Works for me Wednesday

After spending the day at Disney yesterday and witnessing some of the tourists there I thought I would do a post about tips for a day at Disney with kids, particularly in the hot summer. For those of you locals who could probably write this post yourself...feel free to add your own advice in the comments.

• First of all--bring water!! They charge you about $2 or more for a bottle of water. With as much as you will be sweating you will need to rehydrate a lot and you don't want to spend all your money on water. At Publix I bought an 8 pack of small water bottles and we refilled them regularly. They weren't too heavy to haul around since they were small and I wasn't wasting my money on Disney water.
  
• Bring food! After paying $75 a ticket to get in the park I'm sure most families would like to limit their spending once they are in the park. We always bring lots of food and then spend our money on treats like ice cream or popcorn. The food is really overpriced and you can easily pay almost $10 for a chicken finger basket and fries or a burger. And--your kids are probably too distracted to eat anyway. We pack sandwiches (peanut butter and marshmallow fluff--a special treat), granola bars, pretzels (they don't get crushed in a backpack), trail mix, etc. We snack on that all day while waiting in line or just taking a short break. Then, I have the money to buy ice cream in the afternoon and maybe popcorn. Right outside of Disney just down the street from Downtown Disney is a McDonald's and we stop there on the way home if we are hungry and have a cheap meal. Doing this really stretches your money.
  
• GET FASTPASSES!! I talked to a lady yesterday who said that they waited in line for an hour to ride Splash Mountain because they didn't want to get Fastpasses and have to come back in two hours. That doesn't make a bit of sense! Two of the most popular rides--Splash Mountain and Thunder Mountain regularly have lines that are at least an hour. Right when we got in the park yesterday, we got on the train and went to Frontierland and got fastpasses for Splash Mountain. You have to wait two hours before getting fastpasses again so we couldn't get passes for Thunder Mountain yet. But--when we came back to ride Splash Mountain, it had been over two hours so we then got our fastpasses for Thunder Mountain. We were able to do both rides without waiting an hour!
• During the middle of the day when the park is the most crowded do the less popular rides and the shows that seat a whole lot of people and allow you to sit and rest in AC (and have a snack). Later in the day the park clears out a little (not much but a little) and then you can do the popular rides with a half hour wait instead of an hour wait.
  
• Go see the characters in the tents after dinnertime. Most of the families with small children have gone home by then and the lines are a lot shorter.
  
• If you have small children and can do it, go back to your hotel and rest during the middle of the day and come back in the evening when a lot of people are going home. We left at 9:30 last night with half the park but the park didn't actually close until midnight. If I could have walked another mile I would've stayed because I bet we could have done a lot more with much shorter lines.
• Don't keep telling your kid to look at you and smile when he's trying to watch the Spectromagic parade and then fuss at him for not looking at the camera. He's TRYING to watch the parade!!! And, there's a lot to see! (witnessed this last night)
• Take the time to go into Innoventions at Epcot, it's air conditioned and there are some cool things in there!
• Bring sunscreen!
• Remember that even though you paid a lot of money to take your kids to Disney, you are not going to be able to do it all. It is overwhelming and overstimulating to kids to even be there and some of the simplest things are thrilling to them, they don't need to do it all. Take time to just sit and relax and do nothing but watch people. If your kid is melting down, find a quiet place to have some water, a snack, and just settle. You can ride the train in circles for a while to get away from the crowds and the sun. I saw so many kids pitching fits yesterday and I felt very bad for them and for their parents.
  

Okay, I can't think of anything else at this moment. Feel free to add your own advice in the comments.

Works for me Wednesday

In the summer in Florida it is a regular occurrence to go swimming either at the beach, at a friend's pool, at the springs, wherever we can find water to help us cool off in the heat of the day. So, a couple of years ago I started keeping a stocked laundry basket with all our swim stuff. When towels and bathing suits get washed they get folded (sometimes but not always) and put back in the laundry basket. I also keep sunscreen, baby powder (for getting sand off at the beach), and goggles in the basket. And, after not having clothes for my kids to change into after swimming earlier today I decided to add some underwear and an outfit for each child that can just stay in the basket. When we get invited swimming I just grab the whole basket and off we go. Another thing I've done to help with the summer heat is that I've bought each kid a large water bottle and I have one too. We keep them filled and in the fridge. When we go out everyone gets their water bottle and then we don't have to spend money when we are dying of thirst. Works for me!
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