Need help with NOW Budget trip

[Misty89]

i will try to help, although my circumstances a bit different.
we are staying offsite, but laying in place a strict budget and thats that ( i can only work so much extra)

we are a family of 3 - DH, Me, DD9
we will only eat out Dinners, and snacks at attractions ( Orlando, Cocoa Beach and Clearwater beach)

allowing $75/per day for that x 8 =$600
breaks down to $60 or less at dinner ( 20$/ adult, 10$ child)
and $15 for snacks.

we will stop at a store and load up on gorceries for breakfasts in room, and packed picnic lunches for the rest of the time.

IF we were onsite, and had no options beisdes park food and resort food, i would budget $150 a day. ( still eating Breakfast in room)


IMHO, i would not take that much cash on the plane!
do you have a CC or Debit card? i would feel very worried abouyt that $$ on hand.


mabye you could add the dining plan so you would not have to worry about it ( A worried DH is not good on vacation )

or have garden grocer send some stuff to your room........
that way you could have PB&j, etc if you are tired of "park food"
i was just looking at that site yesterday, and it was $12 for delivery, not that i bad i guess.


Tina

 

[extremesoccermom]

We go to WDW alot so all of our trips are budget otherwise we could not afford to go. You do need to consider how much luggage you will be able to bring (we bought our tickets back in March so we are still allowed 2 checked bags per person w/ no extra cost) We always bring food with us even when we are on the dining plan. Although we don't like PJ and Jelly we do bring a case of water (split and double wrapped between 3 suitcases), poptarts, granola bars, cold cereal, oatmeal sandwich crackers, cookies, microwave popcorn, bagels, fruit snacks and nuts.
I don't see which resort you are staying at but all of them have a microwave and toaster in the food court for all resort guests to use. We always buy the refillable cup as we are big coffee drinkers and love a soda at mid day breaks.
Most of the resorts (at least the ones I have stayed at have food items you can purchase in the store) 1/2 gallon of milk, loaf of bread,cereal, box of donuts, chips crackers, some even have frozen meals you can microwave.
As others have mentioned some of the CS meals are huge and not all of them are junk. We split the 1/2 chicken meal between 3 of us (me, DH and DD14) as well as the turkey wrap at Pecos Bills between DD and I. For 9.99 at the Land CS you can get a lot of food and it is really good. At the CS at POR DD and I split the pasta dish and just ordered an extra bread stick and a small salad.
I have even ordered off the kids menu at both TS and CS when I just wasn't hungry and I have not had any problems.

 

[dgaston]

If you do go to Fort Wilderness, consider getting take out at Trails End. It's the same fried chicken as Hoop Dee Doo, and I believe it comes with sides. I think Mary at Mousesavers thinks it could feed several people. It's yummy.

Great counter service -- worth a bus ride in my opinion -- Wolfgang Puck's Express in either Marketplace or Westside. I also like sandwiches at Earl of Sandwich, and those are resonably priced.

 

[delmar411]

just from experience at the POR food court...the PB is not out like the jelly and it is only free with purchase of toast in the morning. Any other time of day you have to pay for the PB. The toast is really cheap esp if your kids enjoy the whole grain bread since it is 2x the size of the standard sandwich loaf. Each slice can be cut into 2 and make a normal sized sandwich. From what I can recall we paid $3-4 for 6 slices and when cut in half (have to do it to toast them anyway) it made 6 sandwiches for a good price.

 

[minnie1928]

Great counter service -- worth a bus ride in my opinion -- Wolfgang Puck's Express in either Marketplace or Westside. I also like sandwiches at Earl of Sandwich, and those are resonably priced.

The last time I went to Wolfgang Puck's Express I got THE WORST case of food poisoning! I ended up in bed for the rest of that day and the following day (missed my Chef Mickey breakfast too!).

However, I do agree about the Earl...great sandwiches!

We've also done nights where we skip dinner and go straight for dessert (Ghardelli!!) I figure that we only do this once/twice a year, so it won't hurt.

 

[MEM]

Well OP, FWIW, we are a family of four - DH, me, DS14 and DD12. We are budgeting $100 per day for food for our November trip and that includes the Food and Wine Festival. We don't need to get four of everything available at the F&WF booths - sharing works very well. DH doesn't drink and I limit myself to one glass of wine per day. We always bring a box of Cheerios and a box of instant oatmeal with us on the plane and buy milk in the gift shop so we eat breakfast in our room. We are DVC members and stay in studios 95% of the time. DD and I often share an entree at the CS places. We have at least one dinner during our week-long stay at EoS and tend to order ice water wherever we go. Ordering water is not to save money, its to save our teeth!

 

[SIMMSMOUSE]

If you have a Disney Reward Visa they have weeks with the dining plan for free. But even if you buy it I think it saves money and you don't have to worry about sharing and if you do share meals on the DDP you can stretch you quick service meal out and not have to pay for any meals out of pocket. I also suggest bringing empty water bottles and the drink packets for bottle water. We just came back on Sept 6 and that saves a ton of money when you don't have to buy water or soda at 2 dollars a pop. Most of the water fountains are cold even on a hot day. My kids liked making there own drinks whenever they wanted them. and I didn't spend a fortune on drinks.

 

[vicb]

You are getting lots of good advice so I will only add a couple of ideas I didn't see mentioned...

bring disposable plastic cups (I use 7oz size). In the morning I use a marker to put each of our initial on the bottom of the cups then put them in my purse/fanny pack whatever I'm carrying. When we are in the parks and get thirsty we can buy just one or two cold water bottles and share. Usually the kids never want a whole one anyway and they get warm if you carry them around. I bring the cups in my check on luggage, saves on buying so many water bottles and sharing germs (we don't do drinking fountains for the germ thing but you could fill free with the cups)

a couple of times we have bought pieces of fresh fruit, fruit cups or mini carrots at the various fruit stands in the parks and a hot dog from take out counters to have for lunch. Makes you feel not so bad about the hot dog and kids can share the fruit.

Like others said, bring in your own snacks for the kids (granola bars, pbutter crackers, fruit roll ups) it really can help bridge the gap between breakfast and lunch or lunch and dinner.

Good luck!!

 

[kaitlin-n-mom]

Another thought, we are a group of 5 with very limited spending money. On our arrival day we are renting a car from Dollar Rental at the Regal Sun (across from Dowtown Disney Market place) for approx $22 so that we can make a quick run to the Super Walmart and stock up on everything we will need for the week. We will then return the car the following morning and relax the rest of our stay. I wish I would have known this tidbit during our last visit. We ended up spending $200 on a rental we really did not need other than for a grocery run.

We were orginally going to use one of the grocery services but I am not that good at planning what I want that far in advance.

 

[akersten]

I really thing you should have gardengrocer or wegoshop pick up some items for you. I think it will help your food budget a lot. Will you have a microwave or just a fridge? We will have DD5 and DS1.5 along and plan to get bread, hotdogs, Boca burgers, PBJ, crackers, juice boxes, cheese, cereal, milk, yogurt, pretzels. Soda, water, beer, & wine for DH and I. But we'll have a studio room with micro and fridge.

 

[dislal]

When we went in Jan we took poptart, cereal bars, pringles things like that in our checked bag and it worked out perfect for breakfast in the room.

 

[jnzimm]

Ok, so I have messed up the family finances....(We are already dealing with that, and hubby will be handling the bills from now on!) But, we leave in 4 weeks, and we do not have the dining plan....We are 3 adults and 3 kids (9,4,2.9). They are picky eaters, and the younger two will probably eat mostly off of one of our plates. How much cash do we realistically need without the dining plan. We should have about 1200-1500 to bring on the plane, and will have access to another 600-700 while we are there..(Direct Deposit, and the debit card.) We have Magical Express, and will not be renting a car, so we are hostages to hotel prices....I thought I would maybe pack Peanut Butter and Jelly in the luggage, and buy a loaf of bread down there. And maybe a bottle of juice for the kiddos. Would it be worth it to have Garden Grocer bring $50 worth of food to the room to have snacks on hand? We are staying at the Port Orleans Riverside, so the food court will be good. (We have always enjoyed it.) Can you pack PB&J in your carry on? I am a little worried about the weight of the suitcase if we check it.

Thanks for any advice!! You all are the best!!!!

I am wondering. I saw on an airline post you said your child was 3 and here you are saying 2.9. If in fact the child is 3 that could impact the prices you are paying for tickets. I have seen threads on this board that warn people that cms will converse with your children in general and possibly ask them their age. I just don't want you to be caught without proper funding.
Have a great time. I am sure it will all work out when you get back.

 

[penguincrazie]

Go to the post office, get a flat rate priority box and stuff with as much stuff as you can. PBJ, cereal (take the bag out of the box), boxes of raisins, disney themed fruit snacks (those gummy things), etc. If you take it all out of the boxes, you can fit a lot and it will only cost $9.30 to ship up to 70lbs. It would be to your resort in 2-3 days from ship date. I do this with DDs rice milk (has dairy allergy) since you cannot buy it there.

Then is the general store at POR you can buy bread, milk, maybe a box of doughnuts.

In your luggage, pack either paper or plastic bowls and you can get spoons from the foodcourt. Oh, oatmeal packs or grits are good too and you can get hot water at the food court.

 

[D&DDisney]

Other suggestions...

Order pizza from off-site pizza place. Check Yellow pages when you arrive. We found a coupon for 2 pizzas, garlic bread and soda for less than Disney offered for on-site pizza delivery. The only drawback (minor really) was you had to meet delivery person at the main entrance. They could not deliver to your room. No biggie for us.

Since you are staying at POR, if you don't mind walking,(about 1 mile) you could take the boat to DTD. From DTD walk down Hotel Blvd towards Crossroads Shopping Center. They have a grocery store there Goodings where you could buy some groceries. I take a backpack and buy whatever fits in there.