Traveling with 5 month old?

[*WeLuvDisney*]

Ok, my husband talked me into another trip in November(yeah, like he had to try very hard! ) We will have a 5 month old at the time. The youngest we have taken kids has been 18 months so this is a whole new experience for us!

We are flying, about 2 hours and plan to stay for 7 days!

ANY and ALL tips would be appreciated!

Thanks!

 

[raysnkaysmom]

I'm gonna watch too....cuz my little one will be about 8 months when we go

 

[Going Broke]

We brought our daughter last year when she was just 5 months old. I think it was pretty easy traveling with the baby. She slept most of the time. Just make sure you have a comfy stroller. In November, I'm guessing, you won't have to worry too much about the heat (I may be wrong, I'm from WI). You'll be able to take the baby on most of the rides and use the baby swap when you can't. Good luck!

 

[PrincessPoohsMom]

My DD has been at 5 months and 1 year and trust me, she was easier the first time!

Bring your stroller from home that reclines fully and you'll find the baby will nap quite a bit while you walk around (don't forget the rain cover). Naps are a great time to do the bigger rides; you can use the child swap (just be aware that the entire party will need to go to the entrance of the ride, since the CM will need to actually see the baby) or FP. We honestly just used FP and went in shifts, found it easier. A front pack or sling/wrap is great for standing in line and makes getting on/off the rides easier.

If you formula feed always bring more to the park than you think you'll need, even in November it might be rather warm and you'll need to keep the baby well hydrated. Slather on the diaper rash ointment too, heat & humidity can do a number on that sensitive skin.

We've never used the Baby Care Centers, but I've heard great things about them.

We brought a sheet from home for the Pack & Play. They of course give you bedding at the resort, but we found DD slept better when the sheet smelled like home.

My #1 tip (from a fellow DISer): Diaper change kits. Take a gallon size ziplock and put in a diaper, a few wipes (I put these in a sandwich bag), and a disposable changing pad. Then when the baby needs a change, just grab one of these. Everything goes into the gallon ziplock and then into the trash when done. No need to drag the big diaper bag into the restroom. Made life much easier at the airport too!

Have a great trip!

 

[gwtw428]

We took our 4 month old and had a great time! She napped in her stroller alot (the restaurants always allowed us to bring in the stroller, we have the medium size Chicco). We used the Baby Bjorn alot too. She loved being able to see everything and be part of the fun.
I pumped every 2-3 hours so we were always in the baby stations. They are great! There is always a cast member in there to help you with anything and they are always cleaning. They also sell infant tylenol, diapers, wipes, bottles, pacifiers etc. You can use there sink and liquid dish detergent to clean any bottles too!
You will be going at a slower pace but my husband and I actually enjoyed Disney more at the slow pace. My daughter called the shots...when she was hungry or needed to be changed we got a break. Did alot of people watching!
We took the infant carrier on the plane since we bought her a seat. We also rented a car.
If you have any more questions, please feel free to pm me!
Have a great trip!
Jamie

 

[mickeysmyboy]

Our littlest will be 9 months next month when we go. I think it will be easier to take him then it was to take DWS a few years ago when he was 2.

You can ship the baby needs down before hand so you don't have to have a whole extra suitcase full of diapers etc.

We're bring DS's regular stroller and an front carrier to take him on rides. I'm really looking forward to seeing how he reacts to everything! It should be a lot of fun!

Good luck!

 

[Going Broke]

I love this tip. The diaper bag is just one more thing to carry into an already crowded bathroom. Since DD will still be in diapers on our next trip, I will be sure to follow this tip! Thanks!!

Also, and I think just about everyone remembered to mention it (except for myself in my previous post), having a baby carrier for in the lines worked extremely well for us. We didn't use one at home so we asked around our friends and family to borrow one. We ended up with a Baby Bjorn and I became an instant fan.

 

[tabrizia]

We took DS when he was 5 months last September. It was great. I loved the baby centers they were wonderful, a great place for changing a baby and the nursing areas were nice, dimly lit and rarely had anyone else in them so he didn't get distracted while eating. Our Mei Tei (type of sling) was wonderful, it made it a lot easier to carry him around and we didn't need to take him out for rides, unlike the stroller. So if he fell asleep in it, no problem we could both go on rides still without one of us having to wait for the other (we didn't do any rides he couldn't do). That being said we also had a stroller which was nice for our longer park days, since after 3 or 4 hours he got heavy (he was a big 5 month old though and 19 pounds at the time).

We did take it slow, which wasn't a big deal since we had been the year before. He loved meeting characters, he adored Minnie's and Mickey's noses and kept trying to eat them.

He was really portable at 5 months which was nice, we did have to make sure he got some move around time in the evenings. He was army crawling at that point though and he had plenty of room to explore when in our room. He also adored the pool, we took him swimming every evening and it was probably his favorite part of the trip.

That being said I would definitely do a trip again with a 5 month old, it was a lot of fun, though we were not comando and watched baby for when he had had enough of the parks and was ready to go.

We were even able to use cloth diapers the whole trip which was nice, we were afraid they might have ended up as too much work, but they worked fine especially with the nice changing centers at the baby care centers.

 

[Spart02]

We took a four month old in December. I can honestly say she didn't slow us down a bit. We used baby swap and fast pass, and it was a piece of cake! I nursed her in the mornings, at naptime, and before bed, and bottle fed her the rest of the time. We used the baby care centers for heating up bottles, and an occasional diaper change. Although the care centers were wonderful to use, they didn't seem to be real centrally located, so that made them hard for us to use. Animal Kingdom had the best location.
The diaper kits were wonderful to use. However, I found that I changed the baby in her stroller the majority of the time. The lines for the changing tables in the restrooms were too long and she was small enough to easily do it in the stroller. We would just lay her changing pad down and go for it!
At four months, my daughter really was easy to travel with. She didn't sleep as much as I thought she would, but she was very happy. She LOVED watching all of the shows and also enjoyed all of the rides we took her on. She would even cry when the ride was over or the show stopped! It was cute!
Have a great vacation!

 

[dutch_girl_scout]

When we took DS at 4 months old, I used a sling way more than the stroller, that way if he fell asleep and we wanted to go to a show, or on the train, or on the bus we didn't have to wake him up and pull him out of the stroller.

We did ship a box ahead with some things in it (we were going on a cruise after WDW) but we used wegoshop (http://www.wegoshop.com) for our formula, and diapers. Marge met us at the hotel and delivered all the groceries we needed for a very reasonable charge. This last time we went we rented some baby gear from A baby's best friend (http://www.abbf.com/). It was really nice becasue they deliver to the resort and then pick it up at the resort, you don't even have to be there.

Enjoy you're trip, it was definately much easier when he was 4-months then when we just went back and he was 13 months.

 

[SplashMountainMama]

We came back a couple weeks ago and our youngest was almost 4 months. He was so easy at the parks. I definitely used my baby carrier a lot for standing in lines. We used baby swap when we needed. The baby centers are great, although I'm not a big fan of the one at Disney Studios. The nursing rooms are pretty cramped and the whole place is a little on the small side compared with the others. I used the baby centers for nursing my son so I'm not sure what it's like to use them with bottle-fed babies. I know that at the MK baby care center one mom who wanted to use the rocking chairs in the nursing room to bottlefeed her baby was told she couldn't use it even though there wasn't anyone in there. It didn't make sense to me at all. There were no other rocking chairs in the place and she really wanted to rock her baby to sleep with the bottle. I felt so bad for her because you could see that the baby was tired and the rest of the center was busy. It was an usually hot day and she was really stuck. I'm not sure if that's the norm or she just got a CM who was a stickler for the rules.

 

[*WeLuvDisney*]

Thank you all for your advice. You have made me feel MUCH better about taking such a small baby to Disney! I love the diaper kit idea!

How about for the plane ride? Anyone have any advice or tips for that?