We are 96 days away! We have drive trip mapped, MagicBands in the DisBox, planner printed with notes galore, ADR’s complete, dessert party and EMM tickets bought, room requests submitted on TP. I’ve been cruising forums for packing ideas, tricks for SW:GE, FP+ plans, park bags. I feel like we are ready for our trip of 6 for 8 park days.
But, yet, still I feel impending doom. I have read multiple threads of rides breaking down, meals not worth the time, dessert parties being crowded, EMM not worth the cost, SW:GE BG’s being gone in seconds, the castle refurbishment, the price increases on every tiny thing. I am nervous, stressing, scared.
My girls and I went in 2017, and TP worked perfect! We only missed a couple of things because my youngest was scared and I wasn’t going to push something she wasn’t ready for. I now am adding DH, DS11, and DS 22, into my trio, making us a family of 6. And with all that I read, I am so worried that we will encounter all the problems all at once, and the 3 guys will think I totally ruined the trip.
Things seem to being planning great right now, reservations made and changed - no issues! ADR’s planned, worried, but ALL achieved! Planning, re-planning FP+, optimizing TP, re-planning FP+. I’m getting more nervous with each thread I read.
I have been trying to read up on things like the Disney at Work thread, the MagicBand threads, the Ears/Hats threads, great food reviews, everything that could be positive. But, I feel a storm brewing…eeek!
Anyone else panic when it seems everything is going so well?
The anticipation and planning are part of the fun but don’t lose sight of the real reason you are going, the memories. Be ok with plans changing. Leave time for travel, leave some empty space for rest and soak in every minute. Everything will be fine. You’re in Disney. Even if it rains and it’s crowded and a ride you wanted to ride is down, you’re in Disney. Just turn around and there will be a new adventure to discover.
Any trip can feel stormy along the way. You are preparing. Go with the flow and be open to changes. See the wonders of WDW through the eyes of a child!
We planners are the only ones who stress about such things. The rest of the family will have a wonderful time regardless if everything is perfect in your mind. I, too, stressed about our most recent trip, and when 7DMT broke down when we were RDing it and threw our whole day 1 touring plan out of whack, that didn’t help, either. Fortunately that magic little re optimize button set everything back to normal and we were able to get back on track while still able to secured extra FPs throughout the day after using our first 3.
It will be fine (even if it’s not) because when things go wrong you will have all this knowledge in your back pocket! When it looked like rain the whole week before we left I was so bummed out but I got us rain gear and we had a blast! It’s normal for me to worry ahead of time but I’m the moment I do pretty well. It’s also much harder when planning for a bigger group.
Just keep saying “We will make the best of whatever happens!”
We love to travel and have had some crazy mishaps, but the family is still fond of the memories because we choose to treat it all as part of the adventure.
“Woot! Rainy day! No one else will be at the zoo today! Let’s go!”
“Ok, we got a lot later start than I was hoping today, and I read that it’s a Bad Idea to start this hike this late [eyeing the afternoon storm clouds on the horizon]. And, after all, I was in the local hospital yesterday on morphine for a kidney stone. Let’s change plans and go explore the ghost town that’s supposed to be down that dirt road instead!”
“So. We are snowed in. It’s PJ and device day! If the roads clear later, we’ll send Daddy to get take out pizza from that place up the road that we ate at yesterday and loved!”
It actually adds fun to the planning process for me. Not only do I try to come up with the “ideal plan” but I’ve got 15 back up ideas sitting on the sidelines waiting to come in.
I’m a detailed planner & was nervous before our first trip last fall. In spite of watching hours of youtube, I wasn’t able to really visualize how what we had planned would actually play out. I finally decided to go into the trip with our detailed plans & a positive mindset, but also a willingness to just go with the flow. Most of our trip veered from my plans, but we ended up making amazing memories and fell in love with Disney World even more than we expected.
So as I’m planning our next trip, I just acknowledge that things will likely go wrong on some level, but know that if we’re determined to look for the bright side we’ll find it. 
I think the secret to our obsessive planning is that when we have to change our plans we know what our choices are and can, almost, instantly make the change. Everyone else would be standing around for 30 minutes trying to figure out what to do next. So, if anything comes up your family will just be amazed at how quickly you can adjust. 
I echo all before me. The planning helps in the moment because you know what to do. I just tell my group this is what we are doing next and nobody asks a thing. Lol
I’m the planner in a family that thinks plan is a 4 letter word. Yet they would never go to WDW - or any trip really - unless we have a plan.
These ideas are always in my mind:
No plan survives first contact.
Plans are “more what you’d call guidelines . . .”
Yup. and the bigger the group is the more deviations that occur.
Plan for the worst, hope for the best is my motto. This is where customized TPs are key to my plans. I set the start time for later than we plan on being in the park and move the walk time slower because I know someone is always going to get involved in something else.
In my experience, if the plan falls apart no one will care except the planner. Last May, I tried to use a solid RD then park hop to another park and use FPs there. It fell apart because we can’t make RD. We did about 4 attractions per day. I felt like a failure, but everyone else had fun and we are going back again this May.
It would probably be a lot less stressful without the big unknowns of SWGE. But, that area is fun even if you don’t get to do it all.