I've fallen a bit behind as I'm also back in school now (teacher). Also, I really get into the Olympics, so DIS time was severely cut.
I must try that Pina Colava on my next trip. It sounds fabulous. You've also tempted me with their pina coladas. Maybe I'll get a guy who screws up the order, too!
All the parks are so gorgeous at night! I've heard that the fireworks are pretty amazing behind the castle.
That's great that you were able to spend the day with your friend Skip. We all talk about our dreams, but it's awesome that he's actually going to live his dream on his boat. I admire people like that who make things happen.
That's too bad the HoJo was a dump. We've had pretty good luck with Priceline on finding reasonable hotels.
It sounds like the Disney Institue was a great experience. Unfortunately, I don't think my employer will send me there anytime soon.
Lastly, could your parents please adopt me! Seriously though, it sounds like you've got some cool stuff coming up!
I hear you on the having your DIS time being cut, I haven't been able to spend as much time as I would have liked lately either.
Yes, please do try both the Pina Colava and the Pina Colada. But if I could only choose one, I'd choose the colada. Yum!!!
That's funny about having our parents adopt you. Stephanie and I are both blessed with great sets of parents, and interestingly enough, that's not the first time I've been asked that. Hahaha!
Great trip report! Thanks to both you and Stephanie for sharing! I look forward to reading your views on Aulani. Hope all the upcoming trips are fantastic for ya'll!
Thanks!!! It was fun sharing the report and glad that you enjoyed reading it!!!
What a cute/fun story about the Disney bacon - sometimes it is the little things and just appreciating that your parents remembered and made the effort to go get it
Cool you got to hang out with Skip - looks like a fun day. And, wow, what a boat! So cool that he will be able to do something he's wanted to for a long time - definitely benefits at time of home schooling (including being able to go to Disney outside of regular school holidays
)
wow, scary with the HoJo - glad you are able to look back and laugh though
Awesome story about that worker at McDonalds - and great idea to send in feedback to them on him
Great summary at the end! I'll probably be PMing you as Employee Engagement is a big topic here - I just got an invite to go over feedback from our most recent Employee Engagement Survey
Happy Early 20th Anniversary to you and Stephanie! That sounds like a great trip! So is the cruise a one-way down to Mexico? That is cool!
Thanks for a great TR! Looking forward to the Aulani one
Disney vacations and home schooling are a great combo!!! We homeschooled Princess through the 6th grade and Buddy through the 5th grade. Up to that point, we had always visited Disney in the off season. I miss being able to do that!
Feel free to hit me up about the Employee Engagement topic. In some ways, that's how this particular trip came to be. I was asked to head up an employee relations type of committee a couple years ago. With an emphasis on increasing employee morale and retainment. I'm a HUGE fan of King Arthur Flour and how they do business. I looked on their employment section of their website to learn more about the benefits that they offer, and noticed that they are repeatedly ranked high in "The Best Places to Work in Vermont". I thought, wow, what does it take to get on that list? After a little digging, it turns out that it's the result of repeatedly having high results in their employee satisfaction survey (as administered by Best Companies Group.) To get ranked, you have to have at least 80% favorable responses on average to the survey questions.
Anyway, I suggest we do the same satisfaction survey... so we did. As a result, we have a bunch of areas that we are focusing on. Some of it it is directly related to communication and leadership... and that's how I was able to justify the Disney Institute training course.
I think the Employee Engagement course will help give us insights and ideas to help us move forward even further.
But like I said, the leadership course did have a lot of relevant information about values and vision, and being intentional about the culture in your organization. I purposefully left out a lot of details in this TR, because they encouraged us not to share too many details on social media. But I'd be happy to share more details with you sometime (Facetime, PM, or whatever) if you want
Thanks for the early 20th congrats. So grateful to have such an awesome wife!! The cruise is actually a round trip with just one stop in Cabo San Lucas. They have a 5 day cruise out of San Diego that's almost the same, but it adds a stop at Ensada. However, people don't rate that port too highly and we figured that we'd rather do a shorter cruise with a couple days at
Disneyland. (We also considered even longer cruises in the Bahamas and Western Caribbean. But after a lot of thinking about it, we decided that this would be a nice option. We've done two Bahamian cruises on
DCL, and we'll do another with my parents on Royal Caribbean next year, so going to the Pacific will be totally new and different for us. And I'm pumped!)
The first thing I asked for was for a employee satisfaction survey. How can you improve morale, if you don't know the pulse of the company?
)
And I'm happy to report that it was indeed a good use of company resources. 
