This was our family's second trip to WDW and we had the best time. We learned so much from the DIS. Thank You all.
For anyone going in the near future, I offer my suggestions:
1) Fastpass works! My dh kept asking me how come everyone doesn't use this. I replied who cares...you're with me and I know about it!! The only time we waited in stand-by lines was when we already had a fastpass in hand.
2) Make sure that you give your kids plenty of opportunities to drink water or have popsicles. Our kids didn't have a chance to get too hot, much less cranky because we kept them cool.
3) Plan your day at the MK so that you do all of the shows in the afternoon. One day we saw the Country Bears, Tiki Birds, Hall of Presidents, in succession. Another good attraction to beat the heat is Pirates of the Carribean.
4) Pick up a Neat Sheet for the parades. It folded up nicely and fit into our backpack.
5) Give kids their own spending money. We took all of the miscellaneous coin jars around the house and processed them in one of those Coinstar machines. They ended up with $110 after fees. DH got them Disney Dollars. They each had $55 that they could spend on whatever they liked. Not bad for a couple of 4 and 6yr old kids. That stopped a lot of the gimmies.
6) Go to Chef Mickey's and Cindy's.
7) Try to ride up front on the monorail.
8) Use sunsreen and visors.
9) Test your camcorder before you leave. We found out the hard way that ours was damaged. We were at CRT and the thing just conked out on us!
10) Be careful and do not leave your character meal receipts on the table--they show your full credit/debit card number!
11) Either get GOH badges or monogrammed Disney T-shirts (they sell them in TDS catalog or online) for your kids. It makes them feel extra special when the characters and/or cast members call them by their names.
12) Have fun!
For anyone going in the near future, I offer my suggestions:
1) Fastpass works! My dh kept asking me how come everyone doesn't use this. I replied who cares...you're with me and I know about it!! The only time we waited in stand-by lines was when we already had a fastpass in hand.
2) Make sure that you give your kids plenty of opportunities to drink water or have popsicles. Our kids didn't have a chance to get too hot, much less cranky because we kept them cool.
3) Plan your day at the MK so that you do all of the shows in the afternoon. One day we saw the Country Bears, Tiki Birds, Hall of Presidents, in succession. Another good attraction to beat the heat is Pirates of the Carribean.
4) Pick up a Neat Sheet for the parades. It folded up nicely and fit into our backpack.
5) Give kids their own spending money. We took all of the miscellaneous coin jars around the house and processed them in one of those Coinstar machines. They ended up with $110 after fees. DH got them Disney Dollars. They each had $55 that they could spend on whatever they liked. Not bad for a couple of 4 and 6yr old kids. That stopped a lot of the gimmies.
6) Go to Chef Mickey's and Cindy's.
7) Try to ride up front on the monorail.
8) Use sunsreen and visors.
9) Test your camcorder before you leave. We found out the hard way that ours was damaged. We were at CRT and the thing just conked out on us!
10) Be careful and do not leave your character meal receipts on the table--they show your full credit/debit card number!
11) Either get GOH badges or monogrammed Disney T-shirts (they sell them in TDS catalog or online) for your kids. It makes them feel extra special when the characters and/or cast members call them by their names.
12) Have fun!
