She mentioned that a set of grandparents is also traveling with them and have 2 suitcases (I believe I read that right) between the two of them. So, if she packed one just for her family, it would be a 3rd large suitcase.
When we go to Disney World, we pack about 3 days worth of clothes and do laundry on the 3rd day. However, we also packed 2 large suitcases between 5 of us so that we'd have room to bring home any souvenirs. My son was 14 months when we went to the world, and I ended up packing a stack of diapers for the week (I knew we would have ended up bringing diapers home in the suitcase one way or the other).
Do you have 3 large suitcases right now that you could take out and try to fit into your car? I would start with dry runs there before deciding one way or the other.
Personally, I would pack 1 large suitcase for the 4 of your. And in a carry-on pack one day's worth of clothes in case your large suitcase were to become MIA (it happened to us, leaving us scrambling at 9:30pm on arrival day to taxi it to Walmart to buy clothes for the week; luckily about 5 minutes before we decided to go, they found our bag and all was well).
Also, you mentioned you are renting a mini-van once you're there, where are the carseats going on the plane...are you checking them, using them? Or are those staying in your car and you'll be renting carseats from the rental car place? While they won't count as your carry-on item for the plane, they will be more things you have to figure out how to juggle around/get from place to place along with the kids.
I know that when we take a plane trip, we always bring my parents along (let's face it, all our vacations are to
Disneyland or World, lol, and my parents love it as much as we do). We, however, have only 1 child. But, we do sit down and jot down everything that has to go, from carry-on bags to personal items, stroller, carseat, etc. Then we assign each adult to each item. For example, our trip to World in 2008 when my son was 14 months old, we pretty much traveled as follows: Mimi was responsible for getting herself and my DS through secutiry; DH was responsible for the stroller and his personal belongings; my dad was responsible for the diaper bag and his belongings, and I was responsible for the food bag and my belongings. In a couple months when we go to Disneyland, we'll have the carseat with us...as well as the stroller. Not sure how we're dividing everything up yet, but we'll sit down and write everything down and figure it out.
Dry runs are ALWAYS a plus when traveling with kids. Hope my suggestions were helpful. And no matter what you decide to do, enjoy your trip!
