WDW: Where dreams come true
I think we’ve all seen the commercial. Its the one featuring a father, mother, and two children: a boy and a girl of course and they are at Disney having such a wonderful time together for a “bargain” price with the tag line “Walt Disney World: Where Dreams Come True”. I have to admit it gets me thinking about going to Walt Disney World every time I see it. But now I have a new reason to get excited. Saturday night Mike and I booked our 2008 trip for 10 days/9 nights. Disney continued the Year of a Million Dreams campaign so I’m hoping for some extra Disney magic on our trip. So now I have 2 trips to plan out -England and WDW - so I better get a movin’!
Now I know you are probably wondering how we can afford both trips this year. I know my parents were questioning it too at first. But… its not really a far stretch. Mike and I went last in 2006 to Disney and determined that we would do a 2 year plan - every 2 years go to WDW until we got tired of going or until potential kiddos come along. So I started doing surveys online in Jan 2007 on a few survey sites, working hard on my favorite rewards site Sunshine Rewards for the past year and 3 months, and charging all the team meals at work on AMEX for the Southwest air tickets and have come up with enough reward points between those things to completely pay for our Disney Trip and airfare if free dining is included in September otherwise I have a few more months to come up with the remaining couple of dollars. Talk about awesome. Mike is still blown away by it and brags to everyone he talks to when they ask about our upcoming vacations. It also helps that we didn’t go anywhere last year so we had our vacation savings to cover our other trip.
So here we are planning away. As of right now I have another checklist going as to what I need to do this week to plan this trip:
- Print out park hours from WDW website
- Determine if we are doing Extra Magic Hours or not
- Determine which restaurant we want to eat at each day and plot out my 180 day mark so I can call for ADRs
- Strictly follow my diet
- Order customized maps from the WDW website
- Download current podcast from the Walt Disney Radio Show on iTunes (its completely free and a great thing to use if you are planning a trip)
Not a terrible list. Its actually a good start. From there I’ll start worrying about the little things like updated guide books, hidden mickey books, and WDW trivia books for carrying around at the parks.
So I hope you’ll join me in planning my trip. I’m super excited and am looking for any suggestions or updates that you may have.
WDW Today and the DISUnplugged are also good WDW podcasts.
And don’t forget to put your stuff in a binder and just be organized. We always go to WDW with a binder with all the information we need. Beats trying to find the stuff while you are there.
Not sure how you plan your day to day plans, but I love TourGuideMike. I’ve used him for all 3 of our trips so far.
I have not tried TGM yet. I have heard some good things about him and his touring plans. I’m wondering if they’d be useful in September.
Thanks for the suggestions Heather. I’ll look into those podcasts.
Kim - the binders will be next. Gotta get to printing stuff out first so I can fill them up!
I’m sure you already do this, but I always carry a print out of my ADRs so I have the confirmation # in case there are any issues when we arrive at the restaurant. There never has been, but at least I am prepared!! :0)
Yup! Now that I have confirmation numbers and times I can start making my little folder of each day where we will be, park times, and dining information.