She's Going Back to Back: A September 2019 and February 2020 PTR

We are one month from the start of our trip!

I think this means it's time to get out luggage!

We've been finishing up details for the trip, and I placed our Garden Grocer order this week. We decided to still use them for water and some food, primarily for making breakfast in the villa (and donuts for the days we don't want to cook).

We are planning on doing some breakfast in the room, we really enjoyed that last year and with the full kitchen we might as well take advantage.

Breakfasts work well for us since we're all at the room anyway, and the cooking is relatively simple. Also we don't miss out on any of our ADRs that we are looking forward to sooo much.

While we were having dinner last night we were going around the table talking about things we were really looking forward to during the trip.

Allie mentioned out of nowhere that she really wants to ride 7DMT at night. This was a surprise, since we only have a Fastpass for it during the day and didn’t even have a night at MK firmly planned.

So after dinner we figured out that since our flight is earlier this year we should have time on our arrival night to play a little at MK.

It is nice to have APs. We’ll still do dinner at Roaring Fork, then head over for a couple of rides before the park closes. We got a Fastpass for Pirates while we were at it, since it is a favorite for everyone.

Hopefully checkin goes smoothly and our reservation doesnt get deleted like it did last year.

Yeah, we are gonna be tired after a super early morning, but it’ll be fun to start with a boat ride to MK and a couple of rides.

I guess we should also post an update on the beloved Mickey Crocs from last year...

Oh yeah, as a public service announcement to anyone considering putting them in the dish washer...

Just don't.... No matter how bad they stink.

Yeah, we got tired of the smell and threw them in, and yes, they came out smelling nice and clean, but were quite a bit smaller.

In my defense it wasn't the first time they'd gone through the dishwasher but unfortunately it only took once.

I thought they might stretch back out, but it wasn’t even close.

No, they kinda changed shape too.
So anyway we were in crisis mode because they are STILL the favorite shoes.

Fortunately you can get almost anything on Amazon, and we were able to convince Marshall that a blue pair would be ok until we get to Disney Word to look for another black light up pair.


So yeah, we've added a pair of Crocs to our must buy on the first night list.

Fortunately we will be right there in MK.

fingers crossed they have them

If not we’ll be the family with the barefoot three year old who will be carrying Amazon Crocs because they are the wrong color...


Wave and say hi if you see us :)
 
So now you make Allie happy with a nighttime trip to MK and Marshal happy with new Crocs. Now we just have to hope that the airline cooperates. :)
 
For new places, we really want to try Homecomin at Disney Springs. This sounds to be our type of restaurant, and the reviews are great.

I'm really excited to try Homecoming, We've heard great things from lots of people
YUM!!! We are going this trip and I can't wait!

the nice thing about planning more than one trip at the same time, you can shift restaurants around and if it doesn't fit in one trip, it might fit in another!

I really feel like Via Napoli deserves a second chance. It didn't really get a fair shot the first time we went there.
I have a love hate relationship with Via Napoli. I always want to love it, but it kind of falls flat for me sometimes. The last time I got a peperoni and priscutto pizza, and it was AMAZING!!!! but the service was terrible that night.

Tonight we are watching the DisneyParksLive stream of the MSEP from Disneyland!
I miss having a night time parade to see... I wish they put something back in. Maybe one day.

We've been finishing up details for the trip, and I placed our Garden Grocer order this week. We decided to still use them for water and some food, primarily for making breakfast in the villa (and donuts for the days we don't want to cook).
I have stuck with GG. It is just easy... I know there are cheaper options now but they have always been good, and good customer service. We will have a car for the 1st day of our trip, so I think we will just do a quick shopping ourselves this time!
 


So now you make Allie happy with a nighttime trip to MK and Marshal happy with new Crocs. Now we just have to hope that the airline cooperates. :)
Yes, we will see when we actually arrive... At least this tiem we will all be on one flight, so that we'll all be together whatever happens. Last year we were on seperate flights and had to wait a bit for Jon and Brandy.

YUM!!! We are going this trip and I can't wait!
We have just heard nothing but good things about it. Apparently it is getting very popular, it was hard to find a time at 180 days, but we got it...

the nice thing about planning more than one trip at the same time, you can shift restaurants around and if it doesn't fit in one trip, it might fit in another!
Yes, but you have to remember which trip you fit it in to... It is astill a great problem to have.

I have a love hate relationship with Via Napoli. I always want to love it, but it kind of falls flat for me sometimes. The last time I got a peperoni and priscutto pizza, and it was AMAZING!!!! but the service was terrible that night.
Yeah, we didn't love the whole experience when we first tried it, but we didn't know what to expect. The pizza was great, so we figure it is worth trying again.

I miss having a night time parade to see... I wish they put something back in. Maybe one day.
We are quite certain they will do it again. They seem to have a plan with it alternating between coasts, but who knows how long it will be before it is back in Florida.

I have stuck with GG. It is just easy... I know there are cheaper options now but they have always been good, and good customer service. We will have a car for the 1st day of our trip, so I think we will just do a quick shopping ourselves this time!
Yeah, we have Instacart at home now, so we could do that, but we know GG is easy and they have always done well for us. Ordering early saved a bit, and we don't have to think about it. Having a car could be a game changer for you though, that will have its advantages.
 
We now have all of our ADRs for the February trip. Since we split our stay between the two DVC memberships, we actually had two resort confirmation numbers and could not make ADRs for the entire trip at once. The reservations are linked as a continuing stay though, so we shouldn't have to switch rooms, but we will see...

The first set was a little stressful and had Paul scrambling with last minute changes. We had no idea how popular Homecomin was

We actually had to switch two of our days because the earliest dinner we could get for Homecomin on our first full day was 10:45 PM. We figured that would not be a good idea with the kids, so on the next day we were able to get a 7PM reservation.

That should be much better.

Everything else went very well, and we got the times that we wanted. This time I made almost all of the reservations through the app, and it worked fairly well. I had to make and then modify a few of them to get the exact times we wanted, but it worked fine (except for Homecomin, where no earlier times were available.)

We are really excited for the restaurant line up for February.

This morning I made the second set, and was able to get everything we wanted. At the last minute I noticed that we hadn't put Teppan Edo into the schedule, despite having it on our must do list. I shuffled a bit, and put it in where we initially thought we would do Via Napioli and found a spot for Via Napoli later in the trip before dinner at Topolino's Terrace. It will be an Italian themed day.

lol isn't it weird that planning the two is kinda stressful, fun but stressful, like we forgot Teppan Edo.

Yeah, there's just more going on at once than normal. Also we don't have the recent experience input we'd usually prefer to have, but it will all be fine.

Another long awaited scheduling task that I completed was reserving the Soarin DVC Member tour. They only offer this on Wednesdays, and it filled up before we could reserve it for our September trip. The CM gave me the date to call for our February trip, and I made sure to be on the phone when they first opened, and we made it in. They only do the tour once a week on Wednesday mornings, and apparently other people are excited about getting to see more of how Soarin works and take a pre-park open ride on it.


Unfortunately the kids can't participate in the tour so we'll be sleeping in a bit and meeting the boys for breakfast at Sunshine Seasons to hear all about it.

We have a Garden Grill breakfast ADR on our September trip that was supposed to be after the tour, but we kept it anyway. Trying Sunshine Seasons for breakfast sounds good too though.

It is always one of our favorites.

We are also pretty deep into researching our February airfare. Since we are flying home on Presidents weekend, the fares aren't as good as we would prefer. We are stalking it every day though, and have seen some recent improvement. We are optimistic that with Southwest opening up later this week there might be some more competition and good enough fares to jump on.


We are exploring ALL the options, Paul has even considered a pilots license...

Lol, planes, trains, boats, whatever it takes to get a deal. I'm pretty sure buying fuel for a plane isn't the cheap way to go though...

Now I am ready to forget February for a bit and focus on what we get to do in a few weeks. We'll be there in just 22 days!

So that's all the news we have for now, we've started dragging out our Disney stuff but haven't pulled out suitcases though.

We are gonna see if we can do it with one checked bag. Check back for details on how that goes...
 
Allie mentioned out of nowhere that she really wants to ride 7DMT at night.

I'm with Allie. I want to ride 7DMT at night on my trip too. We've done BMTRR at night but never 7D. I don't have a fp for it but we'll ride it at the Halloween party.

Yeah, we got tired of the smell and threw them in, and yes, they came out smelling nice and clean, but were quite a bit smaller.

Oh my. They really did shrink.

We are also pretty deep into researching our February airfare.

Purchasing airfare is my least favorite thing about vacation planning. I stress myself out trying to figure out when to pull the trigger. I can't handle paying too much but sometimes you really don't know which way it will go.

I'm 9 days out and we've pulled out the luggage but I haven't started packing yet. The boys are going away on a trip to the Little League World Series this weekend so I'll pack when they're gone. DH already packed for him and ds. So I just need to pack for me, dd and all the odds and ends.
 


Did you have a split reservation for your September trip?

I’m surprised that Homecoming is so popular. Usually the hard to get reservations are for restaurants in the parks and resorts.

Your September trip is getting really close. We have ten days left before our trip. It finally feels close. :)
 
I'm with Allie. I want to ride 7DMT at night on my trip too. We've done BMTRR at night but never 7D. I don't have a fp for it but we'll ride it at the Halloween party.
That sounds like a great reason to do the Halloween party. We still have never done one, and always find other ways to spend the time without the extra cost, but it would be neat to do sometime.

Oh my. They really did shrink.
Yeah, it was pretty bad, and they were THE shoes, like the Only shoes he has worn most days since last trip. He's accepted the blue ones as a decent substitute though, so that's good.

Purchasing airfare is my least favorite thing about vacation planning. I stress myself out trying to figure out when to pull the trigger. I can't handle paying too much but sometimes you really don't know which way it will go.
Yes! It is tough. We tend to plan and buy early, especially since we don't want to miss good fares, but it is so stressful until it is done. Southwest did open up today, but so far doesn't have anything great. The search continues.

I'm 9 days out and we've pulled out the luggage but I haven't started packing yet. The boys are going away on a trip to the Little League World Series this weekend so I'll pack when they're gone. DH already packed for him and ds. So I just need to pack for me, dd and all the odds and ends.
Yep, that's packing time for sure. It is great to be in single digits. Sounds like a fun pre-WDW trip for the boys. Its the odds and ends that wind up being a big deal for us, an might push us to a second checked bag...

Did you have a split reservation for your September trip?
No, we were able to transfer the points to have it all under one reservation. Because the February trip is the second one in the same use year it would have been harder to do that, since we are technically borrowing points from the next use year. It was easier to have separate reservations, but Member Services said there would be no problem having them linked as a continuing reservation. We will see, but we won't have to worry about that till February.

I’m surprised that Homecoming is so popular. Usually the hard to get reservations are for restaurants in the parks and resorts.
We were surprised too. I haven't had that kind of trouble since booking Be Our Guest the first year it was open. I guess it is more popular than we thought, which really is something since there are so many good choices at Disney Springs.

Your September trip is getting really close. We have ten days left before our trip. It finally feels close. :)
Congratulations, and happy single digit day to you now too! We feel like the next couple of weeks will go by pretty quickly, and we don't have any more trips anywhere before we go, so we will just be home packing, working, and getting ready. We hope you have a great time, and we'll be there soon after!
 
Hey check out what WDW Info just posted.
https://www.wdwinfo.com/news-storie...at-fort-wilderness-resort-campground-in-2020/They are building a brand spankin new barn for the Disney horses.



We had been wondering what would happen once the current barn was removed to make room for Reflections. We were both concerned that the new location would not be open to the public.

It does appear however that since the current barns will close on August 19 that we will miss seeing the horses for both of our upcoming trips.


That's ok, it's gonna be beautiful when it's done.

Yep, and they are keeping it open. Go Disney!

I really enjoy visiting the barns on our trips and I'm excited that they decided to do an open set up so that the public can still go see the horses and what goes on there.


Me too, that was one of the first places we went at WDW on our honeymoon.


It gave the area a unique laid back feel that was a welcome contrast to the crowds of the parks. I'm sad that they don't have animals in the ranch area at Disneyland anymore, having moved the horses to an off site barn facility. It is neat that with the space they have available at WDW they will keep the area open for guests to enjoy.

It gives us something new to look forward to for a 2021 trip!

We are continuing to stalk airfare prices and are so close to our target airfare budget! Hopefully prices fall just a little bit next week and we can jump on it.

The best part is it is looking like we won't have to hitchhike or travel as cargo for any part of the trip. If we play our cards right we might even keep nonstop flights! We will see...

 
I'm sad that they don't have animals in the ranch area at Disneyland anymore, having moved the horses to an off site barn facility. It is neat that with the space they have available at WDW they will keep the area open for guests to enjoy.

I miss the whole former Big Thunder Ranch area that used to be at Disneyland. I liked the way it was a peaceful oasis with a rural atmosphere and the Big Thunder Ranch BBQ restaurant with delicious food and live entertainment. I'd seen Jon Walmsley (who formerly played Jason Walton) play the guitar and sing there. Big Thunder Ranch was also a favorite area to meet characters, back in the day. I wish they could have put the new Star Wars stuff in or near Tomorrowland, instead of getting rid of one of my favorite areas of the park. :charac2:
 
I miss the whole former Big Thunder Ranch area that used to be at Disneyland. I liked the way it was a peaceful oasis with a rural atmosphere and the Big Thunder Ranch BBQ restaurant with delicious food and live entertainment. I'd seen Jon Walmsley (who formerly played Jason Walton) play the guitar and sing there. Big Thunder Ranch was also a favorite area to meet characters, back in the day. I wish they could have put the new Star Wars stuff in or near Tomorrowland, instead of getting rid of one of my favorite areas of the park. :charac2:
We completely agree. Big Thunder Ranch was our favorite part of the park and the only spot we would visit every single time. Sometimes progress is a bummer, but we're glad that WDW has enough space to keep an accessible barn open.
 
We love walking to Ft Wilderness from WL. We only explored the big horse barn once, though because we didn’t know that it was open to the public until we accidentally got lost when walking on the old nature trail. Now I wish we had visited it more often before it closes this week.

Unfortunately the kids can't participate in the tour so we'll be sleeping in a bit and meeting the boys for breakfast at Sunshine Seasons to hear all about it.
It would be very nice if Disney provided short term babysitting at the parks so that parents could drop off their kids for a couple hours so that they could enjoy the rides and tours together. When our kids were little we would drop them off at the resort childcare centers and go back in the park to ride the rides that we couldn't take the kids on. But that only worked at night.
Since we are flying home on Presidents weekend, the fares aren't as good as we would prefer.
February is one of our favorite months to go to Disney airfare can be tricky around the holiday. I hope you can grab a good deal. :)
 
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We love walking to Ft Wilderness from WL. We only explored the big horse barn once, though because we didn’t know that it was open to the public until we accidentally got lost when walking on the old nature trail. Now I wish we had visited it more often before it closes this week.
Oh well, it will be something to remember when the new one opens. It will likely be at the other end of Fort Wilderness though, so you'll have to make a point to venture over there instead of having it located so close to the marina along the shoreline.

It would be very nice if Disney provided short term babysitting at the parks so that parents could drop off their kids for a couple hours so that they could enjoy the rides and tours together. When our kids were little we would drop them off at the resort childcare centers and go back in the park to ride the rides that we couldn't take the kids on. But that only worked at night.
We have never done that, but would totally do it. We have left kids with grandparents to go to a park at night, or had them take one of the kids to a park while we did something else. That's one benefit of trips with grandparents. :)

February is one of our favorite months to go to Disney airfare can be tricky around the holiday. I hope you can grab a good deal. :)
We are really looking forward to trying February since it is something totally different for us. The big question is whether we will prefer it to September, and when we'll decide to go in 2021...
We are so close with airfare. Melissa saw a fare today that was withing our target, but it disappeared before we booked it. I hope that we'll get something booked soon.
Your trip should be great, have a wonderful time and get the Lodge ready for us!
 
We are just counting down the days , currently at 12 Days and 17 hours, but who's counting! Only seven more work days, which is quite exciting.


Speaking of a lack of work days, we'd like to congratulate @Wood Nymph on her retirement yesterday! Hopefully we'll still see you around here without you having to spend time commuting on the train. Also we hope that many WDW trips are in your future. Enjoy, and you likely will be so busy having fun that you will wonder how you had time for work!
:cool1:

Seven more work days?? Wow it's getting close.

So excited for you WoodNymph and we hope your retirement is full of relaxing days.


Have a great time on your trip WoodNymph, we'll be there soon!
 
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So excited for you WoodNymph and we hope your retirement is full of relaxing days.

Have a great time on your trip WoodNymph, we'll be there soon!
Thank you. It has been a long time coming and I can't think of a better way to celebrate than at WL. :)

I think you arrive just a few days after we leave, unfortunately. It would have been fun to see you again. ::yes::
 
Guys we're down to 9 days to go!


Hooray, we can do the single digit dance!

We got out the luggage on Friday and started preliminary packing. Our goal is one large checked bag and I'm thinking we can do it just fine. Maybe.

So far so good. We have the large bag out and put a lot of the stuff in it that we know we will need, and so far it isn't full, but we will have to keep an eye on weight. We are also taking three carry-ons, so that will help.

Yeah, we're also missing one of the new shirts I got Paul for the trip. It vaporized or something and disappeared. Wish us luck in finding it, it was really cute.

That is driving me crazy. We know we got it and washed it, and from there it is anybody's guess. The other shirt we bought at the same time is right in my shirt drawer where one would expect it to be. I thought maybe I had pulled it out and put it aside with my other Disney shirts, but it wasn't there either. That will be our challenge for the next week.

We spent the weekend watching the news from D23, and are excited about many of the announcements.

I'm excited for all of the changes at Epcot. As much as I love Epcot it really does need a facelift though and I'm excited to see all the new stuff.

Yes, and while it might take a few years I think they will really make it into something special. I'm also excited about hearing anything we can about Reflections, our soon to be neighbor on Bay Lake.

The artwork looks nice, and the idea of a waterfront sit down restaurant sounds great. Having a Princess and Frog theme will be interesting, and could be really cute.

It seems like it would better fit at Port Orleans, but I could see it being Tiana's restaurant.

Yeah, I guess they fit it on the water where they can. I'm also interested in the waterfront cabins and "treehouses" they announced.


We are pretty excited to see Reflections, it's neat to see more renderings and can't wait to see the finished product of course.

Oh yes definitely.

We are also excited about the Target and Disney partnership. One of the first 25 stores getting the Disney store is fairly close to us so it'll be fun to have a field trip to see it, and get our 5% redcard discount.


I was also curious about the Target store they are adding at Disney, but it sounds like it will be at Flamingo Crosssings, so it won't be super accessible for us. Buying more gift cards is on our agenda for this week, and it really is slick doing it online instead of having to track down enough cards in store. I was always hesitant to combine gift card balances online, so we would travel with a stack of them. Now I have discovered how easy it is to use disneygiftcard.com, and can manage card balances and transfer between cards and e-cards so that we don't have as many cards to keep track of.

It also makes it easy to buy them on Target.com during our trip and then transfer balances to physical cards.

I think that really is going to come in handy. We should save the 5% on all of the money we spend at Disney, which adds up to a lot.

Because we spend a lot at Disney. In other trip related news, we still haven't received our DME tags for our luggage, we called last week and they were supposed to have been mailed on Monday. Hopefully those show up soon or we're gonna have to locate the baggage claim in Orlando, something we've never had to do before.

Yeah, I figure I can call one more time if they aren't there today, but there's probably not much more we can do. I really don't want to go to baggage claim, that's just un-Disney...

We have an absolutely jam-packed week ahead of us with activities but we are insanely excited about the upcoming trip. Even Marshall was telling me this morning how excited he was going to be flying on a plane.

That's awesome. I am down to 6 work days left after today, and I'm really looking forward to a two day week next week. I'm pretty excited about getting to fly on a plane too...

I guess that's about all for today, but we'll post as we get closer to the trip and even more excited!

And if we find the missing shirt...
 
I'm also excited about hearing anything we can about Reflections, our soon to be neighbor on Bay Lake.
I'm really excited about Reflections, too. All you can see from Geyser Point is a few less trees and some bare ground. We are planning to take the boat over to FW on Wednesday morning to look around. The walking path is fenced off, which is very disappointing, but the boat and bus are still running.
The artwork looks nice, and the idea of a waterfront sit down restaurant sounds great.
I wonder if the success of Geyser Point prompted them to build a waterfront restaurant at Reflections. I'm looking forward to seeing what the resort looks like when it is done, because it looks fantastic on paper.
It also makes it easy to buy them on Target.com during our trip and then transfer balances to physical cards.

I think that really is going to come in handy. We should save the 5% on all of the money we spend at Disney, which adds up to a lot.
I bought a lot of gift cards at Target and that 5% was definitely worth the trouble. Disney also replaced a gift card that I had lost, which was great. I just had to send a copy of my Target receipt and they sent me a new giftcard. :)
 
I hope your missing shirt turns up.
So do we, because at this point the best part would be that we can finally stop looking for it. Oh well, I do have plenty of Disney shirts.

Don't worry too much if you have to go to the baggage claim in Orlando. It's not that bad!
Thanks, I'm sure we could find it, but this morning we called and found out that they had shipped the luggage tags to Brandy's office. They received them yesterday, so we should be good to go...

I'm really excited about Reflections, too. All you can see from Geyser Point is a few less trees and some bare ground. We are planning to take the boat over to FW on Wednesday morning to look around. The walking path is fenced off, which is very disappointing, but the boat and bus are still running.
Yeah, not having walking access between WL and FW will be a bummer, but it should be really nice once the resort is done, then we expect the path to open up and allow access between all three resorts. I wonder when the really visible construction will start. I guess they've got a few years to do it, so it is a slow process.

I wonder if the success of Geyser Point prompted them to build a waterfront restaurant at Reflections. I'm looking forward to seeing what the resort looks like when it is done, because it looks fantastic on paper.
We think Copper Creek was a big test run for wilderness themed DVC, and appearently it was well received. Having waterfront table service dining makes sense, and should give a lot of people who wanted Geyser Point to be a sit down somewhere to go.

I bought a lot of gift cards at Target and that 5% was definitely worth the trouble. Disney also replaced a gift card that I had lost, which was great. I just had to send a copy of my Target receipt and they sent me a new giftcard. :)
That's neat that they took care of the missing card. We are super happy with the ability to transfer balances between cards online. It is making getting ready for the trip so much easier, and it will be nice to take one or two cards to the front desk instead of the 10 plus cards we brought down there last year.

We hope you are having a great time at WL and that you get it all ready for us. We were sorry to hear that you didn't get a room that opens to the lobby, but better lake views should help to make up for it. Have a great time!
 

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