With us even now that the kids are older you still have to deal with everyone trying to get good rest while often sleeping in the same room with other family members, when we are used to all having our own rooms at home. Over a few days time I can always see the lack of sleep catchup to us.
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In think the key for these kind of trips can be to have a grandparent or someone willing to take cranky, tired children back to the resort to rest while others carry on. 
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Good luck with your trip and best wishes for many naps!
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I feel like all parents of kids under the age of 8? 10? 18? Need to establish some sort of sign language to share solidarity to indicate that even though it is your kid and not my kid (AT THAT MOMENT) throwing the fit in Disney World (the airport, Target, the grocery store, the school parking lot, etc.)…we have all been there and we will be there again.
So yeah. Especially after the year and half(!) we have all had - so much solidarity. We get it. It’s been hard. I’m not going to get into comparing - but it’s been hard.
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Without completely de-railing @NoBellePrizeWinner’s awesome TR, please know that you are probably a lot harder on yourselves than you realize. We all appear to have a 
together - few of us actually do.
I am lucky in that my kids are relatively well-behaved in public. But let me assure you that they are absolute banshees in private and I feel like my DH and I yell our heads off some days. So my parenting is a complete mirage!
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Exactly. Jeff did it right bringing his wife’s siblings along on his trip! 1:1 ratio of adults to children plus I think kids are more apt to snap out of a bad mood for a beloved aunt or uncle rather than mom and dad.
Jordan, so sorry the trip was not as magical as you had hoped. I hope as time passes, the difficult things fade and the magical memories take over!
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This is so true. They are generally on their best behavior for adults other than their parents. But they will push mom and dad’s buttons to no end. Btw, we have had more tantrums from DD4 since getting home than we had in the entire two week trip prior. I think my kids run best on exhaustion, which is lucky for us for our commando-style Disney vacation, but not so good for everyday living. 
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As my mom says this is because they trust mom and dad will love them no matter what so are more willing to show them their dark side without fear they’ll push them away. It’s cuz they trust you and means you’re doing parenting right.
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Yup…and it also why our kids are angels at school and totally melt down once they get home! 
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i say that every time i see someone struggling with their kid…“don’t worry about it, the rest of us are just grateful it isn’t our turn right now”. those of us with the 10+ crowd were just saying yesterday how grateful we are for this stage!
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Funny, we teachers always hear “But they never behave like that at home!” when challenging behavior is discussed. 
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@JordanRunner…
Looks like those grey clouds are going to clear up…
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Hello all, I really intended to do a detailed, narrative-style trip report, but at this point I can say it’s not happening. When we got back I was so exhausted (and frustrated that the kids behaved so poorly), that I didn’t want to think about the trip for a while.
There are some really amazing trip reports that covered the same timeframe with significant overlap to what I would be sharing. See @Jeff_AZ’s May the Force Be With Us and @amvanhoose_701479’s To Trip Report or Not to Trip Report? @mathhound’s Epic 25th report touched on the use of DAS pretty well, so I’ll just say that we used it as well for our DS4 (if anyone wants more info on DAS feel free to ask). I think there have been other reports as well, but these stood out most to me.
With that in mind, and the fact that I’m too busy to spend much time “narrating” our trip, I’m just going to post my trip “notes” and share some photos. I’ll try to get through all 8 days sometime in the next week or so. Let me know if you want something explained or expanded.
Here’s the overall plan we had:
And here is the detailed plans I printed and carried in my pocket:
Looking back at this, we actually followed more than 90% of the plan (although some was done out of order), so I guess I got an “A”!
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I’m ok w/o a long narrative… I’ll risk blasphemy… I like the pictures and short captions
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DAY 1: SATURDAY MAY 29th
Arrived, checked into Art of Animation (Nemo suite), short trip to Magic Kingdom.
Notes: attractions/meals in left column with notes: RS=rider swap DAS=Disability Access Service (#) running count; specific times are from photo timestamps; A is DS6, C is DS4, L is DD2 (I’m J and DW is R)
| Sat May 29 | ||
|---|---|---|
| (6ish) | Got up around 6, morning routine, finished packing, loaded up car, left the house around 7:15ish | |
| 7:52 | Parked at DAL in Garage C, very full, parked on level 4 (last covered level) which had only a few spots left (Memorial Day weekend, DUH!), got through security (TSA Pre-check) pretty quickly, walked to terminal | |
| 8:29 | Sitting at gate 16, C cath | |
| 9:48 | Boarded SWA #3847 on Boeing 737-700, family boarding, gate-checked umbrella stroller, no car seats this trip!!!, J sat w/ L and R w/ AC, left gate around 10:05 | |
| 10:20 | Wheels up (scheduled 10:15)! Kids mostly did sticker books and watched Disney+ on our phones | |
| 1:20 | Landed at MCO (scheduled 1:38) and arrived at gate 127 at 1:31 | |
| 1:47 | Inside terminal, C cath, walked to the terminal train | |
| 2:01 | On the terminal train, then to baggage claim, where Willy from Quicksilver Tours was waiting for us, got bags and loaded van | |
| 2:21 | Quicksilver wheels rolling | |
| 2:45 | In the bubble! | |
| 3:01 | Check-in at Art of Animation (AoA), asked for different room (assigned 2nd floor but wanted ground floor), request granted, and got room closests to the main building and laundry, very convenient but also very loud at night (ask me about this and I can comment) | |
| 3:20 | At room (Nemo suite), Magic Band (MB) and phone won’t unlock, explored Cars area for 15ish minutes while waiting for room key cards and updated MB, unpacking and checking out our room | |
| LoF MO +Refillable Mug | 4:02 | Getting snacks at Landscape of Flavors (LoF) - fries and mac/cheese since kids were eating crackers and granola bars for snacks all day, got the Star Wars “premium” refillable mug (my main souvenir for the trip) |
| 4:13 | Snacking in room while getting ready to go to Magic Kingdom, C cath, J got stroller at bell services, loaded up and walked to bus stop | |
| 4:35 | At the bus stop, got on at 4:49 | |
| 5:10 | Arrived at Magic Kingdom (MK), activated my annual pass (AP) and C’s disability access service (DAS) at guest services | |
| Main Street | 5:13 | Walking down Main Street, R and I both remarked at how empty the park seemed |
| Cinderella Castle | 5:21 | Walking through Cinderella Castle, got DAS return time for it’s a small world (iasw), headed to Haunted Mansion (HM) which had a short wait (<10 min) |
| HM | 5:34 | Arrived at HM and riding at 5:37 (finished 5:44); HM stopped for at least a minute, with L and I looking down a creepy hallway with a floating candlestick, next to a moving suit of armor, L got pretty scared and started saying “go home, go home” over and over, this is what she said on most rides hereafter… |
| iasw DAS | 5:50 | Back at iasw and on at 5:55, J ran to get DAS return for 7 Dwarfs Mine Train (7DMT) while others went to Pinocchio Village Haus |
| Pinocchio Village Haus MO | 6:26 | Eating pizza @ Pinocchio’s (3 kid’s meals and one flatbread, but even that was too much food); then walked to 7DMT |
| 7DMT DAS | 6:58 | On 7DMT, L’s first rollercoaster (she was exactly 38"), she acted very scared and didn’t seem to like it but afterwards was asking to go again, “again, again”, this happened on many rides (“go home” on the ride, but “again” after the ride, LOL!) |
| 7:06 | Walking back through Cinderella Castle | |
| 7:18 | Eating Mickey Bars in the hub, enjoying being there looking at the castle | |
| 7:47 | On bus back to AoA, C BM, getting ready for bed, went to bell services to get groceries | |
| Refilled mug (2) | 8:38 | Kids in bed, unpacking groceries, J got açai-blueberry-pomegranate vitamin water + blue powerade concoction at LoF |
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In case anyone is curious about the countdown calendar, I made it on my computer and printed on 11x17 paper. The stickers I found online - someone had made a Disney Bingo game, and I used their images because the characters were all a consistent style. If anyone cares, I can try to find those again.
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Your wife is so youthful looking that in the first few photos I mentally lumped her in as one of your kids. Then I was like - I don’t think he has 4. Oh! That’s his wife!
Be sure and tell her
The kids are ADORABLE! I know they had you pulling out your hair but everyone looks so happy in these pics. I suppose why wouldn’t they be, with all those Mickey bars!
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That didn’t start until lunch on Day 2. We were waiting outside H&V, and DS4 pushed DD2 really hard (he has a thing about pushing, pinching, pulling hair, etc.). She fell down and scraped her knee really bad. Like blood coming down her leg. At that exact moment our name was called. We were the first ones in for lunch, and we were walking in with a screaming bloody child while yelling at the other about what he had done. The server tried to go through his spiel but it was just pure chaos. Then after the first round of character greetings, the kids all decided that it would be fun to run around too, and we couldn’t talk any sense into them. To be fair, we had only been inside a restaurant with them once since the pandemic started, and that was a few weeks before the trip.
Thank god I had a long island iced tea…
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Sounds like lunch at WDW!
Hugs, man.
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How old is L? I wonder if she’ll remember the spooky hallway long term. My first memory of Disneyland is on PoC and hiding my face in my dad’s neck when I was about 4. I was so scared! But it’s a precious memory now. I can remember him chuckling a little at how scared I was all the time holding me close. Good memory this Father’s Day weekend! And in a month (less!) I’ll get to see him again for the first time since 2019!
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