afwdwfan
DIS Dad #460
- Joined
- Apr 23, 2010
Welcome to my latest trip report!
If you’ve joined me before, welcome back! I’m glad to have you. If you’re new, I’m glad you could join us!
This trip was a rather large, elaborate extended family vacation including my family of 5, my parents, my 2 sisters and my brother in law and niece. If you're not counting, that's 11 people total with 9 tickets and connected FP+ to keep track of. I’m going to focus on talking mostly about what my family of 5 did, but we did spend a lot of our time together as a group so there will be plenty of mentions of the others throughout.
I have to give an early disclaimer on this TR. It will likely be wordy with pictures few and far between. I’m not gonna lie. This trip had its challenges. Pictures weren’t a priority and therefore didn’t happen. Most of what I do have were stolen, I mean borrowed, from Sis2’s facebook page. But thankfully we had Memory Maker to help us with characters and rides.
We had kids to corral and I was the main trip planner for a group of 11 people. While I love MDE, I spent so much time looking at my phone changing FP times or adding a FP that it left me with some very strong love/hate feelings towards the app. Like right here... ignore the cute kid and look in the background... I'm pretty sure I was doing something with FastPasses.
I felt like I was constantly checking and updating things on the app or explaining where we had to be and when. I just didn’t have very many of those opportunities to get a picture, or just enjoy the moment.
We had a fun trip, but it did have its challenges. There were no disasters by any means, but DD had some serious behavior issues throughout the trip which were really draining on us. All in all, I left Disney World satisfied, but not in a hurry to come back. It was definitely a much different feeling than I’ve had on other trips when I feel like I’m being dragged kicking and screaming off of Main Street on our last day. I don’t even think I turned around to take one last look at the castle this time.
But… that’s why I’m writing this TR. To talk about the highs and the lows. And there were plenty of both! Maybe you can learn something that will help you along the way!
Introductions:
I’m Andy. I’m 35 and will be taking you along on this trip. I’m the master trip planner of the group, but my mom is the Disney addict that started us all down this path.
Favorite Park: Magic Kingdom
Favorite Ride: Rock ‘n Rollercoaster
Favorite Character: Goofy
Least favorite park: Still Animal Kingdom… sorry. See below.
DW, my lovely wife and mother of our kids. She went to Disney World twice before we were married and she wasn’t a big Disney fan. Now, having accompanied me to Disney World 6 times and Disneyland once since we were married, she has really come to love being immersed in everything the Disney parks have to offer.
Favorite Park: Magic Kingdom
Favorite Ride: Soarin
Favorite Character: Piglet
Least Favorite Park: She hates Animal Kingdom as I was told several times. Literally every time we walked from one land to the next.
DS, is our oldest. He’s 7 years old and now in second grade. This was his fourth trip to Disney World and he was tall enough to do everything this time!
Favorite park: Magic Kingdom
Favorite Ride: Flight of Passage
Favorite Character: Pretty much any Star Wars character
DD, our middle child is 5 years old and apparently going through her terrible 2s. This was her fourth trip to Disney World as well. Honestly, she’s been a joy on all of our past trips. But this time… man, what a challenge.
Favorite Park: Magic Kingdom
Favorite Ride: Space Mountain
Favorite Character: Moana… which is awesome because guess who’s not in the park and has no merchandise for sale at Disney World???? Try explaining to a 5 year old who has a temper with a hair trigger why you can’t meet her favorite Disney character.
The baby, little guy, little dude, LG: I’ll probably use an assortment of nicknames for him, but this is our newest addition. He’s 13 months old at the time of the trip and his first year of life has been filled with challenges. He spent his first 3 months of life in the hospital and had to return a few months later for another surgery. Right now things are going ok… he’s having some issues with learning to drink from cups and bottles and gaining weight, but he’s doing well now and developmentally he’s right where he should be. Anyway, this was his first trip. He handled the crowds, stimulation and July heat pretty well to be quite honest. He did have points where he hit his limit and was just done, but overall it wasn’t too bad traveling with him.
Favorite Park: Magic Kingdom
Favorite Ride: It’s a Small Mexico
Favorite Character: Based on interaction we’ll say probably Elsa and Anna.
As for the rest of our group, I won’t get into detailed introductions, but we were joined by my Mom and Dad, my sisters (twins). Sis1 is married to BiL and they joined us with my Niece. Sis2 is single and she came with my parents and stayed in their room. We all drove down to Disney World together in a convoy of sorts, but Sis1 and BiL left Disney World a day before Mom & Dad. Then Mom & Dad left a day before my family left Disney World.
Last summer we had planned a nice vacation including some beach time. Our kids had been begging to go back to the beach, but with little dude coming and spending all summer in the hospital, that just couldn’t happen. Since we didn’t get to do anything fun with the older kids last summer, we decided we wanted to do something big this year. Mom had been discussing a big family trip to Disney World for a few years so we hammered out those details and made it happen. Then DW and I decided to tag on a few days at the end to go to the beach. When it was all said and done, we were away from home for just over 12 days.
We chose to use the Quick Service Dining Plan for this trip with a few Table Service meals paid out of pocket. It actually worked out well, because at the end of the week, we had 4 meals (as in 1 for each of us) left after dinner on our last night so we went to Roaring Forks and bought milk, fruit and pastries for our breakfast the next morning. We stayed at Animal Kingdom Lodge on this trip, but DW and I added on a night at the end at Wilderness Lodge because we needed one more night somewhere before we could check in at the beach. We planned our last day at MK and our favorite resort had always been WL, so this just made sense to us.
Well, that’s the set up and I’ll be back with the first real update sometime!
Once again, thanks for joining me and I look forward to sharing this experience with everyone!
If you’ve joined me before, welcome back! I’m glad to have you. If you’re new, I’m glad you could join us!
This trip was a rather large, elaborate extended family vacation including my family of 5, my parents, my 2 sisters and my brother in law and niece. If you're not counting, that's 11 people total with 9 tickets and connected FP+ to keep track of. I’m going to focus on talking mostly about what my family of 5 did, but we did spend a lot of our time together as a group so there will be plenty of mentions of the others throughout.
I have to give an early disclaimer on this TR. It will likely be wordy with pictures few and far between. I’m not gonna lie. This trip had its challenges. Pictures weren’t a priority and therefore didn’t happen. Most of what I do have were stolen, I mean borrowed, from Sis2’s facebook page. But thankfully we had Memory Maker to help us with characters and rides.
We had kids to corral and I was the main trip planner for a group of 11 people. While I love MDE, I spent so much time looking at my phone changing FP times or adding a FP that it left me with some very strong love/hate feelings towards the app. Like right here... ignore the cute kid and look in the background... I'm pretty sure I was doing something with FastPasses.
I felt like I was constantly checking and updating things on the app or explaining where we had to be and when. I just didn’t have very many of those opportunities to get a picture, or just enjoy the moment.
We had a fun trip, but it did have its challenges. There were no disasters by any means, but DD had some serious behavior issues throughout the trip which were really draining on us. All in all, I left Disney World satisfied, but not in a hurry to come back. It was definitely a much different feeling than I’ve had on other trips when I feel like I’m being dragged kicking and screaming off of Main Street on our last day. I don’t even think I turned around to take one last look at the castle this time.
But… that’s why I’m writing this TR. To talk about the highs and the lows. And there were plenty of both! Maybe you can learn something that will help you along the way!
Introductions:
I’m Andy. I’m 35 and will be taking you along on this trip. I’m the master trip planner of the group, but my mom is the Disney addict that started us all down this path.
Favorite Park: Magic Kingdom
Favorite Ride: Rock ‘n Rollercoaster
Favorite Character: Goofy
Least favorite park: Still Animal Kingdom… sorry. See below.
DW, my lovely wife and mother of our kids. She went to Disney World twice before we were married and she wasn’t a big Disney fan. Now, having accompanied me to Disney World 6 times and Disneyland once since we were married, she has really come to love being immersed in everything the Disney parks have to offer.
Favorite Park: Magic Kingdom
Favorite Ride: Soarin
Favorite Character: Piglet
Least Favorite Park: She hates Animal Kingdom as I was told several times. Literally every time we walked from one land to the next.
DS, is our oldest. He’s 7 years old and now in second grade. This was his fourth trip to Disney World and he was tall enough to do everything this time!
Favorite park: Magic Kingdom
Favorite Ride: Flight of Passage
Favorite Character: Pretty much any Star Wars character
DD, our middle child is 5 years old and apparently going through her terrible 2s. This was her fourth trip to Disney World as well. Honestly, she’s been a joy on all of our past trips. But this time… man, what a challenge.
Favorite Park: Magic Kingdom
Favorite Ride: Space Mountain
Favorite Character: Moana… which is awesome because guess who’s not in the park and has no merchandise for sale at Disney World???? Try explaining to a 5 year old who has a temper with a hair trigger why you can’t meet her favorite Disney character.
The baby, little guy, little dude, LG: I’ll probably use an assortment of nicknames for him, but this is our newest addition. He’s 13 months old at the time of the trip and his first year of life has been filled with challenges. He spent his first 3 months of life in the hospital and had to return a few months later for another surgery. Right now things are going ok… he’s having some issues with learning to drink from cups and bottles and gaining weight, but he’s doing well now and developmentally he’s right where he should be. Anyway, this was his first trip. He handled the crowds, stimulation and July heat pretty well to be quite honest. He did have points where he hit his limit and was just done, but overall it wasn’t too bad traveling with him.
Favorite Park: Magic Kingdom
Favorite Ride: It’s a Small Mexico
Favorite Character: Based on interaction we’ll say probably Elsa and Anna.
As for the rest of our group, I won’t get into detailed introductions, but we were joined by my Mom and Dad, my sisters (twins). Sis1 is married to BiL and they joined us with my Niece. Sis2 is single and she came with my parents and stayed in their room. We all drove down to Disney World together in a convoy of sorts, but Sis1 and BiL left Disney World a day before Mom & Dad. Then Mom & Dad left a day before my family left Disney World.
Last summer we had planned a nice vacation including some beach time. Our kids had been begging to go back to the beach, but with little dude coming and spending all summer in the hospital, that just couldn’t happen. Since we didn’t get to do anything fun with the older kids last summer, we decided we wanted to do something big this year. Mom had been discussing a big family trip to Disney World for a few years so we hammered out those details and made it happen. Then DW and I decided to tag on a few days at the end to go to the beach. When it was all said and done, we were away from home for just over 12 days.
We chose to use the Quick Service Dining Plan for this trip with a few Table Service meals paid out of pocket. It actually worked out well, because at the end of the week, we had 4 meals (as in 1 for each of us) left after dinner on our last night so we went to Roaring Forks and bought milk, fruit and pastries for our breakfast the next morning. We stayed at Animal Kingdom Lodge on this trip, but DW and I added on a night at the end at Wilderness Lodge because we needed one more night somewhere before we could check in at the beach. We planned our last day at MK and our favorite resort had always been WL, so this just made sense to us.
Well, that’s the set up and I’ll be back with the first real update sometime!
Once again, thanks for joining me and I look forward to sharing this experience with everyone!
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