detroitmama
Earning My Ears
- Joined
- Mar 18, 2004
- Messages
- 44
We just got back tonight, and I wanted to give my trip report before life got crazy again. 
I would have to say that two weeks was absolutely perfect! After one week, we hadn't seen everything we wanted to, and we were relieved at the thought of having another week. After two weeks we all felt that we needed a break from Disney World, though we could have spent another two weeks lounging around the pool in the sun.
Honestly, the highlight of our trip was our rental vacation home. My brother and family met us there with their two kids, and our 3 kids, so we rented a large 5 bedroom. It was so awesome. This house was like staying in a dream home, complete with private pool and loungers, 4 bathrooms, a huge gourmet kitchen. For me at least it was much harder to leave the house than it was to leave Disney. I loved that my toddler could nap while I was out getting a tan, or swimming with my kids. I loved that my husband and I could be alone in the hot tub after the kids had gone to bed. I loved that we ate probably 2/3 of our meals at the house, so that when we did go out it was more fun. Did I mention that the master bath in the house was twice as large as my master bedroom at home? Anyhow, when I asked my kids what their favorite part of our trip was, they both said, the pool. Oh, we stayed in Indian Creek off I-192 near splendid China. The location was excellent, and pretty quick to get to the parks. If any of you have any questions, please feel free to PM me.
We were very fortunate to get the 30 day Fun IN the Sun Passes, so we basically could go anywhere anyday we wanted. It was so nice to have that kind of flexibility. Most days we went to the parks from 9-12:30 ish, then drove home for a nap and swim, then went back to a park from around 5-9. There were two days when we deviated from this 'plan', and we all hated it. The two times were when we decided to stay at MK until the 3:00 parade, and then of course it was canceled for rain. The other time was for the AK afternoon parade, which we did get to see, and while nice, it just wasn't worth all the afternoon crankies, crowd, and heat. Oh, and imagine my shock that my DD7 and DD4 actually took naps most days! I can't imagine what life would have been like without that catchup rest.
Overall the weather was great - most days around 83-88 degrees, some days with rain, some days with high humidity, but overall very nice.
It was really funny, before I went to Disney this first time, I had ideas about which parks my kids (DD7, DD4, DS1) would like the best. I was wrong. They loved Epcot the most! Why? Coloring masks totally captivated them. Every evening they would beg to go there. Seriously. After Epcot, they liked Animal Kingdom, then Magic Kingdom, then MGM.
I'll just take a minute here to list our favorite attractions: Epcot - test track and Kidcot stations, making cookies at the Land pavilion, Illuminations, Figment Imagination show. At Animal Kingdom, my kids really liked the Kali River Rapids (with ponchos!), the K. Safari ride, Lion King Show. At Magic Kingdom, they loved the Princess Cinderella Breakfast (worth the money, I think!), Wishes fireworks, Buzz Lightyear, Tom Sawyers Island, Teacups, Aladin Carpets ride, seeing Ariel, Toontown characters. Honestly, we all didn't really like Splash Mountain. Ok, and at MGM, we liked the Beauty and the Beast show, Fantasmic (we showed up 40 minutes before on a Wed night, and had great seats, and people were still getting seats up to 20 minutes before the show. Oh, and my toddler was too tired to tolerate all the loud noise so I had to take him out.), also we liked the backlot tour, Ariels show. Ok, and I went on Rockin Roller coaster and honestly it was too much for me! Too fast too soon. I was happy when the ride ended.
Other highlights of the trip were getting character signatures on my daughters Disney t-shirts. I went to the Disney store before I left, bought some huge t-shirts with tons of characters on the front by Cinderellas castle, then had all the characters sign them with sharpies. I just carried the tees around in a large ziploc with an old CD to use as a hard surface (slips right in between the layers. ) Now my daughters have awesome souviener nightshirts.
Lowlights of the trip? My DD7 broke her arm at Epcot one night, fell off the monkey bars at the little playground by Morocco. Disney was great - gave her quick ambulance ride to hospital for free. Other DD4 got lost one morning at Blizzard Beach, and it took me a frantic hour to find her. Again, disney was helpful, though my husband found her first.
Other lowlight was that I turned out to be the only park commando in my party. I was the planner, and everyone else just didn't seem to get the need to plan and move quickly. Though, by the end of the trip, I think my husband became a believer. We didn't always tour with my brother and his family ( I think my style got on their nerves,) so on the days when we would split up in a park, and then they would tell us later what things they did all afternoon (usually stood in line for 1 thing for an hour) while we saw 5 things. Anyhow, times like this made my husband see the light.
I used the Unofficial Guide for it's park tour plans ( I cut them out of the back and laminated them before I left), and Tourguidemike as well. I liked the combo. Every morning, or evening, before heading to a park, I would sit down for 5-10 minutes and make a little plan of attack based on what attractions were good for that time of day and what we wanted to see. It worked so well. There was so much flexibility, like I would plan the first few attactions, then I would make a short list of other filler things surrounding the first ones. Usually we were able to see everything we had on the list, and we were never hit with the "oh my goodness, the line for Dumbo was 45 minutes this afternoon" like my brother constantly was. So, I would say that having a plan is awesome. The great thing was that we had two weeks, and didn't feel pressure to see it all in one day. Our last few days we just redid favorites.
Logistics, we rented a car, we brought one side-by-side graco double stroller, which the 3 kids took turns using. It worked out wonderfully, though a little tough to get on parking trams and monorail. We flew to Disney.
Oh, and since we were with my brother, we traded babysitting nights, my husband and I went to Pleasure Island, had a wonderful dinner at Portabellos Yacht Club, then went club hopping and we ended up dancing forever at 8TRAX club. What a great night!
Overall we had a wonderful trip. I have to quote my kids though, that Disney isn't quite as magical as the commercials make it seem. Still fun, but there's fun to be had everywhere in life. I know that we'll go back someday, maybe in 5 years. I know that many people love it more than we did, which is great. I have to say that Disney was most fun when the sun went behind a cloud and the crowds were small.
I would have to say that two weeks was absolutely perfect! After one week, we hadn't seen everything we wanted to, and we were relieved at the thought of having another week. After two weeks we all felt that we needed a break from Disney World, though we could have spent another two weeks lounging around the pool in the sun.
Honestly, the highlight of our trip was our rental vacation home. My brother and family met us there with their two kids, and our 3 kids, so we rented a large 5 bedroom. It was so awesome. This house was like staying in a dream home, complete with private pool and loungers, 4 bathrooms, a huge gourmet kitchen. For me at least it was much harder to leave the house than it was to leave Disney. I loved that my toddler could nap while I was out getting a tan, or swimming with my kids. I loved that my husband and I could be alone in the hot tub after the kids had gone to bed. I loved that we ate probably 2/3 of our meals at the house, so that when we did go out it was more fun. Did I mention that the master bath in the house was twice as large as my master bedroom at home? Anyhow, when I asked my kids what their favorite part of our trip was, they both said, the pool.
Oh, we stayed in Indian Creek off I-192 near splendid China. The location was excellent, and pretty quick to get to the parks. If any of you have any questions, please feel free to PM me. We were very fortunate to get the 30 day Fun IN the Sun Passes, so we basically could go anywhere anyday we wanted. It was so nice to have that kind of flexibility. Most days we went to the parks from 9-12:30 ish, then drove home for a nap and swim, then went back to a park from around 5-9. There were two days when we deviated from this 'plan', and we all hated it. The two times were when we decided to stay at MK until the 3:00 parade, and then of course it was canceled for rain.
The other time was for the AK afternoon parade, which we did get to see, and while nice, it just wasn't worth all the afternoon crankies, crowd, and heat. Oh, and imagine my shock that my DD7 and DD4 actually took naps most days! I can't imagine what life would have been like without that catchup rest.Overall the weather was great - most days around 83-88 degrees, some days with rain, some days with high humidity, but overall very nice.
It was really funny, before I went to Disney this first time, I had ideas about which parks my kids (DD7, DD4, DS1) would like the best. I was wrong. They loved Epcot the most! Why? Coloring masks totally captivated them. Every evening they would beg to go there. Seriously. After Epcot, they liked Animal Kingdom, then Magic Kingdom, then MGM.
I'll just take a minute here to list our favorite attractions: Epcot - test track and Kidcot stations, making cookies at the Land pavilion, Illuminations, Figment Imagination show. At Animal Kingdom, my kids really liked the Kali River Rapids (with ponchos!), the K. Safari ride, Lion King Show. At Magic Kingdom, they loved the Princess Cinderella Breakfast (worth the money, I think!), Wishes fireworks, Buzz Lightyear, Tom Sawyers Island, Teacups, Aladin Carpets ride, seeing Ariel, Toontown characters. Honestly, we all didn't really like Splash Mountain.
Ok, and at MGM, we liked the Beauty and the Beast show, Fantasmic (we showed up 40 minutes before on a Wed night, and had great seats, and people were still getting seats up to 20 minutes before the show. Oh, and my toddler was too tired to tolerate all the loud noise so I had to take him out.), also we liked the backlot tour, Ariels show. Ok, and I went on Rockin Roller coaster and honestly it was too much for me! Too fast too soon. I was happy when the ride ended.Other highlights of the trip were getting character signatures on my daughters Disney t-shirts. I went to the Disney store before I left, bought some huge t-shirts with tons of characters on the front by Cinderellas castle, then had all the characters sign them with sharpies. I just carried the tees around in a large ziploc with an old CD to use as a hard surface (slips right in between the layers. ) Now my daughters have awesome souviener nightshirts.
Lowlights of the trip? My DD7 broke her arm at Epcot one night, fell off the monkey bars at the little playground by Morocco. Disney was great - gave her quick ambulance ride to hospital for free. Other DD4 got lost one morning at Blizzard Beach, and it took me a frantic hour to find her. Again, disney was helpful, though my husband found her first.
Other lowlight was that I turned out to be the only park commando in my party. I was the planner, and everyone else just didn't seem to get the need to plan and move quickly. Though, by the end of the trip, I think my husband became a believer. We didn't always tour with my brother and his family ( I think my style got on their nerves,) so on the days when we would split up in a park, and then they would tell us later what things they did all afternoon (usually stood in line for 1 thing for an hour) while we saw 5 things. Anyhow, times like this made my husband see the light.
I used the Unofficial Guide for it's park tour plans ( I cut them out of the back and laminated them before I left), and Tourguidemike as well. I liked the combo. Every morning, or evening, before heading to a park, I would sit down for 5-10 minutes and make a little plan of attack based on what attractions were good for that time of day and what we wanted to see. It worked so well. There was so much flexibility, like I would plan the first few attactions, then I would make a short list of other filler things surrounding the first ones. Usually we were able to see everything we had on the list, and we were never hit with the "oh my goodness, the line for Dumbo was 45 minutes this afternoon" like my brother constantly was. So, I would say that having a plan is awesome. The great thing was that we had two weeks, and didn't feel pressure to see it all in one day. Our last few days we just redid favorites.
Logistics, we rented a car, we brought one side-by-side graco double stroller, which the 3 kids took turns using. It worked out wonderfully, though a little tough to get on parking trams and monorail. We flew to Disney
.Oh, and since we were with my brother, we traded babysitting nights, my husband and I went to Pleasure Island, had a wonderful dinner at Portabellos Yacht Club, then went club hopping and we ended up dancing forever at 8TRAX club. What a great night!
Overall we had a wonderful trip. I have to quote my kids though, that Disney isn't quite as magical as the commercials make it seem. Still fun, but there's fun to be had everywhere in life. I know that we'll go back someday, maybe in 5 years. I know that many people love it more than we did, which is great.
I have to say that Disney was most fun when the sun went behind a cloud and the crowds were small.
Hopefully it won't be too bad over the summer. When my son broke his collarbone bath times were such a pain. Good luck.
