Who: Maman (me), Dad (DH), son (DS3) and baby (4month old).
When: Feb 9th-13th
Where: Animal Kingdom Lodge – Kidani Village
I used to be an AP Disneyland and even had a Premier AP for a couple of years. In late 2019, I let my AP expire as I was expecting my first baby. The goal was to go back to DLR a few months after the birth of my son. The rest of this story is known; pandemic happened, DLR and Disney World shut down. After months of the pandemic, we decided to move back to Canada, baby #2 arrived last fall. During the summer, I decided that I would go back to Disney after Christmas.
And here is the trip report! to get started, some thoughts and tips for going to Disney World with little ones.
What we figured out with toddlers:
- Go with their natural rhythm
- My toddler and baby are early risers. We are naturally up around 6am EST every morning. So rode dropping parks was easy! But even then, it gets old for everyone to be ready every morning.
- Make sure their needs are satisfied:
- My 3yo often does not recognize that he is hungry. He would just start being unruly, jumping, not listening. We figured out quickly that a snack was the way to have him concentrate again. We had many snacks with us at all times, and PLENTY of popcorn and ice cream were also purchased.
The key with being at Disney World with toddlers is understanding what motivates them. My son LOVES trains and boats, so whenever we would be going on a new ride, we would ask: do you want to go on a train? And it would usually works.
Waiting for characters and rides we could see was always MUCH easier. Lines for Buzz and Woody allowed us to people watch and look at the characters, which was easier than waiting in the halls of the Princess encounters.
Toddlers need free time! On our last day, we bought two little cars. While waiting for Lightning McQueen encounter to run again, we found an empty corner and let my son play with his cars. He loved it and was much more motivated for lines after.
GO TO THE BABY CENTERS! I nursed my infant everywhere in the park and that was fine. On the last day, we stopped at a baby center. It was so quiet and relaxing. Toddler watched TV and I could just sit comfortably and chill. That 45 minutes break made everyone happier. We did not go back to our hotel room for a nap that day, but chilling in the baby center was well received.
Babies get overwhelmed too. All the lights, the sounds, the music, everything was fascinating to my infant. He usually is a GREAT stroller sleeper but it was really hit and miss during our Disney trip. Baby FOMO is a real thing.
Make sure to expose your little children to Disney franchises. We watched Peter Pan before going to the parks (that movie did not age well). After our nap at our hotel, we were trying to go back to Magic Kingdom, but my toddler was not into it. We told him: hey, we are going on the Peter Pan ride! And he was much more interested into going.
Don’t underestimate little kiddie rides. On our Magic Kingdom day, we rope drop Dumbo. We rode it three times (without waiting again), than Barnstormer, than Dumbo again. That was fantastic; my toddler loved it. Alien Saucers in Toy Story Land was another favourite. And Slinky Dog Dash was the favourite coaster.
I will post a day by day trip report after!