Now that our trip is over, I've started a trip report:
"Is it time for Mickey ice cream?"
I wanted to mention a few things that I touched on here in my PTR, though!
Dining plan math: I totaled my receipts today and came to the conclusion that the dining plan worked in our favor. We spent $696.55 for the dining plan and my receipts show that we would have paid $745.05 out of pocket. That doesn't include mugs, BTW.
I will say that the dining plan maybe caused us to eat a just a tiny bit differently. We ordinarily wouldn't have had dessert with our QS meals, and it felt a little excessive by the end of the week. Otherwise, it didn;t really have much impact on how we eat at Disney.
Pin Trading: Kind of a success. He liked trading when there was something he was interested in, but more often than not he didn't really find anything that he wanted to trade for. I think he made 3-4 trades the entire week.
He did however sucker us into buying brand new pins... at least 8 that I can think of off the top of my head. So our "cheap entertainment" wound up backfiring on us just a bit.
The other downside to the whole pin thing is how easily those little backs fell off. He had three pins fall off his lanyard. Fortunately, we didn't lose the pins, only the backs. I might consider the locking backs next time for pins that are special to him.
And my park bag? We used every single item in it. The glow bracelets and necklaces were fun entertainment, and we gave away a few to kids around us as well.
So that's it for my PTR! Hope to see you in my TR in the future
. I really liked your Disney math (its the best kind
) I will have to use your method for our upcoming trip. Not sure if we should do the dining plan this time. Have fun on your trip.
I don't know why but I've never used ziplocs and I see now how useful they can be. DUH! 
There were some ups and downs, but overall it was a fantastic vacation. Can't wait to start my trip report!
