Everybody plans a day

[garada3]

DH wants each member of our family (5 of us) to have a day assigned as 'theirs'.

Each person will be able to list the top 3 - 5 things they want to do that day and get to choose where to have a sit down meal (a TS meal each day is critical to DH's vacation mentality). Of course we will do other things in addition to the person's choices, but their choices will be the priority.

I have visions of way too much between parks travel time, and inefficient use of park operating hours.

Has anyone planned a trip like this and survived?

He is hoping that I will not be able to overplan things (like I did for our previous trip) if I have to relenquish some control over day to day activties

 

[disnut8]

I was the overplanner and my husband and son really didn't like me too much for it. So I came up with something that worked for us and might be a good choice for you.

I listed every single attraction, show, and event at Disney World. Everything. Even renting boats and horseback riding. Then I used a grid and everyone had to rank things according to their wishes. I had about eight or ten levels. From "YES, YES, YES" to "No way Jose". In between were "within fifteen minute wait", "30 minutes", "an hour" (this was before FastPasses). I was quite surprised with what I got back.

The Great Movie Ride was a "YES, YES, YES" for my son. I had no idea he was that into movies. I thought the renting of the boats would be approved and it was flat out denied.

The rules were - anything with a "YES, YES, YES" on anyone's list was a must. A "No way Jose" was outvoted IF the other two had at least a "Yes" on their list. Otherwise, not an option for us. We all had to do our lists separately and agreed to be competely honest. Really helped with the trip. I made one master list of the results so when we hit a park, we knew what our priorities were. And no one could complain about another's choice. We filled in the rest of the time with things that were "OK" on the list.

This put the entire trip in everyone's hands. I wasn't the only one calling the shots. The guys were so much more relaxed.

For meal choices, there was no way they would go through the hundreds of menus so I made some decisions and printed out menus that I thought we would all enjoy. Each one of us got to make a choice. And no one could complain. But, they had to tell me why they didn't like a particular option. Then I could see if maybe there were other choices out there I didn't think about for them.

I had a lot of fun doing this and, honestly, it was better than planning the whole thing myself.

 

[lorli]

This was a very clever way to handle your trip. When dd (4) is a little older and can do this independently it might be worth a shot. Nice Job!!

 

[scrappinstevie]

If you're worried about too much park hopping, ect. why not plan out what park or parks you'll go to on each day. Then, if its mom's day she can choose where you'll eat and if there's a specific attraction she'd like to see. What our family does is say we are going to Animal Kingdom we each talk about what we'd like to see that day so we have a priority and one of us will choose where we'll eat. That way everyone is happy each day and everyone has their day for their favorite foods. Have a great trip!
Jennifer in ND