Okay! Help us have a stress FREE vacation...

[dcsend]

Often on this board the suggestion is to "Get to the parks early (1/2 hr. early!) to beat the crowds" Sounds great, but...

My question is, how do we have a GREAT time and do it "all"? (I know we wont do it "all", but I wanna do A LOT!)

How do you get to a park early in the morning after your kids have been up late the night before? Since this IS a vacation, I'm assuming that our 12, 9, 7, & 5 yr. olds are going to want to see the fireworks, not go to bed at 8pm, etc. And they're not "morning" (6am) children - they rise at 8:30am. Realistically, I think that we could get out of the house we're renting by 9-9:30am - after the park has already been open for a couple of hours!

I just don't want to stress everyone out when we're supposed to be having a good time. I know they're not going to want to take a break mid-day and nap ( at the thought!) so that's not an option...

We'll probably never do Disney again either, so I don't want them to miss anything... Any suggestions on how to not be a nagging, grumpy mom, pushy & stressed - all for the sake of having FUN - and trying not to be exhausted when they come home having to go back to school the next day???

We're going in April so I know that it's going to be crazy busy which doesn't exactly help

Your thoughts???

 

[dman11]

How many days are you going for? If you plan on doing mostly everything at all 4 parks in a 4 day stay you NEVER will get it done. To realistically get everything you want to do at the parks at a pace like you've described you need 2 days minimum at MK and you still wont get to do everything. 2 days at Epcot and MGM and 1 day at AK. So if you're staying for less than 7 days try to extend it to 7 days at the parks at least.

If you can't make it 7 days just map out what you definitely want to get done and plan it out so that you can get it done in the time you have at the park. Be sure to use the fast pass option. With that being said, I did have plans on how we were going to attack the parks before we got there but once we were there and our kids saw this and saw that and wanted to do this and wanted to do that... the plan got tossed right out the window and we just went with the flow of what they wanted to do with recommendations on how to get it done. BTW they are 11, 10 and 2!

Really, our enjoyment from WDW is our kids faces with smiles on them and thier excitement while there and beforehand knowing they are going there. You'll get to enjoy it too but the kids are the ones you're doing this for so don't try to push them too hard because they will crash and get stressed and not enjoy it as much. Just enjoy what you can and watch the kids closely because if this is your only trip to WDW you'll want to remember the kids faces and excitement more than what it was liek to ride Splash Mountain.

 

[ChristyJ]

You might be surprised...they may be jumping out of bed early each day with excitement!!
We went last year with my DDs (ages 5 & 8 at the time). They stayed up each night until 10:00 or so (we went in Dec., so the parks closed earlier & didn't open until 8am on early days), and woke up around 6:45-7:30. DH & I would take our showers in the am and let them sleep. It all went well-we rented a stroller a few days & my 5 yr. old fell asleep in it 2 different days.

I think all of the planning I did really helped with easing the stress-we had our dinner ressies all set, knew which parks we wanted to go to for each day, & each night, DH & I would go thru and plan our first few rides for the next morning.

 

[marylou]

The first time we went we did commando style. We did EMH and late evening hours each day. Got a guide book and followed the plan religiously. Everything planned to the minute. ADR made and everything. took a break when the parks started to get busy. THe first two days the kids swam and played in the sun. The rest of the week they napped cause they were exhausted! We were up at the crack of dawn, taking the bus to the parks from the AS (45 min to MK). The youngest was 8 then. Did not think we would be returning either so I wanted to see everything I could the kids were all for cause they thought the same.
My husband (not a Disney freak like me) on the way home said we would have to do that again so I have been alot more relaxed since then.
If your kids are not able/willing to get up at the crack of dawn avoid the early open parks and go to the others on those days. Crowds will be alot less. Still suggest getting a guide book though so you know what rides you want. You will have a more difficult time cause of the older sibling not wanting to go on "baby" rides. Good luck and remember your on VACATION! Have fun!

 

[Mom to Jordan]

First...Forget trying to do it all and just enjoy what you do get done. Most families can not burn the candle on both ends. We are really risers and call it a night early. Our best friends just returned and NEVER made it to a park before 10:00. Just play it by ear. Avoid early entry days, use fast pass and just know that lines will be longer as the day progresses. I would have the kids make a must see list for each park and then anything extra is just icing on the cake.
When you are going makes a huge difference too. Off season should not be a issue but if it is summer you will need to plan more.
Make a PS for a sitdown lunch to give everyone a break without going back to the house. TAke a long ride on the monorail to rest or visit a resort for lunch.
REmember this is suppose to be fun.

Jordans' mom

 

[Kae]

I so agree with Jordan's Mom. On the first morning getting up early is easy But from that point we just kinda take it easy. We pick a few must dos at each park & then the other stuff is just gravy so to say.

Kae

 

[zookeeper]

When we went last September I went with the plan of getting to the park early, breaking at the hotel and heading back to the park until closing time. That plan lasted an entire 1/2 a day, when riding the bus back at 10:00 pm I realized that if I pushed the kids like that we would all be miserable by day 3. You really do have to pace yourselves according to your kids. We have 5 (8,7,6,4 and 1) and more than a few times we split up because the older ones had energy to keep going and the younger ones could care less. The one thing I definitely agree with is to make a list of "must-sees" for each child. My kids had watched the planning video over and over for months before our trip and they knew exactly what they wanted to see the most. I had more than a few teary-eyed moments watching my kids faces as they got to do or see what they had been most excited about.

 

[dsnymomof4]

Dcsend,
Wow - I thought I was reading about myself - our kids are exactly the same ages! First of all, you really cannot do everything you want to do. We've been there 4 times in the past 4 years and still there are things we haven't done. Our first couple of trips, we tried to do the get-up-at-7:00-to-get-to-tthe-parks-early thing. By the end of the day, we were all exhausted. I would say try to get to MK early because that gets the most crowded. I agree that although your children may not be "morning-people", they might be up early because they are so excited. Try to make a list of the attractions/shows that you REALLY want to do, and have a "plan", but don't get upset if you don't follow it exactly. Things always come up, and once you get there, you might find you want to do things other than what you originally planned for. Also, don't think that this will be your one-and-only trip, because once you've experienced the Disney magic, it will be hard to stay away!

 

[Pixiedust34]

We didn't do that many late nights.

We even missed Wishes, because I could see that my kids were dragging at the end of our MK day and knew we'd be pushing it if we stayed at the park long enough for Wishes and fought the crowds to the buses afterward. I'd rather have happy kids lounging at the resort than too-tired-and-cranky kids at the MK.

That said, we were at park opening on most days. Giving up late nights allowed us to do a lot in the parks in the mornings.

We did see Fantasmic and Illuminations, those they were not consecutive nights for us. Those were the 2 nights we stayed up late. Staying up 2 nights wasn't too hard, though more than that would have been too much for us. Go by what is comfortable with your family.

What you might want to do is plan XYZ (fill in the blank here with whatever it is your family wants to do) but be open to change your plans if everyone is too tired to enjoy them. Maybe pick 1 or 2 night shows at the most, and if you are all still going strong, anything you can stay up late for in addition to that is a bonus.

I'm sure you'll have a great trip!

 

[MinnieGirl33]

Don't even try to "do it all" !

You miss out on so much by not slowing down & appreciating what's going on around you.

I am very Type A & this has taken me almost 35 years of park-going (March '72 1st trip) to figure this out! My dad inagurated me into the "commando" way to do Disney.

After 14 years of marriage & 17 years of parks together my husband, who is very laid back, finally won & got me to slow down. Boy did he have the right idea!