Bad GRANDMA's!!

[soulmates]

Bad?? Naaaaa, I prefer "Smart!"

After doing some research into the possibility of us getting 3 rooms at BLT ( Not our home resort) we were told slim to none. Sooooo, the idea of us being at 2 separate resorts came up and you know what? We LIKEY!

Love our kids and can't wait to bring the gbabies with us this trip...however, we don't want to be their permanent babysitters the entire trip. We told them we'd take the 2 little ones, ( almost 1 year & almost 18 months at the time of the trip) for an entire day while they're at Universal Studios. We realize those parks are really for bigger kids and we'd love to have the little ones an entire day.

That being said, if we're not right down the hall, but rather, across the lake...we'll have more US time.

We may be new at this grandparent thing...but we've got the parent thing down pretty well. Always three steps ahead of them

 

[DVC Sue]

So what two resorts are you looking to book? Would you stay in BLT while the kids are VWL? (The across the lake reference made me think of those 2 resorts)

 

[soulmates]

So what two resorts are you looking to book? Would you stay in BLT while the kids are VWL? (The across the lake reference made me think of those 2 resorts)

They want BLT so we're attempting that and we'd love to stay at GFV's. We'll see how it all works out. Their second choice is Wilderness Villas. Either way, we're keeping the adults kids in one resort and taking the college aged one with us. She got spoiled last trip in the one bedroom; having the LR all to herself and her own bathroom. She's totally fine w/ staying with us.

 

[GrumpyPOTFH]

I guess I am the exception, it could also be that I am a first time Grumpa, my grand daughter is now 1. I do not go more the three days and not be with her. I am with her every Wednesday night, my son and daughter-in-law go out to dinner. This started when she was born eight weeks pre and spent 2 months in the NICU. She was 2-1/2 hours away, I would take off after work every Wednesday and drive to be with her for 3 to 4 hours and then drive home. Also spent every weekend with her. AKA she knows me very well and it seems to work for everyone. We have planned from the very beginning to be the first to take her to Disney. Next Thanksgiving we be taking her, and her parents, if I have her every day that is fine with me. We have friends who think I am nuts, I have told my son if I am ever a problem just say the word and I will back it off. But it works for them and she is my world. She will be a spoiled Disney granddaughter. Her favorite show is Mickey Mouse Play House, she chose it not me!

 

[soulmates]

Oh we LOVE our grandson...don't get me wrong. Any day now our grandaughter is about to make her BIG entrance into the world too. We just feel since we're giving them this trip and spending an entire day with the grands not to mention seeing them everyday during the trip....that's good with us. I just see our evenings as the only time we'll have with it just being "Us" and selfish as that may seem to others, for us we feel we'll have earned 7 quiet evenings.

 

[DVC Sue]

Yeah, it can be tricky, I see it with my own kids now. I'm not a grandma yet, but I definitely enjoy our kid-free time. They're older - early 20's. I love them very much, but it is nice to spend some time with JUST my husband.

 

[soulmates]

Yeah, it can be tricky, I see it with my own kids now. I'm not a grandma yet, but I definitely enjoy our kid-free time. They're older - early 20's. I love them very much, but it is nice to spend some time with JUST my husband.

Agreed. Love is not the question; we love our kids and new grandson. We already love the grand-daughter and she's not even here yet!! But we feel like we're GIVING the entire family a deluxe vacation, offering them an entire day to go be BIG KIDS while we watch the babies and we'll still be hanging out in the parks with them ALLLLL day long. I think we're entitled to long nights pool side with a few drinks

And honestly, our kids were SO grateful that we're doing this they never even blinked when we said we will most likely be "Across the lake". They get it.

 

[rpk1951]

We have done a few trips with ours. We put the families in the same resort, just on different floors. That way no one is running to our room late at night or early in the morning. When I did it at check in, the lady laughed at me. After watching the 10 of them during the trip, she called us over and said we were pretty smart for old people. I had threatened seperate resorts but not done it yet. Maybe put them at AK and us at BC.

 

[Buzzsgramma]

Our gr kids have been raised on WDW...they are now 24,20,17,17 & 16...
Our kids have never pawned them off shall i call it even when we offered to keep them with us...
Also we provide the DVC and they are free to do what they want...if we treat for dinner and they want to come with thats great...If we treat with passes and we go to some parks together and rides great...if not they are FREE to do what they like...
We are not or ever have been joined at the hip!!! They owe us nothing just cause we paid for something...
WE have always 13 of us or more always stayed at the same resort...sometimes in a 2 bd rm lock off or studios....
Too each is own.....I might add that DH and I go by ourselves once a year ...I do see from reading other threads we seem to be in the minority....

 

[dallastxcpa]

That's the beautiful thing about DVC; it works for so many in so many different ways. We are staying in a GV at AKL in March. But 2200 square feet seems big enough to get some separation when needed.

Enjoy your trip with your grand babies. And the great thing about your plan is they will get to see both resorts.

 

[keishashadow]

OP Bad Grandmas unite lol

Our 1st joint trip w/oldest DS's family coming up in January, i'm excited except for the intial stop @ Nickelodeon resort ( i'm still wrapping my head around it), then off to cruise (I booked us on separate decks) and finally two studios @ AKV. I fully expect for GD to want to bunk with us a night or two but I know we will need 'our' downtime.

 

[JeanfromBNA]

If all y'all are bad grands, then the world needs more bad grands! Love it!!!

 

[dgaston]

Just returned from a Kidani trip with the family: DH 66, DS 33, DD 30 her DH 34, DDG 2, DS 24. and friend 22. We divided time between everyone, and spent time at MNSSHP, Further complicating this was that DH had fallen and had a broken arm in an external fixater bar and sling. There is nothing like leaving the Magic Kingdom to go to Centra Care to deal with an infection in the pins in your arm.

We watched Abby one night while DD and Dson in law went to DTD to shop. Great duty for me! I also loved being at the Kidani pool with Abby while she was enjoying the splash area and small slide. Great CMs.

More Bad Grandma Time!

 

[soulmates]

That's the beautiful thing about DVC; it works for so many in so many different ways. We are staying in a GV at AKL in March. But 2200 square feet seems big enough to get some separation when needed.

Enjoy your trip with your grand babies. And the great thing about your plan is they will get to see both resorts.

Thanks SOOO much

OP Bad Grandmas unite lol

Our 1st joint trip w/oldest DS's family coming up in January, i'm excited except for the intial stop @ Nickelodeon resort ( i'm still wrapping my head around it), then off to cruise (I booked us on separate decks) and finally two studios @ AKV. I fully expect for GD to want to bunk with us a night or two but I know we will need 'our' downtime.

YES!! I'm sure we'll have those babies with us for a night or two as well.

If all y'all are bad grands, then the world needs more bad grands! Love it!!!

Just returned from a Kidani trip with the family: DH 66, DS 33, DD 30 her DH 34, DDG 2, DS 24. and friend 22. We divided time between everyone, and spent time at MNSSHP, Further complicating this was that DH had fallen and had a broken arm in an external fixater bar and sling. There is nothing like leaving the Magic Kingdom to go to Centra Care to deal with an infection in the pins in your arm.

We watched Abby one night while DD and Dson in law went to DTD to shop. Great duty for me! I also loved being at the Kidani pool with Abby while she was enjoying the splash area and small slide. Great CMs.

More Bad Grandma Time!

 

[GGOOFY1]

I too am a first time grandma!! My grandson is 8 1/2 months old and I can't wait to take him to WDW. We have a GV booked in May at OKW. I have booked Chef Mickey's for him to meet his favorite character Mickey Mouse!! When he gets tired we turn on Mickey's Clubhouse! Our trip is a celebration of our youngest graduation from college, but I'm looking forward to introducing the World to my grandson!!

 

[Cee]

I think that is brilliant!

Sent from my iPad using DISBoards

 

[scooby9932]

Smart thinking on your part. While we all love our GKids, we also know how our kids are likely to behave, so going with your gut on this is smart thinking. Everyone's family works differently.

I'm a new G'ma as of 10.9.13, so I know how awesome it is! As soon as my DD told me she was expecting, we started planning DGD's first trip. We decided on a 2nd birthday celebration trip. So, Oct '15 it is!

DH & I have gone back & forth over details. Knowing my daughter & her SO the way we do, we came to the conclusion that we should not share a unit with them, as we originally thought of getting a 2BR so we'd each have our space & a common area.

BUT...I know my daughter...their space will be theirs and OUR space will also be theirs! It's due to the jetted tub. That will have her in there no doubt about it. So, we decided to put them in their own studio, while we'll book ourselves a 1 bedroom. That way we'll each have "private time" and a nice kitchen/LR area for hanging out in all together when they're over for a visit.

We bandied back and forth over having them at a different resort from us, but we own at OKW, and while we LOVE it, we knew that DD would want AKL as an alternate. That is just too far - nightmare if they use only Disney transportation. Not like your situation of being in 2 monorail resorts. We just won't have enough points for how we'd like to vacation to do that, but it sounds ideal.

So, we've decided on AKL for all of us. We're hoping to be able to get Savannah view Studio for them so DGD can enjoy the animals. Hoping it won't be too difficult to get the rooms we want at the 7 month mark. Otherwise, she'll just have to "make do" with an enormous Studio at OKW.

I've already said we'll be glad to watch DGD while they have a night out to themselves however they want to spend it. If it works out for us all, we might be keeping her other times as well, but we have no intention of being a week long babysitter, either. But that doesn't really concern me. While I know DD will invade my space (hazard of the two of us for 21 years just the 2 of us), I also know that she's tried so long for this baby, she's not likely to even want us to watch her that one night.

 

[Simba's Mom]

Our oldest DGD told Grandpa the other night "Grandpa, I want to go to Disney" so of course we're planning our first trip. Grandma coached her well! My concern about staying in the same villa is that I'll get totally tired out and end up sleeping the last couple days! Grandma just doesn't have the same amount of stamina as when she was a Mom. We'd considered staying at OKW in a GV, but I have visions of the DGDs launching themselves off the balcony down into the LR.

 

[DizBub]

We have taken trips with our grandchildren before we bought DVC but they were really too young to enjoy it or even remember it.

The last pre-DVC trip was in 2008. GKs were 6, 4 and 1. It was a real family affair with all 3 of our daughters and 2 of their spouses. Of course, to make matters worse the husband of DD#1 with the 3 kids wasn't on the trip.

We had booked 4 rooms at Pop Century with a request for 2 of the rooms to be connecting. DD#1 with kids expected to be connected to our room. There was a mix-up at check-in and DD#2 was put into that room. Well, DD#2 is very protective of me and would not give up that room. She felt like this was my vacation too and since I watched my grandkids every day at home I would be taken advantage of. DD#3 felt the same way and refused to switch rooms with us.

While I did appreciate the thought, there are still very hard feelings over this trip 5 years later.

2 years ago DD#3 had an infant on the trip and felt like we didn't help her enough........more hard feelings.

As much as we love our family, it's not really a vacation unless it's just DH and me. I guess we are Bad Grandparents too.

 

[DonnaL]

We're not first time gp's since we have a 12 yr old gs who has traveled with us to WDW since he's 2, sometimes w/Mom and sometimes w/o and DL last year w/o Mom to DL at age 11. However, we just became gp's yesterday (11/23) to beautiful twin girls (our son and dil) and will be again next week when our daughter and sil(mom to 12 yr old) have a daughter. So, we're thinking ahead and while we're thrilled to be gp's to babies again after 12 years.....we're also 12 years older and I don't think I could handle a WDW vacation 24/7 with toddlers again!! I like the idea of having separate rooms (not sure if I would go for the separate resorts) to have a bit of separation on a daily basis....will definitely file that one for future reference in about two years which is most likely when our first trip will be with the three girls....gs will 15 by that time....he has already informed me he has no plans to do "the Princess thing" with his little sister and cousins.....but, after I saw how excited he was with the twins today .....I somehow doubt he'll miss it!!!