Booking the Trip

The only picture I took in the car.

So last July I was talking to a friend of mine who happened to mention that AirTran was having a flash sale.  Being the only budget airline that flies out of our local airport I was game and took a look.  Round trip tickets from here to Orlando for less then a hundred dollars a pop was enough for me to call Jeff and we booked out flights.  Then for the hotel, luckily Disney was having a deal where if you stayed at one of their resorts you got a free meal plan, so we booked with the new Art of Animation hotel on the property and got a stellar deal.  Within a few hours I had spent quite a bit of money but felt very excited to take my kids to Disney World.  I love Disney.  I've not only been to Disneyland quite a few times but also worked at Disney world.  Last year I had hoped to send Max and Jeff together,  (because I was worried about Max getting jaded in school and not believing in the characters,) but we had to replace our furnace instead.  Luckily Max survived Kindergarten with his innocence in tact  and this time we were able to go as a family.  I worried about dragging Spike along, and we did debate whether or not to take him or leave him with friends.  I randomly called my parents and asked if they wanted to come along and was pleasantly surprised at how quickly they were game.  This solved the Spike problem.

So here's what everyone wants to know, what happened to the flight.  Part of me still doesn't want to talk about it cause I'm embarrassed, but at the same time I shouldn't be prideful.  (I do want to say that it isn't any ones business.  It was really annoying, the people who pressed me for details even when I said I didn't want to talk about it.  Hats off to my dad who I had to call quickly and in tears since he and my mom had already flown out.  That man didn't ask a question but just laughed off my brief conversation saying they would be there when we arrived!)  Somewhere along the planning stages I started looking at the arrival time of the plane as the departure time.  Yup, it was all me.  I made a huge mistake that cost us some money and two 18 hour drives.  I didn't realize it until the plane had already left.  Kudos to Jeff for never once saying one word or making one scoff to make me feel bad or place blame.  I really don't deserve that man.  I seem to be surrounded by the best men that this planet has to offer.  Within an hour of discovering my mistake we were in the van and headed to Florida. 

It was a long drive.  The kids did remarkably well.  I am glad that Mae was only four cause this took place on her birthday and an older child would have been a bit bummed to spend the day in the car when they were expecting a day at Disney world.  She was more then rewarded as the week turned into a birthday week.  If Jeff and I weren't such wusses we probably could have made the trip in one day, but neither Jeff nor I are night drivers.  Despite that we made good time and the kids behaved beautifully.  I also get to add Tennessee, Alabama, and Mississippi to my states visited list. 

Trip observations:  Memphis is a nasty looking city and I hope to never go there again.  The Mississippi river seemed a lot smaller then I remember as a teenager, or perhaps it is smaller down south then in Illinois.  Cotton Fields are awesome!  They are so surreal and it was one of those I'm in the South moments.  The bugs in the panhandle of Florida were so bad it was like a plague of locusts.  Some are permanently smashed into the front bumper of out car that no amount of cleaning has been able to get out 4 months later! 

We arrived late the next afternoon and spent a few hours at Disney world with my parents.  The hotel was a dream come true, but I'll talk about that in the next post.