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Renting a stroller at Disney World

Posted on January 12, 2010 2:55 pm by TheAngelForever

Last year, at about this time, I was working on plans for our first family Disney World vacation in May. Having been to Disney World countless times in my life, I knew there was a LOT of walking involved each day. My youngest was going to turn two during our stay, so he would need a stroller to rest/nap in during the long days. What I wondered about was my oldest son. NHL was 5 during our trip. Walking at the mall for long periods of time often makes NHL tired thanks to low muscle tone. Even without the low muscle tone, Disney walking is like nothing else you will ever experience. I knew we had to figure something out.

At first, we were going to rent a double stroller for a week at Disney. If you paid out the week, it was slightly discounted. Thank goodness I turned to the DISBoards and stumbled onto an amazing post about stroller rentals. Everyone on the post said the same thing – go to Orlando Stroller Rentals. So I went to their website and looked at the city mini double stroller. It seemed perfect since it could hold up to 100 pounds of children within it. Several of the Moms on the DISBoards mentioned that they had 5-7 years old that fit into it without a problem. I made a phone call to Orlando Stroller Rentals and spoke with Shannon, the owner. She was fabulous and answered all of my questions.

Why did we go with Orlando Stroller Rentals? Here are a few of the reasons:

Strollers are delivered to your resort/location of choice. It was waiting for us at luggage at Pop Century when we checked in.
The cost is significantly lower than Disney rentals. Was happy to give support to a small local business.
Everyone talked about how uncomfortable and small the Disney double strollers were. I did not think my youngest would be able to rest – no less have room for my 5 year old son.
Picture after picture showed children asleep in these city mini double strollers at Disney World
We would be able to take the strollers from the resort to the park and back. Disney strollers must stay in the parks only – so we would not have them to travel around property or shop at Downtown Disney.
When we were finished with the stroller, we simply returned it where we had picked it up and Shannon would retrieve it.

Our Thoughts:

We loved the double stroller from Orlando Stroller Rentals. It made our trip even more magical. We had a place for both of the boys to rest comfortably. Much to our surprise, our 5 year old seemed to use it more than our 2 year old who wanted to walk with Daddy. The stroller was easy to push around the parks. We had plenty of room, even at Pop Century to fit it in our room at night. With a few tries, opening and closing to take on and off the Disney buses was simple. Both of the boys would sit under the shades to keep cool and relax as we walked from area to area. In addition to this, at night when the kids were exhausted from a day in the heat they could sleep as we wandered back to our resort. Another plus is the stroller was easy to pick out in the mass of strollers parked outside of attractions. They were not only bright orange, but Shannon also has a laminated name badge attached to the stroller.

Our experience was so wonderful that when we were planning this quick trip to Disney for the Social Media Moms Celebration, I immediately called Shannon to see availability of strollers. Lucky for us, we were able to get one for the time we will be there. This will be fabulous not only for our time together as a family, but also when TechyDad is flying solo with the boys.

Now I just need to walk up a storm and get my arms ready to push the boys in the stroller that we will be renting from Orlando Stroller Rentals.

Disclosure: This review of Orlando Stroller Rentals that was done on my own, I received no compensation. We paid in full for our trip in May and are doing so again in February. This post was written to let others know about this wonderful business and service they provide to families visiting Walt Disney World.

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customer service Disney jsl looking back nhl photos Product review travel vacation

Disney on the brain

Posted on January 9, 2010 11:09 pm by TheAngelForever

If you have been following my blog long enough, you probably know that I am a HUGE fan of Walt Disney World. I have been there so many times over my life that I can not keep track. (Mom and Dad were not too helpful either.) I actually opted to take a family vacation to Disney World last May in lieu of going to BlogHer ’09 in Chicago. The deals were just too good to be true and the timing was right for us.

I sat and watched as BlogHer ’09 came and went. Then, everyone was talking about TypeAMom while I sat at home. This week, I heard rumbles about a Social Media Mom Celebration that was going to take place at Walt Disney World.

HELLO!!!! Could anything be more perfect for me as a first time conference? I think not! For more information, please head over to the fabulous post on 5 Minutes for Mom.

TechyDad and I talked about it as I waited for my invitation to arrive. Thursday afternoon it came. Without looking back, I booked the event. That night, we decided to extend our stay at Disney. Why not, right? We’re already paying for the airfare and who knows when we may get another chance to spend time in Orlando. By Thursday evening, I had plane tickets for all four of us and we were trying to get quotes on hotel/tickets/dining for the rest of the week. Friday, the little guy and I went to a travel agent and I put in a call for quotes from AAA. This morning, TechyDad and I tried out the new (for us anyway) online Disney advanced dining reservation system. Even with short notice, we were able to get some very nice Table Service meals. One favorite from our trip in May and a few new places for dinner and character breakfasts. Once those were made, we went back and booked the rest of the lodging/dining/park admission. In 24 hours the hotel booked up the standard room, so we had to go premium. Not thrilled about that, but we love Pop Century.

As I sit here sipping some decaf coffee, I am in disbelief. This is so unlike us to plan and go someplace so quickly. Still, as you will read on the 5 Minutes for Mom website, it was too good to pass up. TechyDad and I are looking forward not only to Disney World, but also meeting in person so many people that we have "met" online over the last 3 years. Another interesting item to note, my 3 year Blogoversary is days before we leave for this trip. Hmmm. . . perhaps that is what I should say I’m celebrating while visiting.

Now I am going to relax for a few days as more details come in about the #DisneySMMoms event. Then I will try to figure out what we need to pack for the trip. I have been to Disney a lot, but have never been in February before. This is all new to me. So in advance, I apologize if Disney is on my brain a little too much, but well I’m a kid at heart and can not wait!

P.S. Is it bad that I never finished blogging about our trip in May? Guess I may have to finish some of that up, especially JSL’s actual 2nd B-day while we were there.

Disclosure: Our family was provided with a discounted price for the days of the actual event. The additional days for our surprise Disney vacation were purchased at our own cost since we are long time Disney fans. All opinions about this event are my own and are not influenced by monetary compensation.

Categories:
Disney fun TechyDad travel vacation web fun

Lego mania at Disney World

Posted on September 24, 2009 9:29 am by TheAngelForever

It is hard for me to believe that it has been almost four months since our family vacation to Disney World in May. To say that I would jump at a chance to go back is an understatement. Sad to also admit that I never finished blogging about our Disney vacation. Something today made me think of the trip.

Both of our boys love to build. We have lots of Lego items in our house and at Nana and Papa’s. We started with quatro blocks, moved up to duplo sets and NHL received a set of regular legos for his birthday over a year ago. NHL is intrigued with building bigger and more recognizable items now. I think some of this has to do with our visit to Disney World.

When we went to Downtown Disney on JSL’s birthday we wanted to get each of the boys their own stuffed friend. A trip to Disney World, especially their first, would not be complete without this. Here are the boys with the friends that they picked.

NHL wanted Dumbo since he was enchanted by the ride at the Magic Kingdom.

Meanwhile JSL fell head over heels for Pluto, or as he calls him "Pup-pup" on this trip.

Both of the boys were happy and excited to hug their new friends on the way out of the Disney store.

After this we decided to go to the next store over which is all Lego products. It is absolutely amazing. Here are the boys outside with some of the Lego statues. JSL had to do a double take because he was not sure about the dogs. Eventually they both checked everything out.

Once we were able to pull the boys away from the Lego people and dogs, we went into the store. They both immediately ran to the first display they saw. Here it is:

We looked around at everything for a little while. Then we spotted an area outside where the boys would build with Legos and go on a nice sized playground. Looked like the perfect place for them to get some energy out before going to lunch.

While the boys played here I went to look at another store to see something. When I came back I saw that our now two year old was quite the daredevil – Oy! He kept doing this over and over again.

Soon it was time to find a place for lunch. As we wandered back toward a few places we stopped to check out more of the Lego creations. First up were the underwater creatures.

Check out this intimidating looking guy:

Next up is the dinosaur that was a big favorite of our boys.

And last, but certainly not least was the sea creature that is in the Lagoon. We have photos of this one from our honeymoon as well. Love this one as a sentimental favorite from my many trips to Disney World over the years.

It was a beautiful day for JSL’s 2nd birthday and we enjoyed strolling around Downtown Disney before swimming at Pop Century and going to the Magic Kingdom for dinner at the Crystal Palace.

So, let me ask you. . . .

IF you had unlimited Lego opportunities (no cost) and the time, what would you build with them?

I know I can not wait to see all that our boys will make as they grow older and learn to love Legos even more!

Categories:
birthday Disney fun jsl nhl photos play time vacation

The Pop Century Tie-Dyed Cheesecake experiment

Posted on August 2, 2009 10:13 pm by TheAngelForever

Back in December, we did a lot of research to try to figure out which Disney World resort to stay at. Several of the Disney message boards had amazing posts with information about anything and everything you could ever want to know. Seriously, they had information about the rooms, pools, buses, and even the food. Best of all, they had photos of items that helped to lure us into staying at the Pop Century Resort.

One night, JL and I were sitting at the laptop reading about the Pop Century. At the time our reservations were at a different value resort on Disney property. We read about all of the activities that took place at Pop Century each day, especially for kids that were NHL’s age. Then we looked at photos of things from the food court. We were immediately intrigued by something called tie-dye cheesecake. The photos were amazing and we sat there almost drooling. Several days after this we changed our reservations to Pop Century Resort.

When we went to Disney in May we knew that we HAD to try the tie-dye cheesecake. Of course, we did just that one morning as part of our breakfast splurge.

We had this colorful, delicious treat twice while on our week long vacation. . . so did my parents. A short while ago JL did a search for the tie-dye cheesecake on Google. He found a recipe mentioned on Slashfood.com that compared itself to the cheesecake at the Pop Century Resort. Today we went grocery shopping and JL mentioned that he wanted to try making this. It seemed like the perfect time since his birthday is tomorrow. So we bought the red velvet cake mix, got bricks of cream cheese, and bought food coloring just in case we needed it.

When we got hom JL and NHL baked the 9" round red velvet cake in our never used springform pan from my bridal shower. It also made a dozen cupcakes with the extra batter. Then I switched out and made the cheesecake part. We opted to only do four colors this time around. So I mixed green, blue, purple and yellow for our experiment. Here is the cake just as it was heading into the oven to bake the cheesecake part on top of the red velvet cake.

Now this colorful creation is baked, cooled and chilling.

Tomorrow we will slice in to test and see how our colorful creation tastes when we have it to celebrate TechyDad’s birthday.

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Submitted as part of Grace’s Kitchen Friends on Feels Like Home.

Categories:
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Favorite quiet moment at Disney World

Posted on July 28, 2009 10:09 am by TheAngelForever

Welcome to this week’s Blog Hop. The theme this week is Favorite Kid Photos. You can have one or more of your favorite photos of your kids, grandkids, someone else’s kid or even YOU when you were a kid. Funny, precious, heartwarming… your favorite!.

This theme made me brain storm some to when we were at Disney World at May. I recalled one of the few quiet moments of the trip. After a long full at at EPCOT, where we stayed to see the fireworks at the end, the boys fell asleep in our rented double stroller. We all laughed that they were definitely brothers since the poses were almost identical. Several times they both moved about and came to the same resting spot.