Honeymoon Registry Alternative

A couple of years ago, Girl Scout Fiancée and I started going to a new and awesome dentist's office right in the same office plaza where she has her office. One of the nice perks of going to this office is that they reward you for successfully referring someone to their office, to the tune of a $100 gift card from any place you like. Recently, through a stroke of luck, Girl Scout Fiancée referred someone to the dentist's office and had the keen insight to ask for a Disney gift card. At the time, I thought that seemed like a great way to get some spending money for the parks during our honeymoon; little did I consider the greater possibility of using them as an alternative to the Honeymoon Registry.

When I see this, I see a delicious steak at Le Cellier.

As I learned through a little bit of Internet research, Disney gift cards can be redeemed for just about anything during a Disney World vacation--including food, hotel rooms, and park tickets. Since food and hotel rooms are going to take up a lot of our honeymoon budget, this seemed like a good use of any gift cards we might receive. Moreover, Disney gift cards don't expire and don't have any fees, so they're just as good as cash (except you can't be tempted to spend it elsewhere).

Due to the craziness of the holidays, some of our relatives didn't get a chance to send us any Christmas presents, and decided they wanted to contribute to the wedding instead (which, admittedly, is what I asked all of my family to do this year for Christmas). I suggested Disney gift cards as an alternative for these relatives, since the honeymoon registry does take a cut out of any gift, and close relatives have our address and can just send us things directly. For more distant relatives or friends, the honeymoon registry is still probably a good choice, because your best man/maid of honor/other family members can spread the link around easily and quickly.

Also, digital donations are pretty disappointing to open on Christmas day.

There are also some perks to buying Disney gift cards ourselves. Some stores let you buy gift cards at a discount, while our local Safeway (where we do all of our grocery shopping) occasionally runs a special where the purchase of gift cards nets you 5X reward points toward gas rewards. Seeing as how, when I fill up my tank, gas rewards have saved me upwards of $20 on the whole tank, that's a sizeable percentage of a gift card's value recovered right away. That doesn't even take into account the extra rewards points I'll earn on my credit card, which I wouldn't normally get just putting that money into our savings account. Of course, we have lots of non-Disney expenses coming up, so I wouldn't want to lock our entire wedding fund up in gift cards, but grabbing one or two here and there could be a nice way to chip at the mountain of expense instead of trying to blow it up all at once. I would say, though, that for anyone looking to do the honeymoon registry, Disney gift cards seem like they could be a nice alternative way to help pay for the honeymoon without going through a third party vendor.

Merry Christmas from the Disney Groom and Girl Scout Fiancée!

Today Girl Scout Fiancée and I would like to wish you all a Merry Christmas! We hope that, wherever you are, you're enjoying a day with friends and family, even if you don't celebrate the holiday. We had a good Christmas together today, and both of us received some cool Disney gifts; I got Girl Scout Fiancée a Mickey Mouse casserole dish, and she got me a Disney Infinity power disc album and several of the Toys 'R' Us exclusive power disc booster packs, which I'd been hunting for a while. I also put together a very "Mary" Christmas package for her, containing the new Blu-Ray of Mary Poppins, a boxed set of three of the original Mary Poppins books, and a Funko Pop vinyl figure of Mary Poppins. A friend of ours also got us each a few Disney Funk Pop figures, of which I have become a huge fan. So Happy Holidays, and thanks for stopping by!

Jasmine, the Rocketeer, and the Genie now adorn my computer desk.

More "Presents" from Disney

December has been a slow month for wedding and honeymoon planning, as faithful readers can almost certainly tell. Combining the fact that we have few decisions to make and that the holiday season is always packed-to-the-brim full of holiday parties, gift-buying, visiting friends and family, and scrambling like a madman to get all of my work done before vacation begins, I haven't had much time (or need) to update the blog. Fortunately, Disney sent us some more goodies in the mail for me to blog about, and since it's Christmas day and we are killing a little time, I might as well write a little Christmas blog about a present from Disney. So sit back and enjoy another Lazy Man's Blog: The Unboxing.

One cold and rainy day in December, the mailman delivered a box with the face of none other than Mr. Incredible (star of Pixar's best film, The Incredibles, a fact that is beyond argument for all rational minds) adorning its outside. I'd heard rumors that Disney was sending little packages out to many people that had a Disney vacation coming up, but it doesn't seem to be something that everyone is getting so I wasn't expecting this one. The image of Mr. Incredible, however, is merely a paper wrapper, and inside is...yet another box. The box inside that is actually pretty cool and sturdy, and I can see myself repurposing it for some of my gaming supplies. The top of the box is embossed with a Mickey Mouse head, as you can see in the photos below.

"Anyone who disagrees that mine is the best Pixar movie is getting a fist in the kisser!" says Mr. Incredible.

Boxes within boxes: the new Disney way.

Opening the inner box reveals a few more layers of goodies, including a helpful piece of cardboard telling you what's in the box, so that you don't miss anything as you dig down through the layers of the box like an archaeologist hunting for dinosaurs. There's also a loose piece of paper that reveals the true purpose of this package: to orient you with MyMagic+, Disney's new all-in-one trip management system tied tot he MagicBand technology that is rolling out in tests right now, and possibly in actual blanket use in the new year. Apparently, Disney really wants to make sure that everyone is aware of MyMagic+ and all of the upcoming changes, which is understandable for anyone who hasn't done any of their trip planning over the Internet. For Girl Scout Fiancée and I, though, this was all old news; we've been using the website for months, as evidenced by all of the previous posts I've made about dining reservations and trip planning. I guess whoever is in charge of sending out these kits has no way of knowing if I'm fully aware of the MyDisneyExperience website or not, so everyone gets one!

Like a terrible-tasting layer cake.

Thank goodness this was on top; the anticipation of waiting several seconds to see what lay within was killing me!

It was upon reading this that I began to suspect this was a package for the non-obsessed trip planner.

Below all of that is a manual that is your standard vacation-planning flyer, and it includes suggestions on rides, shows, and other things-to-do while on your Disney vacation. This was something I wasn't surprised by, as it's a pretty standard method for keeping you excited even though your vacation is still several months away. Honestly, I love getting mail from Disney, even if it's information that's readily available on the Internet, because it does succeed in keeping my excitement up. Moreover, the entire insert is filled with Incredibles images, hitting both my love of Disney and my love of superheroes over and over again.

Dash looks like he's ready to get away from his family...

The booklet is customized for our trip, including my last name on the front, information about our specific hotel throughout, and so forth.

The last page actually contains a refrigerator magnet.

At the bottom of the box was the real treasure: a Disney flash drive! When I saw this, I nearly cackled with delight. What could be on it? What is so important that Disney felt the need to send me physical media, something that is no small fee to manufacture, something that needed to be delivered by such a secure method that it couldn't be sent via e-mail. I feel like Ralphie when he gets his decoder ring, and just like Ralphie the answer to all of my questions is nothing but ultimate disappointment. After popping the flash drive into my computer, the autorun system brings up a web page, and then plays a pair of videos teaching you how to use MyDisneyExperience. That's it. The videos aren't even loaded onto the flash drive; it literally just connects to the Internet through your browser. There is no reason why this couldn't have been sent in an e-mail link and been just as effectively done.

Don't forget to drink your Ovaltine.

At least it looks cool.

And it glows bright green when you insert it into your computer!

Combining two more of my loves: Disney and Tron.

In the end, this package is nice but ultimately unnecessary. We're young, hip, Internet-savvy individuals, I'm plugged into the online Disney community, and even Girl Scout Fiancée has been hitting up message boards and MyDisneyExperience for months, so this didn't really tell us anything that we didn't already know. On the one hand, it's nice that Disney is reaching out to guests, whether they need it or not, to smooth the transition to the new system. And I'm ultimately very optimistic about our digital vacation planning future. On the other hand, part of me can't help but wonder how many other families are going to receive a package like this and feel exactly the same way. In the end, I basically got a free, awesome flash drive with a glow-in-the-dark Mickey head on it, so I'm going to view this as a nice souvenir that came packaged with a bunch of information I already had, and say I came out ahead. Thanks, Disney!

Cinderella's Royal Pain in the--hey there, kids!

At the end of October, I embarked on a magical quest. This quest had one thing as its goal: to secure dining reservations at many amazing restaurants around Disney World for our wedding. This quest was, for the most part, successful, though a quick glance back at the post I made on the first day of November reveals that I did fail to get one of my top-tier reservations, Cinderella's Royal Table during the Wishes fireworks show.

I typically prefer this particular kind of magical quest.

Over the course of the following four weeks, every morning during my post-run coffee-and-almonds breakfast, instead of playing some video games or watching a show on my tablet, as I would normally do, I headed upstairs to the office to hit the Disney Dining Reservations portion of the MyDisneyExperience website. My first stop on the information superhighway each morning was a search for reservation times for Cinderella's Royal Table, and each day I met with the same result as before: no reservation times appeared in the system for a late dinner the first week in May. This became my routine through most of the month, as the cast member I spoke to had assured me that I should have no problem securing a reservation once they were in the system; apparently, reservations for 2 are fairly rare at Cinderella's Royal Table, and they should have little difficulty accommodating us.

Finally, on November 27th, my search turned up something other than frustration and the creeping fear that, somehow, I had actually missed my shot at a reservation a while back. My first search turned up a reservation time at 9:15 for the day I wanted, some 45 minutes before the fireworks show is scheduled to begin.

Got me a reservation now, haters!

Let this post be a word of advice to anyone planning out a Disney trip and seeking to get a reservation that doesn't appear available at first: persevere! In this case, it's clear that reservation times for Cinderella's Royal Table had not yet been entered into the system, and didn't appear until nearly a month after my initial attempts. Throughout my explorations of message boards devoted to Disney Dining, I've also found a lot of folks saying that they snagged a hard-to-get reservation when someone else canceled, so even if you don't succeed at first, just keep checking back. Of course, it seems like taking advantage of the 180 days (+10 for resort guests) advanced dining reservation window is the best way to go, but if at first things seem full up, keep trying back.

Now on Twitter!

You can follow @TheDisneyGroom on Twitter now for updates from this blog. I'll also be checking the Twitter feed regularly, so it will be a good way to get a hold of me if you have any questions or comments that you want a direct answer to. I have no idea whether or not this is useful to anyone, but there you go.

Unboxing a Special Present from our Wedding Coordinator

It's been a busy week here at the TammRod Estate, with my brother and sister-in-law spending the week here in Seattle and joining in our big Thanksgiving event we have every year. Last weekend I returned home from a weekend of beer and board games in Blaine, WA (a trip that we've done nine times now!) to find a special package waiting on me, addressed to Girl Scout Fiancée and I both, from our wedding coordinator, Danny. I wasn't expecting anything, and in the package were a couple of presents from Danny to each of us. Since I'd never heard of anything like this on any of the other wedding blogs I'd read, I figured this might be something worth writing a post about. In the tradition of game unboxings that are all the rage on the internets these days, here's a brief photographic unboxing of our presents from Danny.

The box the presents came in wasn't anything special, but it was very obvious that it was from Disney right from the beginning. Even the exterior label was all fancified, albeit a bit incongruous with the very simple cardboard box.

The Disney Infinity card was not included; I just used it to hide our address.

After breaking the box's seal, the first thing that greeted us was a card from Danny. It's pretty cute and simple, but I think it's a nice indication of the sentiment. Disney is all about going above and beyond your expectations, and I think this sets a great tone for the wedding, even though it is still 5 months away.

I'll admit, when I read the word "treats," I thought it was chocolate.

There were two actual gifts in the box. My gift is a small coin that came in a pouch that fits in the palm of my hand. It's a little charm or token, no real practical use, but it did come with a card that has some suggestions for how it could be used. I'll admit, I'm a sucker for cool little trinkets like this, and definitely want to keep this in my pocket during the wedding and honeymoon.

I'll be like the Disney version of Two-Face.

Girl Scout Fiancée's gift is something a little more practical. Hers is a nice silky bag intended to hold the shoes she's going to wear at the wedding, with a cute little saying about Cinderella emblazoned across the front. Like my gift, hers came with a small card with some suggestions for making the wedding more memorable. This is one of those rare cases where I feel like the groom's gift is actually nicer than the gift for the bride, even though hers is actually more useful.

Useful silky bag vs. shiny useless piece of metal: you the the judge.

I fully realize that the gifts are just a small token in the grand scheme of things, but the fact of the matter is that Disney didn't have to send us these things. If we'd never received them, we wouldn't know the difference, but it's just a nice touch that shows that they want to make this as memorable as possible. Danny is so far exceeding my expectations for what a Disney wedding coordinator should do.

Guest Post at Magical Day Weddings

I've been out of town for the weekend, and in less than an hour I'll be heading to the airport to pick up my brother and my sister-in-law for their week-long visit in Seattle, which means this blog will remain quiet for a short while. However, there is some good news to console you. The totally awesome Carly Morgan asked me to write a guest post for her Disney weddings blog, Magical Day Weddings. Of course, I was honored to be asked, and more than a little surprised as I wasn't sure anyone other than internet bots was actually reading my blog posts. Anyhoo, Carly was nice enough to send me some questions as prompts for my post, and you can see the end results by clicking here.

It's the little things that add up.

We've finally reached the point in our wedding process where we're starting to actually buy things for the wedding, honeymoon, and the Seattle celebration, and I'm starting to realize that, if I don't stay organized, something crucial is going to get left behind. This is the great peril of traveling across the country for a wedding. Of course, the other side of this coin is that we're also starting to spend money out of the wedding fund on various little things, and, as it turns out, lots of little things add up.

Just as lots of little robot lions add up to become Voltron.

For example, like all good Seattleites, Girl Scout Fiancée and I are iPhone users (and, in fact, just this weekend the two of us upgraded to the iPhone 5S). I have a feeling that at Disney World we're going to be using our phones a lot, especially with the MyDisneyExperience app letting us do things like track wait times for rides, manage the FastPass+ and dining reservations we've made, etc. Not to mention snapping photos, entertaining ourselves while waiting in line, and the like. All of those things are battery drainers, so this week I ordered us a backup battery to take with us and keep in Girl Scout Fiancée's purse so we can throw a dying phone on to charge and keep it with us instead of trying to find a place to stop and plug into a wall outlet.

This image by Nathan Pyle illustrates the true gravity of the dying phone battery situation.

Then I realized I'm going to need at least three pairs of shoes for the trip. I'm going to have to bring some comfy walking around shoes for the parks, I'm going to want to bring my running shoes in case I do get motivated to get up and work out in the morning, and I'm going to need to bring my fancy shoes for the wedding. That doesn't even take into account that I might want to bring a fourth set of shoes, more traditionally dressy than the ones I'm going to wear in the wedding, for the nights we go to California Grill, Victoria & Albert's, or even places like Jiko or Yachtsman. What planet are we living on that I have to think about four pairs of shoes? Up until last week (when, for the first time ever, I finally got myself a pair of Chuck Taylor All-Stars) I'd worn the same pair of sneakers every day since last March. My friends and Girl Scout Fiancée would be the first ones to tell you that I'm about as far as you can get from being labeled fashion-conscious; fashion-unconscious might be better, as it usually looks like I was asleep while getting dressed.

Then there's the cavalcade of physically tiny objects that I have to remember to bring along. Annual Pass vouchers, bow tie, cell phone cables, earbuds, Magic Bands, FitBits, belt buckles, the wedding rings...all of these things fit in the palm of my hand, which means it's just that much more likely that I'm going to overlook one of them when we start getting ready to leave. I know it's mildly insane, but I feel like I should just start a packing list now, and add things to it over the next few months every time something pops up. I don't want anything to get forgotten, because once we step onto the airplane at SeaTac headed to our wedding, I don't want us to be doing anything but enjoying ourselves. I know the honeymoon technically doesn't start until after the wedding, but given the amount of planning, saving, and denying ourselves things like vacations and new toys* for the last six months, the moment we depart for Florida is, as far as I'm concerned, not only the beginning of the rest of my life with my wonderful Disney-wife-to-be, but also the first moments of a 15-day vacation, one that, by the end of April, I'm going to sorely need.

I'm on vacation, I don't care which elbow is in whose ear.

*Yes, I realize that I just said that we each got a new iPhone 5S, but thanks to the magic of Amazon.com's trade-in program, we got as much Amazon credit for our old iPhone 4Ses as the new phones cost. Given that we're going to be ordering a lot of the supplies for our Seattle celebration from Amazon, we'll be able to use that Amazon credit toward our wedding. So, we get new phones, and the same amount is put toward our Seattle celebration expenses. I'm going to call that a pretty good deal!

A quick outfit update

It's been a while since I talked about clothing options for me at the wedding, and for a reason: I don't have to have all of my decisions made for a long, long time yet. However, this year's Halloween holiday may have altered my thinking on at least one aspect of my outfit. Girl Scout Fiancée cooked up a great idea for a pair of matching costumes for us, and with a little elbow grease on her part (and a fortunately-timed JC Penney sale on red skinny jeans) she helped me put together this pretty awesome costume combo.

Without the ears, I actually look like just another Seattle hipster.

That photo is from a party the weekend before Halloween, but, for the first time ever, I also wore my costume to work that day, as we were going to a party at a friend's house that night. During the day, a few of my coworkers commented that they thought I pulled off the bow tie well, and while I'm sure at least some of them were being sarcastic, others weren't. I mentioned this to Girl Scout Fiancée and she agreed. A few days later, I received a few e-mails from her showing off vest-with-no-jacket and bow tie combos that other folks have been wearing in modern weddings. Then, she e-mailed me the piece de resistance.

Get out of my brain, Etsy vendor!

I love it. I actually, unironically, think it is totally awesome. I have no idea if I can pull it off, if it would look too silly, or if it's even a good idea, but I really kind of want to buy it for my outfit. I can always get the green-and-navy hidden Mickey necktie they sell in the Disney Store as a backup plan, in case it looks bad, but I think it's the perfect combination of whimsy and my personality (melding my love of Disney and my love of comics) that, provided I can pull it off, would really make me look and feel like a million bucks.

Rehearsal Dinner When There's No Rehearsal

This is a story about how plans change, and that's OK.

Once upon a time, Girl Scout Fiancée and I had a plan that involved getting our immediate families together for a rehearsal dinner the night before the wedding. Since her family is in Pennsylvania, and my family is in Tennessee, there haven't really been any opportunities for our families to meet one another. Even though there isn't really a rehearsal for the wedding (at least, not as near as we can tell; our wedding planner hasn't mentioned one), it's pretty traditional for everyone involved in the wedding to get together the night before, but again since we're having such a small wedding there isn't really a wedding party; it's just me, my best man, Girl Scout Fiancée, and her maid of honor.

Tiny dessert buffet not to scale with actual tiny wedding.

So, during our early planning, the first few days looked a little something like this: We would arrive on a Sunday, spend Monday at Universal Studios (Girl Scout Fiancée is dying to go to the Wizarding World of Harry Potter), Tuesday would be a day with our families (culminating in a "rehearsal dinner" involving taking our immediate families to the Hoop Dee Doo Musical Revue), and Wednesday would be the wedding. After that, it would be all-Disney Honeymoon, all the way. The family day would be the chance for our families to spend some time together, and then that night Girl Scout Fiancée are planning on spending the night apart, doing at least one traditional thing in this non-traditional relationship!

Oh, how naive we were! You see, the key ingredient we were forgetting in this whole schedule is that while we'll be following up our wedding with a dream honeymoon lasting a full ten days, during which time we'll be exploring the Disney parks at our leisure, and don't plan on activating our Annual Passes until the Friday after the wedding, our families would not be in a similar position. As we started talking to our families about making plans, we realized that our families would be on far more restricted schedules, as they would likely be heading home within just a few days after the wedding's conclusion. This is especially important for Girl Scout Fiancée's family, as (with the exception of her brother) none of her family has been to Disney World. This means, like Girl Scout Fiancée, they'll be exploring it for the first time, and want to make sure they have the most time possible to enjoy their vacation.

Truth be told, I think a big reason why we're excited about the Disney wedding is that, while it is a destination wedding, it's a destination wedding that is also a magical vacation. People are going to remember our wedding, and we want them to also remember that it was our marriage that brought them to the Happiest Place on Earth. Of course, that means actually giving folks time to enjoy the parks, and with Monday being taken up by a trip to Universal, that means the only real park-visiting days are Tuesday, Wednesday morning (the wedding is at 5:00 that afternoon), and Thursday, with a possible half-day on Friday if people have later flights out. Given that this would only give her family two and a half to three days in the park, it felt unfair of us to ask them to leave the park early on Tuesday to come to dinner with us, especially since the whole following afternoon/evening is taken up by the wedding.

Let's hope our wedding isn't this exhausting.

So we changed our plans last week, and have decided not to do a rehearsal dinner as any kind of formal event. Instead, we're going to relax that day, and as people become available (or arrive in town, as it's likely that several folks won't be coming in until the night before the wedding) we'll meet them on the Boardwalk for drinks, dinner, and hanging out. I still want to go to the Hoop Dee Doo with Girl Scout Fiancée, as it's right up her alley (gee, musical comedy dinner show, could you be any more built for her?), so that's now replacing the Spirit of Aloha luau on our itinerary. Gotta save something for the first anniversary visit!

Well, at least we won't starve to death.

This week, Girl Scout Fiancée and I passed a big milestone in our wedding planning: the 180 day mark. This is a big milestone because it represents the point at which you can make Advanced Dining Reservations. I've talked before about how some of the reservations I wanted to get for us could be tough to snag, and I've been spending a lot of time planning our itineraries and trying to sketch out a rough outline of what our honeymoon is going to look like. Getting all of the reservations I wanted was a big part of that, but I'll admit it's been fun, and I've enjoyed the time I've gotten to spend digging into my research and remembering (or discovering) things that should be exciting events and meals for our honeymoon. We're spoiled living in Seattle, and Girl Scout Fiancée has a refined palette, so the bar is set pretty high for food when it comes to the two of us; that made it all the more important that I get the reservations I'd planned out. So, during my research, I really focused on two things: finding the restaurants with the best food reviews, and finding restaurants that are going to give us good experiences that you can't get anywhere else. I'll talk more about these criteria later.

Scientific breakthroughs have required less research than I've done on Disney restaurants.

For those of you wondering what the process is like, let me break it down for you.You can make your Advanced Dining Reservations 180 days before the day you check into your hotel, with an additional 10-day window beyond that as a perk of staying on property. That means that, since we're staying at the Boardwalk for the duration of both the wedding and the honeymoon, I could make reservations for the first 10 days of our trip starting at the 180 day mark, getting some restaurants 190 days out. Since our trip is 15 days long, though, that means I could not book reservations for the last few days of our trip. Luckily, each day that passes moves the whole window forward by a day, so throughout the week I've been able to book reservations for subsequent days.

I got up early to make my reservations on the first day because I knew that we wanted one of the most highly sought-after reservations at all of Disney World: the Chef's Table at Victoria & Albert's, the fanciest restaurant in Florida, located in the Grand Floridian. The Chef's Table only has one seating each night, five nights per week, meaning that there are only five reservations available for an entire week. As you can imagine, these reservations go like lightning, and I've never seen a reservation time available when checking casually during the day. I knew that for that one, and for some of our other high-demand reservations (like the California Grill at the top of the Contemporary hotel during the Wishes fireworks show, or Cinderella's Royal Table dinner likewise during fireworks), I'd need to be on the reservation system right as it opened, which happens to be 6 AM...Eastern time. Yeah. Living in Seattle, that meant I was getting up at 3 AM to make my reservations. Do I recommend that for everyone booking honeymoon dining reservations? Not by a long shot...unless you want a high-demand reservation at a very specific time. Even then, the Disney reps tell me that, for a party of 2, even high-demand restaurants are easier to book, but for something like the Chef's Table, or guaranteeing a seating from which you can see Wishes, it's not a crazy idea, and it's less crazy if you're on Eastern time.

"No, Mr. Thompson, that laughter you're hearing is only the voices in your sleep-deprived brain."

Anyhoo, I think the best way to make your reservations is through the website, since it puts all the control in your hands. I made sure to log on a few minutes early to log into my My Disney Experience account, and then I headed to this extremely valuable link. That takes you to the Things to Do webpage where you can make dining reservations. This is a little trick I learned from someone on the Dis boards. Instead of going to each restaurant's page and searching for reservation times for that page, enter your meal criteria at the top (I usually entered the date, time, 2 guests, and then filtered it so I saw only the locations I needed (such as a park, or a hotel, or Downtown Disney) by clicking on the locations tab (it defaults to "All Parks and Resorts" but you can change it with the drop-down menu). Then, hit Find a Table, and wait on it to present you with multiple times for each restaurant. I found it was better to search for a specific time, rather than a meal, as how Disney defines their meal times in this system can be a bit..strange (and it's easier to get seatings during fireworks or at other very specific times this way). You click on a reservation time, confirm your guests and enter your contact number, and then it gives you a reservation number. I highly recommend writing this number down, even though it e-mails you a confirmation, as you may need this later.

For some reservations, you might need to put down the money for the event in advance. For example, two of our events (the Tomorrowland Terrace Fireworks Dessert Party, and the Hoop-Dee-Doo Musical Review) required payment in full in advance. Starting this month (I think?) Disney is also changing its cancellation policy, so that if you don't cancel a reservation at least 24 hours in advance, they hit you with a $10 charge to the credit card you used to make the reservation (reservations don't cost anything on their own, but they do make you guarantee your reservations with a credit card).

The architect of Disney's new reservation cancellation policy.

Once you've made your reservations, they then appear in your itinerary in My Disney Experience. That's pretty much it. All that's left to do is show up for them. It is also worth noting that some things can't be booked through the online system; I had to call the phone line to make our reservations for the Wild Africa Trek tour at Animal Kingdom, which, for the record, you must also pre-pay for in full.

There was only one snag in the entire process: Cinderella's Royal Table. I mentioned it above as a high-demand reservation, but I was stunned that when I tried to make the reservation I wanted (a late dinner, so we could watch the fireworks show from the castle) and found that no times were available, even when I logged on right as the system opened. I called the reservations phone number and the representative was unable to find any reservations past 5:45 PM. After a little digging, I discovered that dinner reservation times for May 2014 have not yet been put into the system for Cinderella's Royal Table, so now I have to keep checking every day to see if I can make the reservation I want. Here's hoping I can get it, as that's the only reservation I tried to book that I didn't manage to settle over the course of two days.

I want to go to there.

For those interested, here's the list of restaurants for which I booked reservations (with helpful links to the Disney Food Blog sites for each, if you want more thorough information):

• Kouzzina (I've never eaten here, but my parents rave about it, and Girl Scout Fiancée and I both love Greek food)
• Chef Mickey's (this is going to be our "kick off a magical time in Disney World" breakfast).
• Splitsville (never been here either, and I'm not sure we'll actually keep this reservation; this is a contingency plan for if our families decide to go to parks that day, while we don't plan on activating our Annual Passes until the Friday after the wedding).
• Cape May Cafe (character breakfast and farewell meal for our wedding guests)
• Yachtsman Steakhouse (after a hectic few days, I have a feeling I'm going to need a steak)
• Tomorrowland Terrace Fireworks Dessert Party (I figure, why fight the crowds; get a reserved area for viewing Wishes, and a delicious dessert buffet in the process)
• Coral Reef Restaurant (I don't know if I've ever eaten here; if I did, I was very young)
• Le Cellier (I almost didn't book this one, and it's definitely one on the chopping block if we find ourselves getting too worn out; plus, I'll have just had steak the nigh before; on the other hand, the food here is amazing)
• Victoria & Albert's Chef's Table (easily the #1 food experience I'm looking forward to)
• 50's Prime-Time Cafe (Girl Scout Fiancée seems very excited about this one)
• Sci-Fi Dine-In Theater (hoping this will be fast so we can get seats for Fantasmic)
• Jiko, the Cooking Place (I've never eaten here, but we're doing Animal Kingdom during the day, and it comes extremely highly recommended by, well, the Internet)
• 1900 Park Fare (This is more or less essential, given that it's a character breakfast with Mary Poppins, and Girl Scout Fiancée's famous "Chasing Mary Poppins through Disneyland" incident)
• Via Napoli (this one's on the chopping block if we're still full from breakfast, or it might overwrite another meal somewhere else)
• California Grill (another recommendation from my parents, plus the viewing of Wishes is supposed to be spectacular from here)
• Mama Melrose's (a lot of people online seem down on this place, but I've always had a good meal; admittedly, if we don't go to Via Napoli a few days before, this one may get canceled and replaced by Via Napoli)
• Biergarten (German food, and German beer, seems assured to make me happy)
• Liberty Tree Tavern (one of my favorites from growing up, but lunch only; I don't like family-style restaurants).
• Raglan Road (another place I've never been, but both my parents and the Internet agree that this place is bomb.com)
• Hoop Dee Doo Musical Revue (it's the last night of our honeymoon; how can we not end it with one of the best things to do outside of the parks in Disney World?)

Wow, when I put it in list format like that, it really seems like a lot. I wouldn't be surprised if some number of those end up getting canceled just for time constraints; any of the ones where we're eating a sit-down lunch and dinner in the same day run the risk of eating up too much of our day in the parks, and then there's always our one-year-anniversary trip to go back to anything we miss this time around.

I alluded to it before, but not every restaurant on that list was chosen for its fine dining experience. Sci-Fi Dine-In Theater, for example, is basically just burgers and hot dogs and such. But the real appeal of places like that, or Coral Reef, or 50's Prime-Time Cafe, or Biergarten is the atmosphere. I think what we want to get out of our honeymoon is more than just "Man, remember how good that food was?" but also a lot of memories of great experiences that we'll keep with us for a long time.

So much atmosphere, we'll need respirators to survive the honeymoon.

Whew, I think that's enough from me. For anyone else going through the process, my advice is this: decide what's important to you ahead of time (quality of food, expediency and time in parks, experience and atmosphere), and then sketch out a plan. If you find yourself with a few high-demand restaurants on your list, book 180 days out. If not, be more relaxed about it, but still make your plans. Don't expect to be able to just walk up to nice restaurants, especially if you're going during a busy season, but also remember that the reason I was so adamant about booking as early as possible is largely because A) I had a plan I wanted to execute, and I'm obsessive about that kind of thing, and B) one of the restaurants I wanted only does five seatings a week. For a lot of people, that kind of zeal won't be necessary, so you shouldn't freak yourself out if food isn't as important to you during your honeymoon.

Biscuits Locked & Loaded

Today I have just a brief update on the Seattle wedding celebration we're throwing. Over the last few months we've been in contact with the Seattle Biscuit Company food truck regarding having them come to our celebration to provide the bulk of the brunchy goodness we plan to have there. After a few rounds of back and forth, we've settled on a menu, and managed to negotiate a price that, while still higher than we'd budgeted for, is still doable. The big difference came when Girl Scout Fiancée decided she wanted us to supply the silverware and plates for the party ourselves. Girl Scout Fiancée had been doing some research into biodegradable wooden flatware, and managed to find some that we could buy in sufficient quantities to supply our party. In this, I will trust her; after all, she did make her living as a banquet chef for several years, and I trust her judgment when it comes to all things food-and-food-service-related.

So, this week we sent in our initial deposit, and now have the Seattle Biscuit Company locked in for our Seattle party. This is the last big piece of the puzzle for us with regards to our whole wedding/honeymoon/Seattle party trifecta, and now all that remains are little details and actually executing on our plans. Of course, this Tuesday will be the 180 day mark for our trip, which means that in a little over two days I'll be waking up at around 2 AM to start making the first batch of Advanced Dining Reservations for our trip to Disney World. More on that later...

Note Unrelated to the Wedding: This year, I was honored to receive the award for Board Game of the Year from the Game Manufacturer's Association's Origins Awards. This week, I finally received my trophy, and I couldn't be more proud.

Achievement Unlocked: Career Highlight.

Phoning it In

Not long after we were assigned our wedding coordinator, Danny, we scheduled a phone call with him to discuss our thoughts and options. This was at Danny's suggestion, I might add; he said that he was looking forward to building a rapport with us. Unfortunately, due to the realities of wedding scheduling, Danny had to postpone our call to this week, but that turned out to be a good thing for us. You see, despite the fact that we're still over six months from our wedding, we seem to have gone from super-high-energy-ferrets-on-Red Bull wedding planning to...something with less energy than that, which would cover just about everything that has energy.

Before the call, Girl Scout Fiancée and I were supposed to compile a list of questions that we had, so that we could go through them all during the call. At first, we just kept a document on my computer with questions that randomly popped up during our discussions, with no real method to it. As we got closer to the call, though, Girl Scout Fiancée had the great idea to print out the Escape Wedding Planning Kit document (a PDF that Danny e-mailed to us shortly after he was assigned to us as wedding coordinator) and then write our questions directly on that document. This was great, and something I highly recommend to other couples, as it helped us group our questions by topic, and ensured that we walked through every single page of the packet and identified places where we were confused or wanted to make changes.

This is what our questions would look like, transcribed onto a chalkboard.

For some reason, the morning of our call, my alarm didn't go off in time, and I was late going out for my run. By the time I got back inside, hit the shower, and grabbed a cup of coffee (also known as the Official Seattle Resident Morning Routine), Girl Scout Fiancée was already on the phone with Danny. Fortunately, since we had just gone through the packet the night before, Girl Scout Fiancée was already working her way through our questions, so all I really had to do was sit and listen, and interject where I needed clarification. Over the course of a little over an hour, we worked our way through the entire Planning Kit, every single one of our questions was answered, and we marked the answers down on the planning kit. We probably could have gone on longer, but Girl Scout Fiancée has started taking tap dancing lessons (for real; adults do this, apparently) and she had to leave.

Going into the call, I know Girl Scout Fiancée had a lot of concerns and reservations about the wedding plans, particularly about the floral arrangement (Girl Scout Fiancée wanted to make sure that she had some control over the colors, which she will), and the floral add-on for the cake (again, Danny assured us that we can put in requests for colors and see what comes back). I was also pleased to note that my question about the peanut butter cup flavor of cake came back with a "maybe" since our cake is likely to come from the Boardwalk Bakery, and that's one of the flavors they do there.

Now, make it white on the outside...

Here are some of the more important things we learned and clarified:

• We can bring our own cake topper, which we will give to Danny before the ceremony and he will see that it gets on the cake.
• We can bring some of our own decorations for the cake table, but not for the pavilion at Sea Breeze Point itself. Girl Scout Fiancée is going to provide some fabric bunting in our colors for the table.
• We can't bring our cake to the dessert party in Epcot.
• We can have a guestbook set up at the ceremony, on a table our wedding coordinator will arrange.
• We can arrange a towncar to take us to the dessert party, saving our limousine (included in the package) for the night during the honeymoon when we go to Victoria & Albert's.
• We can add an hour to the photography for $200, and we can (probably) have the same photographer for our dessert party. We can make requests for a specific photographer, but there are no guarantees.
• The cost of getting the Archival DVD of photos (the super-hi-res images suitable for very large prints) is $995 (!!!), while the High Resolution DVD (which is for photos up to 9x11) is $795. At that point, one of the Cinderella packages (which include the High Resolution DVD, and also a leather-bound, engraved and personlized wedding album) might be worth considering.
• We can request specific songs for the music during the wedding, and our coordinator will consult a database to see if they already have the sheet music. If not, we can provide sheet music for any songs we want to request.
• The timeline of the wedding starts 30 minutes before the wedding with me, and the guests, meeting in the lobby of the Boardwalk and then walking over to Sea Breeze Point. At about 15 minutes before the wedding, Girl Scout Fiancée will go to the lobby for photos, and then begin the walk to SBP for the ceremony, which lasts as long as it lasts. After the ceremony, we'll do cake cutting and photography.

One of the things that Danny suggested that we have to put some serious consideration into is the possibility of doing a "cocktail hour" following the wedding, where we would provide hors d'oeuvrs for our guests through Disney's catering. This would not only reduce the need for our guests to try and find a fast dinner (since they will need to meet at the International Gateway entrance to Epcot at 7:40 for entrance to the dessert party), but it would also give people something to do after the ceremony, and keep them from wandering off while photographs are taken. Between these small bites and the cake, that should tide people over before the dessert party. Of course, as with anything that sounds like a pretty good idea, there are always drawbacks; in this case, picking a menu that will work (between picky eaters, vegetarians, and gluten allergies, these days that is no mean feat) and the ever-present specter of yet another increased cost. If that latter hurdle can be overcome by reducing costs elsewhere, though, it seems like it could be a pretty good idea, especially if we plan to add on an hour of photography to get some photos of our families at the wedding site.

Apparently, food bribes are the only way to make sure this happens.

Thankfully, Danny seemed to understand my reservations about ballooning costs, and reassured me that many of these decisions won't need to be finalized until well into next year. That will give me the opportunity to evaluate our budget as things get paid for (for example, right now I'm probably way over-budgeting for our airfare, which I likely won't finalize until January or even February. Additionally, Danny said that as the process moves along, he can continually provide itemized estimates that take into account all taxes, fees, and costs, helping me budget more accurately. That should help me out a lot in the coming months, keeping me sane while still making sure the wedding, honeymoon, and Seattle party are as memorable as we want them to be.

Overall, both Girl Scout Fiancée and I feel a great deal more comfortable now that we've had our initial call. Danny was very nice, accommodating, and seemed genuinely interested in helping us make our day magical, and the information he gave us went a very long way toward assuaging some of the concerns that Girl Scout Fiancée had expressed after receiving the initial Planning Kit. For my part, Danny really seemed to be aware of my concerns about the budget, and though he did suggest some additions he seemed to focus only on those that would really improve the overall experience, and I never felt like he was trying to up-sell us on things that we really didn't need. My comfort and confidence is definitely at a much higher point than it has been in the last few weeks.

What day is it? Who are you people?

The last few weeks have been extremely busy for me; thus begins my apology to you for the long gap between blog posts. Though it is no excuse, I have to say that there really hasn't been much movement in the realm of the wedding and honeymoon planning. We had a phone call scheduled with our Wedding Planner for last week, but at the last moment Danny was forced to reschedule, owing to some other wedding commitment he had that week. This has given us an extra week to compile our questions for him, most of which revolve around the planning kit we received a few weeks back. Tomorrow morning, I'll be getting up at the crack of dawn to make sure I'm out for my run by 7 AM, giving me enough time to run, come back in, and shower before the call begins. I must make this brief, then, to ensure my good sleep tonight.

A few minor things of note: we sent out our save-the-dates for our wedding (only to the limited number of wedding guests outside of Washington), as well as the first wave of electronic save-the-dates for our Seattle wedding celebration. The wedding save-the-dates were physical and went out via snail mail; Girl Scout Fiancée made some excellent faux-luggage tags that went out in sturdy, but small enveloped. These save-the dates are a thematic preview of the actual wedding invites, which Girl Scout Fiancée and I designed together (again, making great use of my Photoshop wizardry). Alas, these I cannot reveal until they have gone out to the relevant parties, as I don't want to spoil the surprise. The save-the-dates for our Washington celebration went out through Paperless Post, and are of a simple design that I think looks classy. Unfortunately, despite sending out over 80 e-mail save-the-dates, less than five people have been kind enough to send back a response with their snail mail addresses thus far; soon, I will have to crack the whip.

These were designed by Girl Scout Fiancée.

To be perfectly honest, the largest thing occupying my attention regarding the wedding has been the budget. I know it's gauche to talk about money, but this is something I have to keep track of, since Girl Scout Fiancée and I are paying for the wedding, honeymoon, and Seattle party ourselves. Though I'd done some preliminary budget sketches back last year after we made the decision to get married at Disney World, I had gotten the creeping suspicion over the course of the year that there were a lot of hidden costs I wasn't taking into account, so I used Excel to create a massive interactive budget, not only for the wedding but for all of our finances through the end of 2014. I'm a pretty fair hand with Excel, and even set it up to automatically adjust our budget as I input more precise numbers on costs. The initial results were a little grimmer than I'd hoped.

Part of the problem is that I've just been estimating a lot of our honeymoon costs, especially food. However, since I'd spent so much time in the lead-up planning out our honeymoon (in preparation for the all-important Advanced Dining Reservation booking, which is less than two weeks away), I knew, more or less, every restaurant we would be eating at during the entirety of our stay. Armed with this plan, I then went through the menu for every single restaurant and built out a total meal cost for every meal, assuming that Girl Scout Fiancée and I have an appetizer, entree, dessert, and drink at every opportunity. I then budgeted in things like breakfast, coffee, and snacks, filling out our schedule with our costs for each meal, and built a much better view of how much we'd need to set aside for food. Let's just say my initial estimate had been about $500 too low.

I need all this for breakfast at Chef Mickey's!

That's the story of this budgeting process. Even though I thought I was estimating high on things, I've been consistently off of my initial predictions. For example, my original estimate for the food truck for the Seattle party was about $400 lower than it actually will turn out to be. I forgot to include the PhotoPass+ cost in my initial estimate of photography, which is currently $149 if you buy it more than two weeks beforehand. I forgot to include the hair & makeup cost for Tammie, and had under-budgeted for our minister's hotel room.

It's my hope that there are an equal number of areas where I've over-budgeted; I know for a fact that Girl Scout Fiancée and I will not have an appetizer, entree, dessert, and drink each at every meal, but that's how I budgeted. I've got a $500 entry in the budget line for Miscellaneous, which is for any costs that crop up at the last minute. Throughout this, the real X-factor for the budget is the Honeymoon Registry. I have absolutely no idea what to guess for that; do I not budget for it at all, and am pleasantly surprised? Do I plan for a conservative amount? What is that amount?

I much prefer this X-Factor. Way easier to understand.

If anyone out there has any experience with Disney wedding and honeymoon budgeting, I'd love to hear how far off your estimates were, and where the surprise costs came from.

Three-Quarters the Man I Used to Be

With apologies to Nirvana for the title, it's time for another of my (very rare) health and weight loss updates. Back in January, Girl Scout Fiancée decided that we wanted to look good in our wedding photos, which was the perfect excuse for us to undertake some changes to the way we eat and live that we should have done for our health a long time ago, but always seemed to put off. Back in May, I posted an update that I was one-third of the way to my 120 lb weight loss goal, having lost 40 lbs. I can now happily say that I've reached the next milestone, which is 80 lbs lost. That puts me two-thirds of the way to my goal, and only a couple of weeks behind schedule (though, admittedly, I had an ambitious schedule to begin with).

It's a bit weird to look at a photo of myself and actually like how it looks.

I'm also happy to report that Girl Scout Fiancée has been doing a great job as well; though I'm not foolish enough to ask my dear fiancée about her weight, I know that she's been doing a great job of sticking to her plan, going to the gym, and, together, we've been eating healthier. I'm really proud of her, and I know she is happy about her progress as well. Proportionally, she has lost about the same percentage of her body weight as I have, so we're both looking a lot better. Girl Scout Fiancée has also been having a lot of luck with a program called DietBet, which she has done repeatedly over the course of the last few months, hitting her goals and getting her share of the pot each time. She's tried to get me to join in, but there's something superstitious in me that believes that the moment I sign up for something like that is the moment I stop losing weight.

It can be tough to feel like I'm progressing at times, especially on those weeks where the scale just doesn't seem to move. I still see only my physical flaws when I look in the mirror, and since I still have another 40 lbs to go before I hit my target weight, I still only see a chubby guy staring back at me. Yet, when I look at photos of myself from the last few years, even I can see a difference. Plus, there's nothing like putting on a T-shirt you got your freshman year of college, only to discover that it is starting to get a little baggy on you. I'm starting to harbor a little hope that I might actually look pretty good in my wedding photos!

This Post is a Reminder to Myself

When I booked our hotel rooms for our visit to Disney World, I booked with a standard AAA member discount of 20%. However, traditionally, for the time of year when we are going, Disney has offered some even greater discounts for Annual Passholders. For some reason, I had though (perhaps foolishly) that having a Disney's Fairytale Wedding might grant us a discount on our hotel room, but it appears that this is not the case, as nothing we've received from DFTW so far has included anything about a bride-and-groom hotel room discount. There was some information about booking blocks of rooms for our hotel guests (and I suppose we would count for that, too), but it's looking more and more like everyone that is coming will be staying in a rental house in Orlando, as opposed to on the Disney property.

Fortunately, we'll be Annual Passholders by the time we arrive (and maybe we technically already are, since we have the green voucher cards mentioned in my last post). I'll need to keep an eye out for when the Annual Passholders' discounts go live for our visit dates, and fortunately, there's a great Mousesavers page that details the historical posting dates of discounts based on the timeframe of your visit. It looks like, for the last three years, the Annual Pass discounts for our stay window range from 20-40%, and are usually posted between January and early March. So, basically, this entire blog post is just a reminder to myself to check back starting in January for Annual Passholder discounts for the time of our wedding and honeymoon.