Disney World, Here We Come! Batten Down the Hatches!

Well, it's done.

My "every two years cause that's the only way I can afford it" Disney trip is BOOKED!

I am beside myself with excitement. We'll even be there on my birthday! That makes me beside myself squared! I can't wait til June!

Yes, yes, it's corny. Shut up. I'm over the moon, mad crazy excited.

I absolutely love going to a place where literally, I forget all the bad stuff that goes on in my day to day life. The minute I step foot on Disney property, it all melts away.

There truly is something magical about that place.

I'm a Disney person through and through.

I know of people that their reaction to someone booking a Disney vacation is "eh, whatever" and that's fine.

But I'm not one of those people. I'm hardcore Disney. I'm more of a theme park and history buff than movies and TV shows and whatnot.

For those of you that aren't, don't bother telling me what you believe is wrong with Disney. I don't care. I've heard and read it all.

I still love it.

As most of you know, I actually was a Cast Member there from Feb '95 to Dec '95. I worked at Tony's Town Square Restaurant in the Magic Kingdom. It was the one modeled after "Lady and the Tramp".

I LOVED working there. I met one of my most favorite people on Earth there. Hiya, Mimi! Love you! Can't wait to spend 5 fabulous days with you and the boys! So friggin' thrilled and excited.

Anyway, I've adored Disney ever since then.

LOML's first trip was back in 2005. She was 5 and had a blast! She remembers most of the trip. We went back when she was 7 and she remembers more of the trip than I do!

And...she totally gets Disney. I have managed to successfully turn her into a Disney fan.

Thanks to the lovely people at the IRS, we get to take our "every two years cause that's the only way I can afford it" Disney trip this year.

However, we're BARELY able to go. My return wasn't that great and due to the fact that I'm working a job that pays me just over HALF of what I was making before uprooting my life and living here, we haven't been able to save like we were before. I always tried to save $100 a month (for 18 months) in preparation for our trip. That way, we don't have to worry about scrimping and saving and taking Pop-Tarts to eat for breakfast and not eating at sit down restaurants and all that.

But, not this year. This year, we're able to go, but we will definitely be taking Pop-Tarts and snacks and whatnot.

Now, the past two times I've gone, I've done all the booking myself. Joined AAA to get a reduction on my room rate and purchased the tickets through the Disney store in the mall.

We don't do the dining plan because we eat so light. Seriously, mom, LOML and I can share a giant turkey leg, some fries and a couple of drinks and still not be able to eat it all. Plus, sitting down for a meal takes away from park time, y'all. Can't have that! We're not there for the food anyway.

So, since I've been blogging, I've "met" lots of nice people here and found out that Jen over at The Daily Mish Mash is actually an authorized Disney travel agent! How great!

In a casual tweet to her one day, I asked if she could give me a quote.

And......she said sure!

I threw out my (affordable) dream trip at her and asked her what she could do for me.

And wow! Did she not disappoint. She came through like gangbusters for me.

As most of you with televisions know, Disney is offering 3 nights free with a booking of 4 nights.

However, this wasn't long enough for us. We needed a longer stay.

The numbers I was coming up with were do-able, but EXTREMELY tight for our spending budget. I mean SERIOUSLY tight. Almost to the point where we would be miserable due to lack of good food and barely any souvenirs.

The numbers Jen came up with?

Totally rocked!!!

Don't get me wrong. It's still tight for us. Still need the Pop-Tarts....but, we were able to get 9 nights and 8 day park hopper passes for far less than what I could have gotten on my own.

Because she saved me some money, I was then able to book the Princess breakfast in Norway (my fav meal there EVER...the food that's served at the table is typical breakfast food...eggs, sausage, bacon, biscuits, etc....but the buffet that serves Norwegian food? TO DIE FOR!!! Smoked salmon, capers, onion, tomatoes, lefsa, etc......oh, man, I'm drooling just thinking about it!), get one sit down dinner at The Brown Derby in DHS and one sit down lunch at The Brown Derby in DHS (can you tell we like The Brown Derby?).

Before her numbers came back, that was not a possibility. And that would have bummed me out.

Not only did she come through on the numbers, but she also put up with my crazy requests.

She had booked my ADR (advance dining reservations) requests and gotten them for the days and times I had requested.

Then, I e-mailed her needing to add on 3 people (Mimi and her boys).

She did that for me lickety split.

Then, I e-mailed her again needing to add on one more person to that ADR (Mimi's mom is going to join us that day!).

With a smile in her Internet voice, she got right back to me with just a slight change in time and was able to get it done!

THAT, my friends, is customer service.

And best of all, the quote and all the work she did for me DIDN'T COST ME A CENT!

Since she's an authorized Disney travel agent, she gets paid by Disney...not the customer!

It's a win, win for everyone!

Because she did such an excellent job for me and performed some incredible customer service, I told her I'd do a blog post highlighting her and her skillz.

If you want to book a Disney Vacation through Jen, you can go here to her site: Enchanted Escapes.

She also does regular vacations to through the same site. But click here for regular vacations.

You can tell her I sent you. It doesn't get me anything, but it's still nice to drop my name.

You can feel important then! LOL!

I'm taking requests now for anyone that wants me to take a picture of a sign with their name on it at a specific place within the Disney parks.

My friend Jaymie wants me to take a pic at the Animation Academy.

I plan on posting them here on the blog after the vacation when I do a trip wrap up.

Later,

Mama Dawg