One more trip before the next baby...

[lauraleh]

Hi! Welcome! I'm a little late starting this PTR since I've already booked and booked our ADRs but better late than never, right? This will be my first PTR and I've never done a TR or DR either so I hope this turns out ok!


Meet our family:


This was our Christmas card this year. We really need to have some more pictures taken! We live in DFW.

About us:

Me: Laura, 29. I am the wife, stay at home mom, and WDW vacation planner. I love perfecting our days to make everything run smoothly. My goal is to make the day flow seamlessly for the family so they don't feel rushed or scheduled. It worked out pretty well last year!

Favorites.
Park: Magic Kingdom or Animal Kingdom. I think both of these parks do a fantastic job with themes.
Character: I reserve the right to change my mind but right now I like Rapunzel.
Ride: I have to pick one for each park. (Indecisive much?)
MK- Peter Pan's Flight
AK- EE
E- Soarin
DHS- TSMM

My husband: Justin, 33. He owns his own business and works from home. It's awesome that he is almost always there with us. He also does insurance adjusting and is gone for weeks at a time. This trip actually was booked when he was south of Boston working for 5 weeks (reminder, we live in Texas). He must have been really sick of snow because he called and asked "Do you want to go to Disney?" OF COURSE I DO!!

Favorites.
Park: MK or AK
Character: ? I'm really not sure
Ride: MK- Not It's a Small World. He has warmed up to it but funny story...he got separated from his family on it as a child. He said he cried the whole time he rode it and the singing just brings back those memories.
AK- EE
E- Living with the Land (He would love to be a farmer)
DHS- RNRC

Us at Animal Kingdom last September


Evelyn, 4
This girl is a Disney/Princess lover! She can spot hidden Mickeys at age 4. She is so fun and I'm loving doing lots of fun mommy/daughter stuff with her.

Favorites:
Park: MK
Character: Elsa, Daisy, Minnie, or any other girl.
Rides/Shows: MK- Tea Cups
AK- FOTLK
DHS- DJ Live on Stage
E- Meeting princesses

This is an old picture. She was almost 3 but I love it!


Jude, 16 months (almost)

This is our baby boy! He is learning new words everyday and definitely keeps us on our toes. He started walking before he was 9 months old so we have been chasing him for a while! Last year at WDW, he was just along for the ride, but this year I foresee him having a lot more opinions!

Favorites:
Park: MK
Character: Mickey or Jake (two of his favorite words)
Ride: MK- Dumbo

Picture is from his first birthday!

 

[lauraleh]

Table of Contents

Who are we?
When, Why, Where?
Park Days Breakdown

 

[JoshAndEvsMom]

Hi Laura! Joining in!! I have a 4 year-old Evelyn too! Excited to hear about your plans

 

[lauraleh]

Hi Laura! Joining in!! I have a 4 year-old Evelyn too! Excited to hear about your plans

Thanks for joining! Hopefully I can stick with it!

 

[lauraleh]

When, Where, Why?
​

When? Sept 7-13th. I wanted low crowds and I'm hopeful for free dining! We went last September and loved the crowd level. I'm not sure how many other Sept trips we will get to take once my oldest starts school so we decided to take advantage of it while we can. We also did free dining last year but just did the QS plan. This year we are planning on upgrading and hitting a few character meals along with some other crowd favorites. My original last day was the 12th but I decided to add one more park day. Who wouldn't want one extra day at Disney?!

Where? We are booked at POP Century. I might consider upgrading to a moderate but we really are happy with the values. We tend to be out of the room all day anyway and aren't big pool people.

Why? My title kind of tells the why. Originally we were planning on skipping 2015 and waiting until 2016 to go before Jude turns 3 but my husband wants another baby next year. I probably won't want to take a newborn (although we took Evelyn at 4 months), but I'm not completely counting out an early December trip next year. Perhaps for Jude's 3rd birthday. I guess it all depends on when/if we have a baby next year. Evie is at a perfect age for so many WDW things and Jude is really getting into Mickey and Jake. I think each age is fun! So many new things for them to discover!

 

[lauraleh]

Park Days--Advice Welcome!
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As of now, I'm planning on 3 MK days, 1 Epcot, 1 DHS, and 1 AK. I really debated on that 3rd MK day. My first thought was two Epcot days of course, but we really felt like we accomplished a lot in Epcot last year in one day and I don't know that we could fill up a second day. A pro for two Epcot days was better restaurant options. But I guess it's ok to leave some stuff for other trips! Our other thought was two AK days. I know that sounds silly for most people but we love AK. I really had to sit down and look at what we did last year there and what else we wanted to accomplish and I think one day is enough. For MK, our goal is to really just let our kids explore and ride Dumbo 8 times if they want. We actually did MK 3 days last year as well. The third day ended up being an add on since I couldn't get the ever so popular Anna and Elsa FP for the other two days but we loved having that third day to just re ride our favorites and have a slow paced day.

So our current plan based on Josh's crowd calendar is MK (not recommended- I know.), DHS (most rec), MK (most rec), E (most rec), MK (most rec), AK (most rec). We will plan on doing nighttime entertainment on the first MK day but also have the option on the second. The third MK day will be a Night of Joy so the park will close at 7. When we first booked, the first day MK was recommended but then they moved the MNSSHPs back and pushed closing back until 10. I already had Ohana booked for that night (dining spoiler alert) so I figured we would just grin and bear it. I mean it's the first day at WDW! I'm tentatively planning an afternoon break that day. I figured we would do rope drop, rides, lunch, a few FPs and then leave. Back for Ohana and maybe back to the park for fireworks. I'm still iffy on the fireworks though because they didn't go so smoothly last year. Maybe we can watch from the Poly beach? I'm not sure if that is an option anymore since they have done lots of construction.

So that's our day breakdown as of now. I'd welcome any thoughts on the days, especially about which parks to revisit. We will not have park hoppers.

Coming up next...Dining decisions!

 

[lauraleh]

Our Dining Plans
​

I'm not sure anyone is reading this but I thought I might try another update.

I mentioned earlier that we were on the QS dining plan last year and I made it a point to seek out unusual and GOOD food. I think we did pretty good! We will be repeating a few of those QS restaurants that we enjoyed but we are also planning on a lot more TS restaurants so many of our places will be new. I'm trying to do a few character meals for the kids but also good food. This is what we have planned for dining so far.

Arrival Day- Wolfgang Puck Express for dinner at Downtown Disney. We loved this last year.
Day 1 MK- Be Our Guest for lunch (enjoyed last year), Ohana dinner (new for us)
Day 2 HS- Boardwalk Bakery lunch- none of the QS places at HS appeal to me so we make the stroll over to the Boardwalk. We did this last year and really enjoyed the break and the lobster roll. Boma dinner (new)
Day 3 MK- Pre park opening Crystal Palace (new), planning on QS for lunch and dinner. Definitely want to do Columbia Harbor House (new) and maybe Caseys? (not new,but who doesn't love a decent hot dog?!)
Day 4 Epcot- Akershus pre park opening breakfast (new), lunch QS Les Halles or Yorkshire ?, dinner Via Napoli (new)
Day 5 MK- Breakfast/lunch are both up in the air. I have a BOG reservation for lunch but I may drop it for a breakfast. Dinner- Raglan Road at DTD. (new)
Day 6 AK- Tusker House pre park opening breakfast. We did a brunch last year and really enjoyed it. Late lunch/early dinner- Flametree BBQ (new) I can't wait to try this out.

Others that I thought about but couldn't fit in: Yak and Yeti, 1900 Park Fare Dinner, Biergarten, Garden Grill

You'll also notice that I didn't include any snacks. Well, we aren't very good at snacking. In fact, we went to Goofy's Candy Kitchen last year on our last day and spent 16/18 snacks. It's just so much food! I'll do my best to get a dole whip and a Mickey bar this year.