Official January 2016!!!

[JustMeFran]

What are you looking forward to most during your trip?

Friends and family are now asking me what I am looking forward to most on our Disney trip.

Eating. My ADRs and new snacks to try!

Akershus (dinner)
Chef Mickey (EARLY bfast)
Whispering Canyon (dinner)
'Ohana (bfast)
50s Prime Time (dinner)
Tusker (bfast)
TRex (dinner)
Boma (dinner)
Teppan Edo (dinner)
BOG (lunch)
Liberty Tree (dinner)
Wishes Dessert Party

Looking forward to trying:
Sleepy Hollow Nutella, Le Fou Brew, BLT Waffle fries @ Golden Oak, School Bread, Carrot Cake Cookie, Frozen Chai Royal Anandapur Tea Company, Croque Glace.

How about you?
What are you looking forward to doing (or eating)?

 

[ariane37]

Good day for this question! Our trip in Nov. had some "blips" that kind of sucked my enthusiasm for our Jan. trip right out of me Finally starting to get excited again! Which means I better finish making our FP's and ADR's

I'm really looking forward to staying at AKL and the Poly, both new resorts for us. Also looking forward to Club Villain on the 16th and trying some new signature restaurants like Jiko and Citricos

And BTW JustMeFran, School Bread is the BEST snack in WDW

 

[jennad4]

Only 26 days to go!!!

 

[ThreeKMom]

My Magic Bands shipped! Woohoo!

 

[dogdoctor]

1 set of bands arrived Today. Second set should arrive on Monday.

 

[Twindisneykids]

What are you looking forward to most during your trip?

Friends and family are now asking me what I am looking forward to most on our Disney trip.

Eating. My ADRs and new snacks to try!

Akershus (dinner)
Chef Mickey (EARLY bfast)
Whispering Canyon (dinner)
'Ohana (bfast)
50s Prime Time (dinner)
Tusker (bfast)
TRex (dinner)
Boma (dinner)
Teppan Edo (dinner)
BOG (lunch)
Liberty Tree (dinner)
Wishes Dessert Party

Looking forward to trying:
Sleepy Hollow Nutella, Le Fou Brew, BLT Waffle fries @ Golden Oak, School Bread, Carrot Cake Cookie, Frozen Chai Royal Anandapur Tea Company, Croque Glace.

How about you?
What are you looking forward to doing (or eating)?

Sleepy Hollow Nutella is SO good!! I've been wanting to try the fries at Golden Oak too. We are defiantly hitting up Trader Sam's for a couple drink and POFQ for beignets

 

[dekraut]

What are you looking forward to most during your trip?

I am looking forward to simply being with my wife and kiddos and being out of the rat race for a week. For the first time in 20 years I am taking a week off of school (teacher) and pulling my kids out so we can go when it is not sneaker-melting hot and rubbing-elbows busy.

I know it is never empty anymore, but I am really hoping that we will just be able to forget about our regular routine and enjoy "being irresponsible" for a week. It is hard for me to let go and relax, so I am looking forward to staying at a resort for the first time instead of camping and seeing my children have a blast, and my wife watching them do it. I need it.

Also, it will be the first time my kids will be able to see Disney at night, and see the fireworks. They were too young last time. I cannot wait the 27 days until we arrive. RIgh tnow I am hanging on until Christmas, because we have a fun game planned for the big reveal.

Family is great. Disney is great. Family+Disney=AWESOME!

 

[TinkQueen]

I am looking forward to simply being with my wife and kiddos and being out of the rat race for a week. For the first time in 20 years I am taking a week off of school (teacher) and pulling my kids out so we can go when it is not sneaker-melting hot and rubbing-elbows busy.

I know it is never empty anymore, but I am really hoping that we will just be able to forget about our regular routine and enjoy "being irresponsible" for a week. It is hard for me to let go and relax, so I am looking forward to staying at a resort for the first time instead of camping and seeing my children have a blast, and my wife watching them do it. I need it.

Also, it will be the first time my kids will be able to see Disney at night, and see the fireworks. They were too young last time. I cannot wait the 27 days until we arrive. RIgh tnow I am hanging on until Christmas, because we have a fun game planned for the big reveal.

Family is great. Disney is great. Family+Disney=AWESOME!

Awwww! Sounds awesome! I bet your kids will be super excited! Hope you have an excellent sub lined up (I'm a sub, so I know the responsibility you're leaving behind!) Relax and enjoy the time with your wife and kids!

Would love to hear about the fun game planned for the big reveal!

A good friend and I will be arriving around the same time (Jan. 14-19). Fingers crossed for good weather for us all!

 

[ABCastillo]

Getting so excited here! So we may have decided to make a last minute change!! Rather than take the super early flight to MCO and hitting the parks we have decided to add a night at the beginning and take an evening flight after school and work, sleep in and then hit the parks. It has turned into a split stay: BWI and Poly. First split stay and we are soooo excited!!

 

[Jerusalem Gal]

Split stay for us too! First time!
We'll be at Pop for 4 nights, then at the CR for another 5 nights. DDP for both!
Landing and checking in after a REALLY long flight on the 19th!
3 and a half weeks away!!!

 

[AnnaGiselle]

I'm going for my bachelorette weekend and cannot wait! I just went in September and I was worried that with having two trips fairly close together, I wouldn't get as excited. Well I'm an idiot because obviously I am so excited and can't wait! I think we'll have fun with some BOG dinner and afternoon tea at GF. I've been having a little too much fun with all the planning and am sending out an epic email to my friends with our itinerary. Does anyone else get that joy with color coding and categorizing your Disney trip?!

 

[ABCastillo]

I'm going for my bachelorette weekend and cannot wait! I just went in September and I was worried that with having two trips fairly close together, I wouldn't get as excited. Well I'm an idiot because obviously I am so excited and can't wait! I think we'll have fun with some BOG dinner and afternoon tea at GF. I've been having a little too much fun with all the planning and am sending out an epic email to my friends with our itinerary. Does anyone else get that joy with color coding and categorizing your Disney trip?!

That sounds amazing. And I love organizing for Disney. Lol. We are four weeks out and I might have the suitcases out and ziplock bags ready for organizing clothes. Lol

 

[dekraut]

Would love to hear about the fun game planned for the big reveal!

I teach band and orchestra so my sub is ready to conduct!

As far as the game goes - it is pretty involved, but I will do my best to give you the short version.

Last time, we did a scavenger hunt, so my wife was worried that if we did that again, the kids would figure it out. This time we did a quiz game. We are telling the kids that we bought a great game called "The Incredible Journey" on Amazon. They will buy it since we are constantly ordering things from them. I printed out labels to decorate an old amazon box with prime logos and a game logo including the name "The Incredible Journey" so the box looks authentic. Inside the box is a big wooden game board I made with little brass key hooks on it, placed strategically. Also there are 30 question cards for the quiz game. Each question is something they will know the answer to and is age appropriate for each kid. In a second box are "thinking caps" we made out of felt hats from a craft store with stars and their names glued on them. They have to wear these to help think of the answers to the questions of course! Inside two separate very large boxes is 15 balloons each, numbered from 1 to 30 to go along with the questions. As they each answer a question correctly the have to find the matching balloon and pop it. Inside each balloon is cash ranging from $1 to $20 (their spend money for the trip) and a wooden disc with a letter on it. The wooden discs are numbered and have a small hole I drilled in the top so they will hang on the brass key hooks on the game board mentioned above. As they collect the discs they will hang them on the hooks and eventually spell out the words "In three weeks our family is going to." Finally they will open one more package which will have a pencil box with their name on it. Inside the pencil boxes will be their magic bands which should give it away since we used those on our last trip. We also created custom t-shirts with Incredibles logos on them to wear in the parks. They will also get the Birnbaum kid's guides once they get their magic bands.

After our last trip we talked about going as the Incredible Family for our next trip (which they think is Summer 2017) so EVERYTHING (game board, question cards, balloons, wooden discs, magic bands) are color coated red for DS and yellow for DD. This is also the reason we are calling the game the "Incredible" journey.

That wasn't very short, but there is a lot to it! Nothing like cutting it short, but our magic bands still aren't here, although they shipped on the 18th. USPS says they are out for delivery, so here is hoping they arrive with our mail in a few hours. I even called Disney to see if we paid off our trip early, if they would ship them early, but they said they couldn't do that. *FINGERS CROSSED*

EDITED TO ADD - bands just arrived in the mail! So happy. Can't wait until morning.

 

[ThreeKMom]

This sounds AWESOME!
Very creative, I just wrapped our magic bands and will put them under the tree from Santa - but without a name tag, so after everyone has opened their gifts there will be one left. i will let my youngest DD open it for the family!

 

[NYHeel]

Split stay for us too! First time!
We'll be at Pop for 4 nights, then at the CR for another 5 nights. DDP for both!
Landing and checking in after a REALLY long flight on the 19th!
3 and a half weeks away!!!

Same schedule for us minus the on site stay and the long flight. Of course, that 1.5 weeks have a pretty Jewish flavor with Yeshiva vacation week. Highly recommend early dinners for those of you who eat Kosher and want food in the park.

Actually just got our magic bands (throwaway room) today. It's my kids' second Disney visit with our last one 4 years ago. We're planning on spending 5-6 days in Disney and 2-3 days at Universal.

For our previous trip in January 2012, we actually never told our kids we were going. Due to a family illness we weren't sure we'd be able to go until about 2 days before we left. So we didn't want to tell the kids and then have to cancel. My kids were 3, 5, and 9 at the time. We did all the packing after they were asleep or when they were in school. We had the car packed and when they came home from school we told them to get in the car for a treat. We drove to Newark airport and parked offsite and got shuttled to the airport. My younger 2 kids thought the shuttle ride was the treat. My oldest eventually figured it out when we went into the airport. He said he saw me looking at a Disney website once or twice. Anyway, it was a lot of fun, especially messing with my kids on the drive over to the airport, getting them to guess what they think the treat is.

 

[han22735]

Getting so excited here! So we may have decided to make a last minute change!! Rather than take the super early flight to MCO and hitting the parks we have decided to add a night at the beginning and take an evening flight after school and work, sleep in and then hit the parks. It has turned into a split stay: BWI and Poly. First split stay and we are soooo excited!!

Exact plan as us. We added a day as well and are now flying out at noon instead of our normal 6am flight. Looking forward to getting in later and not being exhausted.

 

[tinabina919]

Merry Christmas!

9 days! single digits finally!!!

 

[ThreeKMom]

Anyone else checking January weather continually?
One day I check our week and it's rain everyday, the next we have sun, I making myself crazy!

 

[JustMeFran]

Anyone else checking January weather continually?
One day I check our week and it's rain everyday, the next we have sun, I making myself crazy!

I am 13 days out and have been checking the long term forecasts for a couple days now. More for the temp than the rain.
Not too worried about the rain, makes the crowds less! =)

 

[Kathymford]

Single digit dance over here too! WOOHOO (no matter what my faulty ticker says!). I can't believe how warm it still looks in FL right now! Since we are going for marathon weekend, I would like it to cool off just a tad.