1st Disney Trip for 3 year old twins birthday

[Cajun23]

We are taking our B/G twins for the 3rd birthday to Disney world in December and staying at Poly for the week. I wanted to see if anyone had any tips? items to pack? Rides? Special things to do for birthday? Any advice is welcomed.

 

[roseaster]

Well, it depends a lot on your kids. What I would do for a bday dinner is I would book a character meal(if they aren't afraid of characters) and get them a cake. I would also get them a bday pin to wear on their bday. We have also had special bday ear hats made and had them wake up to the presents on their bed and told them that they are from Mickey Mouse.

Other than that, at 3 I would think that just being at WDW is pretty exciting.

There is always BBB and Pirate's League if you want to spend the extra money.

 

[Cajun23]

Well, it depends a lot on your kids. What I would do for a bday dinner is I would book a character meal(if they aren't afraid of characters) and get them a cake. I would also get them a bday pin to wear on their bday. We have also had special bday ear hats made and had them wake up to the presents on their bed and told them that they are from Mickey Mouse.

Other than that, at 3 I would think that just being at WDW is pretty exciting.

There is always BBB and Pirate's League if you want to spend the extra money.

Thanks for the ideas. We have chef mickeys for breakfast and BOG for dinner so far.

I will have to check in to the cake idea. I need to figure out how to set that up.

We are doing BBB on another day because I was late on scheduling that one.

Thank you.

 

[Cajun23]

Also looking for ideas for the whole week to make special for them. Not limited to their birthday.

 

[twix516]

Just wanted to say that we are doing the same thing! I have b/g twins that turn 3 the end of December and we are going the week after Thanksgiving as an early celebration. Getting in our first family Disney trip while they are still free!

 

[Cajun23]

Just wanted to say that we are doing the same thing! I have b/g twins that turn 3 the end of December and we are going the week after Thanksgiving as an early celebration. Getting in our first family Disney trip while they are still free!

Same here. We will be 1 week behind you guys.

Are you planning double stroller or 2 singles? Pros and cons to both but leaning towards a double stiller.

 

[twix516]

Same here. We will be 1 week behind you guys.

Are you planning double stroller or 2 singles? Pros and cons to both but leaning towards a double stiller.

We are doing the double stroller, but to be honest I never considered two singles. We went to Sesame Place a few times this summer and always took the double and it worked great (granted Sesame Place is a fraction of the size of any Disney park). What are the pros of taking two singles instead?

 

[Cajun23]

We were thinking the pros for 2 singles would be if we split up. We are going with a large group and being b/g twins they have different interest. If we had to split up then we would each have a stroller. We also figured it would be easier to get through the crowds with a single than a double because it would be less wide. They also would not be within arms reach to start any arguments are fights for picking\touching each other.

Having said that the cons would be that we would both have to push all day long vs with a double one could take a break. Also, with transportation i would have to break down and hold 2 strollers vs 1.

We are leaning on the double stroller.

 

[JediBonas]

We took our twins (also b/g) for their 2nd and 3rd birthdays, so much fun! We took our double stroller the first year and two singles the next and the two singles were so much easier! Both years we had bday dinner for them at Captain's Grill and I special ordered cakes for each of them, they loved it! My son loved meeting the characters and wanted to meet/play with ALL of them, my daughter was scared of them all until the very end, then she was fine with the face characters

 

[Lalalyn]

We have taken our twins (both girls) and our older daughter the past two years. For the first trip, twins were turning two and last year they were just about to turn 3. Both times we stayed at the Poly!

Because we had three kids, on each trip we had both a double and a single. So, we were dealing with two strollers. In terms of one versus two if we had the option, it is really a toss up. What turned out to be easiest for the twins (figured this out on our second trip) was to rent a double to be delivered to the hotel and bring two cheap umbrella strollers (the small ones you can get for free sometimes at Babies R Us) for the airport and plane. And that way, we had options for both. (I also checked through our single City Mini for our older daughter.)

We also found that any kind of sit-down dinner was a nightmare. After a long day and being so excited, they just were not up for it and didn't enjoy it. I'd maybe do a late morning character breakfast (eating something in your room before heading out in earlier am) for their birthdays.

They will be so excited about everything. For us, what I thought would make it special went over their head. Read: Eating at CRT in the castle! But yet, to this day they still talk about those Mickey ear balloons!!!!

One twin has the biggest smile on her face in every princess picture as if she couldn't contain herself. Whereas, the other twin would have ridden Small World all week non-stop. Be prepared to just go with what they want to do.

With the Poly, definitely think about the O'Hana character breakfast. Far and away for us better than Chef Mickey's. They bring the all you can eat food to you, so one parent doesn't have to keep running to the buffet. We've stopped the buffets because it is just too big of a pain with the kids to have one parent at the table and one being a runner for food. Even with more adults, everyone has to get up at some point to get food. And the kids get to do a parade around the room with the characters (in addition to the typical meet and greet). Our kids LOVED getting to do that and it made it more special than just sitting and eating and waiting to hug a character.

At 3, they are too young for BBB and I wouldn't suggest Pirate's League for kids that young. Spend your money on balloons and ice cream!

 

[Cajun23]

Thank both of you for sharing your tips and experience.

Someone else mentioned ordering a cake and I will need to find out how and order them one.

We got the free Disney Dining so we plan to do some sit downs. Currently we are doing Ohana(BK & Dinner), Chef Mickeys, BOG, Garden Grill, Backyard BBQ, and Crystal Palace.

For parks we will do each park a different day except, MK 2 day, and one day in the middle as an off day for the group to do whatever they choose. We are a group of 16 so this will allow a break from everyone. LOL.

Our off day we are planning to go to Disney Springs and do the BBB. There are 3 other girls and my daughter loves dressing up as a princess so hopefully it works out well.

My plan for the most part it basically to follow them around and allow for them to go slow and enjoy experiences. I have been 3 times lately and have done all the adult things i need to do so this trip is all about the twins.

We also will try to go back for naps in the middle of the day. They are light sleepers so i don't thing they will be able to nap in strollers but we will see how it goes.

We plan to rent a stroller or 2 from one of the stroller rental companies so it would be one less thing i have to worry about travel.

It will be their first plan flight so hoping that it all goes well but planning for the worst.

 

[twix516]

I never even thought about possibly splitting up with them. My son is super into rides, but my daughter is sometimes scared so I guess splitting up is a definite possibility. I'm hoping her insane obsessing with the characters (Pooh especially) gets her excited to go on the rides!

 

[Cajun23]

For people who have traveled with 3 year old, what would your recommendations be for Fast Pass at the 4 parks?

 

[twix516]

For people who have traveled with 3 year old, what would your recommendations be for Fast Pass at the 4 parks?

Not that I can offer that much advice as we haven't been yet, these are the FP's we booked:

MK: Belle, PPF and 7DMT (I think my son will do this one, but my daughter might not be tall enough and will likely be afraid...my son is fearless!); at MK we intend to do Pooh at rope drop becaue Pooh is their absolute favorite right now and I'm hoping it will get them excited for the rest of the day
AK: Safari, Lion King and Nemo
HS: TSM, ToT and Star Tours (only the adults will do the last two; we also intend to do some of the kid shows there, but didn't think a FP was necessary)
Epcot: FEA, Spaceship Earth and Character Spot

Hoping to see what advice others can give!

 

[JediBonas]

For people who have traveled with 3 year old, what would your recommendations be for Fast Pass at the 4 parks?

At HS the big hits for my twins at that age were: Toy Story, Disney Jr. Live on Stage
MK: Buzz Lightyear and character meet and greets
Epcot: Character spot

Nothing really at AK, they LOVED the big play area there with the slides and sand pit.

 

[Cajun23]

This is what I was thinking so far. Similar to what everyone has said.

AK - Festival of the Lion King, Kilimanjaro Safaris, & Meet Favorite Disney Pals at Adventurers Outpost
MK - Seven Dwarf's Mine Train, Peter Pan, & Little Mermaid
HS - Toy Story, First Time in Forever, & Little Mermaid
Epcot - Frozen, Nemo, & Epcot Character Spot
MK again - Jungle Cruise, Enchanted Tales with Belle, & Winnie the Pooh

 

[twix516]

This is what I was thinking so far. Similar to what everyone has said.

AK - Festival of the Lion King, Kilimanjaro Safaris, & Meet Favorite Disney Pals at Adventurers Outpost
MK - Seven Dwarf's Mine Train, Peter Pan, & Little Mermaid
HS - Toy Story, First Time in Forever, & Little Mermaid
Epcot - Frozen, Nemo, & Epcot Character Spot
MK again - Jungle Cruise, Enchanted Tales with Belle, & Winnie the Pooh

Looks great! Make sure you snag Frozen and Seven Dwarfs first as those were the only two where we couldn't get the times we wanted!

 

[Cajun23]

Looks great! Make sure you snag Frozen and Seven Dwarfs first as those were the only two where we couldn't get the times we wanted!

Will do. Thanks for the tip.

 

[Cajun23]

Also we will be staying at Poly. We have Deluxe Standard Studio. I was thinking of putting a room request in the Tokelau building. i was also going to try and get 2nd or 3rd for balcony. Anyone have any room suggestions?

 

[roseaster]

No advice on the Poly, I have too many kids, so deluxe is over our budget LOL, but I did want to say that if you wanted to order a custom bday cake for your room at the Poly you can call private dining at the Grand Floridian.

Somewhere on the DIS there is a thread that shows pictures of the cakes. I will say that we have ordered custom cakes in the past, and while they are little pricey, they really are lovely and tasty.

Also, if you haven't thought of it Ohana is a lot of fun. Breakfast is a character meal, and dinner has a Polynesian show in which the kids participate. We had a custom cake delivered to Ohana dinner. My son'e favorite restaurant so he chose that for his bday dinner.

Also if you look around on the official WDW website you have can have your room decorated or have gift baskets or balloon arrangements sent to your room.