Last Family vacation: juggling teens and preschooler
Let me start with the basics, Im Tracy, Im in my early 40s and I am the obsessive planner in the family. My family consists of Monty DH 46, Carly DDE18, Erica DD16 and Kaitlin DD4.
We are from Vancouver, Canada so our orginal plans were to take just DH DD4 and I to Disneyland. But, we have a very persuasive travel agent who found a fantastic deal for us to take DH older 2 with us on one last family vacation. (At least one that WE pay for.) We had to adjust our plans from the first week of December to the third week of September but we able to do that will little difficulty. I will get ahead of myself here (as you find I tend to do as you read on) and say that I will NEVER visit DW in September again. Our last trip was in 2008 in January and I will stick with the winter months. The heat and humidity pretty much did us in. But never did it affect the enjoyment of our once in a life time trip. I say once in a life time because it was DD4 (Kaitlins) first introduction to everything Disney and even though I knew she would love it, watching her STILL exceeded my expectations.
If youre still with me, lets get started and re-visit the happiest place on earth.
Our trip began several thousand miles away. We had quite the debate about getting there. Airfare from Seattle was half the price from Vancouver so we decided to drive to Seattle. Option A: Leave at a respectable time and get to the resort at midnight (dont forget about the 4 year old.) or Option B: leave at the ridiculous time of 5:30am and get the resort at dinner time, leaving everyone time to eat and relax. But that meant leaving Vancouver at midnight. (Dont forget about the 4year old).
We chose Option B and waivered on spending the night at a hotel in Seattle, however, since we were getting BACK to Seattle at midnight we thought staying in the hotel on the other end of the trip made more sense. (Dont forget about the 4 year old.) So what would be better to work around a very active (not hyper just very busy) preschooler who is anything but a couch potatoe.
Midnight: Leave Vancouver, Kaitlin woke up (I had counted on her sleeping the whole way) and did not sleep for another 2 hours. We drove the 3.5 hour trip to Seattle, parked the car and Kaitlin woke up. We boarded plane number one at 5:30am and flew 2 hours to San Fran. Kaitlin stayed awake the entire time. (I had counted on her sleeping the whole way.) She did really well for her first plane ride though. We changed planes (thank god I listened to the disers here and decided to buy a stroller instead of renting one so that I had airport use) and boarded the next flight to Orlando. A 5 hour flight. Kaitlin was still awake. But I had planned for this, I pulled out the shinny new Leap Pad 2 which I spent a fortune loading with all things awesome for just such an emergency. However, she was handing it back to me within 30 seconds and getting cranky. I realized she was tired (Of course, she hasnt slept near what I was hoping she would) so I pulled out her blanket and pillow (thank god I listened to the disers here) and she cuddled up and slept the entire 5 hours. So, now do I wake her up and risk cranky child on a small cramped plane or let her sleep and risk having her up all night. With consideration to the other passengers, we let her sleep.
We were all checked in a ready to go to our room at the Caribbean Beach Resort by 6:00pm. (3:00pm Vancouver time.) The resort was beautiful. It exceeded our expectations straight off and we were located in Jamaica 45 as requested. It was only a 2 minute walk to the pool and concessions so we were thrilled. Although this was our last family trip and most of the trip itinerary would center around Kaitlin, we did have big surprise for Carly (18) and Erica (16). We got to the very small room with only 2 double beds for 5 people and asked them where they would like to sleep. Both of them were troopers but I dont think either had given much thought about the cramped quarters. They masked their facial expressions very well and said wherever would be fine. So I hand each of them a key and said how about each of you take one bed? I so should have had the video camera on as the look of shocked realization that they would actually have their own privacy came. As requested we had connecting rooms so total freedom wasnt going to be had, but at least they could live in their own mess and heat. (They like a very warm room. So warm that there is almost no difference going from their room to outside. In fact, so warm that they attracted not one but TWO hissing cockroaches in their room. I have to state that this resort is beautiful and we found it very clean so it was absolutely no fault of the resort that these girls attracted the bugs. We were right next door in a refrigerator and had no issues.)
We all settled in and headed out for a bite to eat and to explore the resort. We did not have high expectations on food quality and found it to be neither good nor bad. We checked the pool times as Kaitlin had slept for the last 5 hours and DH did not, I thought I would take her to the pool while Monty got an early bedtime. (with work and all he only had maybe 5 hours of sleep our of 36 hours.) We read the time wrong though and thought it closed at 8pm instead of the actual 11pm. What was I going to do with this kid? We went back to the hotel room to find that Mickey had left a whole bunch of presents. (I had shopped the 50% off sale at the disneystore before we left) Everyone got PJs and shirts. Kaitlin didnt really know what to think as she had no idea about the adventures she was about to have.
By 9:30 we were all in bed looking for a good night sleep. (6:30 our time with a kid that had a 5 hour nap.) Somehow though and with a lot less fight than I anticipated, even Kaitlin fell asleep.
I promised many more pictures in future posts. Just didnt' take that many of everyone sleeping on the plane.
Because we are westcoast dwellers and because we were dragging along 2 teenagers, I had only planned one early morning wake up. This was not it. We got up about 9am, went for breakfast a little shopping in the gift shop (as recommended on the dis,) I let Kaitlin buy one thing so that I would not be hounded all day. She chose a very cute Minnie Mouse hat (yep, the red one with white polka dots and the Minnie face.) Then we got on the bus for Animal Kingdom. I have to interject here that with the exception of the last day, I found the transit system awesome. I had heard horror stories about CBR and wait times, but we never ever waited more than 5 minutes in any direction. One of the trip reports that I am still following and love (she still hasnt finished and she went in May) had said that they found it easier leaving from Old Port Royale and I have to say that for the most part we did to.
We arrived at Animal Kingdom and Kaitlin was about jumping out of her skin with excitement. What was funny was that she didnt really know what she was so excited about. We had watched some You Tube videos in preparation, but so not the same as being there, especially if you have never been there.
Animal Kingdom is our least favorite park. In my opinion its like a big zoo and we dont like zoos. Kaitlin wants to touch, feel, feed, play with the animals, all this looking stuff is of no interest to her. But, this park does have the best ride, which is why we decided to get this park out of the way first. We got our Photo pass Plus redeemed (I bought early and got the discount, best money I EVER spent.) then we headed off to get Everest Fast passes. Kaitlin is 42 inches tall and loves the thrill rides at our local park, so fortunately, she could go on all but a handful of rides. Our fast passes were about 40 minutes away so we ran over to Kali River Rapids for our first ride. I knew by the way we ended up sitting that I was going to be soaked and Kaitlin too. We came down the first hill and got a little wet. The girls sitting across from us were laughing at Kaitlins reaction when a sudden shower of water popped up behind them getting them soaked. Kaitlin thought that was the best ever. Carly and Erica, not so much. Somehow Daddy got off the ride dry as a bone. Another opportunity to teach Kaitlin that life is not always fair.
It was time for our fast passes. This was also Ericas first trip to Disneyworld as she chose not to come with us in 2008, so this was her first time. I let Monty go with his girls first while I tried to figure out how to entertain Kaitlin. Snacks are always a good start. Within 15 minutes, they were back! My turn, with rider swap, the girls got to ride again. Again, we were back in 15 minutes. We added the photos to our PP+.
Monty was adamant on taking Kaitlin on the dinosaur ride. I wasnt so sure, its very jerky and loud and she wasnt yet acclimated to Disney Theming. We passed Prime Evil Twirl first which caught the girls eye. Kaitlin wasnt big enough for that one so I took her on the triceratops spin ride. Boring!!!!!! She wasnt impressed after Kali. But getting out the exit she saw something that did tweak her interest. She wasnt too sure what it was though. Upon investigation I saw a short line with Pluto and Goofy at the end. I continue to underestimate my kid cause she knew who the where and was asking for her autograph book for them to sign. I didnt even know she knew what the autograph book was for. Anyway, a quick call to Dad to let him know where we were and in line we stood. I had Kaitlin watch the other kids so she could get the idea. This was her very first meet and greet. Monty and the girls arrived just as it was our turn. She cautiously approached at first and handed over the book with some encouragement. Pluto tried to get her to dance with him while goofy signed but she was too busy staring and didnt get what he wanted. A couple of hugs later and she were realizing what this was all about. She blew them kisses good bye and we pulled her out. (She wasnt leaving). I didnt think that smile would ever come off, but then we went on the Dinosaur ride.
I relented and we headed for the ride. We should have checked the fast pass as it was already being redeemed, but it was the first day and we were all still thinking about the big adventure so we just got into the standby line. It wasnt so long and before we knew it we were on the ride. (again, thanks to the dis I had bought glow sticks for Kaitlin for the darker rides so she wouldnt be so scared and other guests wouldnt be interrupted. We even ended up sharing some with other kids along the trip.) This glow stick was fantastic idea. The ride was not. She was a trooper though, and I even though she was enjoying for a while, but at the end she simply said I didnt like that ride. I hope this would not bite us in the butt later trying to get her on other rides.
