I was sort of going to wait for the website to show it but when people started having success and then reporting long hold times I figured better get what I want while I could (always book now, think about it later!) Still shocked the 3rd sold out so fast but it seemed like so many people not even in this thread were booking that day.
SWA has been high for me for months too although recently began to drop again. I booked when it was lowest and it went up steadily until it was double what I paid and now back down to 1.5x what I paid. so I don't know.
What I DO know is that free dining is a huge resort-filling promo for WDW and allowing check in dates up to 11/28 will have some people showing up the week before and staying through til sunday the 4th. I think this is why EMM is sold out on 11/29 as well. That is literally the only check in window (after thanksgiving and until 11/28) where you can get all of the christmas stuff under free dining. Yes I know that
MVMCP is going to be running in November and now JBJB in HS, but Holidays around the World is a HUGE draw too. Neil Patrick Harris is doing CP narration from 11/28-12/1 and HE is a huge draw. 12/1 is the thursday. so I think all of that is going to make the Disney resorts and Disney restaurants very busy until 12/3-12/4... but as we all found making our FP+ there was plenty of availability for that week for pretty much anything we wanted. I even got 7DMT for the last day of my trip more than a week after the 60+ day window opened up.
That said, and as I have said over and over, just because the disney onsite resorts are full to the gills, it doesn't mean the parks will be. But I am not surprised that all of the special amazing events that people who are in the know enough to get the free dining promo also know about are selling out for that time too. The 12/3 date is especially pivotal because a whole bunch of us wanted that date, but it is also a last night thing for people the week before (which as I've explained above will be a very popular week). But that said I have read that Disney occupancy is always 85%+ no matter what the season in their hotels... disney hotel occupancy does not drive in park crowds... it is the off site people... who are going to be on lower budgets in general and less likely to be booking this kind of stuff. I mean even in this thread... look at how many of us are staying onsite vs. offsite. there may be one or two people staying offsite that I've seen post in this thread. I think that is why 11/29 EMM is booked up too... it's just right in that sweet spot of the only free dining week that has all of the xmas stuff, NPH narrating and the rest of it. I'm not sure if you have to be an onsite guest to do EMM but it does seem like it is the kind of thing that would appeal to people with more generous budgets, staying onsite rather than staying off site and eating in the room and in offsite restaurants etc. Just two different types of trips IMO.
Anyway that is my theory about all of it lol.
so now we have to decide if we do f! Or the jbjb (non party). We haven't seen either but at the end of a long day, f! Is appealing because I can FP it and it's seated.
Hopefully smooth-sailing from here on out. 
So that was a pretty good trade-off!
that's great everything worked out nicely in the end! It'll be an extra great vacation because of all the effort you put in 
