work and personalized signs. I also make greeting cards.
Hubby's name is Lin and he is over the welding department at the local community college. He is also the main instructor there. We also own a welding and fab business that keeps us all busy. Lin builds the handrails, etc and the family helps install them. While this trip is just hubby and I, I may mention our kids some so want to gtell you about them as well. We have three kiddos. They are all older now. Our oldest, Zach, got married in January and so now we have a lovely daughter-in-love (Victoria) as well. She has always been a part of our family, but it became official in January. Our middle child is our daughter. She is getting married November 1st so we will also be gaining a son-in-love (Riley). I'm not sure we could have handpicked a better match for Becca. They are so alike in some ways, yet so different in so many other ways.Funny fact...we call Becca Bec Bec because when Blake was little he started calling her that. When she gets married her last name will be Beckman so she will be Bec Bec Beckman. Our "baby" is Blake. He just graduated high school in May but you would never know he is the baby because he is 6'4" and pushing 300 lbs. It's funny to see him and I next to each other because I am only 5'1".

I am going to try to get a few pictures resized so I can type up the day before we head to Disney in a bit, but we have family night with all the kiddos coming to eat supper so I ma not get it posted today.
Then soon enough you'll hear about the event that brought on the trip report title.
 
Nashville Bound...The day before Disney day:

We had decided we would go ahead and drive to Nashville the night before our flight. We live about an hour and 45 minutes from Nashville so staying the night before would allow us to sleep in a little bit longer the morning of our flight.

Lin works half days on Fridays so he was able to be home by 12:30.
By the time he got home I was completely packed and ready to go.
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Our plan was to wait until our daughter got home from work to leave. She usually gets home around 4:00 so that worked out well. After she got home we told her and our youngest bye, and left all our flight info and emergency contact numbers on the frig. It may be a bit nervous because our oldest son and DIL were also going to be out of town as was my MIL and SIL those are the first people that would be called in an emergency. Thankfully my sister and BIL were not going to be out of town so that eased my mind some.

Hubby had forgotten to stop by the pharmacy to pick up some meds he needed so when we left the house around 4:30 we had to make that pit stop as well as filling the car up. By the time we actually headed to Nashville it was 5:00 on the nose.
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I would screen shot my phone to keep track of times, but a side note about my wallpaper on my screen. The flower is a close up of our Azaleas and the writing is my mom's handwriting from a card she gave me before she passed away. I lost her when I was 14. I found a card she has written in a used my computer program to scan and trace it so now I have it as my screen saver. I normally would have the only picture I have of her and I when I was little, but I changed phones and that picture didn't transfer over and I haven't taken the time to re add it to my phone yet. Anyway, back to Disney...or in this case, Nashville.

So surprisingly we had no issues getting to Nashville. Even though it was almost 7:00 on a Friday night. First stop was so supper.
This is the pace we went...not sure I can post the name without it being edited:
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Its a chicken and fish place. I got the chicken fingers:
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And hubby got fish and chicken:
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It was okay. I'm a wimp so I don't like anything spicy (not even pepper) and it had too much pepper for me but I still ate enough to get full.

We had one more stop before heading to the hotel for the night...
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Hubby and I both love The Dukes of Hazards and as much as we are in Nashville, we had never went to Cooters to see the museum. Since it was less than a mile from the restaurant, we decided to stop.

The Halloween costumes brought back a lot of childhood memories.
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Growing up, my sisters and I had three costumes we had to rotate each Halloween. They all had the plastic mask like this and a plastic outfit. One was Casper, one was a witch and I am drawing a blank on the third. I'm sure my sisters remember though so I'll have to ask. They were so hard to breathe in and the plastic edges were so uncomfortable.

After spending a little time there we headed to the hotel for the night. We wanted to get to bed early since we had an ealry morning. Even though the hotel was close to the airport but we had to be ready to get on the 5:00am shuttle. We would be at the airport early but I was worried waiting for the next one would put us cutting it too close since the airport would get busier by then.

Just one more picture to post before finishing this update. It's the room for the night.
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It was a decent room and we had a king size bed. Ignore the messed up covers, I had already checked for bedbugs. The hotel we stayed at was the Four Points by Sheraton. We got a great deal and that included parking our car there for the week we were gone.
That pretty much ends this day. We went to bed around 9:30 because I had the alarm set for 3:50 the next morning.
 
Joining in.

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Love that Mickey and Minnie bag!
 


Hi there!

I love your Serendipity purse! (I may or may not have a few) Dorinne does such FABULOUS work (ART really!)!

And second, do you ever visit the Disney Outlet at Opry Mills when you are in Nashville? If so you need to stop in and say hello if I am there.

I live right around the corner from that restaurant (have only walked in there once, looked at the menu and left...at that time the only options were fried things and I was not feeling it).

I can't wait to read more!

Lynn
 
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Joining in! I remember those horrific plastic costumes lol so uncomfortable! I did have a Laura Ingalls one once that I loved though :)
 
I forgot I was writing this TR! So sorry. I have been in wedding mode. DD's wedding is in 30 days!

And second, do you ever visit the Disney Outlet at Opry Mills when you are in Nashville? If so you need to stop in and say hello if I am there.
I do! I'll have to stop in and say hi next time I'm there.

Joining in! Sounds like a great start to your trip!
Thanks for joining in!

Joining in! I remember those horrific plastic costumes lol so uncomfortable! I did have a Laura Ingalls one once that I loved though :)
Welcome! Thanks for joining in.

Following along. Looking forward to reading more
Thanks for joining. I am about to type up the next installment...Getting to Disney.
 
Travel day 2: Getting to Disney!

We left off getting in bed early because we had a 7:40 flight this morning. Even though we were close to the airport, we were catching a shuttle there which meant we had to be up and ready by 5:00am. I knew we would be at the airport super early, but because the shuttle is shared with another hotel the next one would be around 6:00 and I didn't want to risk security being extra busy an hour later. Because of that I had my alarm set for 3:50am so I could get up and get showered then I would wake hubby up once I was out so he could shower. I ended up waking up about 10 minutes before my alarm went off so I went ahead and got up. It was Disney day after all!

After I showered I packed up the dirty clothes from the day and took our overnight bag back to the car and locked it up while hubby finished getting ready. Hubby and I were both ready a little before 5:00 so we went on out to the waiting area and chatted with the night clerk. The shuttle pretty much left right on time with hubby and myself, another guy and a family of three.

We arrived at the airport around 5:15. there was a small line at curbside check in for Southwest but it moved quickly.
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We quickly made our way to security and of course I pick the slowest line. But it still wasn't bad. We both set off the scanner so had to be patted down. This unfortunately was a sign of what was coming the whole week.

By 5:15, we were already through security and seeing a non busy airport. Of course by the time we boarded 2 hours later, it was bustling.

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After finding our gate we decided to head for some breakfast. Someone had recommended a small cafe in the airport but I couldn't remember what the name was. So hubby and I walked the entire concourse seeing what was available. Unfortunately we just got a breakfast sandwich from Burger King. It was nasty! But that's okay... We are on our way to DISNEY!
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Obviously I'm a little more excited than DH!

After breakfast we went back to the gate (I think it was around 6:15 at this point) and waited....and waited some more...and waited even longer. Thankfully they had Scooby Doo on the TV.

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I took this picture to send to the kiddos. We are Scooby Doo fans at our house. When my youngest was little he had a stuffed Scooby Doo that his older brother handed down to him. He would take that Scooby every where. One time we left it at my sisters house (who lives 2 1/2 hours away) and he was devastated. Hardest time of his life until he got it back. Also a couple years ago my DD and some friends dressed up as the Scooby gang. She was Velma. Here is a bonus picture of her dressed up.
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Back to the report...
When we got to the gate, I asked the lady at the desk if the flight was full. She told me there were actually 30 empty seats. WOOHOO! That meant there was a good chance no one would sit on the row with us. Lin likes the aisle seat and I like the window seat so I was worried one of us would have to be in the middle seat or let a stranger sit between up.
We were suppose to board at 7:10. We had A-31 and A-32. there was only one person in the A-1 through A-15 so I was really the 17th person to board. We sat in 11A and 11C. Hubby picked the row because it was in front of the wing. The engine was a bit load during take off but it didn't bother me at all.

While we were waiting on the plane, we chatted with the family across the aisle. They were from Jersey and going to Disney too. It was a young couple with a little boy. It was their son's first Disney trip. They were staying off site in a family member's time share though. The little boy was so excited to be on a plane. It made me miss my kids being little. We actually took off a couple minutes early. Once we were in the air I started watching the new Dumbo. Lin decided to watch Shazam. Because the flight was so short, I only got to watch the first hour of Dumbo. We ended up landing about 15 minutes early. In the RAIN!!!! Blah. But that's okay. We were almost to Disney.

We stopped and put on our magicbands
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then took the fake-o-rail from the terminal and headed down to MCO. That's when things came to a screeching halt!
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The line for all the resorts were so long. It seemed like we waited forever but in reality it was just about 11 minutes.
Soon we were boarding our ME bus (really a Disney Cruise line bus) to our home for the week. Wilderness Lodge, here we come.
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I'll stop here for now because I'm at my picture limit but will be back sooner than I was this time with the next installment.
 
Well I guess I lied. I wasn't back sooner than I was for the last update. I forgot I had this TR going ...YIKES!
A lot has happened since I last posted. Our daughter got married and we were finally able to share the news that we are going to be having our first grand baby in April. Our oldest son and his wife are expecting! YAY!

Hopefully now that I'm finished with all the Christmas orders I can actually make it back here and update again.
 
Whoops, I completely forgot I was writing this. I am working on a new post. No sure anyone is interested but since I have started planning a girls trip for 2021 I think it will be fun for me to relive this trip (even though it happened in August of last year).
 
As a quick refresher, this trip was a 25th anniversary trip for my husband and I. It was at the beginning of August 2019. It was just the two of us on this trip.
When I left off in the previous post, we were loaded on ME and headed to The Wilderness Lodge. It wasn't too long before our driver was informing us we would be passing under this glorious sign...
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Not the best photo but we were in the second seats so I snapped this between the two front ones.

And shortly after we were arriving at Wilderness Lodge.
I didn't do online check in and so we needed to go to the desk. There was no real reason I didn't do online check in other than we weren't in any hurry and I knew we would be dropping our carry-on bags at the desk anyways.
I did make a room request. I basically requested 6th floor and actually requested a specific room number. Our room wasn't ready so I had no clue if it was granted at that point.

We were pretty hungry by now. So we grabbed our anniversary buttons and headed to Roaring forks for some lunch.

Hubby got the flat bread and I got the bison burger. Here the thing about my eating habits...I am not a huge red meat eater in general. No other reason except I just don't care much for it. I also basically eat like a 5 year old. give me chicken fingers and fries and I'm good. I ordered the burger knowing I would only eat half (if that much) but hubby usually eats the rest of my meat.
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We also bought the refillable mugs just because I knew we would use them a lot since we had planned quite a bit of down time. Honestly we got our moneys worth this first day because after lunch our (and by our, I me my) plan was to go check out a few other resorts. I wanted to look around The Poly, The Grand Floridian and AK Lodge. So after lunch we headed to the boat dock.

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Even though it was hot, it was a beautiful day to start vacation now that the rain had stopped.

We were headed for the Contemporary so we could do the monorail loop to the Poly.
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Our first monorail ride of the trip...but man it was a doozy getting there with the remodeling going on at the Contemporary.

I will make a side note, I had my disney crossbody with me and I really wish I hadn't. We went through so many bag checks because of the resorts we visited. Thankfully only one or two took a few extra minutes, but this is why I would go bagless for most of the park days.

I honestly had no desire to stay at the Poly but really wanted to check it out. Now, I would LOVE to stay here.
In fact, I bought the wax melts that smells like The Poly.

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I really love this picture. I would love to have that view everyday.
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We didn't linger too long before we went and hoped back on the monorail and headed for The Grand Floridian.

(continued in next post)
 
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Soon we were back on the monorail for a short ride to the Grand Floridian.

When we walked in, we ran right into a wedding photo shoot.
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Okay, so this has seriously been one of my top dream resorts. Yes, it stemmed from Full House when Jesse sang to Aunt Becky. In reality this resort is gorgeous!
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After I picked my jaw off the ground, I wanted to stop by Basin. Our daughter was getting married in November so I wanted to pick up something for her to put into their gift bags she was making them. I picked them all out a shower bomb thing and we were on our way.

We once again hoped onto the monorail and ended up here:
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We unfortunately weren't staying. We passed right by and walked to the bus stop for AK Lodge. Forty five minutes later...yes you read that right..45... we pulled into AKL.

Another dream resort.
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we headed outside to see if any animals were out. It had warmed up so I didn't have huge expectations but I was wrong. The animals were out in full force.
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I had finally gotten the room ready text around 3:00 so we were ready to get back and rest up a bit before supper. So after looking around a bit more we decided to catch the first park bus that came then transfer to the WL bus there. AK was the first one so we hopped on. by the time we transferred buses and got back, it was just a little after 4:00. While hubby grabbed the stuff we left with Guest services, I went to the Mercantile and bought distilled water for his C-PAP.

We were ready to freshen up so we were ready to head to the room...room 6015 the exact room I requested.YAY!

Continued in next post...
 
So, the reason I requested room 6015 was just because I had seen the view from there in pictures and I thought it was great. We could see the water and the pool area. It wasn't too far from the elevators by Roaring Forks so it was convenient when I did laundry or we wanted to fill our mugs. It was also convenient to the boat docks when we used the "back" doors.

We were surprised to see our luggage already there when we walked in. It was nice knowing everything actually made it.

I took a few pictures of the room before we made too big of a mess:
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Even though this was an anniversary trip we laugh about the fact we had two beds. They came in hand later in the week when hubby wasn't feeling to great and fell asleep in the middle of one. I was still able to have a bed to sleep in without sleeping on the very edge.LOL

This was our view looking straight off the balcony:
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After resting a little bit we got up and freshened up. We had a supper ADR to get to.

We didn't have to go too far because we were having supper at one of hubby's favorites:
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We actually checked in a bit early so while hubby checked us in, I snapped a few photos.

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I didn't get many photos taken though because 2 minutes later we received the table ready text.

Continued in next post....
 
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I was still full from lunch so I just ordered Mac and cheese.
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Hubby order the skillet...

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Our waitress had it noted it was our anniversary so she brought us a cupcake. She also offered a champagne toast but hubby and I don't drink so we kindly turned that down. No sense in wasting something we wouldn't drink.

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After supper we looked around in the Mercantile waiting on the caricature artist to show up. We found this soap so I had to take this picture for my sisters. the reason why is a whole other story that I won't bore you guys with.

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after we looked around we checked and the artist was just arriving. We were the first customer of the night.
The reason I wanted to do this was because we had one done at Sea World before we were married. I thought it was on our honeymoon but hubby corrected me saying it was our first trip before we were married. IMG_1219 (2).JPG

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I want to frame this one ad the old one and hang them in my work studio.
by the time we were done, the artist had a line of people hanging out waiting to get their pictures done.

Once we were finished, we headed outside to look around at night then headed up to the room. It had been a long day and we were tired. I also wanted to see some of the Electrical Water parade and I wanted to see how well we could see it from our balcony.

The pool wasn't quit as busy now, but still several people swimming this late.

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From our balcony we could see the parade between the trees but this is the best picture I could get. The rest are blurry. this one isn't too great because as I snapped the "float" moved behind the tree.
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After watching the parade we headed to bed. Tomorrow was our first park day!!!
 
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