Dan & Dave's Orlando Wedding & Disneymoon - Oct 15 - UPDATE 1/10

[DiddyDan]

After stalking so many people’s trip reports on here for 2 years now, I thought I would have a go at writing one of my own! It has been invaluable reading past bride’s trip reports, so thought I would try and help out in some way too. I also think it would be nice to look back at it in years to come. Just a warning, there’s probably going to be a photo overload! So I’ll start off with who we are

I’m Danielle (Dan), 28 and love all things Disney & Orlando, spending quality time with my family, and my 5 nieces and 1 nephew!



Dave is my DFI, he is also 28, loves golf, rugby and everything I love



And one of both of us



We have been together for nearly 8 years now and we work very hard to have lovely holidays together! We have had a couple of holidays to places in Europe, however Dave can’t sit for longer than 20 minutes sun bathing so we quickly ruled those holidays out and ventured to Orlando, LA, Las Vegas, New York and San Francisco. Can you tell we like the US of A?!

Because I can, and to give you a back story, I’m going to share some photos of our past trips together

In 2008 we went to Orlando for Christmas and stayed in a villa with my family, bar my sister Michelle (she was 38 weeks pregnant when we went)! There was myself & Dave, my Mum & Dad, my brother Ryan and his girlfriend Bethany, my sister Lisa and brother-in-law Phil and their first daughter Madison, who was 10 weeks old at the time. We went to all of the Disney parks, Universal & Islands, SeaWorld and Busch Gardens. This was an amazing trip, and I can’t believe we haven’t been back at Christmas yet! I think this is partly due to the free DDP, and also because my parents bought into DVC on holiday this year!

On a side note, you may have seen pictures of us in my sisters Lisa29’s trip reports.











We had holiday blues after we got back (as everyone does)! 2 weeks after we got back from Florida we just happened to go into the travel agent, and had Vegas/LA/San Fran priced up at an absolute bargain, £900 each, for all hotels and flights! We rushed home to talk to my Mum & Dad to see if it sounded okay and they said yeah go for it. We told Ryan & Bethany about it, and later on that day all 4 of us went back to the travel agents to book it!

Roll on October 2009, 4 nights in Vegas at the MGM Grand, 4 nights at The Wilshire Grand in downtown LA, then 3 nights in the Handlery Union Square in San Francisco.

We did all the usual touristy attractions, Grand Canyon on one of these! Went round most of the hotels, a lot of shopping, the Bellagio fountains, and the secret garden in the Mirage etc.









We went to the Hollywood walk of fame, Santa Monica pier, more shopping, had a drive down the coast and saw Huntington, Newport and Laguna Beach.







We went to Fisherman’s Wharf, Alcatraz, Lombard Street (which we walked up instead of down lol!), did a bus tour which was definitely money well spent, and more shopping!









Again not long after we got back we started talking and deciding what to do for next year! Can you see a pattern here?! October/November 2010 was booked, 2 nights in New York, then 14 nights in Orlando! 2 nights in the Crowne Plaza Times Square, 5 nights in Disney’s Kidani Villas (2 bed villa), 2 nights in Disney’s Vero Beach (2 bed villa), 2 nights in Royal Pacific, then 5 nights in Disney’s Bay Lake Tower (through pure luck, we got upgraded to a 3 bed grand villa!). The Disney stays all courtesy of my parents DVC This time it was myself and Dave, my Mum & Dad and my sister Lisa, my brother in law Phil and their daughter Madison. Only myself and Dave went to NY, we flew to Orlando the same day the rest arrived.

I had been to NY before, but Dave hadn’t so we just tried to cram everything into 2 days! Times Square, Brooklyn Bridge, Soho, 5th Avenue, World Trade Center memorial etc.









This time we did all of the Disney parks, Universal, Islands and SeaWorld. We also got to do MNSSHP and saw the Osbourne lights at Hollywood Studios (which is one of our faves). It was also nice to go to Vero Beach for 2 nights in the middle of the holiday for a rest : It was the first time we had stayed at Universal, and loved the FOTL passes. We all absolutely loved having Madison there, she had just turned 2 and was the perfect age to see Disney through a child’s eyes

















Sorry about all the photos then, I struggled to pick my favourites!

Continued in next post...

[DiddyDan]

...continued from previous post.

Next came Vegas in September 2011, 7 nights in the lovely Cosmopolitan, with a balcony overlooking the Bellagio fountains. We chilled a bit more on this holiday as we had been before, did a bit of sun bathing in the mornings, then went exploring in the afternoon/evenings. We enjoyed the tipping $1 for a drink while playing on the computerised blackjack machines. We’re not big gamblers! This time we went to see a show, which was amazing! We hired a Hummer for a day and a Mustang for another day and drove ourselves to the Hoover Dam, which we loved! Again a lot of shopping was done
Also, how difficult is it to get photos together when there is no other family member there?!











We struggled to decide where to go the next year, in the end we picked LA for 6 nights, November 2012 over Thanksgiving. Yay shopping on Black Friday! We stayed in Marina Del for 4 nights, then Newport Bay for 2 nights. This time we crammed both Disney Land parks into 1 day! It was really busy as it was Thanksgiving week, but we made the most of the time we had at Disney. World of Colour is now one of my favourite Disney shows, it was amazing! I’m so glad we went, however I compared it far too much to Orlando, and I was really disappointed with the castle We had 4 nieces by this point so I absolutely loved shopping in Disney for their Christmas presents.





We now decided we needed to be grownups and start saving to buy a house. My whole family was going to Orlando in October 2013, my 5 nieces were going, which I sooo didn’t want to miss out on … in the end we decided that only I would go so we could carry on saving. I had a brilliant time, but would never ever go without Dave again!



This is a pic of said 5 nieces, but now we also have a nephew, I love them all to bits!



The house hunting started early 2014. We found one in the March and should have been in it pretty quickly. This didn’t happen, we decided to pull out and looked again. We finally got the keys to our house in November 2014! Buying a house is the most stressful thing we have ever done, not an enjoyable experience at all!

The day we got the keys



Roll back to June 2014 in the midst of all the house drama, (why I am writing this pre-trippie!) and Dave took me to DLP for our 7 year anniversary.

He booked it way in advance on the 2 extra days/nights free offer, and managed to book the Eurostar on the day of release so we bagged 2 x Return tickets St Pancras to Marne Le Valle for £69 each! Our trip was 1 night in London at a lovely Travelodge as we were going to see the Lion King in the West End. Then 4 nights, 5 days at Disney’s New York hotel

I went with a total open mind about DLP after comparing Disney Land Anaheim too much. And wow, the castle! Cinderella’s castle in Orlando is still my fave, but I was blown away by how magnificent Sleeping Beauty’s castle is. And I loved that you could go inside it! We weren’t impressed with the food in DLP (other than EOS of course), but loved the rest of it and how you could walk to it from your hotel. And how close to home it was! We did a day trip to Paris, which was nice but we much prefer being in the ‘Disney bubble’!







On our first full day, our 7 year anniversary, just after 8am in the morning, this happened …







I so wasn’t expecting it as I never thought he would get down on one knee and definitely not in public! Even though it was still pretty empty lol. He did it in the perfect place as Disney means so much to the both of us, he did good





I hope everyone’s still with me, I wanted to give you a back story as I know how much I love reading peoples back stories on here!

Now onto the wedding planning…..

[Lisa29]

Yay, you finally started!

I loved seeing all the pictures and I had forgotten quite how many times you had been to America, plus all the times before Dave came along!

I want to read more please! xx

[rens]

Beautiful proposal & ring!

Love your holiday snaps- it looks like you've been on some amazing trips together

I've been reading along with Lisa's pre-trippie so can't wait to read more about your wedding plans

[disneymadhouse]

Ooo, I've been looking forward to reading Lisa's TR, so to have the report from the brides point of view is a lovely bonus! Can't wait to read more

[DiddyDan]

Originally Posted by Lisa29

Yay, you finally started!

I loved seeing all the pictures and I had forgotten quite how many times you had been to America, plus all the times before Dave came along!

I want to read more please! xx

See more...

I know, I needed to get it started otherwise I would have kept on putting it off!

We were lucky Mum and Dad took us and started off our love for Disney and America! A very expensive habit though

I'm hopefully going to post the next bit tonight, or if not definitely tomorrow! x

[DiddyDan]

Originally Posted by rens

Beautiful proposal & ring!

Love your holiday snaps- it looks like you've been on some amazing trips together

I've been reading along with Lisa's pre-trippie so can't wait to read more about your wedding plans

See more...

Aww thank you! It really was, I think I'd always secretly hoped it would be in front of a castle

I struggled to pick my favourite photos, so I hope I didn't put too many on there!

Lovely, you can read them from 2 different perspectives. Although I don't think I am as organised as Lisa! x

Originally Posted by disneymadhouse

Ooo, I've been looking forward to reading Lisa's TR, so to have the report from the brides point of view is a lovely bonus! Can't wait to read more

See more...

Aw thank you for taking the time to comment! I should hopefully get some more posted tonight or tomorrow x

[DiddyDan]

Kind of continued from previous post…

We both had a week off work when we got back from DLP so got cracking straight away with the wedding planning! All my life I knew I didn’t want the ‘Big White Wedding’, it just isn’t me at all and the thought of being stood at the front of a church, in front of all our friends and family, well it scares me! Luckily we were both in agreement!

We already knew that we wanted a small intimate wedding in Orlando … we’d been together so long, it had obviously cropped up in conversations I had my eye on Cypress Grove and Paradise Cove (more on that later)! I got my hands on my Dad’s shift pattern for 2015 and 2016 to see when his holidays were (we have to plan our holidays around my Dad as he has set holidays each year). Initially we thought 2016 to give people long enough to save, but we just felt that was too long away and the fact that we could start booking things there and then for 2015 was so enticing! So, we decided on October 2015! First though we needed to find out numbers…

We quickly pulled together this save the date invite:





Sorry for the rubbishy photos and I don't have one of the inside!

Everyone was so overjoyed and happy for us and we had immediate yesses from most people! We only invited our immediate family, 17 people, of which 12 are coming.

Here’s the cast:

My parents Lorraine and Mick



And a picture of them with their 5 granddaughters on holiday in 2013



My sister Lisa, brother-in-law Phil, and their daughters Madison (7) & Kaley (4)



My Brother Ryan, sister-in-law Bethany and their daughter Piper (2) - This is a photo from when we were on holiday in 2013 so I have included a more recent photo of Piper below.



Dave’s parents Helen and Kevin, and his only brother Adam. I haven’t asked if they would like to be included in this report so I will leave them out for now.

Just because I can, here’s a pic of me Madison and Kaley.



I wanted to put one up of me and Piper but I don’t have a recent one where she’s not trying to get away from me! So here’s one of her from the other day



Sadly, my sister Michelle, her partner Jamie and their 3 kids can’t come. I never in a million years thought they wouldn’t come, they will be missed terribly, but I understand that it was such a big ask and we look forward to celebrating with them at the party back home

Next time, more wedding planning!

[gartland87]

Hi

What a great start to your pre trippie! I've been following Lisa's last few trippies so it will be interesting to read yours when you've been mentioned so much before!

Looking forward to more updates xx

[Nesbits]

This is so great, Lisa's pre-trippie and now yours. I will be following both