Quinns Do Disney...AGAIN!

Well whoda thunk we would have gotten to go back to WDW so soon! It all started right after we got home from our last trip. Christopher and Craig had been thinking about taking their kids but weren't really sure when they wanted to go since they were expecting a baby. When we found out about my nephew, they decided to start planning a trip for the fall to give them something to look forward to.  They had two dates this Fall they had quotes for and were deciding between. Then my dad started talking about taking us on a family vacation since it has been 7 years since we had taken one, and that turned into us all joining the Heys for a trip to Disney World. Planning this time around was different. So much was going on in our lives that is was hard to get excited about Disney. We lost my nephew, my mom had major surgery for what we thought was cancer {but thank the good Lord that against all odds it turned out benign!} and I was in the hospital with her for a week and she is still recovering, then my miscarriage...it's just been a tough year. BUT Disney definitely gave us something to look forward to, even if it was hard to get excited and plan in the months leading up to it. But once the week of the trip hit, we all were very excited!

And since we had just been, I didn't have to do too much to prepare. I made the girls some outfits, and that was by far the most stressful thing I had to do. Well maybe that and staying up till 2:30am doing fast passes for 11 people!! Ugh. That wasn't fun. Ok and the system wasn't working right when I booked dining either, so add that to the stressful list. :) All that aside, we didn't have too much to do.

This is not the best picture, but I made all four girls some Minnie pajamas, dresses with the carriage appliqué, and the Halloween Minnie shirts. That's 12 things I had to appliqué and monogram. Whew! My girls were able to re-wear a lot of their things from February even though the weather was warmer this time. I cut some of their pants I had made into shorts, and they never complained about being hot. The temps were cool in the mornings and evenings but pretty hot during the day.

We surprised the girls again this time. Curran got out of school at 11:50 that day for teacher conferences, so once John got home early that afternoon we spilled the beans. But actually Curran had walked in on me in the guest room one night the previous week, and I had all our Disney stuff spread it. So apparently she went back and snooped later and saw some evidence of the trip. She suspected that we were going. :)

Most of our princess dresses are very "well-loved" {read completely torn to shreds}, so I wanted some new ones for them to have in Disney. We got the Rapunzel one for C handed down from a friend, and I got SC's Anna dress for $13 at Target. I also got them some new slippers because hotel room floors gross me out, and they each got a new mini plush doll- Rapunzel for C and and Tinkerbell for SC. Everything else in their buckets was reused from last time. 

We stayed at the Grand Floridian this time, thanks to my generous parents. My dad is a hotel snob :), so there was really no shopping around. It was beautiful, the staff was very nice, and the rooms were great- updated and super clean. There was a turn down service each night, and the girls particularly loved the chocolates on their pillows and seeing how their stuffed animals were arranged. :) It was a truly wonderful experience that I'm so glad we got to have!

{These two photos were taken from the Disney website}

The Heys, my brother, and us all had rooms next door to each other in one of the outer buildings- Conch Key. I had requested Big Pine Key because it was closest to the beach and the main building and pool, but I guess they just put us where they had three rooms together. It ended up being fine because we had a nice view of the lagoon and were close to the boat launch, but we were furthest from the monorail. My parents were in the building next to us called Sugar Loaf Key because they had club level service {access to their own concierge and complimentary breakfast, snacks, and appetizers, among other perks}. You had to have a room in that building in order to even get in using your Magic Band.

Even though everyone says it's so great to be on the monorail, I found the transportation to be more confusing than on our last trip. There would be times we would get up to the monorail and it wouldn't be running yet, or we would go to get a bus and it wouldn't be going to where we needed it to just yet, and we got wrong directions to places several times. I would make our next day's travel plans based on how things ran the day before, and it would be wrong when we showed up somewhere. And even though the monorail is convenient, it can still take a while to get where you want to go. Magic Kingdom was the first stop if we were headed there so that was awesome, but our resort was the last stop leaving the park, so it was not quick when everyone was tired and ready to be in bed. One afternoon I left MK to quickly grab something from our room, and it took 50 minutes round trip. So while fairly convenient, it wasn't super quick. But I feel super lucky we got to stay there as it was probably a once in a lifetime thing for us, but I wouldn't break my budget just to stay there. Just my two cents. :)

Packed and ready to go!!

She loves the play area at the airport!

The trip really didn't start until Saturday, but the flights out of Birmingham that day were not good, so we found a flight Friday night and used points to stay at a Hilton in Disney Springs {Downtown Disney}. We left Birmingham at 6:00pm Friday evening and got to Orlando at 8:30pm. Since we were staying at the Hilton that night, we couldn't take advantage of Disney's Magical Express. John's one job was to line up our ride to the hotel. Well...there is a reason I plan everything myself. :) After much back and forth trying to figure out a shuttle {all while carrying 4 large suitcases, two smaller ones, our back pack, computer bag, and 2 tired, grumpy children}, we ended up taking a cab. And it was totally fine. I just like to have a plan and not waste time wandering and trying to figure things out at the last minute. SC fell asleep on the cab ride and thankfully slept through check in and getting her settled in the bed.

{The Heys rented a car through a car service so their girls could be in car seats and so they could stop at a grocery store. We thought about doing that with them, but it was going to be pricey and we didn't need to go to the store, and John said the shuttle was $22 one way. Well that's $22 per PERSON, and we were going to have to wait 45 minutes for the next shuttle, hence why we took a cab. And just FYI they do have plenty of stores who will deliver groceries straight to your room.}

Next up, Day 1!