A couple of months ago my parents were thinking about travelling to Florida and wanted to know if we wanted to go with them.
Of course I said yes! (Kyle did not want to travel, so he stayed at home with the dogs)
I debated whether this would be a surprise trip for the kids or if I would tell them.
When I started collecting information and checking out the
Disney website and making spreadsheets I decided that I wanted the kids to get excited as well. Katheryn was very excited about going to Disney and made up a wish list of everything she wanted to do. Nick wasn't that interested in anything
Disney but wanted to know if they had Ninja Turtles in Florida.
And they do...
The
Nickelodeon Hotel is just outside of Disney World. They have Ninja Turtles and other Nickelodeon characters. But you have to stay at the hotel. We had thought to change hotels through the trip (to a more adult hotel with a pool for my parents) but when the other hotel couldn't guarantee us an accessible room, we decided to stay at the craziness that was the Nick Hotel.
Finally the day came!
I had lists of what to bring and how to pack. Because Kyle didn't come with us, I had a letter from him saying he knew I was taking the children out of country. We got to the airport early and were directed to a special line and jumped the line. But we checked everything (walker got checked no problem) and Nick was in his wheelchair.
I am always a little nervous going on a plane, but of course I couldn't show it.
I had a whole bag of stuff to distract the kids with. Including some note pads.
I was worried that because we didn't pre-book seats that they would separate the kids. I talked to someone at Air Canada the night before we left and she said they wouldn't divide up the kids with people they didn't know.
Katheryn sat with Grandma and Papa.
And Nick sat with me. He wanted the window (about half way through they traded seats).
We got to watch the sun set as we were landing.
We arrived no problem. My luggage... a problem
For some reason my luggage was not loaded on the plane so we had to spend time at Baggage claim. We had also rented a minivan. When we were booking we did a lot of checking about what kind of vehicle we needed to get. In the end we booked a Grand Caravan (which is what both my father and I drive at home), it fit the 5 of us, a wheelchair, walker, 2 large suitcases (even if we only left with 1), 4 large carry ons and extra bags.
I had packed car seats (1 which was left in the luggage they lost).
We had a map and were ready to get to the hotel. The kids were still awake and excited!
After about 1 hour and driving around in circles, paying lots of tolls and driving through Disney World 3 times we finally pulled into Epcot and got directions to the hotel.
10 minutes later we were there!
The kids woke up in time to enjoy their bunk beds. And we all needed to get to sleep because it was right to work... I mean play... in the morning!
(I did not lose any of Nick's medical supplies in the luggage, we had a seperate carry on that we kept with us for this particular reason)
