A Fall Family of Five Trip

[Dominason]

Hi! What better way to fight the post-Disney blues than by writing a TR? I’m sharing my family’s fall break trip. This was our third trip as a family (my fourth; I went as a teen), and we had an incredible time!

We’re a family of 5: me, my husband, our 9- and 6-year-old sons and our 15-month-old daughter. I had some hesitation taking a one-year-old, but she’s one of those unicorn babies and is super easy-going, sleeps well, eats well, etc. I don’t think she had a single meltdown on our trip.

A little backstory on how this trip came to be: on my first day back from maternity leave last October, I got laid off (a larger company had bought my company, restructuring, blah blah). THAT was a stressful time. Fortunately, they did pay me a decent severance. I got a new job in March, and when my husband asked what we should do with the leftover severance, I said I wanted to go to Disney World (as any financially responsible adult would do ). Our school district has a 2 week fall break, so we planned it for the first week of the break.

Our trip was September 27-October 2, and we stayed in a cabin at Fort Wilderness. We’ve previously stayed at Pop Century, but I wanted more space since we have a third kid now, and FW was cheaper than 2 rooms at Pop or a suite at AOA. We had 4-day park hoppers, and we hit the parks pretty hard considering we had a one year old in tow.

Note: I don’t feel comfortable sharing our faces, so you’ll have to assume we’re all really, really attractive. Also, we are not foodies at all, so don’t expect food pics or food reviews.



Hope you enjoy reading about our trip

 

[Dominason]

Day 0

Let’s back up to Friday, the day before we left. 2 weeks prior DS9 had broken his arm. Impressively, this is the SECOND time this year he has broken the same arm. DH took him to the doctor to get a smaller cast. He’d had a cast up past his elbow, and they were taking that one off and putting on a shorter one, which would be so much more comfortable (especially in Florida!).

After they took the cast off, DH texted me and said DS9’s arm looked bad, like the broken bone was still very prominent. 10 minutes later, I got a phone call from the doctor’s office, and they said something along the lines of they were about to call an ambulance, but they wanted to see if I could come up there instead.. I was so confused. What was wrong with DS9’s arm that he needed an ambulance when they were walking distance from the hospital?? Then they told me that it wasn’t DS9 that needed help, it was DH. He had passed out.

I quickly left work and went to the doctor’s office. DH looked rough. He was pale as a ghost. He didn’t really know why he passed out. And it had really scared DS9 because it was just him and DH in the room when it happened. I took DS9 to school, though he was still shaken up (thankfully, DH works at his school and had coworkers checking on him) then took DH to the ER.

They ran a gamut of tests, including an EKG, and determined that nothing was wrong, and that it was just a random incident of passing out. We told the ER doctor our plans to travel the next day, and he assured us DH would be fine, saying he’d probably feel rough the rest of the day but would likely perk up by evening and feel better tomorrow.

I took DH home, stopping by my office to grab my laptop since I still had some tasks to finish up before I was going to be out. I don’t think my boss was super keen on me going home, but DH was very weak, and I knew he wouldn’t rest unless I made him. He rested most of the day and did start feeling better in the evening. The trip was still on!

We think he passed out from seeing DS9’s arm. He’s gotten lightheaded in a couple of other situations when our kids got injured, but this is the first time he’s passed out. Regardless, I took DS9 to all of his other ortho appointments.

DH was fine during our trip, and he got a clean bill of health when he visited a doctor after we got home.

SO, that was an eventful day! Next up, an earrrly wake time and arrival day.

 

[Dominason]

Day 1: Arrival Day

We live a little over 2 hours from the airport, and our flight was leaving bright and early at 7:05 am. That meant a 2:45 am alarm with intentions to leave at 3:30. This is a small airport, and we have TSA precheck, so that’s why we only gave ourselves a little over an hour to get to the gate. I think we left about 10 minutes late, pulling the kids out of bed and straight into the car. I figured DD1 would go back to sleep but knew the boys would be too excited. DD1 eventually went to sleep—about 30 minutes from the airport.

By the time we got to the parking lot, we knew we were pushing it with time. We waited and waited for the tram to come get us from the parking lot; we probably waited 15-20 minutes. Now we really felt in a rush. We checked our bags and got through security quickly and started hoofing it to our gate. They had just lined up to start boarding when we got there.



I had planned on filling water bottles, going to the bathroom, and handing out the granola bars I had packed for breakfast before we boarded, but there was no time. We flew Southwest and boarded between the A and B groups. DH had to get a gate check tag for the pack N play (they wouldn’t let us check it with our bags), and that made us the last ones in the line. It wasn’t a problem for us to find seats together, though.

The 2 hour flight was uneventful. It was DD1’s first flight, and she did great. We landed, grabbed our bags and made our way to the Mears shuttle. We had to wait a bit once we got there, and the boys were getting restless. DH started making them do squats, sit-ups, and planks.



I had DD1 in a baby carrier strapped to my chest, and she fell asleep and stayed asleep for most of the bus ride.

We arrived at Fort Wilderness a little after 12. I had checked in on the MDE app, but I wanted to check in at the desk just in case our cabin was ready early. Why is the check-in area so small?? My kids were going nuts in there. The cabin wasn’t ready, but they said we could probably go ahead and get our golf cart.

Prior to the trip, we had considered using our free admission to Blizzard Beach but decided it would probably be too much to try to tackle. I’m glad we didn’t end up going because it definitely felt like we had too much going on to try to navigate a water park.

We decided to get lunch then take the kids swimming since the cabin wasn’t ready. Rookie move: I had not packed all of our swim stuff in the same bag. Cue me opening 4 suitcases in the tiny FW check-in area, digging through bags to find swimsuits, goggles, and sunscreen, all while my kids were telling me how hungry they were.



DH had left to get the golf cart, and I didn’t have my eyes on DD1. She climbed onto a chair and fell, prompting a loud scream. Let’s just say I was flustered.



I finally acquired all the swim gear and got DD1 calmed down. DH arrived and took our bags to bell services. We hopped in the golf cart and went to Trail’s End to get some lunch. While we were eating, I got a text that our cabin was ready, hooray! We scrapped our plans to swim since the kids were obviously tired and headed to the cabin (# 2835) when we finished eating. So glad I spent all that time fining our swim gear earlier.

The only request I had made was to have a cabin with a bathtub, which was accommodated. We all loved the cabin; the boys were especially excited about the bunk beds. They looked so cozy.



DH went to get our stuff from bell services. In addition to our bags, we also had a grocery order from Walmart and the stroller and high chair we rented from BabyQuip (side note: I know stroller rental companies are not allowed to leave their items with bell services, but that’s what they did with ours. We also left it with bell services when we checked out. No idea why it was allowed in this instance ). DH wasn’t able to get everything in one trip, so the CM offered to bring the rest of the stuff to us, which was so nice.

Next order of business: naps. I set up DD1’s pack n play and SlumberPod and got the boys settled into their bunks with a movie on. DH and I pulled down the Murphy bed in the living room and napped as well.

Note about a pack n play: it wouldn’t fit in the bedroom without blocking access to the beds. It wasn’t a problem for us to have it in the living room since we had the SlumberPod (basically a blackout tent), and DD1 is a great sleeper. However, I wanted to mention it. This was DD1's set up:



I didn’t nap long (too excited!), so I started quietly unpacking while everyone else was sleeping. I hate living out of a suitcase. When DH woke up, we debated on waking the boys and taking them to the pool but decided to let them sleep, and DH said he would take them after dinner.

Up Next: a character dinner

 

[mi*vida*loca]

Your arrival day gifs have me cracking up. I remember those chaotic arrival days with little ones.

Can't wait to hear about the rest of your trip!