Walt Disney
World here we come, well of course by the time you read this we will be back
from there. Sorry, about that, but I
find it’s better to run posts about when we are traveling after the fact for
safety’s sake.
Anyway, I’m actually
typing this post on 4/4/2014. We are 48
days out from our departure date for WDW and I’ve got so much going on I’m
starting to get really excited.
While we’ve
always traveled on a shoestring budget to WDW, and everywhere else, this trip
we are traveling strictly on a cash basis, so it’s exciting, but a little scary
too.
We made our
reservations MONTHS ago for Ft. Wilderness campground starting on Memorial Day
2014.
Every other time we’ve ever gone
I’ve done all the leg work on trying to get the best deals, making reservations
and such, but this time I decided to let Naomi- Maclearn-at the Magic for Less
Travel agency do it for me. Why this
time? Because now I can get my “room
only” reservations I prefer through them, where before I had to book them
directly through Disney. A vast
improvement for certain.
Naomi is a
gem, and should you want to book, please give her my name, Charolett Jan
Patterson –yes I do get a reward for recommendations—honest disclosure
here. But that’s not why I say use Naomi. She found a discount on our campsite for us I
would have probably missed and it cut our 10 day trip cost down by over
$400.
Not only
that but she was very, very good at keeping us up to date for ADR dates
(Advanced Dining Reservations), Fast Pass + and Magic Band information,
refurbishment dates, park hours and so much more. Things I normally would have had to spend
hours and hours doing, she took care of.
She was also VERY patient with me.
So if you
decide to book a trip, please consider The Magic For Less Travel Agency and
especially Naomi. BTW they charge no fee
to do all this work for you.
So when we
first chose our dates we chose that time for specific reasons.
The first
was we were suppose to be credit card debt free by then. That has not came to pass, while we are close
Murphy has hit us with over $7000 worth of truck repairs, some vision issues
and other little things like the IRS wanting a chunk of money for the 2013
taxes, so our snowball has slowed way down, but it is still rolling. In fact by the time you read this we should
be 1-2 debts closer to being debt free.
So life is still good in that category.
The second
was a way to get MORE vacation time for our vacation. My guys had rolled over their vacation from
the previous year to some extent and would need to take that rolled over time
by a certain date. By taking those hours
on to the Memorial Weekend we got an extra day for vacation. Who couldn’t use an extra day at Walt Disney
World?
Since they
only work half days on Fridays normally we decided that would be our first day
of vacation, so that combined with weekends and holiday time would give us 19
days to enjoy ourselves. How sweet is
that? Even better it left us more time
to go back between this Memorial Day and 2015 Memorial Day to take full
advantage of our annual passes.
So back in
the July of 2013 we booked this vacation and despite all Murphy threw at us we
persevered on to a tremendous vacation to Walt Disney World for the first time
in eight years! It’s been a looooong
wait.
As soon as
we decided we were going I started my lists of lists. I was determined this trip would be well
organized, fun, and completely paid for in cash, at the lowest possible cost,
without spoiling the fun.
One of my
lists was on things we wanted to do/buy before the trip. Things like the truck repair—which went way
past the $1,000 we had budgeted for, to new shoes all the way around purchased
early enough we could break them in and walk comfortably at the park, two pairs
each.
Then we
started watching the sales, picking up non-perishable items like paper plates
and plastic silverware (no one wants to do dishes on vacation) after
holidays. It doesn’t matter that we are
going on Memorial weekend and we will be drinking out of Christmas disposable
cups that were purchased at 75% off in January, it is like Christmas in
May/June to us going on the trip right?
As time grew
closer I watched sales for foods for the camper, bug spray, sunblocker
etc. Stocking up as I went for the
trip.
We each
evaluated our wardrobes and determined exactly what we would need to dress
comfortably and nicely. We were strict
in our evaluations and only purchased what we really needed as inexpensively as
possible. We finished that shopping up
today. I’m pretty proud of us for being
that prepared this far out.
Another
thing I’ve been doing in the winter months is DEEP cleaning the house. The plan is to leave it clean so we can come
home to it truly clean. It also helps me
not be so tired when we leave because all the hard stuff will already been done
before that last week of packing.
Since we are
now just under 7 weeks out from our departure date preparation for the trip is
really kicking into high gear. Thus the
reason for starting this series of posts.
Like I said
today we finished up our clothing shopping.
We also got the part in to fix our ECV (Electric Convenience Vehicle)
while none of us are dependent on the ECV I have developed knee and back
problems that make long periods of walking almost impossible for me without a
lot of pain. My men suggested we get the
ECV out of storage recently for a short trip to Silver Dollar City and we
discovered the scooter had problems, as you
have already read about (if not, go here).
Even that
repair turned out to be done on a shoestring.
It needed two new rear caster wheels and all the quotes I got locally
were for nearly $60 a wheel plus another $10-$15 each for shipping, plus of
course the labor by the shop.
By scouring
the web we found a company Monster Mobility, that sold the exact wheels we
needed for $56 for the pair and only $10 for shipping! We ordered them on Monday and had them by
Friday. Great service, original parts
and a perfect fit.
The wheels
came today and it took my husband less than 10 minutes to install them. So my horse has new shoes. We’ll test run it later this weekend most
likely.
The first of
the WDW trip food was packed today too. Just a box of Rice Krispie Treats, but they
are a traditional item for our trips.
Many times I will make them myself, but our local Sam’s Club had them on
a great special and they were individually wrapped. The expiration date is far past our trip
date. So a box was purchased and
packed.
Once at the
park a few of those treats will go into either my belt bag or the backpack we
will put on the back of the ECV, for the pennies I paid for them today we will
have a good treat, that would have cost a high price in the parks. Granted they won’t look like Mickey Mouse
heads, but they will taste just as good. We’d rather save the cash on something
like that to spend on other things while there.
I have spent
the last couple of days working on a countdown calendar that is just a little
bit different and I will post on it complete with what materials I used and how
it was made in the next installment of this saga.
In the meantime, here are some articles I've written in the past on traveling to Walt Disney World and other places on a shoestring. Please note, while I may mention saving cash back bonuses on credit cards in these old posts, we don't do it. We stopped using credit cards in 2009 and have never regretted it. We've saved far more in interest than the cash back rewards ever gave us.
In the meantime, here are some articles I've written in the past on traveling to Walt Disney World and other places on a shoestring. Please note, while I may mention saving cash back bonuses on credit cards in these old posts, we don't do it. We stopped using credit cards in 2009 and have never regretted it. We've saved far more in interest than the cash back rewards ever gave us.
HOW TO PLAN A FRUGAL TRIP TO WALT DISNEY WORLD http://cjpattersonontheranch.blogspot.com/2012/01/how-to-plan-frugal-trip-to-walt-disney.html
PAYING FOR YOUR MAGICAL TRIP http://cjpattersonontheranch.blogspot.com/2012/01/paying-for-your-magical-trip.html
SAVING MONEY ON THE TRIP, GETTING THERE http://cjpattersonontheranch.blogspot.com/2012/04/saving-money-while-on-trip-getting.html
SAVOMG MONEY ON THE TRIP, AT THE PARKS http://cjpattersonontheranch.blogspot.com/2012/04/saving-money-while-on-tripat-parksfood.html
SAVING MONEY ON THE TRIP, SOUVENIRS AND OTHER THINGS http://cjpattersonontheranch.blogspot.com/2012/04/saving-money-while-on-tripsouvenirs-and.html
Jan who is
so excited to be headed to Walt Disney World again after eight long years in OK
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