ccahpp25
Cat Mom in a Mouse World
- Joined
- Apr 11, 2023
We stumbled into our house at 4:30 Sunday morning after our 14 hour drive home and I'm finally recovering from that drive, so I figured it was time to put this together 
This was my sixth trip, but in many ways, it was a first trip. It was the first trip in which my five year old son got to actually MEET characters (thanks, covid), first trip after his autism diagnosis, very first trip for my wife. And I think it's honestly been my favorite trip. After our last trip in 2021, it finally felt like the magic was back.
Saturday, June 10- checked in to Art of Animation. We arrived at 10 am and fully expected to need to dump our luggage at bell services and go kill time to wait for our room, but surprisingly enough, it was ready! So we were able to unpack before hitting up the character warehouse and Disney Springs. We met the Kingdom Strollers rep at 3 pm to pick up our stroller (grownups of humans with sensory issues: we rented the Mini GT Single. It has a canopy that almost fully encloses the kiddo inside of it. It gave Tiny Human a dark, quiet space to hide and decompress and was a major reason this trip was so successful). We wandered our resort to take some pics, had dinner at Landscape of Flavors, and enjoyed some pool time before calling it an early night before our first park day.
Sunday, June 11- 8 am breakfast reservation at Crystal Palace. I'm not going to lie, I teared up at Tiny Human hugging characters for the first time. His excitement was contagious and it was the perfect way to start our trip. Not to mention those churro waffles were AMAZING. After breakfast, we got Tiny Human's stroller tagged as a wheelchair and carried on with our day. We used DAS for this trip and found it very easy to manage, it was absolutely a game-changer for our needs. Tiny Human was tall enough for everything except TRON, which wife and I child-swapped on. It was awesome, but for some reason I did not expect it to be that fast and I stumbled off of it in a bit of shock. For park days, we usually open the park and stay there until about 1-2 pm, then we go back to our resort for a break and we come back to the park sometime between 3-4 pm. My wife sobbed relentlessly during Happily Ever After while Tiny Human and I danced it out
Monday, June 12- EPCOT day! Guardians of the Galaxy is my new favorite ride, hands down. We somehow managed a super early VQ and got the notification for our boarding party as we were coming into the park from the skyliner. We had lunch at Garden Grill, which was delicious, as usual.
Tuesday, June 13- Animal Kingdom. No dining reservations this day, but we did have lunch at Satu'li Canteen and those noodle bowls they have are great! Flight of Passage was made 10x better by Tiny Human leaning towards me halfway through and yelling, "you were right mama! This IS fun!" As if I regularly told him things were fun and then smashed his dreams, leading him to believe that I would lie about these things
Wednesday, June 14- free day. Started the day with a 7:30 reservation at 'Ohana. It was so fun and the food was great. We hit up both of the local character warehouses this day, along with another round at Disney Springs. All of the shopping was so much easier during the week, when we had gone on Saturday, everything had been beyond packed. We rounded out the afternoon with a reservation at Beaches & Cream. Food was okay, milkshakes were awesome, but honestly the atmosphere was the real draw here, it was a super fun way to spend a couple hours with the family.
Thursday, June 15- Hollywood Studios. Did the Frozen sing-along for the first time because Tiny Human is obsessed with Elsa. It was surprisingly hilarious for the adults, and I was really surprised at how much I ended up enjoying it. This was my first time doing Rise of the Resistance (didn't feel like battling the crowds to do it in 2021 with a 3 y/o who wouldn't have been at all interested) and it was a really neat experience. We had lunch at Roundup Rodeo and the food was decent, but this was another dining place that we really enjoyed for the experience.
Friday, June 16- a second day in Magic Kingdom. We opened this one with an 8 am Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique, which Tiny Human LOVED. I had fully expected him to go for a princess costume, as that's all he ever picks out when we go shopping at home, but we had seen the live-action Ariel the week prior to our trip, so he's developed a new fixation on Ariel and chose the Prince Eric getup, which was equally as adorable. After he was made-over we ran all over creation getting pictures with every princess we could find in Magic Kingdom, as he was determined to battle the dragons for them with his new sword and shield. This was the first time he actually interacted with any of the characters he got pictures with, which was amazing for me to experience. Ariel spent extra time with him, and even offered to sign his magicband when he showed her that he had picked out The Little Mermaid magicband for this trip.
Saturday, June 17- After we checked out of the hotel, we resort hopped, via skyliner, monorail, and bus. Lots of transfers, but it was tons of fun, our goal was to try all of the pride snacks at the different resorts and we did get quite a few of them! We also went back to Disney Springs one last time for a final perusal of World of Disney. We did get incredibly drenched that day, but it was a really fun way to end our trip.
Things I learned this year: Tiny Human is a rollercoaster junkie. Space Mountain, "S'mores" (seven dwarves in Tiny Human's language), Big Thunder Mountain, Slinky Dog, we rode them all multiple times and I have some fantastic ride photos from them. Also, Disney was actually a restful vacation for us. Thanks to the accommodations they offer and the fantastic cast members, I had my best week with Tiny Human that we've had in a year and a half. No meltdowns, few communication issues, it was AMAZING. We took his noise-cancelling headphones, tagged his stroller as a wheelchair, and he was happy as a lark. But, if you do those things, be prepared. We did overhear a few snide comments when we would take his stroller into queues and shows, people questioning cast members or just making comments to other people in their groups. We ignored them and carried on with our days, but it definitely stung a bit at times. If you're one of those people, stop. Special needs families deal with enough without your commentary on how we choose to help mitigate our childrens symptoms, and we deserve to enjoy Disney just as much as you do, even if we do have to do it a little differently.
Overall, it was an incredible trip and we're already planning our next one for October 2024, so catch me back over on the pre-trip report board within the next couple months as I plan my (very first!!!) Halloween trip!
This was my sixth trip, but in many ways, it was a first trip. It was the first trip in which my five year old son got to actually MEET characters (thanks, covid), first trip after his autism diagnosis, very first trip for my wife. And I think it's honestly been my favorite trip. After our last trip in 2021, it finally felt like the magic was back.Saturday, June 10- checked in to Art of Animation. We arrived at 10 am and fully expected to need to dump our luggage at bell services and go kill time to wait for our room, but surprisingly enough, it was ready! So we were able to unpack before hitting up the character warehouse and Disney Springs. We met the Kingdom Strollers rep at 3 pm to pick up our stroller (grownups of humans with sensory issues: we rented the Mini GT Single. It has a canopy that almost fully encloses the kiddo inside of it. It gave Tiny Human a dark, quiet space to hide and decompress and was a major reason this trip was so successful). We wandered our resort to take some pics, had dinner at Landscape of Flavors, and enjoyed some pool time before calling it an early night before our first park day.
Sunday, June 11- 8 am breakfast reservation at Crystal Palace. I'm not going to lie, I teared up at Tiny Human hugging characters for the first time. His excitement was contagious and it was the perfect way to start our trip. Not to mention those churro waffles were AMAZING. After breakfast, we got Tiny Human's stroller tagged as a wheelchair and carried on with our day. We used DAS for this trip and found it very easy to manage, it was absolutely a game-changer for our needs. Tiny Human was tall enough for everything except TRON, which wife and I child-swapped on. It was awesome, but for some reason I did not expect it to be that fast and I stumbled off of it in a bit of shock. For park days, we usually open the park and stay there until about 1-2 pm, then we go back to our resort for a break and we come back to the park sometime between 3-4 pm. My wife sobbed relentlessly during Happily Ever After while Tiny Human and I danced it out
Monday, June 12- EPCOT day! Guardians of the Galaxy is my new favorite ride, hands down. We somehow managed a super early VQ and got the notification for our boarding party as we were coming into the park from the skyliner. We had lunch at Garden Grill, which was delicious, as usual.
Tuesday, June 13- Animal Kingdom. No dining reservations this day, but we did have lunch at Satu'li Canteen and those noodle bowls they have are great! Flight of Passage was made 10x better by Tiny Human leaning towards me halfway through and yelling, "you were right mama! This IS fun!" As if I regularly told him things were fun and then smashed his dreams, leading him to believe that I would lie about these things
Wednesday, June 14- free day. Started the day with a 7:30 reservation at 'Ohana. It was so fun and the food was great. We hit up both of the local character warehouses this day, along with another round at Disney Springs. All of the shopping was so much easier during the week, when we had gone on Saturday, everything had been beyond packed. We rounded out the afternoon with a reservation at Beaches & Cream. Food was okay, milkshakes were awesome, but honestly the atmosphere was the real draw here, it was a super fun way to spend a couple hours with the family.
Thursday, June 15- Hollywood Studios. Did the Frozen sing-along for the first time because Tiny Human is obsessed with Elsa. It was surprisingly hilarious for the adults, and I was really surprised at how much I ended up enjoying it. This was my first time doing Rise of the Resistance (didn't feel like battling the crowds to do it in 2021 with a 3 y/o who wouldn't have been at all interested) and it was a really neat experience. We had lunch at Roundup Rodeo and the food was decent, but this was another dining place that we really enjoyed for the experience.
Friday, June 16- a second day in Magic Kingdom. We opened this one with an 8 am Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique, which Tiny Human LOVED. I had fully expected him to go for a princess costume, as that's all he ever picks out when we go shopping at home, but we had seen the live-action Ariel the week prior to our trip, so he's developed a new fixation on Ariel and chose the Prince Eric getup, which was equally as adorable. After he was made-over we ran all over creation getting pictures with every princess we could find in Magic Kingdom, as he was determined to battle the dragons for them with his new sword and shield. This was the first time he actually interacted with any of the characters he got pictures with, which was amazing for me to experience. Ariel spent extra time with him, and even offered to sign his magicband when he showed her that he had picked out The Little Mermaid magicband for this trip.
Saturday, June 17- After we checked out of the hotel, we resort hopped, via skyliner, monorail, and bus. Lots of transfers, but it was tons of fun, our goal was to try all of the pride snacks at the different resorts and we did get quite a few of them! We also went back to Disney Springs one last time for a final perusal of World of Disney. We did get incredibly drenched that day, but it was a really fun way to end our trip.
Things I learned this year: Tiny Human is a rollercoaster junkie. Space Mountain, "S'mores" (seven dwarves in Tiny Human's language), Big Thunder Mountain, Slinky Dog, we rode them all multiple times and I have some fantastic ride photos from them. Also, Disney was actually a restful vacation for us. Thanks to the accommodations they offer and the fantastic cast members, I had my best week with Tiny Human that we've had in a year and a half. No meltdowns, few communication issues, it was AMAZING. We took his noise-cancelling headphones, tagged his stroller as a wheelchair, and he was happy as a lark. But, if you do those things, be prepared. We did overhear a few snide comments when we would take his stroller into queues and shows, people questioning cast members or just making comments to other people in their groups. We ignored them and carried on with our days, but it definitely stung a bit at times. If you're one of those people, stop. Special needs families deal with enough without your commentary on how we choose to help mitigate our childrens symptoms, and we deserve to enjoy Disney just as much as you do, even if we do have to do it a little differently.
Overall, it was an incredible trip and we're already planning our next one for October 2024, so catch me back over on the pre-trip report board within the next couple months as I plan my (very first!!!) Halloween trip!
It also sounds like you found what works for your son, and yourself. Sometimes it takes a minute to get the trip mojo right, figure out what does and doesn't work for everyone. Thanks for taking the time to share, I enjoyed reading!
