Pre-Trip "I don't care what happens, I will not cancel this trip" Pre-Trip report - Jan 2019

Well here is the who, what, when, where, why...

Who: My husband, Aaron, who is 32 years old and hates the sun and heat. My son, Joseph, who will be 4 and loves Toy Story, The Incredibles, and The Beast and he also has a big crush on Belle and Ariel. My daughter, Sadie, who will be 2, and loves cats (meow meows), dogs (row rows), ducks/birds (quack quacks) and Minnie. Of course, I will be there too! I just love everything Disney! Here is a picture of us at Dollywood during our vacation last month to TN (excuse my son's messy face and shirt, he had a pirate face paint earlier in the day and we just finished eating ice cream).
fam.jpg

When: January 26-February 1.

Where: All-Star Movies.

Why: When my son was 2, I promised him that when he was 4 we would go to Disney, and he didn't forget! We have never gone on a vacation with just the four of us before...we have gone to NJ with my family three times and to TN with my in-laws since we started having kids. We have had two Disney trips booked in the past that I had to cancel. The first one was because I became pregnant with Sadie and I didn't want to not be able to ride the rides and then I had a trip booked for this September but then my in-laws decided that they wanted a big family vacation in the mountains and my husband works for a small company where he only gets one week paid vacation so he picked his family over Disney lol. So I told my husband "I don't care what happens, I am not cancelling this vacation!" so I don't care if I end up going alone....someone in our family is getting to Disney World!!

What: Hoping to get to MCO around lunch on Saturday so we can do something fun the first night we are there. We are doing this as cheap as possible so standard room at Movies and 5 day base park tickets and if a good deal comes out we will do the dining plan. We plan on doing MK twice and the other parks once. Hoping for ADR's at Chef Mickey's, Akerhus, Be Our Guest (dinner so my son can meet The Beast hopefully), T-Rex (husband's request), and maybe one more place.

I will have plenty of questions because things have changed so much since our Disneymoon in 2012. Suggestions on where else to eat? QS and TS? Must do's with our littles? Is Be Our Guest the only place to meet the Beast? Suggestions on room requests for AS Movies?

Thanks!
 
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Cetta

Cetta

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
DH and I have decided we will not tell our children until December/Christmas that we are going to WDW. My son talks about it every once in a while and we have been watching a lot of Disney movies to get them familiar with the characters. We decided not to show them too many videos of the parks, so that they can be surprised and in awe the whole time. Of course he has seen Cinderella's Castle and other park photos but we are trying to limit their exposure on youtube and stuff like that. Both of our kids had birthdays this week, 7/15 and 7/17 so now that birthdays are over we can focus on Disney planning!
Our ADR's open up in 11 days, so we have decided where we want to eat. After reading a couple trip reports I decided to add Mama Melrose to our dining adventures. I can't wait to try the mac n cheese and steak entrée. We plan on making rope drop every morning and being in bed around 9-10pm every night. With the parks not opening too early and not staying open late, I think we might be able to get away with not going back to the resort for nap. The kids can nap in the stroller, plus my son goes without naps often at gramma's house.
Saturday: hoping to arrive to MCO around noon. I am planning on making ADR's at Chef Mickey's for around 6:30 pm, watch the fireworks from wherever we are at the moment, take the monorail to MK, then take the bus back to our resort. If we get to AS Movies early and can do some resort hoping around the MK resorts before our ADR then that's what we will do. I know my kids would love riding the monorail or riding on a boat because who doesn't love that?!? The last 4 trips I have taken we always ate at Chef Mickey's on our first night, so I hope to keep that tradition with my kiddos. Any estimates on how long it takes to get from MCO to AS Movies?
Sunday: Animal Kingdom Day! Start our day at the Safari, enjoy FOTLK, FP+ for pandora boat ride, I have a feeling we will be spending a lot of time in Dinoland, ride the train to RPW, I hope to catch ROL, maybe watch Nemo, and watch the UP bird show (DD loves birds). We plan on eating at Restaurantosaurus and no ADR's today.
Monday: Magic Kingdom!! Lunch at BOG (my son loves the Beast, so my plan is to eat here for lunch today and then dinner on Thursday so he is surprised when we meet the beast after dinner!), We will probably spend most of our day in Fantasyland because we got kiddos!
Tuesday: Hollywood Studios! Pretty sure we will head straight to Toy Story Land like everyone else! I will FP+ TSM because all of us can ride, and letting DH & DS stand in line for Slinky and get a child swap so I can ride later. My plan is to take DD to Disney Junior while DS & DH do star tours. I also plan on getting DS signed up for Jedi Training (DS's third word was Boba so we are big star wars fans). Lunch at Backlot Express so we can get the Star Wars Chicken & Waffle and cupcake with dinner at Mama Melrose. I know that kids will love Fantasmic and fireworks to end the night of course.
Wednesday: Epcot! Plan on going to Soarin, LWTL, and the Sea's first. Late breakfast/early lunch at Akerhus to meet the princesses! afterwards we will ride Frozen and meet Anna & Elsa. I plan on spending the afternoon, evening walking around the world and doing the kidcot spots. get to SSE at some point. Maybe fish & chips for dinner in the UK or wherever we are.
Thursday: Magic Kingdom again! I hope to do whatever we missed and whatever we loved from our first day at MK. Lunch at Pecos Bill sounds good to me. Dinner at BOG so we can meet the Beast! of course watch the fireworks again.
Friday: My plan is to head to DS as soon as we can, have lunch at T-Rex Café, and then head back to AS Movies to get the Tragical Express to MCO so we can head home. I am hoping to get a flight around 5-6 ish so we arrive back in Indy around 8-9pm and get home around 10ish. We have Saturday and Sunday to rest at home, so I don't mind getting home late, DH might have another opinion.

How do you decide what park you are going to when the park hours are not even out yet? It is driving me crazy that I cannot see the hours for the parks for the week we are there!! I am currently going on touringplans.com and Kennythepirate.com to decide where to go. Is there a special secret place where I can get the hours before Disney publishes them? I don't want to make all these ADR's and then find out the hours are not what I thought they would be.

thanks for reading along!
 
Cetta

Cetta

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
I woke up early on July 30th while everyone was still sleeping to make ADR's for our trip. I got everything I wanted within 15 minutes of the times I wanted! All this talk about hard to get ressies had me worried but it all worked out!
Saturday-Dinner at Chef Mickey's at 5:55pm
Sunday-Breakfast at BOG at 10am
Monday-Dinner at Mama Melrose at 5:45pm
Tuesday-Breakfast at Akerhaus at 8:15am (pre park opening!)
Wednesday-no ADR's
Thursday-Dinner at BOG at 5:30pm
Friday-lunch at T-Rex at 11am

We have been discussing taking a late flight on Friday so we have all day Saturday instead of half a day. Flight prices keep changing every time I look and I just don't know when I should book them. We have also been talking about doing the dining out of pocket without the dining plan since we think it will save us some money since we won't be drinking any alcohol and I'll probably bring snacks with me into the park anyway. Still in planning mode so things change because I am always thinking about our next trip!
Has anyone used Shipt at Disney World?
I use it at home and work for small grocery orders when I don't want to leave the house but I wasn't sure how it would work at a resort.
 
Cetta

Cetta

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Well it is getting more real now! Only 109 day! We got the plane tickets so there is no going back! Saturday, January 26 landing at 7:20pm to Thursday, January 31 leaving at 9:10pm. Not as long as we wanted but it fits our budget. We plan on spending Sunday resort hopping with brunch at Chef Mickey's so the kids can meet the Fab Five on the first day! Monday will be Magic Kingdom, Tuesday at Hollywood Studios and Epcot and Thursday at Animal Kingdom and Magic Kingdom. Thursday we are having lunch at TREX Cafe and hanging around Disney Springs before heading home. Only doing a three day park hopper but at least we are going to be there....some is better than none and like I said...I was not cancelling! Sad to see that Peter Pan's Flight will be closed while we are there because I know my two little kiddos would have loved it.
 
Cetta

Cetta

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Made another change today...moved our arrival flight from a 7:20pm landing to 2:10pm landing at no charge! So now we are rearranging a couple things because we won't be landing so late and will actually/hopefully have time to enjoy some things. Kids still don't know we are going but we did watch some youtube videos on the Magic Kingdom over the weekend and they couldn't take their eyes off the screen! my son kept saying "I want to ride that!" over and over again. I originally didn't want to show them much about it so they would be amazed but now I can't help but want to get them excited about it. I mean if they don't know what is there, they won't want to go...right? I know there will be a lot of "child swapping" for us because my daughter will be too small for the rides my son will want to go on.
Saturday: arrive at 2:15 at MCO, hopefully our room will be ready when we arrive at AS Movies. Plan on browsing the resort and getting some groceries delivered. Maybe go to Disney Springs.
Sunday: EMH at Magic Kingdom in the AM, lunch at Chef Mickey's at noon, either head back to MK or to HS after lunch. Tonight would be our only chance to see Fantasmic so we plan on getting to HS eventually.
Monday: our rest day....sleep in, breakfast/brunch at Trattoria al Forno on the Boardwalk to meet some princes and princesses. Maybe rent a Surrey bike to explore the boardwalk. We have never done one before and I think the kids would enjoy it.
Tuesday: morning at Hollywood Studios and evening with EMH at Epcot. Dinner at Via Napoli
Wednesday: morning at Animal Kingdom and evening at Magic Kingdom with EMH.
Thursday: morning packing and check out. Disney Springs with lunch at T-Rex Café. flight leaves at 9:10pm
 
Cetta

Cetta

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
So over the weekend, my 4 yo put together that Marvel is owned by Disney. Now he thinks that if we go to Disney, we will also see Marvel. It's hard to explain to a 4 yo that yes, Disney owns Marvel and Star Wars but you can only see Star Wars at the parks and not Marvel. Uh! Now my husband wants to take our son and go to Universal on our rest day and my daughter and I stay on Disney Property. I am not sure if getting rid of our rest day is a good idea for our 4 yo but I know he would love to see all the Marvel and Jurassic Park things. So as a planner, my head is racing....what about a stroller? are you going to carry a backpack? Uber there? Is it going to be a waste because I'm worried he won't do his homework and know where to go and what to do. Uh!
 
amjt660

amjt660

Premium Member
Cetta said:
So over the weekend, my 4 yo put together that Marvel is owned by Disney. Now he thinks that if we go to Disney, we will also see Marvel. It's hard to explain to a 4 yo that yes, Disney owns Marvel and Star Wars but you can only see Star Wars at the parks and not Marvel. Uh! Now my husband wants to take our son and go to Universal on our rest day and my daughter and I stay on Disney Property. I am not sure if getting rid of our rest day is a good idea for our 4 yo but I know he would love to see all the Marvel and Jurassic Park things. So as a planner, my head is racing....what about a stroller? are you going to carry a backpack? Uber there? Is it going to be a waste because I'm worried he won't do his homework and know where to go and what to do. Uh!
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I will not be popular but I suggest to keep the rest day
There will probably be an opportunity to go in the future and Universal is not really aimed at the little ones.
I consider it more of a preteen /teenager park based on most of the rides being thrill based.

Just my two cents - either way I hope you have a great time.

Max
 

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