DC Trip..CANCELLED.....WDW Trip ON----Like Donkey Kong!

[starann]

Welcome to my pre trip report. Backround, before introductions, is we had planned a summer vacation to Washington DC for July 29th to Aug 5. Hubby wanted to do something 'different' as we usually go visit family in NC/SC near the beach. I suggested Cape Cod (that was a no), Boston (a no, too expensive), a Dude Ranch (HUGE no), and DC. Hubby said great to DC. We booked a hotel in Arlington for $2500 (YIKES) and so our vacation was planned. I did research and the more I did I wasn't sure this was the right time for our family to go to DC. Our kids are 13,12,6 and 3. The younger 2 would be bored out of their minds at a lot of the stuff there. I voiced this to hubby who said it would be fine.

Fast forward to June 11, our annv. We were on our way to b'fast with the 2 little ones, as the big ones were at a sleepover, and hubby asked "What do you think about skipping DC and going to WDW? The more I think about it, the more I think the littles will be miserable" WELL, you never have to ask me twice to go to Disney. I went home and started looking up prices.

YIKES, that was scary. We usually plan a trip a year or more in advance and save accordingly. The gave us under 2 months to plan and PAY for a trip. Could we do it? Was I getting my hopes up for nothing?

 

[starann]

I called the next day and found out we could do a ASMu Suite or WL Cabin for almost the same price. While the suite has 2 bathrooms, I chose the Cabin as we like taking the boat to MK. I booked the cabin with 4 day base tickets as we had a little under 30 days to make the final payment and I wanted to make sure we could save up enough. We have no credit cards so we pay cash for trips. Thankfully with my job I can pick up extra hours and lately they have been paying bonus and double bonus on top of our regular pay or time and a half. When I called to make the final payment last week I added to make it an 8 day ticket and memory maker to it (as that is how much we had saved/collected in GC...using my Target card and saving 5%). We plan on getting dining, but had to wait for the next 2 paychecks to pay for that.

We will be driving down, as we did on our last trip.



Wait, did I mention that we are not telling the kids?????

Yup that was 1 thing Hubby was adamant about, we surprise the kids. Our older 2 are in Vegas right now visiting my mom for a few weeks, so it's been easy to make plans and talk about things without them finding out. The littles don't really pay attention so we are in the clear there. Still not sure how we are going to do it, the big reveal. Part of me wants to wait until we are driving under the signs and let them figure it out, but the big boys will know something is up once we get to NC! We usually stop for b'fast in the am, so I'm thinking of telling them at b'fast once we sit down and recording it. Any suggestions?

 

[starann]

Introductions


Me: Star (yup, that's really my name!). I am a 37 year old wife, mom and nurse. I work as a NICU nurse, working night shift. I've been a nurse 17 years, but only in the NICU for the last year and a half I am also trained in post partum, so I work with babies a lot, a love it. I have been to WDW at age 7, multiple times as a late teen then again in 2006, 2008, 2010, 2013 and 2016. I LOVE it there and would prefer to vacation at WDW over any other place.

DH: Randy. Randy is a former Dept of Defense firefighter, now Mon-Fri building/fire inspector. He is going to be 43 this year. He has an antique firetruck which he enters into car and truck shows and parades. He had never been to WDW before 2006, stating "Why would I want to see some over priced, over grown RAT!" Needless to say he has been in 2006, 2008 and 2010 and loves it!!!

DS1: Cody is 13 and and will be in 8th grade. He is a really bright boy, LOVES to read but has Aspergers, ADHD, anxiety and Tourettes. This was the 1st trip that we actually had a diagnosis for him (in past trips it was just meltdowns and emotional immaturity). He loves POTC and Star Wars. He has been to WDW 5 times, this will be #6 and he loves all rides, well all rides except TOT!

DS2: Shane is 12 and is going into the 7th grade. He is a sweet boy who knows how to push all of my buttons. He plays baseball. He also LOVES Star Wars. His favorite ride is not a ride at all, it is One Man's Dream. We have managed to get him to go on a few rides, and depending on the ride he may or may not try it again.

DS3: Casey.. is 6 and will be going into 1st grade. He has recently been diagnosed with ADHD, he may also have Aspergers as he has several soft markers for it, but we are waiting a bit to see if that is a true diagnosis or a symptom of other things. He loves Disney, he is a little ride junkie!

DD1: Josephine was a special surprise we brought home from our 2013 trip. We were done with 3 kids, but she has certainly completed our family. She had her 1st trip Oct 2016 and really loved it. She is not really a girly girl, having 3 older brothers has a little something to do with that I assume. But she does like Belle and we often pretend she is Belle and I am Beast and we act out scenes in character.

 

[mercydisney]

I am the 1st one!!!!!!
Have you figured out how to surprise the kids? What about having a themed Disney breakfast?
I also like to pay cash for Disney vacation. I enjoy it more knowing its paid for.
Do not forget to make your FP's.

 

[starann]

So moving onto some more of the grit of our trip. We are used to doing 10 days with park hoppers. We decided to skip PH this time to save some more money and time. We are staying at the Wilderness Cabins, which is new for us. We have stayed at ALMo, WL and BWV. We love being close to MK and riding the boats to and from there. I told my DH when we booked that we have to go into this without the expectations of a typical trip. We have less time, it will be more crowded, and certainly hotter than we are used to (we usually go in the fall). I made FP selections for mostly before 2pm, this way if we want to go swim before dinner we can. I have NEVER been to Fl in the height of summer, so I have no idea what to expect as far as crowds or heat go.

As soon as we booked I went to task of making our ADRs. I was shocked at how many choices we had with it being so close to our trip, esp since we are a family of 6! Hubby had a few request for meals, so I tried to make them possible, some had to be put on the chopping block because we are not doing PH, but overall I am happy with our plans. I tried to try new places as this is a new type of trip for us so here are our plans (I made FP plans as well)

July 28th, Leave PA when DH gets home from work (about 5ish)
July 29th, arrive in Orlando around lunchtime, check in, grab a QS lunch and head to MK
FP Magic Carpets (this is always our 1st ride in MK as the whole family can go on it)
FP POTC
FP 7DMT
Dinner at the Diamond Horseshoe (this is never opened when we go in Sept/Oct, Hubby wanted LTT, but I felt this had more options for my picky older kids)

July 30th Epcot
FP Soarin
FP Pixar Short Film Fest
FP Nemo (I may play around with these so we aren't runnign back and forth)
Dinner at Akershus (we've done this our last 2 trips and love it.....it was the only way our 2 little ones would even look at characters)

........gotta leave you hanging.....we are currently getting a heavy rain storm and our basement is filling up with water........not what I wanted to hear after working 12hours last night!

 

[starann]

OK....water isn't too bad....we have an outer stairwell and when it rains really hard the water comes down the stairs, hubby build a cover and it broke (we didn't know it broke)

Where was I?

July 31 MG (yup I still call it that)
FP TSM
FP Star Tours
FP VOTLM
Dinner at MM (a 1st time for us, we booked it with the music thing, which is a 1st for us.)
We also have to fit in RNR as it's my 13yo fav ride, and it's our only day there

Aug 1 AK
TH Bfast
FP KS
FP Navi
FP KRR
Dinner at Trails End....we went for the 1st time last trip and LOVED it

Aug 2 Epcot
FP TT
FP SE
FP Meet Mickey and Pals
Dinner at San Angel (a 1st for us, we had it booked last trip by cancelled it to go to Trails end with friends we met up with)

Aug 3rd MK
CP pre park b'fast
FP Splash
FP Dumbo
FP 7DMT

Aug 4th AK
FP Navi
FP KS
FP KRR
Dinner at TH, with ROL package (we are hoping to see Flights in Avatar by getting there early, if not, there is always next time!)

Aug 5th MK
FP Buzz
FP JOTLM
FP Splash (my 6yo fav ride)
Dinner at 1900 Park Fare (again a 1st for us)

Then we leave to come home early Aug 6th

 

[starann]

I am the 1st one!!!!!!
Have you figured out how to surprise the kids? What about having a themed Disney breakfast?
I also like to pay cash for Disney vacation. I enjoy it more knowing its paid for.
Do not forget to make your FP's.

I'm thinking of telling them when we stop for b'fast. By then we will have passed DC and we usually stop for b'fast. I'm thinking once we get seating, telling them and recording it.

I have been buying Disney GC in Target to save 5% like a crazy woman! Every little bit helps. This is a pay week for us, so I just ordered more. Once I pay some more bills I'll see how much more I can buy and put to our Dining plan. I'm so grateful work has been so busy, so OT (bonus OT at that) has been available pretty much anytime I want it.

 

[mercydisney]

You are amazing. I could never keep it from my kids until than. Mainly because I am to excited. Probably more excited then the kids, even though they are older now. LOL
While you are at breakfast you can ask them wouldn't it be great if we can have Mickey Waffles tomorrow?

 

[mdsouth]

I called the next day and found out we could do a ASMu Suite or WL Cabin for almost the same price. While the suite has 2 bathrooms, I chose the Cabin as we like taking the boat to MK. I booked the cabin with 4 day base tickets as we had a little under 30 days to make the final payment and I wanted to make sure we could save up enough. We have no credit cards so we pay cash for trips. Thankfully with my job I can pick up extra hours and lately they have been paying bonus and double bonus on top of our regular pay or time and a half. When I called to make the final payment last week I added to make it an 8 day ticket and memory maker to it (as that is how much we had saved/collected in GC...using my Target card and saving 5%). We plan on getting dining, but had to wait for the next 2 paychecks to pay for that.

We will be driving down, as we did on our last trip.



Wait, did I mention that we are not telling the kids?????

Yup that was 1 thing Hubby was adamant about, we surprise the kids. Our older 2 are in Vegas right now visiting my mom for a few weeks, so it's been easy to make plans and talk about things without them finding out. The littles don't really pay attention so we are in the clear there. Still not sure how we are going to do it, the big reveal. Part of me wants to wait until we are driving under the signs and let them figure it out, but the big boys will know something is up once we get to NC! We usually stop for b'fast in the am, so I'm thinking of telling them at b'fast once we sit down and recording it. Any suggestions?

Hi! I am joining in on your planning! Wow! I have to say, how exciting for you! Like you, I love Disney and would love to go all the time. That being said, I just went to DC for the first time ever. We just spent one night there in Arlington. It was around 225 for the night. Since the kids and I never had been before we just toured the National Mall, saw the White House, the Capital and the Pentagon and went to Arlington Cemetery. We did not tour the White House, just went to the outside of it. The price was great - FREE except for twenty dollars to park at Arlington. Otherwise we just found free parking on the street and walked everywhere. Some day it would be nice to return to do the Smithsonian museums and other things but like the price of the hotel will be crazy. But my kids are older and so they get a lot of it.

I totally understand your decision to wait until your two littlest are older. At their ages, they would be bored and if you are like me, you would not get much out of the trip since you would be taking care of the little ones.

DS1: Cody is 13 and and will be in 8th grade. He is a really bright boy, LOVES to read but has Aspergers, ADHD, anxiety and Tourettes. This was the 1st trip that we actually had a diagnosis for him (in past trips it was just meltdowns and emotional immaturity). He loves POTC and Star Wars. He has been to WDW 5 times, this will be #6 and he loves all rides, well all rides except TOT!

My son has Aspergers and ADD. He is 20 and doing very well. He loves maps, all kids and is a big geography guy and now he is into all sports. He loves to watch pro baseball and pro and college football and knows all the stats about different teams, players and even the stats on the actual ballparks.

I remember taking him to WDW when he was around 8 and there were some issues with the large crowds and his reluctance to ride lots of rides.

 

[mdsouth]

I have always thought staying at the cabins would be great! It just looks fun. I have read wonderful reviews about Trails End and it is one of those places I keep wanting to try. But don't because of the time it would take to leave the parks and go to Fort Wilderness and return.

On my last two trips, we did not have park hoppers and it worked out great for us. We saved a lot of money that way. When we went we would go to the park in the morning, leave in the late afternoon for a swim and sometimes dinner and then return to the same park. Some days we ate in the park we were at for the day and on the other days we had dinner at one of the other resorts.

I really never missed having the park hoppers and on the two trips without them we were there during busy times, in the summer and then around President's Day.

 

[mdsouth]

One idea you may want to do to add to your Big Reveal would be to have some type of package for the kids to open at breakfast. You could have one box and tell them that you wanted to give them something to open to help pass the travel time. Then in the box can be big clues to WDW, stuff like stickers, maybe t-shirts, Mickey ears (if you have some already and planned to take them back with you), etc. Or a helium filled balloon with Mickey on it that can pop out of the box.

 

[Tom Cottone]

I know you stated this is your first summer trip to WDW. 90s and humidity are the themes of the day. Expect that afternoon T-storm and some ride closures if there is lightning in the area. Hydrate, hydrate, hydrate! Bring a cooler loaded with bottled water. QS vendors will give you a free glass of ice water.
We took our granddaughter in mid May and it was unusually hot for May.
Enjoy and have a wonderful time