Another place we'll have to stop by while we're there.

My family LOVES Putt putt. So this will be a must on our vacation.

http://land.allears.net/blogs/kristin-ford/2013/06/fantasia_gardens_at_walt_disne.html

Starbucks BABY

http://land.allears.net/blogs/debwills/2013/06/starbucks_opens_in_magic_kingd.html
YEAH BOOOYEEEE!

Bummed out

Talked to my buddy, Sommer, today. She's down in Florida having a blast at Disney World... But she gave me some news that bummed me out. You can no longer collect Fast Passes to just use whenever you want throughout the day. You HAVE to use it during the allotted time window stamped on the ticket. I was sure she was wrong, just sure, so I texted my cousin to get the scoop. NOPE. she was not wrong. Apparently they are cracking down on that now. My cousin indicated that it had something to do with these new wrist band things they're going to be trying out but she couldn't tell me more. I knew I had read about them somewhere so I went to good ol' www.allears.net to dig up some more dirt. Couldn't find much other than that the wristbands would be used for basically everything: park admission, buying food and merchandise, fast passes etc. So I did some more digging and found the following articles:
http://www.technologyreview.com/view/515641/disneys-electronic-wristband-illustrates-why-big-companies-push-contactless-wallets/

and
http://www.geekosystem.com/disney-world-id-bracelets/

Not sure how I feel about it. I see both the perks and the downsides. Instead of having to carry my tickets and my photo pass plus card on my lanyard, and my wallet, it could all be in the one wrist band.... But there is that fear of losing my wrist band, or someone stealing it or all the data they'll mine on me. We'll see.

So why is this place so important to me? Well, I know I talked about it in my first post but I've been looking at this picture, above,  for a while and realized that it has more meaning for me. Not just because of the place but also because of that year and all the things that went on from there on out.
I'm getting ahead of myself. You see, my husband and I had a crappy honeymoon.. No, I mean that quite literally. We were pretty poor and decided to just go to a bed and breakfast on the other side of the border from us. It sounded cute and quaint.... Meh was a pretty good word to describe it. It was a drafty old house, cute but, again, drafty (which doesn't bode well in the winter time). They advertised a whirlpool tub, that sounded romantic. Nope, it was very literally a tub (so no romantic baths for two) and the jets came out at such a rate that it bruised up my legs. Then my husband of two days came down with the flu, a horrible flu. Did I mention our honeymoon was only for a weekend? Needless to say it was just a horrible horrible start. Good things came from it but that really wasn't how we wanted to remember it all.
The plan came about a few months later that we would save up and have a honeymoon-redux and go to Disneyland. My husband had never been and I grew up in California so it seemed like a no-brainer. February of 2004 came about sooner than we expected and we were off for 2 weeks of fun in the sun. It was great road tripping with him across country and experiencing new sites with him. He LOVED seeing my face light up as we walked across the street to Disneyland. I was a child all over again. He made it clear that he really wanted to do this again, but next time, we should go to Disney World.. Just so we could experience it all.
Now I know I said all of this before, but the more I got to thinking about it, the more I realized how impact full that year was. One month after this picture was taken we moved back to his hometown. Two months from that picture I got hired at my current company (WHICH I LOVE) and began a career. Seven months after that picture was taken I found out I was pregnant with our first child.
Next May I'll get to hold true to the promise I made to my (relatively new) husband 10 years before. We'll go to Disney World and have a new picture taken...One that shows how we've grown together, how we've added to our family and how we're all still children at heart.

New month, new pictures for the countdown

New information to contemplate

So, I just confirmed that my buddy, Sommer, will be flying out of Moline, IL through the same travel company I plan on going through. Because she's flying out of Moline, she can fly out on a Saturday... If I fly out of CR I'll have to fly out on a Monday.. Flying from Moline would have some perks but it would also have some draw backs. Same thing for flying out of CR.

Flying out of Moline Pros:
1. Could leave a day earlier than expected which means we could get more of our money's worth from our timeshares
2. Would also get two extra days in Florida.
3. Could keep the surprise to just our little family instead of making any Grandparents jealous that one set or the other got to see the look on the kids faces when they found out where they were going

Flying out of Moline Cons:
1. We'd have to drive to Moline vs. driving to CR
2. We'd only get 1 day back home to acclimate to being back vs. 2
3. We may or may not have to get a hotel room for one night (depending on when check in or check out is at certain time shares
4. We'd have to pay for long term parking ($35.00 a week)

Flying out of CR Pros:
1. The original plan I have for surprising the kids still sounds like a lot of fun
2. My in-laws could give us a lift to the airport therefore saving us gas money
3. And parking money
4. We'd get 2 days to acclimate back to being home vs. 1 day

Flying out of CR Cons:
1. We'd have to check in "late" to our timeshare, which just feels like a waste of money.
2. We'd also have to fly back on a Friday, which means we'd have to check out early from another timeshare... which also feels like a waste of money.
3. Chance that one set of grandparents will miss the surprise leading to a twinge of unhappiness.
4. Would have less time in Florida

hmmmm

Wow! How sweet is this?

So.. In looking for fun things for Sommer to do on the plane I came across this AWESOME site.
http://www.themouseforless.com/downloads.shtml#kids

It even has a school excuse letter along with fun trivia and word puzzles. I'll definitely be going back to reference this site when my turn comes about!