Do you pack more or less as DVC members?

[wdwoldtimer]

Oooh a sound machine! Good idea, but I'm way ahead of ya. Among the electronic junk I always pack is a portable CD player and I always bring my Nature Sounds 3 CD set - Ocean Moods, Tropical Rainforest and Thunderstorm. Great minds think alike. Couldn't sleep without it! Hmm, what if my CD player goes on the fritz? I better get one of those Sound Soother things in case, eh?

TWENTY AA's?? Now I'm impressed! You got me beat there. Although hold on a minute. Our digital camera uses rechargable NiMH batteries and of course I bring the recharging unit too. So in effect, I'm bringing hundreds if not thousands of spare batteries. (Never mind that I usually only have to recharge once/week.) LOL

 

[ohiominnie]

Oh, no, wdwoldtimer, I think WE have YOU beat, because we ALSO have a digital camera with rechargable batteries, and we ALSO bring the recharger! But, on the other hand...we don't bring film. Unless, of course you count the children's disposable cameras....oh, and the underwater camera.


ohiominnie

 

[ohioMickey]

Hey WDWoldtimer....

Maybe if you weren't packing so many things...and trying to keep track of so many things.......you wouldn't have lost that $2000 Granny needed for her surgery!!!!!

 

[MaryAnnDVC]

Oh yeahhh? Welllll, I packed enough travel tissue packets and wipes and antibacterial gel to wipe the noses and hands of every kid at the MK.

I've brought scotch tape (the little plastic pack with individual pieces)...might have to tape the park maps (it could happen!); a mini stapler...might have to staple receipts together (or....something); post-it notes...might have to leave a note for housekeeping on the bathroom mirror.

Let's see...what else? I'm going to have to check my packing list. But not tonight. Because I'm going to California in less than 3 weeks and if I really start to think of everything I have to pack, I'll never get to sleep.

 

[Patricia]

This post is too darn funny. I cannot wait for my husband to read it. I would have to say that although we are members since 93, always stay in a 1 or 2 bedroom, always SAY" oh we don't need too many things, there's a washer and dryer"... I still way overpack. On our first trip to Vero, we had... 36 pairs of shoes for the 5 of us.. Ok Ok I know, but my then 13 yr. old DD had those spongy pool shoes in 4 colors. I wasn't paying attention, and she took them ALL!! That pumped up the number... ANyway, even for our wdw trips, we overpack. Every single year, the driver to take us to the airport comments that the suitcases are really heavy.. I don't know how I do it. I try so hard.. really I do.ANd we never come back to the room to change to eat. We go right to WDW restaurants.. I just don't know what the heck we do with all those clothes. Carry them down and carry them back.. Ohiomickey, we will be there the same time as you are OKW from 8/16-8/23 and then BW for the last two nights. Just look for the LARGE suitcases...

 

[MaryJ]

Oh, how I hate to pack. You should see when I send the kids off to camp for a week. They roll their eyes while I tell them "just bring it...make your mother happy."

MaryAnn, you would have gotten along great with my father. His motto was "Better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it." Guess that's where I get my overpacking tendencies from....it drives my DH crazy!

 

[KCritter]

We pack a lot less. Partly because of the washing machines, but also because we finally realized that we always end up buying some article of clothing, especially t-shirts. We don't bring "dressy" clothes, just one nice "resort casual" outfit each.

I do bring along decaf tea bags, coffee filters and laundry & dishwasher tablets. We do tend to buy too much food while we're there. This last trip I had to pack home a couple cans of soup. Talk about making your luggage heavy!

We've been trying to cure our overpacking by buying small, rollable carry-on suitcases so we don't have to check our luggage. If it doesn't fit in the carry on, it doesn't go with us!

 

[llp479]

I pack less clothing because I can wash while there. I also have gallon size zip lock bags under my bathroom sink packed and ready to go with all our assorted toiletries. Got another one in the kitchen with the stain stick, laundry tabs, dryer sheets and coffee filters. Just grab them and throw them in. Learned this trick when I was single and traveled a lot for work. Now I just have to remember to check the expiration date on the meds to make sure they haven't expired!

Of course now I have to drag along my laptop so my DH can check all his messages, and the kids can watch DVD's. I must admit, DVD's take up less room than the VHS tapes, and it frees up the TV in the main area so we can watch TV in there.

 

[wdwoldtimer]

Carry on suitcases, huh?? I would try that, but I don't think Delta allows 6 carry on's per passenger, do you? How else am I gonna lug all my necessities? Besides, it could be a problem trying to wheel all six down the aisle. I can see it now, a suitcase train.

Ahem...Patricia, don't you think 36 pairs of shoes is a bit excessive? That's ridiculous! You need some advice from an expert in packing. Let's see...I pack a pair of sneakers (for walking around the parks), a pair of casual shoes (for what else? a casual dinner!), a pair of sandals leather (for those casual dinnners on very warm nights), a pair of sandals rubber (for the pool), a pair of dress shoes (just in case something formal comes up), a spare pair of sneakers (in case the other pair gets wet on Splash Mt or Kali Rapids), a pair of slippers (for walking around inside the room)...ummm...what am I up to now? Err...7 pairs per person? So your family of 5 only needs 35 pairs of footwear, not 36!!! Talk about over-packing! Sheesh!

Never fear ohioMick....hmm....hold on....my amazing powers of deduction tell me you just might be related to ohioMin...anyway, never fear! I can now keep track of everything because I have computerized my packing list and store it on one of those nifty PocketPCs, which, of course I bring along with me. (Naturally that means yet one more recharging cord to pack!) But, you know, I don't inventory the cash in the list so if you find any more, most likely it's mine.
Disposible cameras....you mean you're supposed to keep those things? I thought you were supposed to throw 'em out when you were done. Oh great, that's more to pack! THANKS ALOT, OM!
My 4 yr old DD loves those things. The kid can snap all 36 exposures in a matter of minutes. A nice shot of the back of my leg....a beautiful close up of her finger....mom's face (from the nose down)....Mickey's left foot....an empty seat on the MK-OKW bus....yep, dad's little photographer!

 

[Peggy Sue]

This post is hysterical!

One thing I've fallen "victim" to is looking through travel magazines and finding all those "must have" items to take along on your trip...like the compact sewing kits, small magnifying mirror, pill boxes, air line back and neck pillows, personal hand held fans, fanny packs, sea sick bands, shoe bags, those plastic bags that you put your clothes in and roll up to expel all the air so the clothes take up less space in your suit case, night lights, flash lights, batteries, gum supply, candy... I just love all these things..and then have to find room in our suit case to bring them along. (Arthur Formmer has my number...sends me a "travel essential catalog" every 3 months!)

I'm glad to see I'm not alone! Although we do pack a lot less clothes (we really have mastered that!) we still pack a lot of "stuff" BUT...I believe I am packing lighter because all this "Stuff" is make for traveling...and those folks who sold it to me wouldn't be lying to me about my needing it and how easy it is to pack and lug around..now would they??

We took my niece and dad along last month...she couldn't get over all the "stuff" that came out our suit case..but you know what??? Even she admitted she needed and used a lot of that "stuff" we brought along!

 

[ohioMickey]

I just got a brand-spankin new Palm gadget with 8 megs of memory (my old Palm only had 2 megs) to help me with trip planning!!!!

I have travel tracker to help track each vacation. You can put car rental info, resort info, park hours, parade times, daily iteneraries, priority seating times and numbers, nap times, swimming times, laundry times, potty times, ets, etc, etc into it. Each day color coded and each item marked off with its own little icon. It puts my old index card system to shame.

...of course you never have to recharge index cards...

It also has avantgo on it so i can keep a current copy of INTERCOTS disney site with me at all times....

and a palm version of photosuite lets me look at some of last vacations photos while i am enjoying this vacation...that way i remember which pictures i ALWAYS have to get....in front of the main street station...in front of Partners...in front of the castle behind Partners...on the wooden walkway with Splash in the background...In front of the haunted mansion...the two little eggs that open and close on Its a small world (yes, that is a traditional shot)...in front of tree of life...in front of the monorail track at EPCOT next to Mouse Gears...whew....now i can not only watch my children grow up, but i can see if any of the Disney attractions show signs of age (once the two little eggs were one little egg because one was gone for re-hab...i would have forgotten about that if it wasn't for the picture).

If I ever want to get committed, all i have to do is show this thread to a shrink and admit that i participated in it!!!

 

[ohiominnie]

wdwoldtimer...
just a question....when, oh WHEN are you going to be at WDW next? ohiomickey and I (yes, we are related) would LOVE to meet you in real life. You are TOOOOO funny! And YOUR 4 yr old and OUR 4 yr old sound a lot alike in their interest in photography! Looking at the pictures from last year's trips, let me list off some of our favorite shots:
A picture of the bar on the front of the boat in It's a Small World
A picture of a man hole cover. (hidden mickey on it)
A pcture of 1/2 of a bench.
A picture of his sister holding up her gameboy. Trouble is, she has NO head!
A picture of a bird.
A picture of his binky.
Tigger, no head.
A picture of a duck.
Dad, no head.
The rest of the family, no bodies.
Another bird.
Some lady's ponytail.
An airconditioner vent on top of WL.
Dad without a head again.
Another bird.
A love bug.

After EVERY shot, he would hand his camera back to us and state proudly "that will be a good picture."

Thing is, MOST of them are well centered and interesting. For a 4 yr old he didn't do too bad!

We have yet to develop this trips film, but I'm predicting 50% of his pictures are of birds.

So, my question still stands, when will you be at the World?

ohiominnie

p.s. maybe we can meet up and we can get that $2K back to you!!!

 

[MaryAnnDVC]

Slow down...I'm trying to take notes...

There's a "travel essentials catalog"?? OMG! I need it!

ohioMickey, I could barely catch my breath reading your post. I just got a Handspring Visor Prism last week for my birthday!! Tell me, please...where can I find "stuff" to put on it for my trips?!

ohiominnie...my mom's famous for taking pictures and cutting off body parts. Got the Statue of Liberty's torch...just the torch, in the corner of sky. And took a picture of my brother and his best friend in their Army uniforms when they were home on leave (in the '60's)...no heads. The only picture of them in their uniforms.

And...birds are nice.

On our first trip to WDW, when DS was 4, we gave him a disposable camera and he took pictures of his feet...so that everyone would know that he'd been to Disney World. He always was a quirky child.

 

[ohioMickey]

MaryAnnDVC... go to www.palmgear.com. They have hundreds of programs there! The one i like best is called travel tracker. You can do a search for it at the palmgear site or you can go directly to their website at www.silverware.com.

The program is fully functional when you download it, but only for 30 days. After that, if you haven't registered it, you lose all your info and the Silverware guys get to go WDW in your place. It costs $29.95 to register...well worth it!!!!!

ooops...not sure Ohiominnie knew i registered it

As for avantgo....just go to www.avantgo.com ... very nice service...and its free!!! be sure to get the WDW channel from INTERCOT.

Photosuite for the palm came bundled with my Palm (the m505), but you can go to www.photosuite.com for more info. To be honest, i am least impressed with it. The pics are small and a bit grainy on the Palm.

But TravelTracker 3.2 is FANTASTIC!!!!

 

[dianeschlicht]

LOL! You guys are making this WAY too complicated! I figure the simpler the better. We try to get everything into a carry on size piece for each person. That includes the few kitchen things we bring and the laundry detergent (tablets are easiest). The one thing that takes a lot of room is our shoes. We only bring athletic shoes, but most of us have bad feet, so we bring two pairs per person. Now that doesn't sound so bad, except we all have very large feet!!! One size 10 (me), one size 12 1/2 and one size 13. We pack two pairs of shorts, one pair of jeans, 5 shirts, one sweatshirt, and 4 days of undies per person plus swim wear. We tend to do one load of wash each day. We too do all the wash before heading home so we are packing clean clothes instead of dirty ones.

THe hardest thing to get used to is knowing what you want and need for the kitchen. What we take depends on who is traveling with us. If it is just our family, we don't take as much, but if we have friends or family along who can't afford to eat out so mucn, we pack more and shop more. I did finally get smart last trip and made a list of the things I knew I would need. It is amazing how you forget what is in the kitchen.

At any rate, pack light and HAVE FUN!!

 

[wdwoldtimer]

I'm beginning to think we are all victims of some kind of mass hypnosis here. Yeah, I bet American Tourister and Samsonite are behind all this. And that Arthur Frommer guy too! Oooh, I'd kill for one of those airline pillows!! And not a plain old inflatable one, but one of those with the gooey jelly stuff inside. Now your talkin'!! God knows I have all that time to sleep on the flight to Orlando with the "Daddy, I have to go to the bathroom" every five minutes. Funny how the wife always seems to be asleep every time.

I bet if you compared my photos to yours, o-Mick, you'd be hard pressed to tell them apart. (Err....except for that wacky double egg tradition of yours..I don't do no eggs lol) And don't forget the shot of "Spaceship Earth with World Showcase at your back" Type1, and Spaceship Earth with World Showcase at your back - Type 2. (That's with and without the fountains in the foreground for you newbies out there.) And my all time favorite - the air conditioner vent on top of WL!! A classic.

Ok here's another tip for you Palm owners...get the eBook version of Birnbaum's guide and store it on there. You never know when you might need to reference it for something. OF course there isn't an official eBook version so you'll have to buy the hardcopy, scan each page and then translate to text with OCR software. That's not too obsessive is it?! (psst, I'm about halfway done mine) While you're at it why not scan in the park maps? I know what your thinking...most of us here could find our way through the parks blindfolded - walking backwards on one foot...we don't need park maps! Ah, but hold on a minute! What if a nice family of non-English speaking foreigners asks you how to get to Cinderella's Castle? Sure, you could simply turn and point to it from just about every location in the MK, but wouldn't it be way-cool to plot a trail on the electronic map? Hmm...come to think of it, you might want to pick up a portable thermal printer too. Unless you plan on giving your PalmPilot to the first family of non-English speaking foreigners that can't find Cinderella's castle, that is.

Ok, when are we going? Haha!!! We'll be going to the World in three short weeks! Stop snickering out there, I know it's <ugh> hot and <ugh> crowded around the Fourth, but it's my dad's 70th birthday and the whole clan is going down there to celebrate. Which reminds me....I have to stop writing here and start packing now!


wdwoldtimer

Oh, about that $2k you owe me...you might as well fly me out to Ohio to pick it up...I've been dying to go to that park in Sandusky anyway - a coaster lovers heaven!! Oh and feel free to take another twenty bucks out to help cover the airfare.

BTW, Diane....any basketball players in your family perhaps? Those are some healthy feet!

 

[Mary Anne]

We never carried much before only 3 carry on's for the 4 of us. Now we still carry the same 3 carry on's only 1 is for clothes and the other two are for stuff.

Sometimes I wish you could just rent a locker down there and KEEP some of the stuff in it so it would be there when you came back!

 

[Peggy Sue]

MaryannDVC...go to www.travelessentials.com ... you'll find another whole world of "stuff" that you're going to need!! Enjoy!

 

[ohiominnie]

Mary Anne, that is a WONDERFUL idea!! Lockers would make it so much easier to pack. But Disney knows this isn't a good idea....after all, they are counting on you not packing your ponchos and having to buy more!!


wdwoldtimer...WHAT? I'm sorry, I'd have my father officially change his birthday to a non-peak time!! Or celebrate his 70 1/2 birthday instead!! Our poor dd has already been informed that we will NEVER be at WDW for her birthday (July 8th) Then again, we'll never go for mine (December 28th) I had my birthday there as a kid, when I turned 8....but back then it wasn't nearly like it is now.

ohiominnie

 

[Patricia]

WDWoldtimer... Thanks for setting me straight. I will have a stern talk with my family to cut down on the excess and tell them the new rule came from you. We are heading out on a cruise in two weeks... Can you imagine the shoes?????