Hi everyone!
We got married in WDW in December and had our honeymoon there. We stay a total of 2 weeks at the Grand Floridian and it was AMAZING. It was my dream to stay there and I am so glad we did. First off, we did get some extras but they are not guaranteed.
When we arrived we were greated outside the resort by someone who greeted us by name...that was so exciting. She had all our check in info with her already and sat us down to go over everthing. She said our room was not ready but would be ready in a few hours. So, we took a brief walk around the resort and checked things out. One word, GORGEOUS! We were there during the holiday season and the hotel is just decorated beautifully. Every restaurant, store, even the bathrooms had different decorations and music! Truly magical. It was so incredible to stay at a monorail resort and come back to the hotel at night to see the tree & gingerbread house.
So, we then went over to Coronado Springs to meet most everyone else for the wedding (we had a small custom wedding...15 people). The men were doing their tux fitting. Now, I had all guys in the bridal party and started calling it the 'dudes party'. So....anyways, now, almost every guy forgot to bring a white t-shirt and black socks. At first I was upset because, come on.....I had to bring:
- my dress, tiara, cape, shaw, gloves, jewelry, 2 shoes, purse, muff, viel, pantyhose, slip, bra, etc. Not to mention other wedding day things. And these guys can't remember a white t-shirt and black socks. Goodness! Anyways, I then got over it cuz luckily some of our guests live right outside of Orlando and were able to get some from the store.
So, after the fitting my fiance and I went back to the hotel to see if our room was ready. It was and when we got to the room we were greated to a beautiful site. We were upgraded. We had a lagoon view room facing dead ahead to space mountain. I could see fireworks, main street station, the Polynesian & Cinderella Castle. I hear the parade and welcome event word for word. We got to see the electric water paegant from the room also....Really awesome! Our building was also right at the 2nd pool so all I did was take the elevator downstairs and out the door was the pool.
So, we did that then hurried to the boat to go meet everyone at MGM Studios for dinner at the Hollywood & Vine then off to Fantasmic and the osborne lights, then some of us went to the ESPN for the Eagles Monday Night Football Game! I didn't really were my minnie wedding ears until the rehearsal because I put them at the hotel when we arrived and people kept congratulating us on our marriage and we weren't there yet and it felt weird.
Well, we were at the Hoop Dee Doo Musical Revue for the Rehearsal Dinner and we had our ears on for part of it. His mickey top hat was just too small for his head so he wore it for me for all of 5 mins at the Hoop Dee Doo. Oh well! But our table did get special attention. Six Bits from the show came over and was messing with my uncle joes head (he is bald)...he was doing crystal ball impressions and buffing it up. Then he heard my aunt deb (married to joe) turn to him and say three words (she is a loud person) and he ripped on her for the rest of the night. I do have a picture of six bits leaving and passing by our table telling her to shhh! It was absolutely hysterical. He would signal to her on stage and everything. The best line he told my uncle was "I don't care how good the picture is, if the sounds is broke, I'm taking it back!" We all just died laughing!
Next is the wedding day....I will report on that later....best day of my life!!
Now for the first few days of the honeymoon, the guests were there. They all left at different times. But we ended up then having the full 2nd week to ourselves.
We realized this a little late in the honeymoon that we had forgotten to get the disney wedding/honeymoon pins from guest services (at any theme park). GET THEM RIGHT AWAY!! They are easy to wear especially if the mickey & minnie ears bother you and people will constantly congratulate you and you may get free perks. We got extra pixie dust sometimes. I ended up getting a free beer in EPCOT one time and we also got mickey confetti put on our table at the liberty tree tavern. We also got a free dessert at 1900 Park Fare at our last meal.
Some other things worth mentioning....on the wedding day, it rained during illuminations so for the food portion we got moved into an indoor location so I was kind of bummed about that. However when we got to EPCOT...winnie the pooh, tigger and piglet came out of this door and my dad screamed out winnie the pooh...so our EPCOT guides went over and asked if they would take pictures with the bride...so I have a handful of pictures with 3 characters. The other thing I did was after our MK photo shoot the following Saturday, we went back to the Grand Floridian and I asked if we could have our picture taken with Mary Poppins who sits outside of 1900 Park Fare. They allowed us to. She is my favorite Disney Character so I was thrilled.
Having 2 weeks down there was truly nice. Even though it was broken up quite a bit with wedding stuff we were able to do alot of the holiday things we never got to do before. So, we walked around EPCOT and did all the holiday storytellers...while having 1/2 yards from the UK!! I never got one of those before because there wasn't time to drink it because we were heading to a ride or show. But since we were walking around EPCOT for much of the day we were able to.
Make sure your hotel knows you are a honeymooning couple...you never know what they will do for you!! Please pm me anytime. I'd be glad to help you with honeymoon plans if you wish. I had such a fantabulous time on my honeymoon & wedding that I live to help others with it. If I remember other little things that we got I will post. We really relaxed more on the honeymoon and it was nice to do. We were both exhausted. Someday, i want to visit for 2 weeks with no wedding! Although, I have already been thinking about the vow renewal!!
Have A Magical Day!!