February 2017 Disney World Trip Planning (with a baby!)
Brad, Melody, and I just got back from Melody's first trip to Disney World!!! What is super funny about Melody going to Disney World at the age of 8 months old...Brad made a comment that we would never take a baby to Disney. He/She would have to be at least a few years old before going. Well Brad is the one who initiated this trip! We also used this trip as a visit to see Brad's grandparents who live only a few miles from Disney. I want to share some details that went into planning our trip. This is very basic. I plan to write more about doing Disney with a baby in future posts.
Dates
We decided to go February 4 - February 9. I did a lot of research when deciding what dates to go. As always, I used WDW Prep School's Crowd Calendar to determine when NOT to go. We also wanted to wait a week or so between my birthday trip and this trip to help keep the stress at home to a minimum [packing for a trip with a baby can be stressful (more on that later!)]. We looked at a few dates in March, but we really wanted to go before Spring Break started. We also looked at what hotels still had availability and what dates offered the cheapest airfare. So in the end we came up with 2/4 - 2/9. We planned to spend the weekend with Brad's grandparents and go to the parks during the week to help with crowds. We made the decision December 19th and booked it!
Hotel
Mom and I always stay at Value Resorts. Brad has always preferred Deluxe Resorts. I have tried to convince him to stay value before, but he has always said no. Well this trip we wanted to save as much money as possible. We weighed the pros and cons of a value vs. moderate, but in the end, the value won. I wanted to stay somewhere new though. So we decided to stay at the Pop Century resort.
Tickets
As I mentioned in my January planning post, I have an annual pass. We could not decide if we wanted to get Brad an annual pass or not. We hope to visit again in the next year, but we do not know that for a fact. So we opted to get him a 3-day park hopper ticket. We planned to decide while on the trip whether we should upgrade his ticket to an annual pass.
Transportation
We pretty much knew we wanted to fly. Melody is a great traveler in the car, but 10 hours does not seem appealing. It was just making the decision on where to fly from. If we flew from Huntsville, it would require a layover. For Melody's first flight, we did not want to deal with that. So our next options were Nashville or Birmingham. Birmingham was way too expensive for the times that were best. We also had another option...Memphis. Brad's parents live in Memphis, so it made sense that we could fly from there. It would end up adding two days to our trip, however. In researching, we were going to ultimately save money if we flew from Memphis. I also felt more comfortable flying out of the Memphis airport with Melody since we knew that airport. I didn't know Nashville at all. So in the end, we booked a direct flight from Memphis to Orlando via Southwest.
Dining Reservations
I booked numerous dining reservations leading up to the trip simply because I was unsure of our dates. Once I knew our dates, I cancelled those I knew we would not use. I also cancelled a few others that just did not make sense. I kept a few on Wednesday that I intended to cancel Monday evening if our Monday plans went well. If for some reason we had to miss a meal Monday, I wanted the opportunity to have it Wednesday. Below is when I made/cancelled the reservations:
- 11/15/16 - Garden Grill Breakfast (2/6/17); Chef Mickey Dinner (2/8/17)
- 12/11/16 - Garden Grill Breakfast (2/1/17); Garden Grill Breakfast (2/3/17); Chefs de France Dinner (2/1/17); Chefs de France Dinner (2/3/17); Kona Cafe Dinner (2/2/17); Garden Grill Breakfast (2/8/17); Be Our Guest Breakfast (2/7/17); Chefs de France Dinner (2/6/17); Chefs de France Dinner (2/8/17); Tony's Town Square Dinner (2/5/17); Garden Grill Dinner (2/7/17); Garden Grill Dinner (2/1/17); cancelled Chefs de France Dinner (2/1/17)
- 12/30/16 - cancelled Garden Grill Breakfast (2/1/17); cancelled Garden Grill Dinner (2/1/17); cancelled Kona Cafe Dinner (2/2/17); cancelled Garden Grill Breakfast (2/3/17); cancelled Chefs de France Dinner (2/3/17)
- 1/2/17 - Garden Grill Dinner (2/8/17); The Plaza Restaurant Lunch (2/7/17)
- 1/3/17 - cancelled Chefs de France Dinner (2/8/17); cancelled Be Our Guest Breakfast (2/7/17); cancelled Chef Mickey's Dinner (2/8/17); cancelled Tony's Town Square Dinner (2/5/17)
Below are the final dining reservations we had before leaving for Disney World:
- 2/6/17 - Garden Grill Breakfast, 8:20 a.m.; Chefs de France Dinner, 6:30 p.m.
- 2/7/17 - The Plaza Restaurant Lunch, 11:10 a.m.; Garden Grill Dinner, 7:05 p.m.
- 2/8/17 - Garden Grill Breakfast, 8:20 a.m.; Garden Grill Dinner, 6:50 p.m.
Fastpass+
Because of Melody, our Fastpasses had to be strategically planned and well thought out. That isn't to say I don't usually invest a lot of thought into our Fastpasses on other trips. BUT, I did not want all of our Fastpasses to be right in the middle of when she normally naps.
I also knew that I could take advantage of Rider Swap in combination with Fastpass+ and we could ultimately end up with a Fastpass+ to 6 rides in one park instead of 3. [Each person gets 3 Fastpasses. Since you can utilize Rider Swap with a child, you could book one person's 3 Fastpasses, then for the other person, you can book 3 other rides. When you go to use a Fastpass, you request a Rider Swap. So you only have to use one Fastpass but you both ultimately get to ride.] Our reasoning is that we are on this trip as a family. It wouldn't be fun to ride every ride separate. So we picked a few rides we would do Rider Swap for, and we decided to skip the other ones she could not ride. Once we got there, we knew we could change our mind if we wanted. However, that is our plan prior to our trip.
Check out the Fastpass+ reservations we made prior to leaving for Disney below:
2/6/17
- Meet Disney Pals - 11:00 a.m.
- Journey into Imagination with Figment - 12:10 p.m.
- Frozen Ever After - 2:30 p.m.
2/7/17
- Peter Pan's Flight - 12:50 p.m.
- Jungle Cruise - 2:25 p.m.
- The Haunted Mansion - 3:45 p.m.
2/8/17
- Disney Jr. Live on Stage - 11:00 a.m.
- Toy Story Mania - 11:45 a.m. (they allowed this to overlap since the previous Fastpass+ is for a show)
- Star Tours - 1:10 p.m.
- Tower of Terror - 1:10 p.m.
Touring Plans
Our touring plans were tricky. We didn't want to over-plan because we knew we would truly be on Melody's schedule. But you really have to plan some in order to enjoy Disney these days.
To start, I selected all the rides I wanted us to attempt to ride. She can ride anything that does not have a height restriction. I also selected the ones we would attempt Rider Swap with (Soarin', Tower of Terror, Star Tours, Rock 'n' Roller Coaster).
Next up, I entered our planned dining reservations that were must haves. In this case to start, it was Garden Grill breakfast and Chefs de France dinner on Monday. I did not include any others because I wasn't sure how they would truly fit in the schedule.
Then I included all of Melody's feedings. In Orlando time, she would eat at 10 a.m., 2 p.m., 6 p.m., 8 p.m., and 10 p.m.
Lastly, I let Touring Plans optimize my plan. I knew that I would not 100% stick with this because I wanted to try and do some feedings at the Baby Care Centers while in the parks. Melody can be a very distracted eater, so we knew this would be best. However, I did want to see what Touring Plans would come up with.
After Touring Plans gave me a suggested plan, I edited it. Like I said above, I wanted to do a few feedings in the Baby Care Centers. So I arranged the rides so that we might end up near one so we would not constantly be going out of our way to feed her. I could not always succeed at this. For instance, on Monday, we had dinner reservations in France at 6:30 p.m. Even if we moved our dinner reservation, it would be hard to do both her 6 p.m. and 8 p.m. feedings at the Baby Care Center (it is near Mexico). So we opted to keep our reservation the same and feed her somewhere in France. There are a couple of quiet places around there. We should be finished with our dinner in time so that we can feed her at 8 p.m. at the Baby Care Center, however. I also started adding other meals for us in at this time [ones that didn't require reservations].
After rearranging and reevaluating, we then saw what rides were best for Fastpasses and booked based on that. Then once I secured the exact Fastpass time, I edited our plans to make sure it would all work. I do not intend to follow those plans exactly, but I wanted a general plan. Below are the official Touring Plans:
- 2/6/17 - EPCOT
- 2/7/17 - Magic Kingdom
- 2/8/17 - Hollywood Studios
I entered our plans into Excel to be more generalized. I made a sheet for each park/day. I included our Fastpass+, Dining Reservations (that we intended to keep), intended feeding locations, and general plans. I printed these and laminated them. It seems like overkill, but I did not want to risk us getting completely off plan. My main concern was keeping track of generally where we wanted to be each time of day!
Ok-that wraps up all the general planning. I did a few extra things I normally would not do if we were not taking Melody but not too much. I also did a few projects to help make Melody's trip more magical that I will write about later! Be on the look out for my trip report and magical extras soon!
