Thanksgiving break or Christmas break crowds with a toddler?

[disneycat321]

How bad are Thanksgiving week and Christmas week, really? DH and I are DLR vets, former local APs. We’re toying with the idea of a Christmas trip (our favorite season at DLR), but I’m a teacher, so we’re limited to the most crowded options. Our daughter would be 2.5 then, so LLMP is a no go for us since she can’t ride almost anything it includes. Really, I’m wondering about the crowd impact on Fantasyland/no height requirement type rides in particular. We’re adept at navigating crowds as adults (we’ve done a couple days before Christmas and I’ve done Presidents’ week and the week before Easter), but it really is a whole other situation with a toddler. We’ve also never been during Thanksgiving week at all.

This would either be park days Sun-Tues of Thanksgiving week (definitely what I am leaning towards, personally) or Sun-Tues of Christmas week, with Christmas falling on that Thursday this year.

We just had an amazing trip last week with our 2yo and really enjoyed just going with the flow and doing what worked for her. We didn’t care about hitting constant rides, and lucky us, DD’s favorite ride is the carousel, which was always a 5 min posted wait. But if those holiday weeks are going to see something like 20+ min waits for the carousel and wall to wall people in Animation Academy watching the videos (I love that place) - THOSE kind of crazy crowds - then we’ll just skip it and aim for June trips for the foreseeable future.

Thank you!

 

[LKing]

We just had an amazing trip last week with our 2yo and really enjoyed just going with the flow and doing what worked for her. We didn’t care about hitting constant rides, and lucky us, DD’s favorite ride is the carousel, which was always a 5 min posted wait. But if those holiday weeks are going to see something like 20+ min waits for the carousel and wall to wall people in Animation Academy watching the videos (I love that place) - THOSE kind of crazy crowds - then we’ll just skip it and aim for June trips for the foreseeable future.

I'm glad you had a good trip. I would love to hear more about what worked and what didn't work. Maybe you can add a follow up to one of your original planning threads.

 

[maleficent55]

We have done the week of Thanksgiving before Thanksgiving and are in fact doing it again this year, the Friday to Tuesday before thanksgiving

It was so crowded yet here I am again! Lol
There isn’t really a time I’d never do at Disneyland

If it works for my schedule I’ll go for it
Mitigate crowds with rope dropping, single rider lines, rider switch, mid day breaks…smiles

 

[hardcorestitch]

How bad are Thanksgiving week and Christmas week, really? DH and I are DLR vets, former local APs. We’re toying with the idea of a Christmas trip (our favorite season at DLR), but I’m a teacher, so we’re limited to the most crowded options. Our daughter would be 2.5 then, so LLMP is a no go for us since she can’t ride almost anything it includes. Really, I’m wondering about the crowd impact on Fantasyland/no height requirement type rides in particular. We’re adept at navigating crowds as adults (we’ve done a couple days before Christmas and I’ve done Presidents’ week and the week before Easter), but it really is a whole other situation with a toddler. We’ve also never been during Thanksgiving week at all.

This would either be park days Sun-Tues of Thanksgiving week (definitely what I am leaning towards, personally) or Sun-Tues of Christmas week, with Christmas falling on that Thursday this year.

We just had an amazing trip last week with our 2yo and really enjoyed just going with the flow and doing what worked for her. We didn’t care about hitting constant rides, and lucky us, DD’s favorite ride is the carousel, which was always a 5 min posted wait. But if those holiday weeks are going to see something like 20+ min waits for the carousel and wall to wall people in Animation Academy watching the videos (I love that place) - THOSE kind of crazy crowds - then we’ll just skip it and aim for June trips for the foreseeable future.

Thank you!

Definitely go on Christmas. Disneyland at Christmastime is a VIBE, even for someone that young. I went to Disneyland during the holiday season and the crowds were manageable.

 

[SOCALMouseMommy]

I would choose your Christmas dates. All the Magic Keys will be blocked that entire time (except one key, Inspire, which will only be open on your first day, the Sunday before Christmas).

For your Thanksgiving dates, three Magic Keys are open to visit and with kids out of school, local key holders definitely will visit.