Before the DREAM

Dale and I took a Disney cruise September 2008 for our 25th anniversary and had a Disney Fairy Tale Wedding (Vow Renewal); and NO kids! So now we wanted to take our kids on a cruise.

In February, 2010, we booked a family cruise for September 1, 2011 (17 months in advance) on the brand new Disney ship, the Dream, which would make her maiden voyage in January 2011. We booked this sailing, hoping it would be convenient to everyone's schedules (i.e. work, school, etc).

Finally it was time for our trip!!! ~ August 31st

The best place to start this TR is actually the night before. We were packed for the most part and knew that our daughters boyfriend (Danny) was taking us to the airport and then staying at our house to take care of our furbabies.

A little back history on our furbabies.

Abbey is a pug, she's 10 and diabetic and had eye surgery 3 years ago. She gets two insulin shots a day and eight

eye medications a day.

Furbaby #2 is Jade, our bulldog. She's easy going and only special needs is her diet.

Due to some confusion, there was a point after midnight that we weren't sure if Danny would be able to take us to the airport or care for our furbabies. With this little unrest, I was going to get up at 5am and call my sister if need be and drive our furbabies to her house (30+ minutes in the opposite direction). She was our original dog sitter, but thought life would be easier with bf staying here.

Thankfully, I did't have to do that.

So, morning arrives and we are getting ready. We go over things again with Danny and I stressed to not get worked up over Abbey’s EIGHT eye meds, just make sure she eats on time and gets her insulin.

Aubre is now upset, not feeling well, feeling like she is going to be sick (I honestly think she was ‘upset’ leaving her boyfriend for the week). Once we got on the road at 9am, she was fine and not feeling sick any longer.

We get to the airport and breeze through security. First stop was Dunkin Donuts which was in the next terminal. We took the long walk over, everyone got their coffee and headed to our assigned gate in our terminal. The kids stopped to get magazines before we got to our gate (and we sat while Dale ate his breakfast sandwich, his second breakfast for this day). They each walked out with three magazines.

I was a ‘little’ surprised that Aubre picked up a Bride magazine. I know she and Danny have been together for some time and ‘thought’ they might be ‘getting serious’ but not quite sure since she doesn’t ‘share’ much of her life.

We get to our gate and realize it’s going to be lunch time while we are in the air, so the kids each got something to eat and Dale gets MORE food. I swear, I don’t know how he doesn’t weigh a ton more, he can eat constantly.

We each had a separate reservation on Southwest (long story) so when I checked us in the previous day, I had IE; Firefox; Chrome and my phone Southwest app all open to ‘check us in’ at the 24 hour mark. Dale and I got upper A’s, Aubre and Ty lower B’s.

We were able to secure the emergency exit row again. This is now our favorite place to sit if available as the extra leg room is wonderful. So we all get boarded and are soon on our way to Orlando!