New Here! Planning our 2nd Family WDW trip...

[ShanRee]

We are a BIG family (is there a sub-board on here for really big families?). Anyway, we have 8 children and we took our first family WDW trip the last week of February 2012 and spent Leap Day, "One More Disney Day" in Magic Kingdom We had an AMAZING trip and did it on an even more amazing skimpy budget. We took my mother with us, she was in remission from Leukemia after a bone marrow transplant. There was a total of 11 of us. I want to give a run down of our planning and costs both to remind myself and to help others with planning and also ask those of you on here who are experts a few questions about some of the things we did.... Anyway, here goes...
We bought 10 tickets (youngest child was under 2 yrs then) in October of 2011 from UnderCover Tourist for a total of $2400. (4 day + 5th day free base tickets)
I pre-purchased 11 Mickey Ears hats on ebay for $25 for the whole lot. They would have been $15 each in parks.
I bought 4 sets of 11 shirts (Gray, Red, Purple, and Black) for $4 each ($176) and had a friend who generously made personalized iron ons for us for each shirt for free. So we all matched each day and wore a different color for each park.
I bought a free parking pass on ebay for $10, saving a $15 each day parking fee
I bought personalized cinch style backpacks with each kids' name embroidered on them to carry lunches in while at the parks, $8 each including shipping ($88)
I bought 5 "front of line" passes on ebay (full color cards that all of the internet said didn't exist that allowed my entire family to get into the Fast Pass line on each of those rides. They worked perfectly with no questions. I still have no idea where they originally came from and why/how they work... but they did. Same seller still today sells them on ebay. We had ones for Soarin, Big Thunder Mt, Mission Space, and 2 others I forgot.) I know I am not the only person to have had these there because we found one laying on the ground while there too. ($50) WHAT ARE THESE? WHERE DOES THIS EBAY SELLER GET THEM? AND WHY IS IT SO HARD TO FIND ANY INFO ON THEM?
We stayed off-site in a VRBO called Villa-Osprey.... It was spectacular. 4 bed, 3 bath, heated pool, game room, etc.... ($600 total for the entire week)
We spent $300 on gas round trip (12 hours one way, from Alabama)
We spent approximately $100 on pizza and drive thrus there and back and approx $200 on groceries to eat at our rental house and to pack as lunches. ($300 total on food)
On the night that we stayed until after midnight in MK we ate at the food thing by the speedway (I forgot the name), we ate cheap and shared meals and spent approx ($60)
One night Hubby and I had a date night out alone and spent $65 at Joe's Crab Shack while my mom babysat
We purchased one Mickey Mouse stuffed animal for the baby ($20)

We carried lunches/snacks in with us each day consisting of apples, granola bars, chips, cheese sticks, pretzels, sandwiches, bananas, etc and carried a 24pk of bottled water in the bottom of the stroller each day.

We had an amazing time, the kids never complained about carrying lunches or having pre-purchased souvenirs given to them rather than buying them at kiosks. Our entire total cost of our WDW vacation for 11 people including tickets, lodging, food, and gas was : $4094.00


NOW:
We want to do this again for Leap Day 2016 as a "Nanny (My Mama) Memory trip," she passed away July 4th of this year. Ticket prices have gone up since then so it looks like we'll be spending a lot more on tickets, though we will be buying one, possibly 2 less of them (my oldest daughter doesn't know if she'll be going with us). Thankfully the VRBO we rented last time is still available as a rental, I am quite sure we will utilize it again for the great price that it was. I am hoping that yall Disney PRO's can help me cut corners and save even more money this time. I am hoping someone knows of specials, deals, opportunities to earn cheap/free tickets, and I really wish someone could give me a definitive answer as to what those line passes were that I bought. I lurked on these boards then before going and on other sites and everything that I read said that no such thing existed or that they were scams, but the ones I bought worked without a hitch. Does anyone know what these are and where the seller seems to get an endless supply of them?
Thank you if you have made it this far

 

[pooh4evr]

Well - Fastpass has changed COMPLETLY since your last trip. the paper passes are no longer given out, so I am gonna say you are probably out of luck there. It sounds like you paid for fastpasses (which are free to all Disney guests) You need to read up on Fastpass + . they have also really cracked down and changed the way people with disabilities go through the lines (if that is the kind of pass you had before) So basically I would be really surprised if you could get away with using any front of the line passes anymore.

Free or discounted tickets - the best deal on tickets will be from undercover tourist or other places like that. The deals that come out are usually for people staying onsite who have packages (hotel and tickets) booked through Disney. There are no "free" tickets. Free dining is also only for onsite guests.

It sounds like for the most part you have done about everything to cut corners already.

 

[ShanRee]

Well - Fastpass has changed COMPLETLY since your last trip. the paper passes are no longer given out, so I am gonna say you are probably out of luck there. It sounds like you paid for fastpasses (which are free to all Disney guests) You need to read up on Fastpass + . they have also really cracked down and changed the way people with disabilities go through the lines (if that is the kind of pass you had before) So basically I would be really surprised if you could get away with using any front of the line passes anymore.

Free or discounted tickets - the best deal on tickets will be from undercover tourist or other places like that. The deals that come out are usually for people staying onsite who have packages (hotel and tickets) booked through Disney. There are no "free" tickets. Free dining is also only for onsite guests.

It sounds like for the most part you have done about everything to cut corners already.

Thank you for replying What I bought was definitely not fast passes... we did get the paper fast passes in park when we were there. These were full color paper cards that were about 3 inches by 4 inches and were full color front and back with animated pictures of the ride they were for and on the back stated something to the effect that the pass was good for all of the members of one party to have no wait access to the ride. The site won't let me post links yet but this is the title of a current ebay auction with the exact type ones I purchased and it is from the same seller: "Disney Fastpass Card , Front Of line Pass No Waiting , very rare"

This is the same seller I bought them from over 2 years ago and he/she is still selling them and still has 100% feedback so they apparently worked for others too. I really wish I could figure out what exactly they are for/originated from and why this person has access to so many of them.

AND.... I *think* I have read something about armbands rather than paper tickets now. Are those available through undercover tourist too? I sure hope so, because I worried to death about losing our ticket while there last time.

 

[TipsyTraveler]

Those cards are given out by Cast Members to children who are too short to ride. The kids can hold on to the card until they grow tall enough and then skip the line. How that seller gets her hands on them, I don't know.

 

[3princes+1princess]

Depending on how many kids you have that are over 10 years old, you can save quite a bit of money on tickets by signing them up for the YES individual classes. They get to take a 3 hour class and all kids (under 18 years old) that are enrolled will pay child prices for tickets. Since 10 years and older at disney pay adult prices for tickets..could save you a few hundred dollars.

 

[ShanRee]

Depending on how many kids you have that are over 10 years old, you can save quite a bit of money on tickets by signing them up for the YES individual classes. They get to take a 3 hour class and all kids (under 18 years old) that are enrolled will pay child prices for tickets. Since 10 years and older at disney pay adult prices for tickets..could save you a few hundred dollars.

Thank you... I have seen the YES program stuff and even called the other day asking about it, but I don't quite understand enough about it to feel comfortable signing up for it yet. When we go back in February of 2016 my children will be ages: 20, 13, 11, 10, 10, 10, 8, and 5. What would the ones who couldn't participate in the class do? Would we be limited to certain things with our tickets and not be able to experience all of the park?

 

[ShanRee]

Those cards are given out by Cast Members to children who are too short to ride. The kids can hold on to the card until they grow tall enough and then skip the line. How that seller gets her hands on them, I don't know.

I searched and searched to figure out what those were and never could find an answer. Since you posted this I have googled it and found info on them. Thanks! I do wonder how that seller gets so many, I wonder if he/she is a cast member and snags them to sell. I bought the ones we used at the end of 2011 and the seller is still selling them now at the end of 2014... weird!

 

[Shelly F - Ohio]

Just to let you know that pass you bought on Ebay is not a free parking pass. There is no such thing. All free parking passes have your name and the dates that you are staying printed on them and are only issued by the Disney resort you are staying at.

. You probably bought a AAA diamond parking pass which still requires that you pay $15 a day to park at Disney. The only thing that pass is good for is parking at the front parking lot in a special section. And they expire in Dec. of the year in which the parking pass was issued.


I looked up the front of the line passes you bought and they are no longer good at Disney because they are the old fast pass. They no longer use those.