Disney Dreaming ...Planning our daughter's 1st trip and my mother's 1st extended stay!

[lilmape]

Tonight was our second movie night.

Feature Presentation: Tarzan
Craft/Activity: Monkey Masks; Fingerprint Monkey Craft; Barrel of Monkeys Game

Jason's "5'o clock shadow mask"...

Fingerprint Art:

Sorry they are sideways!

Snack: Little Debbie Snack Cakes

Miss. K absolutely loved Tarzan and all of our activities. She only became distracted maybe twice but for very short periods of time. She loved this movie! I can't put into words how much fun tonight was. Even if we don't make it to Disney this year I want to continue these family nights. Electronics are off, except the movie. We just spend time being a family. That can be so hard when folks work full time and have different schedules... After the movie K hopped around the living room with her mask pretending to be a monkey with her daddy. Can't wait to see what next week holds!

 

[sailored]

I love the monkey faces!

 

[Elleshoodat]

Joining in!

I still have some catching up to do, but wanted to say that you have a beautiful family ... and a great name.

 

[Jackiemarie21]

Love the movie night, super cute! Movie nights are the best, we have a no technology policy during the movie too and the family time is priceless!

Looking forward to hearing more about your trip!

 

[disneyguy4life]

Even if we don't make it to Disney this year I want to continue these family nights.

Family nights are always a great idea. I couldn't agree more. Nice job!!

 

[lilmape]

Hello! Hope all of you are doing well! I find the initial stages of planning to be so comical. So we thought we had settled on dates, but now we are shifting them around checking prices and researching historical crowd calendars and temps. I just can't settle on dates. Once deals come out I know we will. But, I have a rough sketch of daily schedules for each week. I'm really considering the last week of September. Flights are cheaper (yes the hubs asked me to research flights)...

Any of you have experience with a toddler at disney in September or October? I want to go when it's hot enough to swim but not so she's miserable.

Anyway! Can you guess what this weeks movie is? I let Miss K pick. Then showed her a short clip and she's so excited. This will be SO much fun!

 

[disneyguy4life]

Any of you have experience with a toddler at disney in September or October? I want to go when it's hot enough to swim but not so she's miserable.

Sorry, I can't help you with the toddler part of things. But my wife and I had our trip last Sept 11-20 and it was still very hot and uncomfortable during the day. I looked at the crowd calendars and they were not correct. But that could be because the World Cup kept all the Brazilians away in previous months and they were flooding WDW at that time. Still we had plenty of fun and with fastpass+ it really helped keep our wait times down. By then all the MNSSHP has started, free dining, hotel discounts, and food and wine started at the end of our trip. I hope that helps just a little.

 

[Sisa]

Love your movie nights! Super cute bug hats! Hooray for the love of Tarzan! Family movie nights really are the best. I totally agree on the dates issue. I thought I had for sure picked our dates, DH even requested the time off work, then I did more reading and decided to change them. It is really inevitable, I swear. I do not like changing plans, I like them set and leave it alone. I cannot seem to do that with a trip to WDW.

 

[lilmape]

Love your movie nights! Super cute bug hats! Hooray for the love of Tarzan! Family movie nights really are the best. I totally agree on the dates issue. I thought I had for sure picked our dates, DH even requested the time off work, then I did more reading and decided to change them. It is really inevitable, I swear. I do not like changing plans, I like them set and leave it alone. I cannot seem to do that with a trip to WDW.

Thank you! They are so much fun to plan and even my hubby looks forward to them.

So... About the dates lol. I subscribed to touring plans and am amazed at how different the crowd calendars are from all the other I read. I'm all about data (I live it at work. Constantly making data based decisions). So, now I'm not worried about any of the weeks we have looked at. The others had me terrified it would be so busy, but even on "busy" days the crowd levels aren't more than a 3 out of 10... Makes me happy I'm leaning heavily towards the last week of September and maybe adding in a MNSSHP.

 

[Sisa]

My DH does too!

I agree, the calendars really just make it more confusing on picking a week. I also subscribed to touring plans to help me pick a week. I think any week in September will be fine, if you have the option to go during a week where MNSSHP is offered, I'd do it! I've heard such amazing things and am bummed we will miss it, our dates cannot be changed.

 

[lilmape]

Hello! Good gravy the weather change has made kiddos crazy at work. I have been exhausted every night! We had to move our family night this week because my in-laws (who haven't visited in 2 months and live 10 minutes away) dropped in. I'm a fairly accommodating person so we just moved it back. Miss. K needs some quality time with them.

So I've been working on planning and I think we've settled. Here's a very rough sketch of what I have so far:


September 27-October 4

27- Fly to Orlando
Lazy Afternoon at Hotel
Dinner - will likely keep it low key with the travel

28 - Epcot
Breakfast - Akershus
Tour
Afternoon Rest/Nap/Swim

29 - MK
Possible Early Breakfast - Kona?
Morning at MK
Afternoon Break
Possible QS Dinner
MSEP/Wishes

30 - Rest
Swimming
Possible Dinner - Raglan Road Evening at DTD

Oct 1 - AK
Possible Breakfast - Tusker House (how many is too many character meals? We will definitely do princesses and disney Jr)
Late Lunch - Flame Tree BBQ
Rest/Nap/Swim

2 - HS
Morning at HS
Lunch - Hollywood & Vine
Afternoon Break/Nap/Swim
Possible Dinner - Portobello (DTD)


3 - MK
Possible Dinner - Grand Floridian Cafe?
Possible MSEP/Wishes

4 - Depart
Breakfast - Kona Cafe (our favorite)
ME to MCO



Any good MK or MK area dining options are welcomed... Probably won't do the castles as we didn't care for the food and Miss K is very selective. So my options are pretty limited. We are doing some food training over the summer to hopefully expand her options but she makes herself gag and vomit...

 

[lilmape]

Monday was movie night #3

Feature Presentation: Dumbo

Craft/Activities:
Carnival Games
Glow Bracelet ring toss
Knock over the Cups
Balloon Badminton
Elephant Nose Craft

Our snack: Homemade Elephant Ears (Fried Dough w Cinnamon and Sugar) and Popcorn

This one was a bit more challenging. I was exhausted from work and Jason had been with Miss K all day. She had been to visit her cousins and was really cranky. So keeping things moving was important. She really enjoyed the movie but it wasn't my favorite. I liked it better when I was little. She selected 101 Dalmatians as our next movie. We have watched it before but not with snacks and activities!

 

[princessbelle2015]

Love your movie nights

 

[disneyguy4life]

What a good mom. Keep up the good work.

 

[Sisa]

Your schedule looks good, wish I could help on the MK dining options.

Dumbo! Such a fun one, I can't wait to do that one with my kids. Yum, the home made elephant ears look so yummy, I am planning on making those too. Looking forward to seeing your 101 Dalmations MN.

 

[lilmape]

Movie night #4:

Feature Presentation: 101 Dalmatians
Activity: Find the Dalmatian spots.

I put 20 spots throughout the house and when Miss K woke up from her nap she went on a hunt. She loved it so much we had to help her find them MANY more times during the evening.

Craft: Dalmatian Ears

Snack: Dalmatian Spot Cupcakes

We had a great time with this one. The find the spot game was so much fun. We took turns all evening finding the spots together and counting to 20 as we found them (though the locations never changed). Miss K loves this movie. She picked Mulan for this weekend. We are all looking forward to it!

 

[jandlinz]

Hi Tiffany,
Just joining in! Kaitlyn is darling. I love all your movie nights and craft ideas. We have gone once leaving September 11. We did the beach first for 5 days before arriving at Disney. While we were at Disney it was HOT! We went with both set of grandparents and I remember my dad having a heat stroke in line at The backlot Tour. He ended up leaving and heading back to the hotel. The next time we went we left late September and got back October 11. It was much better. We did the water parks and it was much better. Can't wait to read more!

 

[disneyguy4life]

I can't wait until my boy is big enough to do these kind of things. Thanks for all the good ideas I'll use in the future.

 

[lilmape]

Breaking news! My mom is coming along!

 

[lilmape]

Just joining in! Kaitlyn is darling. I love all your movie nights and craft ideas.

Thank you for joining in. We have a lot of fun and even my hubby has been hopping in on the planning

I can't wait until my boy is big enough to do these kind of things. Thanks for all the good ideas I'll use in the future.

Glad you're finding some ideas! We really have so much fun!