Wishes And Pixie Dust

Follow the journey of a Wisconsin family of 4 who relocated to the Walt Disney World area in July 2011

Monthly Archives: July 2011


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So What Does Mickey Say?

One of the blessings of being able to access social media 24/7 is the ability to instantly connect people with happenings as they occur.  It’s been fun to document our travels down to Florida using Facebook, Twitter, Gowalla and Foursquare.  It also provides a way for you to “follow us” and experience our journey as well!

Last Christmas we purchased at Walmart a mountable Mickey Mouse that utters different sayings, such as “Hiya pal!”, “Hotdog!”, and “Oh boy!  It’s going to be a great day!”  Before our trip we mounted Mickey on our dashboard, and Ben takes great delight in saying: “So what does Mickey say?” at different intervals.  It’s a cute way to include the Disney magic as we journey down to Florida.

Mickey in Chicago:

Mickey in Indianapolis:

It was a loooong drive through Indiana!  One of the interesting things we noticed involved the landscape.  Wisconsin, Illinois, and Indiana are pretty much the same, flat land, but once you enter Kentucky, the difference is noticeable with the huge hills, trees, and different terrain:

Just wanted to put a quick note in here regarding the tolls on the way down.  We paid $2.50 in Illinois:  $1.50 at Lake Forest, and $1.00 at the Edens.  We paid $3.50 for the Chicago Skyway, $1.50 at the Indiana Toll Road, and $.60 just after Gary.  $8.10 in total, which is quite a bit more than we remember paying two years ago.    We had put our toll money in an M&M tube, something that we’ve used in the past for the kids to do pressed pennies at Disney, and today remembered why it’s not such a cool idea.  All the quarters fell out of the tube!   Apparently the clasp is enough to hold M&Ms, but not heavy items like change.

We had a fun picture to share.  We saw this sign after we left the Kentucky Welcome Center:

Another Clermont sign!  And speaking of welcome centers, we do believe Kentucky has the absolute nicest welcome centers of any state we’ve traveled through.  It puts Wisconsin’s rest areas to shame.  😉

We wanted to note a couple of items that have made our trip so much easier.  These were mentioned in an earlier blog, but the book The Next Exit provides valuable information about what restaurants and gas stations are at what interstate exits, and it allows you to plan upcoming rest stops.  The other item is the Verizon Navigator (GPS) function on the iPhone.  Once you are located in a city, it gives you all possible options in terms of shopping, restaurants, gas stations, etc, and will navigate you there.  While very helpful on the way down, it will prove invaluable once we arrive in Clermont.  Verizon charges an additional $4.95 for their GPS service, but we find it easier and more functional to use than Sprint’s version.  (Currently we have phones from both providers.) The only negative we can say about it is the announcer’s voice is a little hard to hear.  As of yet, we haven’t figured out if there’s a way to make it louder.

The drive, while long, was so much more enjoyable because we were doing it at a more reasonable time frame.  And the postcard idea is working out brilliantly.  The kids are really getting into the idea, and it provides a great way for them to document the trip as well as work on writing skills.  But shhh, don’t tell them that!

Off to bed for tonight– be sure to follow us tomorrow as we journey through Tennessee and Georgia.


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On Our Way

Our morning started by seeing the representatives from Mayflower walking down our street to the house.  As it turns out, the city had illegally parked a dump truck at the end of our street, blocking the truck from coming.  It was straightened out shortly thereafter:

We were very impressed by how thorough and efficient they were.  Carpets were rolled down to protect the carpets, and the upstairs was emptied of the boxes first and brought downstairs. It took 4 hours to empty the house, and we were given a delivery date of July 30th.  However, the dump truck that blocked them this morning decided to block them this afternoon, and they backed down the street to leave.  It amazed us they were able to do that, given how big the truck was.  Our weight was estimated at 5399 lbs, and we came in at 5200 lbs, so we’ll be getting a small refund back in a couple of weeks.

We had arranged with our landlord to come at 3:00 but apparently there was a miscommunication, and we ended up getting a later start.  We stopped by Nick’s apartment on the way out, to say good-bye:

We decided to start a postcard scrapbook album with the kids.  At every stop we’ll let the kids choose a couple of postcards and when we arrive they’ll have a postcard book of their trip.  They can choose to journal on the back, but even if they don’t, it’s kind of a cool souvenir.

We arrived in Kenosha around 7:00 and after we checked in at our hotel we chose to eat at Hillcrest Family Restaurant.  Ben was just impressed with the service and quality overall (as we all were), and we joked that he should make a commercial for them.  🙂  He was really taken when he saw the following on the menu:

Afterwards we visited Harry & David to pick up some Moose Munch and went into the Pepperidge Farm Outlet Store but didn’t really see anything that jumped out at us, except the bread, of course, but we’re not going to try to transport bread to Clermont….lol

Overall, we think things went fairly well today.  A shout out to Nick and Jessi for helping us with the cleaning and removal of items; without their help we would have been much further behind.  Our car is absolutely packed full, and we’re tired, but it is totally all worth it.

Be sure to follow us tomorrow on Facebook and Twitter as we make our way through Illinois, Indiana and Kentucky.


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Craigslist Booty

 

 

Plans on the docket for today include finishing up packing and cleaning.  We decided to break open our piggy bank–the one we’ve been putting all our extra money and Craigslist and Ebay winnings into.  We’re here to dispel the myth that Craigslist is not worth the effort, and a few dollars does not make a difference.  We started listing on Craigslist soon after we made the decision to move this summer, and while it can be tedious at times: listing items, responding to emails, waiting for people to come (or not come, as the case may be), and repeating the process over and over again, we are here to say it is well worth the effort.

 
We expected to have approximately $200- $250 in there.  Our grand total is $382.70!  $346 of this was in bills, and $36.70 in change.  This does not include the $10 we had to “borrow” to give Catie a little extra spending money on her ski trip.  We may also be adding $15, as someone is scheduled to stop by this afternoon and buy our weed whacker.

We’ve decided to keep as many quarters as would fit in an M&M’s tube:  In case you’re wondering, it holds $22 worth of quarters!

The remaining change we will turn into a Coinstar and use to purchase our picnic goodies for our dinner on Friday.

Thanks for following along!  We will try to keep posting smaller updates as they happen. Tomorrow we lose our Charter internet, but we do have the hotspot to keep us connected to the Internet.

Two days!

 


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Approaching the End

Last week we received a call from our landlord, stating he was going to send us a checklist of things we need to complete if we want to receive our security deposit back.  He called this morning to check to see if we received it, and as of yet, we haven’t.  He then stated he would get it to us soon, but we’re not overly concerned with what’s on it.  This will be the fifth time we’ve moved in thirteen years, and we know what needs to be done, and are working on completing it.  It’s exhausting to say the least, but we are thankful the end is in sight.

Today we pulled all items off Craigslist, except for the lawnmower, and will donate them to Goodwill.  The kids’ mattresses were picked up today, and the television armoire was also picked up today.  Yeah!   Our garbage can and recycle bin are overflowing, as we tried to dispose of as much as we possibly could, so as not to leave the cans full when we leave.  (Pick up is Wednesday morning)

Today was Ben’s last day with Ray* (*name changed to protect privacy).  Ray has been Ben’s therapist since Kindergarten, and he has really helped Ben to grow and mature, and understand his autism.  We have had several therapists come and go in our household, but Ray has always been there for Ben; he has been his steady rock in a world that seemed always changing and unfamiliar at times.  Ben knew that no matter what happened; Ray would always be there for him. Over the years Ray went from being a therapist to one of the family, and really provided that Grandfather presence that Ben lacks.  We are so appreciative of Ray’s devotion to our son; there is no way we could ever express how much it means to us.   And so today, we said good-bye to Ray; there were tears, but Ben handled it really well.  God bless you, Ray, for making a difference in the life of our child.  ♥