First time with 11 month old…a few questions!

VTGirlinNC · Mar 1, 2015

Hello! We have been the past 4 years in a row with our almost 6 year old son. We are considering a June trip which will include our baby (she will be 11 months in June). I can't imagine how different this trip will be for us! Here are my questions:

1. What do you do if your baby freaks out in the middle of a ride? I'm picturing Spaceship Earth for example. That is not necessarily a short ride. Obviously, you can't get off, and I'm sure this has happened before. I am lucky in that I have never seen a baby melt down on a ride. That must be so stressful.

2. For those of you that have taken a baby, do you follow the same sleep schedule that you have at home, or do you wing it? It would be nice to enjoy an evening or two in the park, but I'm not sure if she will sleep in the stroller at that point.

3. When booking dinner reservations, do you plan for early dinners or late dinners? The problem with an early dinner is if you are at the hotel for an afternoon nap, and they sleep late combined with the travel time to the parks, you could be cutting it close.

Thanks for any input!

bostonminnie · Mar 1, 2015

We took our son at 11 months and had a great time!

I find that generally the rides were distracting and exciting enough to prevent melt downs. I also never realized how loud things are, so if a melt down does happen, it is hard for others to hear. My son did cry for most of Small World, but I don't think people could hear him over the noise of the ride. We did stay away from long rides like Ellen's Energy Adventure just in case he were to become unhappy in the middle of it.

I think the sleep schedule depends on the child. My son was doing 2 naps a day at 11 months. At Disney we did one nap in the stroller and took him back to the room for one nap. He was ok with that, but needed to be in bed within an hour of his normal bed time or was miserable. We did dinners around 5-6pm and that worked out well.

Have a great trip!

msmama · Mar 1, 2015

I was still nursing my son for his first trip at 10 months so if he got fussy I could just nurse him and he'd be okay on a ride (or in a show). Puffs (doled out one at a time so as not to make a mess) would probably work in a pinch. But really, distraction is key to avoiding those kinds of meltdowns. (If my son seemed even vaguely cranky I would have skipped the ride).

Sleep and food, I tried to keep as normal as possible at the beginning of the trip though was willing to wing it by the end of the trip (meaning I pushed it more a little bit each day, but didn't want to have an overtired baby at the beginning of the trip). Turned out that going back to the resort for a nap didn't work, he slept on the bus and then was wide awake when I wanted him to sleep. He mostly took lots of short cat naps rather than one long nap (but he was never a terrific mapper so that didn't shock me).

Touring is definitely slower and I'm a big believer in only going as fast as the slowest member of the party.

Have fun!

rblucy · Mar 1, 2015

We went when our son was 10 months old. We never had any meltdowns on rides. If he seemed a little uneasy, we'd just try to distract him. As others said, if he was cranky, we didn't go on a ride. When he started to get cranky, we'd try to find a quieter spot in the park and rock him in the stroller til he fell asleep. We didn't end up doing any later nights out, but that had more to do with me getting sick. I think he could have handled 1 night but would have needed a good rest that afternoon. Earlier dinners were better for us, but we usually eat on the earlier side at home. I'd say to stick with times that work at home. You might not want to plan a dinner for the first day or two of your trip to get a feel for how it's going and then you can always cancel the other dinners if you need. Overall, it's a lot of fun with the baby, just a very different trip

Bethpremier · Mar 1, 2015

I am SOO glad you asked these questions. We are planning a trip when my daughter will be 10 months. She is almost 4 months now and its hard to imagine her sleeping in a stroller for a nap and surviving on 2 naps since she has 5-6 now. Im planning on babywearing. We dont go out that much now because its so darn cold. I cant wait until this summer so we can do more and practice with wearing her. I see that you live in NC. So do we!! Please feel free to send me a message. We can talk through this together. Everyone seems to be very positive about bringing a baby to Disney. Ive heard nothing negative but all I can picture are meltdowns and constant crying. Im looking forward to how everyone else responds to your post.

George4 · Mar 1, 2015

We took ours at 9-10 months and had no problems. We did keep his schedule the same as at home, although in a different way. There are quiet areas in the parks where there isn't much noise or distraction if needed. We brought a towel to put over the stroller in help induce both naps. Ours learned to walk while we were at WDW, so we had to build in a little time to let him move around each day. He did not want to stay in the stroller all day. We just accepted a little slower pace of movement through the park, and my wife and I traded off the bigger rides (Space Mountain, BTMR, RRC, EE, etc.) with our other kids. We had no problems with the other rides as he was usually so busy looking around at everything. If it helps, ours fell asleep coming down from Spaceship Earth.

Jenna319 · Mar 1, 2015

Subscribing! We too our taking our 1year old this November; she is 4 months old now. It will be our 1st trip with a baby so I know it will be a different pace than I'm used to.... hoping grandma comes along so we may have a night or two to go out after 7pm once our little one is asleep. Looking forward to more responses!

AspenLL · Mar 2, 2015

We are taking our son at the end of next month for the first time when he will be almost 13mo. We booked our dinner reservations around 5/5:30pm to be safe. We are going to try to keep his schedule as normal as possible, but he is a champ at taking naps in the stroller, so I am expecting that to happen. He is also switching from three naps to two during the day, so it'll be interesting to see how that plays out!

disneypolybride2008 · Mar 2, 2015

we are taking our dd for her first trip at 13 months. we also have a dd who will be 4. we took dd4 at age 2 and now we have waited long enough. i cant wait til our second daughter is 2. I didnt travel while prengant and so we missed just one year's trips. I am splurging on the Polynesian if the free dining comes out or the 30% off comes out. That way getting back to the room is a bit quicker. Also, every time we go to disney i WANT to take some resort time, pool time, and take it easy but then that rarely happens. Last time at AoA we only went to the pool once. So, going to the Poly knowing i'm paying SO much for that resort and it's going to have a new pool will make it easier to TAKE IT EASY. Right now my DD has just turned 5 months. She is great at sleeping during the night and takes 2 naps, once in the morning for an hour and once in the afternoon for 1/2 hour. She is the best baby ever and i'm so happy to not wait til she's 2 to go to disney. She likes her bedtime at 6:15 and asleep after nursing by 6:45 on the dot or she's not happy. That part will be rough, but maybe DH and I can take turns going to bed early and the other one can be with DD4 out later.

mommd · Mar 3, 2015

My daughter's first trip was last month at 10 months old. She is pretty flexible and doesn't follow a strict schedule, so it worked out well. Babywearing saved us because she didn't care for the stroller. I wore her in my ergo or Tula most of the day. She napped while I wore her so we didn't go back to the hotel for a nap, although we did go back for a break a couple of days. A few trips when my oldest was 2-3yo and still napping every day we would go back to the hotel by 1pm to allow her to nap. We like to eat early so our ADRs were usually right around 5pm. We were pushing it to get there some days but overall it worked well for us. I knew we'd be cutting it close so we just made sure to make it back to the hotel early enough to allow for adequate nap time and schedule dinner ADRs at places that were easy to get to from wherever we were staying. If we wanted to eat somewhere that would require a few bus transfers (at another resort, etc.) I would schedule them for a little later or make a lunch ADR and just to QS for dinner that night.

As for the rides, we had a few meltdowns and I would distract, nurse, or hand puffs one at a time as PP mentioned. She actually had more meltdowns on buses & the monorail than rides.

Overall it was worth it and I would absolutely do it again!

Betty Rohrer · Mar 3, 2015

one thing to think about with going back to room for naps is how your child does with going back to sleep after falling asleep and being woke up example going from car to bed. even Poly has the time from the park to resort like the monorail. the boat ride to the fort did not work for us as little one would not go back to sleep after the short nap on the boat

mickeyfanachey1999 · Mar 3, 2015

We took our youngest (the picture in my avatar) when he was 5 months. We had no problems whatsoever. Keep in mind that it will be hot as heck outside so keep your little one sunscreened up, covered and hydrated. He stayed with us through the morning and then one of us would go back to the room with him. Then we would all go out again at night. The nights were really nice when the weather cooled off a bit and everyone could relax after a day of running around the parks.

djock19 · Mar 4, 2015

We took our son when he was 10 months old and the best advice I recieved was to get a stroller fan! I ordered one from Amazon that clipped on stroller and had sterofoam blades for safety. Worked great!!

skuttle · Mar 4, 2015

My middle son's first trip was at 11 months and my youngest son's first trip was at 11 months also. Our kids always slept in the stroller well so that's what we did. When they go cranky, we put them in the stroller and found a quiet place for them to fall asleep, then we kept on going with our oldest son.

If you can, try to do diaper changes at the baby care centers. Each park has one. They are SO much nicer than just the changing tables in the bathrooms (although not always convenient!). The changing tables are padded and huge, they have rockers, and even a TV and small toys. THey also sell things you may need (Formula, baby food, diapers, etc.).

We did also did their first hair cut at the Main Street Barber Shop even though neither one really needed it at the time. We were there so we had it done.

We actually tried to avoid dinner reservations and made either breakfast or lunch reservations. We also learned with our older son that the less reservations you have for meals the better, especially at dinner time! We haven't done the dining plan in years because of this.

mybestieismickey · Mar 5, 2015

We took DD for her first trip to Disneyland at 10 months this last Dec. So fun! We did have one meltdown on the Pinocchio ride, but that was our fault. We hadn't ridden it in years and hopped on on a whim to kill time while we waited for Dumbo to open. DD cried and gave us a look that basically said "how could you do this to me?" Parent fail. Fortunately, the ride wasn't too long, and it was loud-ish. We just waited it out, and she was fine once we left the building.

We were on a two nap schedule, at the time. We did the morning nap in the stroller, and went back to the room for the second. DD is really good about transferring from her stroller or car seat so that was no problem. We did choose one day to not go back for the second nap. Big mistake. DD was G.R.U.M.P.Y. More than the nap, she needed the break from the constant stimulation.

We did do one later night to see the fireworks, but it was toward the end of the trip, and she slept right through. I even picked her up out of the stroller and held her just before they started so that she wouldn't freak out when they woke her. She doesn't mind them generally, but I think it could be a jarring way to wake up. Didn't matter. That kid was down for the count.

As for meals, we pretty much just did QS. We figured it would be easier on everyone if we weren't rushing to get to reservations. We did do one character breakfast, and I'm not sure if I would bother again, but I probably would.

One thing we did do in preparation, was take DD to parades and fireworks displays in our area over the summer. We wanted to see what her reaction was to guage her interest and see if they needed to be priorities or skippers. Parades ended up being a priority and fireworks were meh. She liked them, but could take or leave them.

The real key is flexibility. I thought I had a pretty minimal plan, and we still did less than I thought we would. We never rode Peter Pan, but we did do It's a Small World 7 times in 5 days. DD loved it! We would have done it more, but the lines were getting too long by the end of the week.

Good luck with your plans, you're gonna love it!

jandlinz · Mar 5, 2015

1. We've taken small children and never had a problem with them having a meltdown on a ride. You could bring a bottle on the ride or nurse your baby if you need.
2. As far as naps, we usually let the baby fall asleep in the stroller. Sometimes the baby would fall asleep on a ride. We would try and find one with air conditioning. I think you have to be flexible. For the afternoon nap we would head back and try and get the lo to sleep while making dinner (we had a 2 bedroom with a kitchen). Our older children would go to the pool with dad or watch tv so it was quiet.
3. We did dinner reservations twice the first time we went with the kids and never will schedule them again. Cooking at the resort was much easier. If you don't have a kitchen then do a quick service somewhere. Kids can sleep longer or want to eat earlier so having that evening reservation when you have to wake up your baby can be brutal.

First time with 11 month old…a few questions!

VTGirlinNC

Earning My Ears

bostonminnie

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msmama

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rblucy

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Bethpremier

Kidanites Unite!

George4

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Jenna319

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AspenLL

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disneypolybride2008

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mommd

Earning My Ears

Betty Rohrer

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mickeyfanachey1999

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djock19

Earning My Ears

skuttle

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mybestieismickey

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jandlinz

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