Tell me your stories about Disney stays w/ the in-laws - the good, bad & the ugly!

[Haygar2]

I, also, am worried about the whole parent thing. We are going to Disney in September 2014. My mom, after listening to me rave about it, decided she wants to go. Last summer, we (my husband, myself, our 13 year old daughter and our 10 year old son) stayed at POR. It was wonderful. However, when we go next year, we are staying at WL so my kids can have bunk beds. My mom and her husband are staying at POR due to my recommendation. I am going to book my trip first (this Friday...yay) and my mom will book hers later through the same TA. One thing I am firm on is that we stay in different resorts. I love my mom. She is fantastic. But.......I know we need some away time. She doesn't do heat and humidity very well and she doesn't ride rides. Neither does her husband. I keep giving them ideas of things to to. We are also doing a water park while we are there. They are not. We are not going to Hollywood Studios. I told them that they should go to HS that day and enjoy. We will meet up for dinner every night. I am hoping they do their own thing some of the time. The one problem I foresee is that we are driving and they are flying. She said to me, the other day, "now your resort is close to ours so you can pick us up, correct?" Uhhh..no. I keep reminding her that they have shuttle buses that go everywhere. I want to make sure that she understands that BEFORE we get there. If they are wanting to go back to their room in the middle of the day and we do not, I don't want her to expect us to leave to take them back. Like I said..I love my mom. She is great. But, this is also a family vacation and I want to spend time with my husband and my kids. My husband and I will also be celebrating our 20th wedding anniversary while we are there.

 

[Jessica527]

These are excellent suggestions! I really think the separate rooms are a great idea.

So far I see that 3 rooms at POP would be $125/night per room. POFQ is around $215/night per room.

Personally, I would love to stay at Boardwalk again but want to make sure we fit in every ones budget. A 2 bedroom villa is $800/night and is not really separate.


Any other resort suggestions?

 

[DisneyHardin]

Everything can be great if you know ahead of time what to expect. We went with my inlaws a few years ago and I had the grand pictures of us happily following along my touring plan enjoying every minute. I had no idea that my FIL moved like slow molasses in winter in the mornings or that lunch had to be at the dot of noon and it didn't matter that we didn't eat breakfast until 10:00. After a HUGE meltdown at Animal Kingdom we agreed that we needed to split up and just do our own thing and just meet up for evening ADR's.

A big problem I had was that my DH ADORES his parents - he thinks they hung the moon and can do no wrong. So, I had a hard time convincing him sometimes that my way of doing things was the best.

I'm not sure I would go back to Disney with them, but we have gone to the beach the last two years with them and even a laid back vacation like a week at the beach takes some getting used to with people whose routine is drastically different from yours.

 

[Belleandtinker]

I barely can spend Christmas Eve with my in laws so the thought of wasting good money and vacation time with them is completely crazy for me.

If you like your in laws, then you should be fine. We went with my family and it stressed me out being responsible for everyone's fun. Since we go too much, I put a lot of pressure on myself to make everyone have fun. At the end, I could have had more fun and won't vacation in WDW with another family related or not related.

Good luck!

 

[campbell95]

We have not gone with my in-laws. They don't like Disney

But we did go with my parents, and my husband agreed that the trip was one of our best (and he does not always get along with them so well )

Separate rooms.
Have a general plan - which park per day (or parks, if you have hoppers)
Make sure everyone has a texting plan. My dad had to increase his for the week (no smartphone)
Be flexible! Have meet up times, be willing to split up and do your own thing
We did not do every meal together. Just 1 a day. It worked well for us all.
DH and I didn't want to go to DTD that trip, but my parents did, so we split up for half a day.
They even did a split stay, and we didn't. So they were in a different hotel for 2 days. It is NICE to have your own space and not be all in each other's business for the entire trip! Everyone has their own interests, and splitting up can be a good thing.

Overall, it was a great experience! My husband even agreed to make this an annual thing! (we have APs and go a couple of times a year, so the bigger family trip would not be our only trip)

 

[gtpoohbear]

We went with my ILs in 2010 - MIL, FIL, SIL, plus her 3 kids.

We had three separate (adjoining) rooms at CBR, which was perfect. Everyone had their own space, but being close together made it easy to coordinate.

I would also recommend planning plenty of "alone time", maybe 1 meal/day together, and separate for the rest. Not only does it help everyone's mood, but we found out the hard way that it takes a LONG time to eat with such a big group. Everything is slower.

I would also try to get them involved in the planning more, don't do it all for them. This was probably the biggest fail on our trip. None of them were interested in planning at all, just said they would "do whatever we did". Knowing I didn't want them to "do what we did" ALL the time, I made 3 separate plans. But there was no buy-in from any of the ILs, which caused problems at times.

All in all, it was a successful trip, and I've never regretted it. The cousins had a blast together.

Our biggest issue was actually MIL and her sleep habits. Let's just say she is NOT an early riser - she whines about having to get up at 9am!!! She assured us that she could do it though, and would make RD (and several amEMHs) with us every day.

She did make it - the first day. Then she started sleeping in again, later and later every day. Which was fine, we just told them to meet us at the park when they got going. (FIL was always up early, but wouldn't leave MIL to come on her own)

Problem was, by the end of the week they weren't getting there until lunch time, at which point we were about ready to leave for our afternoon break. Then MIL would be furious that we were about to leave, when she had just gotten there. On our last full day, FIL tried to force us to stay in the park and skip our break so that MIL could have her grandkid time. SIL gave in and stayed, but I caused a big stink by refusing. (I was 6 months preggo, it was HOT, we had been there almost 5 hours already, and DD was nearing a meltdown if we didn't get back to the room soon)

So... just be aware that issues may come up. Brush it off and don't let it ruin your fun, especially if you have communicated your plans in advance. If the rest don't want to follow, that's fine. But don't let them make you change your game to suit them.

 

[ElizabethG]

Our last trip was with my parents. We got a 2-bdrm lock-off. So, yes to separate spaces. Other than that, we did everything together. I am the planner and they were very excited to have be plan everything. I kept telling them that if they needed to rest, they could. They hung in with us the whole time.

This year my in-laws are coming. They won't do anything on their own. They want me to plan. I think the only thing they may do on their own is leave the park early and go back to the room. I planned a little slower pace as my in-laws are 10 years older than my parents.

With both trips, we did a split stay. So, only part of our trip is with the parents. Then, we have part with our family only. While I like to spend time with them, I really need time for just my family. This year will be 5 days with the in-laws followed by 6 days for just our family.

 

[Minniesgal]

These are excellent suggestions! I really think the separate rooms are a great idea.

So far I see that 3 rooms at POP would be $125/night per room. POFQ is around $215/night per room.

Personally, I would love to stay at Boardwalk again but want to make sure we fit in every ones budget. A 2 bedroom villa is $800/night and is not really separate.

Any other resort suggestions?

Separate rooms? How about separate resorts!

 

[Jessica527]

Separate rooms? How about separate resorts!

Haha love this!

 

[GoBearsGo]

we have done in laws a few times. My inlaws yern for WDW of old with no ADRs or planning. I love the planning. I make the plans as I would do without them. I make ADRs with them coming, but if they don't it's easy for the restaurant to adjust down. They are welcome to come or not. We have had only one meltdown in our trips.

It was epic. MIL was mad because we actually discipline our child. My MIL started getting mad at my wife and my son started crying. Mind you I found a TINY table at Sunshine at high noon. My MIL storms off with my son crying after her. My wife storms off with my FIL trailing after her. I'm sitting there with all this food and a lady grabs my chairs saying you won't need these. I walked out ready to go drink around the world, but they were all waiting for me outside.

Other than that no issues.

 

[uagirl]

6 of us traveled in September 2012. Me, DH, DD (2), my brother (27), my mom and my stepdad.

DH, DD and myself were in one room, my parents and brother in another. We didn't request them, but our rooms were connecting. I don't think we ever opened the connecting door.

Overall, it was a great experience. We planned some meals together and some apart. A couple of days, we spent the entire day together, but others we ate breakfast and then headed our separate ways.

It can work pretty well as long as you have a plan for everyone to have their space. I would have felt completely smothered had we been together 24/7, but we made sure that we were not, so it worked out great.

 

[toodycat]

Separate rooms? How about separate resorts!

I second that and I'm not kidding. We invited MIL and FIL, who live in FL, to make the short drive and meet us at WDW. We paid for their room for one night at the GF with us and figured that would give us two days with them and two days alone. (We were only staying 4 nights ourselves) MIL did not like the GF and complained about everything. She also took bread from the dinner table at GF Cafe and brought it back to her room for "breakfast", never mind that DH was buying her character breakfast. After the one night at the GF, they extended their stay and moved to All Star Sports, so they could stay with us longer. All I heard about was how much cheaper that resort was than the GF and how we were wasting our money at the GF. They didn't actually like the All-Star Sports resort. They complained about that too...too crowded, too noisy, too many kids, uncomfortable bed. MIL doesn''t really like WDW or Disney in general and looked pained whenever we took photos with characters as though that is something grown-ups don't do. She kept telling us how she preferred Epcot to MK. Our son was only 8 at the time, so you know we were at MK a lot. So the moral of my story is: proceed at your own risk.

 

[Minniesgal]

I second that and I'm not kidding. We invited MIL and FIL, who live in FL, to make the short drive and meet us at WDW. We paid for their room for one night at the GF with us and figured that would give us two days with them and two days alone. (We were only staying 4 nights ourselves) MIL did not like the GF and complained about everything. She also took bread from the dinner table at GF Cafe and brought it back to her room for "breakfast", never mind that DH was buying her character breakfast. After the one night at the GF, they extended their stay and moved to All Star Sports, so they could stay with us longer. All I heard about was how much cheaper that resort was than the GF and how we were wasting our money at the GF. They didn't actually like the All-Star Sports resort. They complained about that too...too crowded, too noisy, too many kids, uncomfortable bed. MIL doesn''t really like WDW or Disney in general and looked pained whenever we took photos with characters as though that is something grown-ups don't do. She kept telling us how she preferred Epcot to MK. Our son was only 8 at the time, so you know we were at MK a lot. So the moral of my story is: proceed at your own risk.

Oh I wasn't kidding either!