Trip booked for August, but now what?

[eskgwin]

I haved booked our trip to DW for August 10-19. We are staying at the BC for the first time. It is actually our first time in a deluxe resort. I received our first confirmation letter in the mail as well as the Disney 2011 trip planning DVD that I had ordered.

I know it is a long time away, but I feel like I want to continue to do Disney stuff. I have the family helping me decide on some ADR's that we can start making on Feb. 11. I have 3 girls who will be 11,11 and 13 at the time we go. I want to either make or buy some cute things for them. A t-shirt with their favorite character and their name on it (is putting their name on their shirt a good idea?). We will be in the parks for 6 days (park hopper) and water parks included. Are there other cute/fun things to do while I wait for August to get here? I want to keep my Disney happiness alive for the whole 7 months.

Any ideas?

I don't even know if I am asking in the right place.

Thanks for your help.

Allyson

 

[WDWisTheBest]

Try doing a search with the term "ADR" or "ADRs" in it. There are tons of suggestions in the threads

 

[santadog]

My DD and I are going on the 19th of August for 10 days - one thing we're doing to pass the time is we designate one day a week for looking at the tour books and watching Disney movies, the more obscure, the better.

 

[sdmom]

WDW in August is tough on the body. Make sure you are ready for it. Having a trip planned makes my daily walk much more enjoyable.

 

[donnaf516]

We're booked for August 27th...

Some of the things I do in the mean time are:
*There's so much info available here, I read as much as I can
*Shop! Each night at the Word, Tink sneaks in our room and leaves the kids a small prize. It really curbs them asking for everything they see. A couple nights we're there, Tink even leaves them Dis Gift Cards so they can buy what they like. I'm also a little crazy and coordinate the family's outfits for each day so I'm always on the hunt for cute summer clothes.
*Watch Disney movies! If I'm really into it I'll even plan a family night around the movie. Dinner menu, snacks, games, etc.
*Create a count down calendar. This trip is a surprise for the kids! We're not telling them until the morning we leave, but normally we do a count down calendar starting 3 months out.

We're also celebrating our 10 year wedding anniversary! So I'm trying to plan a nice night out for my dh and I.

 

[Jessica14]

I know this won't take you all the way to August, but we have family movie nights on Fridays. As we got closer to the trip, we started playing all Disney movies. It really helped remind us of some characters and stories that we hadn't seen in awhile.
Jessica

 

[Fantasmic23]

Congratulations on your August trip!!

You've already received some great suggestions. I'm a movie buff and I agree with the poster who said the more obscure the Disney movie (Books, too), the better!

There are also some wonderful Disney-themed documentaries out there (You can find most of them on Netflix), not only dealing with the parks but with Walt Disney himself, the Imagineers, Disney music, etc. Off the top of my head, some good documentaries to rent are:

Waking Sleeping Beauty
The Boys: The Sherman Brothers' Story
Walt: The Man Behind the Myth
Walt and El Grupo
Modern Marvels: Disney World
Frank and Ollie
Disney Parks Collection (5 DVDs in all)
Walt Disney: Secret Lives (You can find this on YouTube)

 

[Hootch]

understanding some of the planning going on behind the parks and rides so I read a number of books, websites and threads on this site for things to look for and some of the thought processes. For example:

* the famed chess game in the Pirates of the Caribbean is a loop game. Any move will end up moving back to the same configurations. When the ride was reworked the Imagineers could not figure out how to return it to previous state until they found a Marc Davis' diagram. Many people mistakenly believe it is a stalemate but it's not.

* The Cinderlla Castle murals were done by the most effective Nazi interrogator of WWII. Hans Scharff was known for his ability to gain trust of downed Allied pilots and gather information from them over time. He was a humane interrogator and moved to the US after the war. He was honored by many of the former prisoners for his treatment of them. In at least one circumstance he intervened with his superiors to save the lives of the captives. His daughter in law also did the murals in The Land in Epcot.

My son likes those kind of details so we discuss them leading up to a trip. I also make a habit of reading a different guide before each trip. They have different perspectives that I find helpful. I did read the Unofficial Guide from four years apart but didn't much new information that I didn't already know.