An Island Frame of Mind (A Cam and Luke PTR) Updated 5/22 About This Page:

[Cam22]

The past few days have gotten me into a Disney mood, and since we are now at 59 days until Disney Time, I’m thinking it’s time to start our PTR for the May trip. Yesterday was online check in and FastPass+ selection, guaranteed to get me excited about the trip. Right after we had accomplished those two tasks, I checked my e-mail, discovering that the Pandora charms and bracelets were again available at the online store, which matched a date given to me by a Cast Member on the Magic. I quickly began browsing the selections because in October every WDW shop that carried these was already sold out. The first two charms I selected, an Epcot monorail charm and Animal Kingdom charm were again sold out. The Pandora charms were also sold out on our December Cruise. Downer! I persevered, finally finding the Mickey parts charm and Cinderella castle still available. I haven’t received an e-mail that these have shipped yet, but I can’t wait to add them to my bracelet purchased on the cruise. Pictures will follow once these arrive. Then yesterday evening I helped with a fundraiser banquet for Care Net where I volunteer every Wednesday afternoon now. Friends of mine who were seated at the same table told me they are planning a surprise December trip for their kids and wanted some advice. We did really get to talk about Disney World for more than ten minutes, but we’ll get together just for some planning. Of course, I recommended a PassPorter as the perfect planning guide. My mood was ramped up again this afternoon when Luke and I saw a matinee of Cinderella. Incredibly magical!! Cinderella has been my favorite princess since I saw the original animated Disney version. She is the very first princess I remember. On our first trip in 1997, I was speechless and almost in tears as Stefanie and I met her before heading up to eat at Cinderella’s Royal Table. I’m ready to buy the Blu-ray right now.

Besides all our Disney motivators this week, we also experienced the return of warmer weather and sunshine. Luke and I have resumed our daily 5K walks outdoors, dodging snow mounds everywhere. In fact, the first couple of days, we had to walk in the streets because the sidewalks were still covered in the cold white stuff. When I worked at Care Net Wednesday, I arrived while there was still quite a bit of fog. It had been very thick all morning, and by 11:00 A.M. it was very visible. But as I came out of the sonogram room, I immediately could tell the world was different. Folks were laughing and energized. Our manager told us to check outside. So amazing how sunshine can lift your spirits. Luke has kidded me as I’ve begun some of the spring cleaning and changes. The spring/summer sheets are back on the bed (though I’m keeping the heated blanket a while longer as we might have lows in the upper 30s next week), I’ve swapped out fall/winter Bath and Body shower gels and lotions for beachy ones, the Easter bunnies are decorating the living room, and I’m gradually cleaning out cabinets, e.g. the master bathroom cabinets and drawers were purged today.

So if it’s Spring, it’s time for a Cam and Luke PTR. Let’s begin with when, how long, and getting there. From 2003 – 2013 we annually made our trek home in June. I was a teacher, Stefanie was a student and then school volunteer, so we needed to travel when school was not in session while Luke had to schedule around ending one school year and beginning another. Because leaving Disney World was rough on Stefanie and because Luke’s two week break was best spent out of town to avoiding being called in, we settled on the first two weeks of June. That did mean buying more DVC points, but we can’t complain about that. Our first trip back without Stefanie was hard on me in so many ways, and I remember telling Luke as we waited for our DME bus that I was totally spent have 13 parks days. We discussed trying for slightly shorter trips of 8 to 9 days. Since it’s just the two of us now, we usually, at least when possible, stay in a studio. That change, in turn, has allowed us to make two annual trips back. When we were planning our trip for last spring, we realized that we didn’t have to wait until June as we are both retired now. May seemed like a good time of year weather-wise, and we’d be able to finally experience the Flower & Garden Festival and still not miss Star Wars Weekends. We’ve made every SWW since 2003, meaning this year’s will be our 13th SWW. We enjoyed last May’s trip so much, we decided that for the foreseeable future our spring trip would come in May.









Some of you who have read other of my trip reports will know that we have always flown to Disney usually out of Nashville, Tennessee, though we’ve also flown from Evansville, Indiana, Louisville, Kentucky, and even our own little Owensboro, Kentucky airport. But this December in an effort to save money when we added a third trip and cruise, we drove down over two days and back in one. I was a little worried that lots of sitting would aggravate my arthritis, but instead the trip wasn’t bad at all. We liked driving, except maybe through Atlanta. Luke has asked for a Disneyland trip for his 55th birthday this October. Airfare to Los Angeles costs a bit more than to Orlando, so driving down in May would allow us to save points to put towards our flights to and from Disneyland.

Soon after we returned last May, we looked over the calendar, knowing we wanted to go back at nearly the same time. We also realized that we’d like to add one more day, staying 10 days. In the end we settled on Monday, May 11 through Wednesday, May 20. We will actually leave home on Sunday, May 10, which happens to be Mother’s Day, stopping for the night in Valdosta. That will leave us a short ride to WDW on Monday.

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