Mistakes made while planning for Disney World (I should know better)

Florida was chilly and our evening at Magic Kingdom was downright cold!

But did we care? Well honestly, yes we did, we were shivering.

More important- did we let it stop us?

No!

We mortgaged our entire future and hit the stores to buy some layers, and stayed on into the night.  I’d packed what I thought were plenty of warm items, but had soon discovered they weren’t enough.   Sugarwings needed warm, heavy sweat pants over their jeans, I needed one more cozy sweatshirt.

I never go to Disney without scarves/shawls.  They keep the sun off you on hot days and prevent cool air conditioning from giving you goosebumps when inside.  For our below average temp day, I packed a fuzzy, cuddly, shawl, some gloves and a hoodie.  It’s just hard to know for sure what you’ll need for the entire day, no matter how prepared you think you are.

On our second day, we were joined by Dewdrop and my boy for time at Epcot and of course I preached and nagged ahead of time about broken in shoes, layers, and warm socks.  Did people listen?  Well, a little bit.

At Epcot, your car is much more accessible than at Magic Kingdom, so I brought extras to leave in the parking lot, and besides for a few issues, we did fine.

Once again, the weather was not ideal, but the company was.  But if you are prepared, it doesn’t stop you.  

And sometimes it means crowds are lighter.  I’ll take lighter crowds with a light drizzle any day.

We stayed at the Coronado for the first time, I booked one of the poolside rooms in the auxiliary buildings, not in the tower.   And surprisingly, we used the adjacent pool as well as the main pool quite a bit.  Florida cold is different than Kansas cold, and the temps fluctuate so much that you can squeeze in a swim at the heated pools even if the weather is subpar for the south.

Pool snack bars are our favorite places to eat when we get a chance. And at Disney, the food at them is usually better than at some of the resort food courts.  

Another mistake I made was not bringing food to keep in the room.  My son and Dewdrop had to cancel joining us (or so we thought) plus Sugarwings and I mostly share meals.  I had a few drinks in the room for us, and we were fine.  

Then we got the happy surprise that the other half of our group was coming after all!  A grown man and a teen require more food than I’d planned on. Seriously, even if it was just two of us, I should’ve had fruit, yogurt, and other snacks in the hotel fridge.  

We had a late night at Epcot and realized we were hungry after getting back to the room.  I had not packed a scrap or tiny tidbit of anything to eat.  We all went to bed a little hungry, so I got up early, walked the trail over to the main building, took out a second mortgage on my house and filled up a bag with pastries, juice, and fruit to surprise everyone with breakfast in bed when they woke up.

The pink sprinkled donuts as big as your head were as good as they looked, but for under ten bucks, we could’ve eaten much healthier if I’d simply thrown some groceries in the cooler before driving to Orlando.

Even though I hadn’t planned as well as I should’ve, the weather wasn’t close to ideal, the trip was short, and half our group could only make it half the time- I treasure the time we had there.  

We found Hidden Mickies (This is the back of a koala’s head in Small World), explored, laughed, and just hung out together.

With my husband retired, and our budget tightened, I know what a splurge going to these parks is.  Rich doesn’t like being there himself, so it is very generous of him to send me off on my own or with family while he does other things.  
Sometimes I feel very selfish about my obsession with this place.  I tell myself that I am done with it, I’ve been enough.  And I’m fine with that.

For a while.

Then, thoughts of Mickey shaped food start popping into my head. And I’ll find myself reading recaps of other’s trips and travel hints online. Next, I’m looking at calendars to see what dates kids are out of school that can mesh with a quick trip that direction, or sneaking an extra vacation day onto another planned trip to somewhere sorta nearby to slide in “just a little visit” while I am so close.

Mickey, I have tried, but I can’t quit you.  I’m a Disney magic junkie.