My family and I did a wonderful, fast and hot week at Disney September 16-24. We stayed at POP and had the hopper pass with the standard Disney Dining Plan. We spent 1 day each at HS and AK, 2 days at Epcot and 3 ½ days at Magic Kingdom. Kari helped us with booking things and was never frustrated with my constant questions. We paid for a portion of it using swagbucks and yard sale money. We definitely enjoyed going at this time but with the crazy Irma situation, we felt it was more crowded than in the past due to people moving from the week prior. Here are 8 things we did right and 5 things we did wrong.
What we did right….
1.) Memory Maker – My husband hates when I ask other families to take our picture, so I will always get the memory maker. I love the posed shots in front of the castle, the magic shots and the fun ride photos. If that is something that you can swing, I’d totally recommend it. I consider it my souvenir and an essential part of our vacation. It’s also a fun thing to check on your phone while you are waiting in line.
2.) Dining plan – we love having everything taken care of and just knowing that we can just scan our band whenever. Luckily, we got the “free dining” so that was even a bigger bonus. However, since our girls are such small eaters, if we had to pay out of pocket for it, we might not have used the dining pln. You really need to look at your eating habits. We had my SIL and BIL join us for the last 2 days and we paid for all of their meals and snacks at the food and wine festival. If we hadn’t done that, we would have had a TON of credits left over!
3.) Food and Wine Festival – we are not drinkers, but we make up for that with how much food we eat. We love going during the festival and trying all the yummy options. We especially loved the ginger pork from Japan and of course the filet from Canada. I also don’t think the girls would have enjoyed Epcot as much if we hadn’t always been having a snack.
4.) FastPasses – I booked our passes for 9, 10 and 11 (as much as I could) then we definitely made use of the rolling fastpass on the MDE app. As soon as we scanned our band, I was on trying to get another one. I did find that the app was hit or miss as far as getting a signal. We actually had to use the kiosks a bit because I couldn’t get the app to connect.
5.) Daily prep – for each day, I packed our clothes, including socks, underwear, hair ties and hair bows in a huge 3 gallon zip top bag. I had our daily schedule printed on our table so the kids could see what we were doing. I also had a tinker bell gift for the girls every day. This totally eliminated the need for a souvenir each day. This was especially helpful when I was laying out things at night because I could just grab a bag, dump it and hit the bed!
6.) Following the kids lead, even if it wasn’t our choice– My girls didn’t enjoy the classic Disney rides like the Haunted Mansion, Space Mountain or the Pirates of the Caribbean. My big girl loved driving the Tomorrowland racers and my baby would have ridden the carousel all day. Sometimes we have to take the kids lead and change plans to keep them happy.
7.) Sit down meals – I scheduled most of our sit down meals for lunchtime. I know that might not be the most popular option, but I knew it would be blistering hot and having a good hour long break every afternoon would be a nice break. We enjoyed having a good meal and a rest in the air conditioning each day.
8.) Using a stroller – My girls are 6 and 3 and seldom use a stroller at home. However, with the heat and the amount of walking I knew they would both need one. We walked 5-9 miles each day and the kids would have never kept up. I bought 2 cheap umbrella strollers off Facebook before the trip and just gate checked them at the airport. I loved how small they were, especially folded up in our tiny hotel room. I understand the draw of the nice big double strollers but they are just so big and clunky in the big crowds and on the bus. Plus, since mine were boring umbrella strollers, I never worried about them being stolen.
What we did wrong….
1.) Bringing snacks from home. We only brought some bagels and fruit and some snacks for the kids but since we had the meal plan, we definitely didn’t need it. We constantly felt like we were eating. I might still bring some fruit for quick breakfasts, (especially since I cannot pay $1.99 per banana at the food court!) but nothing else. We tried doing an amazon now order but Orlando was still recovering from Hurricane Irma and they didn’t have any fresh fruit options. We will definitely try on our next trip.
2.) Not camping out early enough for the fireworks- We ended up being off to the side (right under the Tinkerbell wire), so seeing Tinkerbell right above us was great, but we missed a bit of the projections on the castle. The new show was amazing and totally worth seeing. Since my girls are small, we only stayed 1 night, but it was great. We started camping out at 8 and it was already filled completely around the hub. Maybe next time we will start earlier. We also brought 2 tubes of glow sticks to keep the kids busy for an hour.
3.) Not enough pool time – my girls love to swim and I know that, but when we are at Disney it’s super hard for me to schedule down time to just swim or relax. I’m going to try very hard on our next trip to actually schedule a hotel day (but I can’t make any promises!)
4.) Underestimating wait times…not just for rides but walking from one side of the park to another, waiting in line for buses (especially first thing in the morning or right after fireworks), waiting in line to order at quick service locations and then waiting again to actually receive your food. Waiting at table service for your server to take an order, for you to receive the food, and waiting for the bill. Waiting in line to buy souvenirs, waiting at the front desk to speak to a cast member, waiting in line at the restrooms, especially after the fireworks, and waiting to use the rider switch option with the baby. Waiting in the big crowds during the parades (even though that was a great parade to see) and waiting in line to get a Disney photographer to take our picture. Basically, there is A LOT of waiting so plan accordingly.
5.) Using the bathrooms – So my littlest one used to be afraid of the automatic flushers, but she had been doing great. I didn’t bother bringing our post it notes to block the sensors, but apparently at Disney they are even louder than normal. Luckily we had several cast members that gave us some stickers, so we used those to cover the sensor. Also, any time one of us had to go potty, we should have made everyone go. It never failed that 2 minutes down the road, someone else had to pee. This was especially true on our last time at Epcot. The baby had fallen asleep and wouldn’t wake up to go once more before we got on the bus. Of course as soon as we got on the bus, she woke up and needed to go potty. Luckily Daniel Tiger on the iPhone and a borrowed diaper from another mom on the bus saved the day.
(Thanks Alisa!)