Toddler naps on park days/mid day breaks?

[sponica]

@LSUmiss I'm thinking the trip we took at 20 months will be better than the trip next year. Seriously. she's a nightmare right now.

At 20 months she was perfect. Went from just after RD to about 7 PM without an issue (except the first day, we didn't realize until too late that she needed the stroller reclined to nap). Our last park day she slept through our entire lunch at Tiffins, and since it was Tiffins and not very crowded they let us keep her in the stroller. She outlasted my inlaws most days...

Now she's 3 and next year when we go she'll be almost 4. She's in the "I want this" and "I do it myself" phases. And when she feels something, she lets you know. Thankfully we have a LONG trip planned next year, so if I have to scrap things, I can.

 

[LSUmiss]

@LSUmiss I'm thinking the trip we took at 20 months will be better than the trip next year. Seriously. she's a nightmare right now.

At 20 months she was perfect. Went from just after RD to about 7 PM without an issue (except the first day, we didn't realize until too late that she needed the stroller reclined to nap). Our last park day she slept through our entire lunch at Tiffins, and since it was Tiffins and not very crowded they let us keep her in the stroller. She outlasted my inlaws most days...

Now she's 3 and next year when we go she'll be almost 4. She's in the "I want this" and "I do it myself" phases. And when she feels something, she lets you know. Thankfully we have a LONG trip planned next year, so if I have to scrap things, I can.

Did she enjoy the attractions? I’m thinking there really is no perfect age between now & like 5 & we won’t wait that long so might as well go like we like to go & roll with the punches.

 

[Sleepcoma]

We just got back from 7 days with a four and a half year old. For any full park day we built in a four hour window to nap/rest from about 1:30 or 2:00 PM to 5:30 or 6:00 PM and that worked out well for us. We were staying at Pop Century and had pretty good luck getting on buses easily and back to the resort at that time and our daughter who absolutely hates sleeping easily fell asleep for naps any time we hit the room. Never fell asleep on a bus or in our stroller, due to her extreme fear of missing out on anything fun. We also had days for rest in the middle of the trip, where we'd sleep in as late as we could, then go to the parks in the afternoon. We thought there would be a nap on those days, but our daughter never got enough energy out on those mornings to justify one, so we just had easy mornings waking up around 9 AM and headed for the parks around 3 PM. These days might actually have been the hardest, since we stayed out until park close and she was exhausted come 9:30 or 10 PM.

The night we stayed at Magic Kingdom for fireworks was the roughest, since we didn't get back to the hotel room until about 11:30 and endured the flood of guests leaving the park all at once and waiting in the bus line for probably an hour or so. Definitely would not recommend that experience to anyone as the bus waiting area at Magic Kingdom reeks of port-a-potty stank and it's still pretty warm out. No other night was remotely this bad, even when we stayed for shows. I would highly recommend getting ahead of the end of the night rush, but our daughter doesn't like fireworks so didn't care if we missed the end of night spectaculars. I even stayed by myself at Hollywood Studios one night until after park close at 10pm to check out Galaxy's Edge and walked out of the park as the show ended and hopped on the first bus that pulled up, super easy.

I think with all the MNSSHP nights going on, MK gets super crowded on nights when it's open for regular guests, and most people will want to see fireworks at the castle at least once, so everyone goes on the same day. If you can go to MK on a day with no party, it will be amazing! We went to MK at 7 AM our first day and rode rides with nearly zero wait all morning long, then had lunch at Be Our Guest at noon, FP into Enchanted Tales with Belle after lunch and then back to Pop for naps, then spent the evening exploring Art of Animation since our daughter loves all things Cars and Lightning McQueen/Cruz Ramirez. It was a great first day and awesome to not deal with crowds in the morning.

 

[AARCLUKSCH]

I just have to jump in on this one......I am a HUGE fan of breaking every day. We have been to Disney about 10 times. We have gone back to the hotel every day with our little ones. Those little ones are now 18 and 21 and we STILL go back to the hotel every day for a couple of hours and either nap or go to the pool!! You are going for such a long time that this will not interfere with seeing everything. As for what times work best, that depends on your fastpasses, dining reservations and more than anything, your kids. The 2 things I learned traveling with toddlers - when they are hungry, feed them, when they are tired, let them sleep.

 

[sponica]

Did she enjoy the attractions? I’m thinking there really is no perfect age between now & like 5 & we won’t wait that long so might as well go like we like to go & roll with the punches.

She like the Frozen ride, the nemo ride and tolerated jungle cruise and it's a small world. hated every other thing we did as far as rides (including the safari and she clawed her way out of Dumbo, or tried to). She loved country bears, talking with crush, and the scenery. It was a slower paced trip. When we wanted to ride "big rides" we had a non rider who hung out with her.

Honestly she probably loved the splash pad at POFQ and climbing on every park bench more than anything else we did. We spent a lot of time in the world showcase so she could get out of the stroller and walk a bit.

 

[LSUmiss]

She like the Frozen ride, the nemo ride and tolerated jungle cruise and it's a small world. hated every other thing we did as far as rides (including the safari and she clawed her way out of Dumbo, or tried to). She loved country bears, talking with crush, and the scenery. It was a slower paced trip. When we wanted to ride "big rides" we had a non rider who hung out with her.

Honestly she probably loved the splash pad at POFQ and climbing on every park bench more than anything else we did. We spent a lot of time in the world showcase so she could get out of the stroller and walk a bit.

Ok this sounds like our past trip last week. I know all kids are different, but that kinda gives me my answer. I don’t mind the work that goes into bringing a toddler but want him to get something out of it. We can climb park benches here lol. The last 3 trips we went with other friends or family so we were going anyway, but this trip would just be me, DS, & DH. Doesn’t seem to be much point yet I don’t think. He would actually be 22 mos then but doubt that’ll make a huge difference from 20 mos. We have plans to go with family again when he is 2.5 so even though things might not change much for him by then, it would be one of those we are going anyway trips.

 

[gtpoohbear]

When my kids were younger, the midday naps in the hotel were an absolute must! We would usually tour pretty hard from 8/9am-noon, have lunch, then be back in the room for at least two hours. Usually we would swim afterwards, and head back to the park for a few hours in the evening. However, most of our evening park time was dinner, fireworks, parades, etc. The vast majority of our rides and attractions were during the morning hours. If you have a long enough trip, you can definitely make this work. Especially if you are not as interested in many of the thrill rides, which you probably won't be with young ones. Now that the kids are older, we tend to do shorter trips and have to pack in park time much more densely, but I do sometimes miss the more relaxing pace we took when they were little!

 

[NYEmomma]

We've gone when all 3 of my kids were 2 and still nappers. My oldest, we went back to the resort in the afternoon and she (and DH) would nap for a couple hours. With my youngest 2 we tried that the first day and they were NOT having it. So we gave that idea up. One of them would throw a screaming fit in her stroller for 10 minutes mid afternoon (I'd take her to a corner near a bathroom so she wasn't disturbing people) and then she'd sleep in the stroller for a good hour. The other one just didn't nap the entire trip and ended up being entirely pleasant the whole time (which is generally not like her, even now as a 7yo, lol).

So you're going to just have to wing it and see what ends up working the best for your kid and your family.