We Should be responsible adults! - September 2016 Pre-Trippy

[Fairygothmum]

We should be responsible adults - Pre-trippy - The beginning...

So dear Dibbers, this is the beginning of my second ever trip report. only this time I am actually doing a 'proper' pre-trippie! something of which I have neglected to do in the past through my own sheer laziness! - I need to warn you all that the only way I could combat said laziness was to pre-write all of this so I can copy and paste it in so this was started last June, that's why the writing sometimes appears in the past tence...

so first of all let me introduce you to the main cast and then of course the supporting roles so to begin with there is my good self... some of you may remember me from the 2014 trip report 'we're all mad here' - I am Hannah, 28yrs old by the time we go (gulp) usually recognized by my bright hair and large haunted mansion thigh tattoo...
The knower of all things Disney, keeper of all documentation, the rambo of all known possibilities and the remedies for most situations... need a plaster for your heels? I got it... need a spare pair of socks for comfort? no worries it's in the backpack... need a resuscitation kit complete with tracheotomy equipment? you know I've got it (No seriously I have... I pack for every possible problem... )

I have a dry sense of humour and am usually the one to come up with the silly catch-phrases (anyone remember the nobby poncho?) I LOVE Harry Potter, Disney and Halloween and am usually the driving force for all vacation needs.

My spirit animal is Stitch, my spirit princess is Anna (we couldn't believe how like me she is when we first watched frozen) oh and I am a proud Ravenclaw.

Martin - 25yrs old when we go, fellow Ravenclaw, Pokemon Master (yes he really has caught them all!) lover of all things tron/frozen/guardians of the galaxy and especially big hero 6. unlike me he has only been once before (in 2015) and loved every minute of it! he is very unlike me... he is quiet and sometimes socially awkward, but can be a lot of fun once he knows you.
He is my ex boyfriend (yes you read that right) we booked the holiday when we were together, but have since split up. we're still good friends though and there is no awkwardness or hard feelings as we'd been friends for years so no worries there!

Last time he went to Disney he brought about 5 different hats, so I expect this trip will be no different! I also want to add that he's never worn any of them since returning to the UK but that's impulse buyers for you

Emma - 22yrs old when we go, Martin's sister she is the baby of the group but she is my partner in crime when it comes to planning as she too is a super excitable person when it comes to Disney. So it really is helpful having her there so we can bully *cough* I mean convince Martin that all our crazy plans aren't crazy at all!
She is a lover of all things Disney and massive rides and of course Harry Potter! she practically brought everything from the HP studio tour in London when we went for Martin's birthday last year. a Gryffindor and huge Lion king fan, she is into all the same things as Martin.
She can be quite shy but nowhere near as shy or awkward as her elder Brother. Her, Martin and a couple of their friends went to Disney for her 21st birthday which again was her first visit so she's dying to get back to the magic.

Now for the supporting roles... again some of you may know them from my last report. I've put them in the supporting roles section because, we're not spending the whole holiday together, more on that later!

So we have my beautiful and sometimes terrifying :P older sister Sian - 30 when we go (I'm not laughing really!) she will be a happily married woman by then as this is her Honeymoon trip... oh the plot thickens! wearer of the nobby poncho, queen of the one liners and hater of most weather types... if she was a super-hero she'd become the incredible 'sulk' when it rains or when it's too hot.
she is a self confessed ride wimp, but if you read the last trippy you'll all know that she has come on leaps and bounds in this department and I couldn't be more proud! she loves all things romantic and her favourite film is beauty and the beast, so a trip to be our guest is a MUST this trip.

Andrew - 29 when we go, he will also be a happily married man by then and my brother in law... god help him... he is the keeper of the catch-phrase ' is this one a rollercoaster!?' and was my ride buddy on our last trip. he absolutely loves horror and HHN, I think he finds Disney rides a bit too tame but he's more than happy to be at Disney so it's fine.
he is unfortunately a directionally challenged fellow and usually gets lost, but it is rather comical as both me and him have no sense of direction at all (you may or may not remember when Sian sent us both out for food at the ASM resort last time, rookie error, and we didn't return for over an hour)

so that is our cast for now, I will update you all on the why's and how's in a short while but I thought it better not to bombard you all with too much information so I will leave it here for now

[Fairygothmum]

We should be responsible adults - you want to do what?!

Hello and welcome back to my 2016 pre-trippy! so last instalment we discovered who the cast, and in some cases extended cast were... but now we need to get down to the nitty gritty.
So how did all this come about? well the funny thing is that whilst we were away in 2014 we visited the Polynesian resort for an Ohana's breakfast where Sian and Andrew (already engaged then) hatched a plan to return in 2016 for their Disney moon.

I was a little sad as I had no one, other than them to return with for future trips, because a lot of my friends can't afford/ won't save up for a holiday to Florida and even though Sian joked about me coming along on their honeymoon I didn't feel like it was appropriate so resigned myself to the fact I wouldn't get to visit the mouse again for many years.
However... my then best friend Martin and his sister Emma were off to Florida in April 2015, and I had joked with him a lot about how he had to take me back in 2016. Emma got wind of this plan and even before she had been for the first time ever decided it was a definite go and kept saying we should go back.
I tried not to get my hopes up as people say a lot of things in the spur of the moment so I didn't want to put much stock in it, sad I know but you all know what it's like when you're a Disney obsessive.
So I tried to busy myself with Sian's honeymoon plans and helping her sift through all the internet offers etc as she's never booked such a mammoth holiday before. meanwhile Emma and Martin had jetted off to Florida and I couldn't help but feel a little pang of jealousy even though I was happy for them.

of course whilst they were away prices were released for 2016 so I couldn't help but do some research, purely for the Disneymoon of course! :P as I didn't want to bother them when they were on vacation, I didn't bother telling Martin anything even though we spoke every day whilst he was away.
I already had the dates in my head of when to go because I always go around the same time, being a huge Halloween fan I can't not go around Halloween time! Sian and Andrew's original plan was to go the last week of Halloween and the first week of the Christmas period so they could do both. and so that if we did go then our holiday and their honeymoon didn't intersect.
though as the months went on I got a text from Sian saying that Andrew thought it was a good idea for us to all go at the same time, because Sian doesn't get on any of the big rides (hulk etc) he wanted someone he could ride with, which is understandable. So a plan was forged that they'd book our dates and then if I was given the green light by Emma and Martin then we'd be in Florida at the same time. we have established some ground rules though, so we won't be hanging out every day just at certain parks, like universal and meeting up for some dinners here and there.

I found an amazing deal through Disney for Sian and Andrew, as they wanted to stay in a Disney moderate resort with upgraded DDP and 14 day tickets. they could get all this in budget with the added bonus of a $200 gift card and FREE memory maker which I had paid $168 for last time (I think it was that) so I rang her to tell her the good news.
she was well chuffed with that, however upon further investigation I discovered that they could actually stay at AKL for a couple hundred more what with the good deals, and it would still be within budget.
they talked about it and decided that they liked POR more than AKL even though it's a deluxe and they could save money and get a king size bed. So a day after Sian's birthday we booked for them to stay at POR for 2 weeks with upgraded DDP, king size bed room + 14 days ultimate tickets + Free MM + $200 gift card 27th September 2016 - 11th October 2016.
We just have to book flights when they were released in November 2015

The day Martin & Emma landed I shamelessly e-mailed them all the quotes I had compiled, as much as I felt terrible to bug them as soon as they got back in the country I was also really eager to get an answer as to whether or not I was going to Disney next year, partly because I needed to know if I needed to start saving money and partly because I am too excitable, I don't think either of them minded really.
So a few weeks later after me and Martin had talked and decided to start dating, Emma was chomping at the bit to book something! So we systematically went through all my quotes and realized that we could stay at the beach club for a little more than the price of a moderate plus we wouldn't have to pay to upgrade the DDP.
We had our hearts set on the idea so we did some research and decided we were going to book it! the only problem is I needed to submit my annual leave to our head manager before booking it, as I'd require 3 weeks off (anything over 2 weeks you need written consent from the head manager otherwise they have the right to refuse the holiday time and I'd lose a lot of money!)

So by the time they'd approved my annual leave it was the beginning of June! we sat down on 3rd June with the laptop, pad and pen and the phone in hand ready to ring Disney.
We rang them only to discover that they'd run out of standard rooms at the beach club and all they could offer us was a lagoon/pool view room which was going to cost another £1,000 on top of what we had budgeted! reeling slightly I said I'd have to call them back as it was a lot of money.
so then came the debate which took 45minutes! we were absolutely destroyed and I cursed work for taking so long to approve my leave... none of us wanted to admit the fact that we couldn't afford it, no matter how many times I totted up the figures on the pad in front of me. it was going to cost another £330 each which stopped it from being a 'deal' so as nobody wanted to say it I said it 'we can't afford it' Emma tried to justify the excess because she was so disappointed, but she has a better paying job than me and Martin so she could have afforded it where as my bills each month would mean that I would be living hand to mouth just to afford a holiday with no margin for error should the car need something or there was an emergency.
So I was the one who said 'We should be responsible adults' which is now not only the title of this trippy but it is also my phrase every time we want to add something extra to the holiday! I'm not usually the sensible one, but I need to think about the future... sad and boring I know, but as my nan says 'money doesn't grow on trees'
so with heavy hearts we rang back and booked 27th September 2016 - 11th October 2016 staying at POR with upgraded DDP + 14 day ultimate tickets + FREE MM + $200 gift card.
on the plus side we now owed £700 less per person so I tried to convince the others that this was the silver lining but I don't think I even convinced myself! so as of now we have paid the £150 deposit for us all and secured the accommodation and tickets I couldn’t wait to book flights!

[Fairygothmum]

We should be responsible adults - failing at being responsible

10th June 2015

Welcome back! this update is where things get interesting... So when I last left off we had all booked POR, Sian & Andrew were happy, but the three of us were really bummed out.
I kept thinking about it over the week after we booked, and I could tell that it wasn't just me that was disappointed with the outcome, it was like it had been cruelly snatched away from me and even though I was being a selfish child about it seeing as I should count myself lucky that I was able to go at all, I just couldn't shake the sadness.
All I kept saying is that we were being responsible and that mattered most, but I still couldn't help but check the website periodically to just fawn stupidly over the one that got away, how emo eh?!

Anyway short of breaking out a bucket of Ben and jerry's and a Bridgett Jones movie, so dramatic, I checked up on the website and decided to play devil's advocate and change the dates of our stay to see what happened.
Low and behold if we flew out a day later 28th September they had standard beach club rooms available for our entire stay for the same budget we'd originally agreed on!
My little mind whirred with the possibility... I quickly rang Sian, as silly as it sounds and asked how she felt about flying without me a day before. the reason I asked is because Sian has a fear of flying. Andrew does his best to calm her but she always prefers to have me with her as after nearly 28yrs together I know how to make her feel safe. and I didn't like the thought of her being distressed there without me.
I know she is an adult and it seems like I baby her, but we're so close that we do take one another into consideration with things like this, and I think if she was distressed about flying and I couldn't be there I'd end up being distraught all day on the other end, silly I know.
Anyway she said she'd be okay with Andrew and that I should go for it if it meant I could get the resort I wanted, as we both don't know when we'll be able to make it back so I should just go for it!

So next was texts to the other 2 to see what they wanted to do, Martin was dubious as he was still repeating our mantra of 'we should be responsible adults' whereas Emma was like DO IT! I was with Emma and did remind Martin that we had originally planned to spend that much so it didn't really make a difference, it was then that he pointed out to me that we had booked a holiday which was costing thousands after only being together for 1 week :P because we're crazy.
I reminded him that we had been friends for 3yrs though so it didn't count! it's not like we'd just met and didn't know each other well enough! though I did point out that at least the beach club had 3 beds should anything go wrong so we didn't have to share a bed unlike POR! (oh how right I would be eh?) so after only 8 days of booking POR I rang Disney and asked them to upgrade us, being totally irresponsible! as luck would have it though we got a lovely cast member who upgraded us to a garden view room at no extra charge as she said she didn't like the standard rooms because they only overlook the parking lot! thank you very much Mrs Disney lady!

that put the spring back in our steps and I couldn't stop grinning! so now we're staying 14 nights at the Beach club, 28th September 2016 - 12th October 2016 + 14 day ultimate tickets + FREE DDP + $200 gift card + FREE MM I was like the cat who got the cream.
Of course Sian was instantly jealous bless her, even though she was happy for us so a whole 4 days went by and finally she declared to me that her and Andrew had been talking and they wanted to upgrade to the beach club too! haha! talk about not being able to get away from them :P
So she made me ring them one day after she finished work because she's scared to ring people (considering she's a nurse!) and low and behold they too are now going the same dates as us with all the same things including a garden view room as they'd sold out of the standard so they had to pay extra for the garden view unfortunately, but they're now besides themselves with excitement!

they did have to give up the king bed as it was going to be over £1,000 for them to upgrade but I said maybe it wasn't a bad thing having 2 beds in the room, as sometimes Andrew snores and keeps Sian awake fidgeting so I said she could move beds if she needed to and she agreed.
So as it stands now we have upgraded both resorts and are completely over the moon! next up should be booking flights!

[Fairygothmum]

Shopping update!

So due to us booking our holiday so far out, there isn't really too much to do in the meantime... as we couldn’t book flights yet or ADRs, FP+ or really plan too much.
so what does a girl do when she can't progress with her holiday bookings yet? she shops!
I've tried not to buy too much stuff as I did buy a lot of things ready for our last trip and seeing as I am a bit of a clothing hoarder :P I've tried to dial it back a bit!

I did notice though, when looking back through some of the photos from the last trip, that I wore a lot of dark coloured clothing, as is my way. so I was determined to buy some nice light coloured clothing this time!
So I started with some nice PJ's from Topshop, I know a lot of people have brought the Disney PJ's from here but they are really cute a great quality (they should be for £22 each!) and they had a lovely Ariel pair, so as the beach clubs mascot is Ariel I just couldn't resist.



I also ended up getting the beauty and the beast ones because I do love the movie and they were so cute too.



I then did the entirety of my Christmas shopping... in July... I know that sounds crazy, but when you have to budget for an expensive holiday, it's easier to get things out of the way when you have the spare money to do so rather than struggling later on in the year.
plus it means come November/December time I will be able to sit back and relax whilst other people are stressing over what to get people and book my flights to Florida.
Anyway I digress! so I ordered most of my Christmas shopping online, including a dress Sian wanted from H&M (for Florida of course!) unfortunately they were having a 70% off summer sale, so a few sneaky things made their way into my basket for me.

Pale pink 'Twill' shorts - £4 H&M - so I can wear this with either my lilac coloured Tim Tracker T-shirt or my 'Living the dream' Cinderella castle Tee which has some of the same colour tones.



White with little anchors 'twill' shorts - £6 H&M - I mainly brought these because all my shorts are black/navy, also what with the beach club having a slightly (not as much as yacht club of course) nautical theme, I thought these were really cute and would go with most things.



Grey 'London rebel club' fitted crop top - £4 H&M - This was mainly an impulse buy, spurred on by the fact it said 'London rebel club' it's a subtle nod back home to our capital plus I am a rebel Also I have the perfect pair of high waisted blue denim shorts to wear this with. So I am not showing off my ‘Buddha belly’



I also had a £20 Boots gift card left over from my Christmas presents my uncle John got me, so I popped into boots thinking I’d get something for my holibobs, you know like sun cream or something sensible…. Well I came out with this Minnie mouse toiletry bag, even though I have hundreds of them at home, whoops! £9.99 – Boots

Something else I got, I again wasn't going to get! I was going to wait until we got to Florida before buying some Disney vans. the only ones I like and would wear from the collection were the ones I got and the villians ones, other than that I wouldn't really wear any of the other designs.
I wasn't too fussed about getting them to be honest and thought I'd rather wait till we were in the states and pay less for them, but having wide feet I wanted to try them on first as my feet always get rubbed by my converse so I wanted some comfortable slip on's for the parks in the daytime.
However when I went into all the different stores that stocked them in Brighton, it would appear that the ones I wanted were one of the most popular so they had no stock and probably wouldn't be getting any in for a while.
The girl at the vans store also told me that if they do come back in they wouldn't be the same design as vans always likes to change them when they re-collaborate with companies so the pattern I wanted might not be available.

I was gutted but thought 'Oh well, saves me money' that was until I checked the vans website and saw they'd just restocked them in my size, how fortuitous... so I decided to order them, using my early birthday money my mum and dad had given me, with the thought of if I don't like them I can send them back for free! needless to say I love them.

So here they are, the cream Minnie mouse print slip on vans - £52 from Vans



The very last thing I got for myself were a pair of flip flops from Primark, now I don't usually wear flip flops, mainly because the bit that goes in between your toes really hurt my feet. but I was thinking about how much we're planning to be in the pool next year and it really would be easy to have a shoe I can just slip on and it doesn't matter if my feet aren't completely dry.
So I saw they had these adorable sleeping beauty flops in my local primark and I couldn't resist! though I did for a week as I didn't have any money, and when I went back to fetch them they had been reduced to £1! result!



I then realized after using the minnie mouse toiletry bag for a weekend away that it wasn't big enough... so I ended up buying this cutie instead because it was bigger and I loved the 'contains fairy dust' caption... I need help!

Mickey back pack - £10 – Primark – this was actually a Christmas present from my parents. I don’t usually know what I am getting for Christmas but we popped up to London for the Harry Potter studio tour, and mum asked me to pick it up for her as they didn’t sell it in our home store (Brighton) it’s super cute and I needed a new bigger park bag.



Sally costume - $30 – Hot topic online – I got this as my Halloween costume for Mickey’s not so scary Halloween party. I had ordered this last time to be delivered from Walmart, but it never arrived  on the plus side I got this in the sale after Halloween for cheaper than it normally is.



Enchanted forest colouring book – present from mum and dad – I mentioned that I wanted one of the adult colouring books for the plane, as I get super crazy bored and struggle with anxiety and colouring helps so they brought this for me for Christmas



The Tim tracker vest - £20 – from spreadshirt – as you all know I love the haunted mansion, and I love Tim and Jenn so I really wanted to help them out and buy some merch to wear around the parks, you know in case I bump into them plus it’s a really cool design.

Light blue chambray jumpsuit – Boohoo - £10 – I really wanted a nice casual jumpsuit I could wear to the Mall or to the store (getting all American there :P ) as I am not always comfortable in shorts and a vest at the mall.



Anne Stripe Bardot Open Back Playsuit – Boohoo - £12 – I absolutely LOVE this playsuit! I’ve really gotten into playsuits recently, considering I am not the fashionable type. It looks so classy in and it’s really comfortable! I am going to team it with my strappy wedges for our meal at the boathouse.



Iron fist wishbone vest – Asylum clothing - £22 – Again this is one of my favourite things. It’s very sheer and delicate with a nice peal encrusted peter pan collar, so it can be super girly whilst wtill maintaining my alternative style.



White bikini – New look – £17 – I needed a new bikini as mine are all worn and stretched out. Like everything else I’ve picked up this was in the 70% off summer sale so instead of it being £40 (which I’d never pay for a bikini it was just £17 Bargain!



I also got a Halloween candy ‘bucket’ for our MNSSHP night as he was too cute to resist  I got him from work after Halloween for a bargain of 75p!



so that is everything I have so far, I am going to be ambitious and say that these are the only things I am going to buy myself for the next trip, as I already have so much stuff! but I think we all know that it's a little bit of a 'porky pie' but we shall see! until next time everyone I'll leave it here.

[Lalalou]

Looking forward to reading along! I fly out on the 27th! The Beach club looks like a beautiful resort to stay at. 😀

[Fairygothmum]

Originally Posted by Lalalou

Looking forward to reading along! I fly out on the 27th! The Beach club looks like a beautiful resort to stay at. 😀

See more...

Awesome! we've not got long now thanks for reading

[Unexpectedpenny]

Sounds like you have a great trip planned. We fly back on the 28th!

Very jealous of your upgrade to beach club, it looks beautiful there.

Love your shopping update, I said "I want that" to everything you've bought

[Fairygothmum]

Originally Posted by Unexpectedpenny

Sounds like you have a great trip planned. We fly back on the 28th!

Very jealous of your upgrade to beach club, it looks beautiful there.

Love your shopping update, I said "I want that" to everything you've bought

See more...

thank you we are so excited for the beach club! we've only ever stayed in value Disney resorts so I can't wait to see what their deluxe resorts are like

I'm glad you liked what I've brought. of course I've brought too many things but that's what holidays are for right!? Thanks for reading!

[Fairygothmum]

We're off to neverland! - How we're getting to Disney.

So here is the next update, it's going to be a little tedious so please bare with me! I've told you about the when and where, but I have neglected to cover the how a tedious task as I've previously mentioned but necessary none the less!
So originally I wanted to do an overnight stay at one of the airport hotels, so that we could have a relaxed morning and start the holiday a day early to boot! but Martin wasn't keen on the extra expense so I had to drop this plan straight away.

The next topic of discussion was then to get a taxi to Gatwick, again Martin didn't want to do this and wanted to save money by getting his parents to drop us off... I didn't take this too well and did the 'I'm putting my foot down!' girlfriend (at the time) speech which has resulted in me telling them to make their own way and we'll meet at the airport.
I know this sounds silly but I suffer from social anxiety with people I don't really know, and I've never spoken to his parents (hard to believe I know) so I don't relish the idea of being sat in complete silence for 45 minutes, it's literally my idea of hell... plus that would mean Sian and Andrew would have to make their own way as the car isn't big enough. I think it just makes sense to get a people carrier to share.

So as it stands; me Sian & Andrew are getting a taxi together like we did last year and Martin and Emma are getting their parents to drop them off, so we'll just meet at the airport.
Anyway! we're booked to fly with Virgin Atlantic as these are the only people we do long haul flights with. I know some people prefer BA to VA but we are personally huge VA supporters.
Now both myself and Sian & Andrew have only ever flown to Florida on the 13;00 flight because we've only ever been on the days where VA operate one flight a day. This time however we were sure we’d be on a day when they are operating 2 flights….. Though, as it turns out they’re not, :’( so we had to resign ourselves to the good old 1pm flight.

We went to book the flights on release day, 12th November 2015 through VA themselves as me and Emma are flying club members. Our flight budget was £500pp or under, but when I rang on release day the prices were £692pp which we were not happy with.
So I decided to bide our time as there was no way I was going to pay nearly £700pp even if the flights are with virgin and direct, so I kept checking relentlessly everyday on the off chance of catching a good price.
The went down to £618pp around December 2nd, which I still wasn’t happy with as it was £118 over our budget so I decided to wait even though the rest of them (bar Andrew) were getting antsy.

So I decided to check on 19th December just on a whim, even though I didn’t think the Christmas sale would have kicked in, but to my surprise I was getting a price of £575pp which I didn’t think was too bad even if it was £75 over our budget.
So I decided to play devil’s advocate and quickly punched in the Miles+Money fare calculator and to my absolute shock they were coming back at £388pp + 3,000miles. Needless to say I got super excited because I’ve never seen direct prices so low, let alone miles reducing something more than £30!
So there was a quick frantic phone call to Sian to inform her of the crazy deal, though what with her and Andrew not being flying club members they’d have to pay the £575 which she said she was happy to do. I then quickly text Martin who did the typical boy thing of not answering straight away! And I am the kind of person who will send you 50 texts in a row and feel no shame in this kind of situation so you can see how this played out :P ANYWAY I wanted to book it ASAP as I was worried it was a glitch or it was a timed offer so I wanted an answer.
Emma however was at work…. So I had to get Martin to make a decision for once, which he really hates doing, he’s one of those ‘oh I don’t mind, whatever you want to do’ kind of people urgh! So he managed to get into Emma’s flying club account (don’t ask how, it’s probably not legal :P I kid I kid!) and saw she had the 6,000 miles to cover their fare.
BUT this is at 3pm in the afternoon….. and she wouldn’t be home till after 6pm…. So I was going to get him to book it on their behalf, problem is they transferred their flight money to me, as I was going to book them for them.
And I couldn’t send the money back straight away as I don’t have online banking (due to it keep locking me out *sigh* ) and my phone app only allows me to send £250 a day to another person not the £1,000 they’d transferred for flights.

I’d rang him at this point as he was too darn slow at replying via text, so after a quick discussion I said I’d ring him back. The dilemma I had was that I had 15,000 miles in my account, which would have covered all 5 of us, but selfishly I know, I didn’t want to use them on everyone’s tickets as it had taken me 4yrs to accrue that amount of miles and I wanted to use them for a trip to California next year but after thinking it over for a while, I felt mean not helping everyone out.
So I rang Sian just in time before she had booked and said I’d use my miles to get them their saving on the flight as a nice thing for their honeymoon, she was very grateful as was Andrew, and then rang Martin back to say that I’d use miles on there’s too if Emma would transfer the 6,000 miles from her account to mine. (I didn’t find out till later that you had to pay £115 to do this, so needless to say I never got the miles in return)

So I rang up and booked them all for a total of £1,944 for all 5 of us  Anyway despite all this craziness, we shall be leaving London Gatwick at 13:00pm on 28th September 2016 with Virgin Atlantic and returning on the 12th October on the 17:25pm flight from MCO - LGW landing back at Gatwick around 6:30am where a taxi will be waiting to collect me Sian and Andrew, and Martin and Emma's parents will be waiting to collect them.

we've decided that we will be having a Frankie & Benny's breakfast before take off, as it would be rude not to that and we're all huge foodies

So that's it for now! hopefully it won't be long for the next update

[Fairygothmum]

Part 6 – Holiday extras:

So like we haven’t already spent enough money already, me, Sian and Andrew decided that we wanted to do Halloween horror night again this year like we did in 2014.

Now Martin & Emma don’t actually like anything horror related so to begin with I said I would go with Sian and Andrew, so I didn’t miss out on it, as I really liked it in 2014 and they could stay at the resort.
But Emma said she was up for it, and as Martin didn’t want to be left alone (understandably) he decided to come with us too. This will probably back fire on the night and he’ll regret the decision but you know.

Anyway, I mentioned that the last time we did HHN we stayed at the Hard rock hotel at the universal resort so that we didn’t have to go all the way back to Disney at 1am in the morning.
Add this to the fact that I said we got FOTL passes, and early entrance into the parks on each morning of our stay both Emma and Martin were sold!
I did debate whether or not £100pp extra for another hotel, when we were already staying at a deluxe resort as it is, was worth it…. BUT I did love the HRH and the FOTL passes so the debate was brief.

The thing was, Sian and Andrew couldn’t afford another £250 for a one night stay, which was really unfortunate as we’d have ended up having to wave goodbye to them at the end of the night and send them on their way.
So I kindly offered to pay for their room as their honeymoon gift, which the pair of them jumped at. So on December 28th after saving the money and also getting the money from E&M I finally booked the HRH direct with loews, as I didn’t want the hassle of having to pay the tax on arrival like with places like booking.com.
Once you factor in the conversion rate and the credit card charge it was around £105pp which was okay, I would have liked it cheaper but I did want to just get it booked ASAP so we didn’t have to worry about it later on down the line.
So we’re staying the 6th October – 7th October 2016 in 2 standard rooms. How did I know when to book for a HHN night you ask? Well it’s simple really…. I’m kinda like ‘Rainman’ as Sian likes to put it, so I am very good at certain things.
Some of those things being patterns and sequences, so I set about working out the sequence to the HHN dates and went from there.

Roll on more planning!