January 2013

[Momto2PrncChrmgs]

Just wanted to post my happiness for the week. Today was our 180 day mark!! That in and of itself is a wonderful milestone but, I also made all of our ADR's this morning. Plus, a reservation for the BBB for my daughter and a reservation for the Harmony barber shop so my baby boy could get his first haircut in Magic Kingdom!!

Makes everything more real that we are finally going. YAY!

We had our youngest son's first haircut there. Such a magical experience.

 

[mickeyplanner]

I think I saw that thread on the restaurants board! The good thing is you definitely don't need 180 day reservations at Sanaa. We really love it (and AKL), and we hope you do too! One of the best parts is seeing the animals, which is definitely easier at lunch than dinner . . . a few times a week there's a children's activity around 1 pm where the kids make some sort of food treat/enrichment item for the animals and the keepers put them out around 1:30 - makes for quite a show when you're eating lunch b/c all the animals come close to the windows.

Thanks for the tip on lunch. Maybe I might reconsider and have lunch there instead of dinner. We have a savanna view and the kids are really looking forward to it. We are planning on spending a whole day just at the resort because of all the activities listed that is why I wasn't considering lunch didn't want to take away from the activities.

 

[mickeyplanner]

Just wanted to post my happiness for the week. Today was our 180 day mark!! That in and of itself is a wonderful milestone but, I also made all of our ADR's this morning. Plus, a reservation for the BBB for my daughter and a reservation for the Harmony barber shop so my baby boy could get his first haircut in Magic Kingdom!!

Makes everything more real that we are finally going. YAY!

Sounds like you are on the same schedule as us. I made our ARDs yesterday and booked our airfare. The Barber shop is one of our favorites. DD loves getting pixie dust in her hair. Sometimes we do it twice a trip.

 

[eeyoreland]

We use a couple of sites to pick which parks we'll be in for which days: Touring Plans and easywdw. If you want to hit the evening parades/fireworks, be sure to figure out which days they're available during your trip, esp. if you don't get parkhoppers. Then we figure out when we'll eat at our preferred restaurants to make ADRs (we do not do table service meals every day; with our young children it is too much sitting/waiting). Closer to the trip, we'll sit down and make a basic plan for each day based on advice from above sites and our personal preferences. We'll include the attractions we want to experience (in order), when we need to obtain fastpasses, any characters we specifically want to meet, where we think we'll eat lunch & dinner, and any shows/parades/other time specific events we want to include. That gives us a framework to refer to as we go, but we're not slaves to the plan, especially after lunch. We set it out ahead of time to make sure we cover everything over the course of the trip. We use www.tripit.com to organize all our details.

There is a lot of information out there - it can be a little overwhelming, but I think your child(ren)'s age(s) and interests will help guide your planning. You're staying in a great location; there is nothing better than walking "home" from the Magic Kingdom after the fireworks!

I'll put in another plug for tripit. We used it on our last trip and it was awesome. I'm not a huge techie so it took me a bit to figure out how it works, but once I did it was awesome to have all that info in one place from airline to car rental to resort to dining.

 

[mariamouse]

July 11th and still no January EMHs.

 

[T&G1994]

July 11th and still no January EMHs.

What's the deal. No EMHs, anyone hear anything from the CMs.

 

[readytogotodisney]

What's the deal. No EMHs, anyone hear anything from the CMs.

I've read there are "changes" coming... no idea what that means, but my guess is that is has something to do with the nextgen stuff.

 

[T&G1994]

I've read there are "changes" coming... no idea what that means, but my guess is that is has something to do with the nextgen stuff.

If that's the case hopeful things work smoothly. Thanks for the info.

 

[dsnygrl21]

Gosh, it really is going to make ADR's a little more difficult, at least for me. :sigh:

Starting ADR's on Sunday!

 

[hulagirl87]

booked today for January 24-February 1 staying at AoA!!! Can't wait to go. We haven't been since 2009 and this will be DD's first trip!

 

[letthewookiewin]

booked today for January 24-February 1 staying at AoA!!! Can't wait to go. We haven't been since 2009 and this will be DD's first trip!

& added
First, I love avatar!! I watched that movie today!! I love it!! How exciting it'll be your DD's first trip. How old is she? I'm sure it will be a magical trip!!

I have a list of prices for my DH that range from the CS for $2,143.30 to a Main Building CL TPV at the GF for $4,595.82. I'm going to try and convince him it would make more sense to push a London/Paris trip to 2015. It'll be our 20th wedding anniversary, which will mean we have lived 1 more year as a married couple than we did as single people (we were married at age 19).

 

[dtr_angel]

I finally booked today - we are officially going January 4th - 10th and staying at AoA. Kicking myself for not doing it sooner (no excuse why I didn't) because there were no Finding Nemo suites so were staying in Lion King. Maybe it will be quieter since there is no pool? Still excited! Now just waiting for EMHs to be posted to plan each day and ADRs.

 

[ButterflyJen]

We're booked! Jan 27 - Feb 2 at AoA. Just finalizing ADR info now...can call on the 31st. So far we're planning on CRT breakfast on my DD's birthday, dinner at 1900 Park Fare, 'Ohana dinner, Whispering Canyon Cafe dinner, & a goodbye breakfast at Chef Mickey's the day we check out. SO excited!!!

 

[mickeyplanner]

I've read there are "changes" coming... no idea what that means, but my guess is that is has something to do with the nextgen stuff.

Do you really think we might be able to book our FastPasses before our trip? That would make the wait on posting EMHs worth it.

Well, we changed our dates again thanks to flight increase in a matter for 4 hours. We are now going January 6-10 BLT Studio LV and January 10-12 AKL Kidani Studio Savanna View.

 

[maman_et_fille]

I'm sorry if this has been hashed out before - I just recently subscribed to the January 2103 threads and I'll be honest, I haven't read back over them very thoroughly. I'm having a hard time keeping up with the two threads and the FB group . . . is there a reason we couldn't merge the two threads? I'd be happy to compile/retype the lists at the beginning of each thread of who is going and when.

 

[mya174]

I need a little advice. We are making our trip shorter (Jan 21 -25) and I need help on which parks to visit. Traveling with 8yr, 5yr and 2 yr old boys. Heard that MK needs two days. Opinions? This is my first family trip and I am overwhelmed with the planning. Thanks

OH! And I forgot to add that we are now staying at Port Orleans French Quarter instead of Pop.

 

[readytogotodisney]

I need a little advice. We are making our trip shorter (Jan 21 -25) and I need help on which parks to visit. Traveling with 8yr, 5yr and 2 yr old boys. Heard that MK needs two days. Opinions? This is my first family trip and I am overwhelmed with the planning. Thanks

OH! And I forgot to add that we are now staying at Port Orleans French Quarter instead of Pop.

How many days are you planning in the parks? I would do 2 days at MK myself, 1 day at Epcot and then 1 day at HS. AK is by far our least favorite, we were done with AK in 3 hours on our last trip, and we'll be skipping it on our next trip.

 

[readytogotodisney]

Do you really think we might be able to book our FastPasses before our trip? That would make the wait on posting EMHs worth it.

I'm not sure, I don't have any inside information at all, but I think it makes total sense.
1) they've already tested it out but haven't made any announcements on rolling it out. I don't see them doing the nextgen rollout during the opening of the FLE, which isn't that far away.
2) It's supposed to be in unison of the roll out of the RFIP bracelets and the door locks are already in the process of being changed out.

 

[mya174]

How many days are you planning in the parks? I would do 2 days at MK myself, 1 day at Epcot and then 1 day at HS. AK is by far our least favorite, we were done with AK in 3 hours on our last trip, and we'll be skipping it on our next trip.

Just Monday through Friday. Not sure if I am brave enough to spend Friday at a park then drive 7 hours home. So probably just 4 days at the parks. My biggest debate was AK or HS. Mixed reviews on both.

 

[maman_et_fille]

How many days are you planning in the parks? I would do 2 days at MK myself, 1 day at Epcot and then 1 day at HS. AK is by far our least favorite, we were done with AK in 3 hours on our last trip, and we'll be skipping it on our next trip.

Too funny - I would switch the advice on AK and HS for us, but we love the animal exhibits and shows at AK - you know what your family would most enjoy Are you getting parkhoppers? Will you have a car or rely on Disney transportation? You can fit a lot into four days.

Without hoppers, I would go with readytogotodisney's plan, with one MK day being one with MSEP and one without.

With hoppers, I would plan on one full day at MK and one partial day, then hopping to Epcot or AK after nap or mid-afternoon if you don't take a break. AK closes kinda early, so if you decide to not do a full day there, you might want to start one day at AK and hop to Epcot. (So, 1.5ish days MK and use the other days as partial days at each park; start at DHS, hop to Epcot. Start at AK, hop to Epcot (poor Epcot).)

Our first trip was 3.5 days - our daughter was younger - we did one afternoon and one morning EMH at Epcot, 1.25 days at AK, and spent the rest of the time at MK. We didn't hit DHS at all.