Dinner is very busy. We always get the first dinner reservation of the day (5PM, I think), and there's a long line to get checked in (we arrived around 4:40), then a long wait to be seated (usually seated around half an hour after our PS time.)
The first time we kept the kids close, thinking we'd get called shortly. They got antsy. The second time we wised up; DH and I took turns waiting in line, we brought the kids to see Pluto, then let them go watch cartoons. Sometimes I watched with them, but as the time got close I stood outside the door to keep an eye on DH so I could grab the kids quickly when we got called.
Just go in expecting a bit of a wait. It's busy inside, sometimes the characters come around pretty quickly (one right after the other, not stopping very long), and sometimes you have a chance to have a few bites between them. Some will stop and chat or play with your kids for a bit, which is nice. Usually guests will wait at their tables for the characters to come around, but this last time there were a few kids who followed the characters around. I think the CMs with the characters are probably better about controlling this at GK.
This behavior was much worse at the Minnie & Friends breakfast, IMO, and ironically we encountered a CM who was quite snotty about it as well. We were bypassed by Eeyore twice on his way through our room (DS3 really wanted to see him, but I told him he had to sit and wait), so I asked on our way out if we could see him. He was about to take a break, but the CM said we could wait and she'd make sure he spoke with our kids before continuing on his rounds. So we waited, but when Eeyore came back another CM told us to get back to our table.
I explained that we'd already left our table, but had waited to see Eeyore as instructed, and the CM gave a quiet but public tongue-lashing to the nice CM who'd said we could wait. Oyyyyy... Some people just don't belong in customer service.
