To those who know us, it is no secret to anyone that my husband and I love Walt Disney World. We are members of the Disney Vacation Club (since 2007!) and it quickly became "our" vacation spot. Once we welcomed our kids into the family, the discussion of how and when we introduced them to the "Happiest Place on Earth" was had and determined. A couple of weeks ago, we returned from taking our little ones - our almost 3-year-old son and our 10-month-old daughter - on their first trip to Walt Disney World.
I will openly admit here that we are planners by nature and tend to worry about things that we shouldn't worry about nearly as much as we do (which happens because we over-think the 893278 scenarios of how things "could" play out in a situation). Because of this, we were apprehensive about bringing our tiny humans on the airplane ride. We knew we could swing the actual vacation with a few simple strategies, but the airplane ride was what made us nervous. At the end of the day, everything was manageable and we walked away with a few lessons learned from the plane ride and the trip itself - and a great first family trip to the House of Mouse.
Because I feel like the community of those who have been before is often the greatest resource, I wanted to share with you some of the things we did that helped us out on our vacation. My goal is to add to the litany of blog posts out there about traveling with kids, and hopefully you'll be able to glean something that will help you out. After all, it was Pinterest searches, advice from friends, and blogs of other moms that helped me out too.
I feel like the Monty Python crew is behind me yelling "Get on with it!", so here we go...
1. Let Go of Whatever "Before Kids" Looked Like. When we used to do a Disney trip before Will and Evie were here, it was a whirlwind parkfest. We would arrive at opening and stay until the park closed for one day at each of the 4 major parks, spend a day at Downtown Disney, and another day trying a new non-park restaurant and packing up to go home. It was always a power trip (so to speak). This seemed an unreasonable approach with 2 under 3. There would be naps to contend with, non-park character breakfasts (because let's face it, we all know that the 2.5-year-old just wants to see Mickey as much as possible), bedtimes, and all other types of unpredictable things that come along with kids. So before you even CONSIDER attempting to recreate whatever your favorite pre-kid vacation was WITH your kids... just forget about what it used to look like. It's not going to look like that again for a while. (Sidebar: If your kids are old enough, involve them in the planning and ask them what they want to do too!)
"Will, when we go to Florida, what do you want to do?" "I want to see Mickey Mouse."
2. Plan Around the "Normal" Routine Where Possible. With our kids being so young, naptime is still a pretty crucial time of the day. We planned our air travel, restaurant reservations, FastPasses - you name it, and we scheduled it AROUND naptimes. Tired kids are cranky kids, so we made sure that they would be able to crash either in our hotel room or in the stroller as close to their "normal" naptime as we could. We also tried to get them to bed as close to their normal bedtimes as possible too (understanding that sometimes it's not entirely possible - we did what we could). This not only made transitioning from home to vacation relatively smooth, it also made transitioning back home again pretty easy as well. For us at this stage in their life, we found that our double stroller worked perfectly for naps on the go. The back part for our 10-month-old lays completely flat and the front reclines so our 2.5-year-old could get comfortable. Covered their faces (reasonably) to eliminate distractions and they were well on their way to taking a 1.5-2 hour nap every afternoon. It worked out SO well. (Sidebar: Find your normal routine sticking point/points when thinking this through. For us it's naptimes and mealtimes - but it might be different for your kids. Also - map/find out where baby changing/nursing areas are; it will make your life easier if you already know ahead of time.)
This double stroller was our naptime power tool. So glad we brought it with us!
3. If You Can Stay Away with the Amenities of Home - DO IT! When we became DVC members several years ago, we chose the option we did knowing that we were hoping to have 2 kids and wanted to have spaces for them to sleep. What we also did for ourselves that turned out to be not only an added bonus but I think a MUST for anywhere we stay again was make sure we had access to a kitchen and laundry machines. It turned out that having those amenities made life a LOT easier for us. We were able to keep up with our laundry - which with a toddler and an infant is HUGE - and only had one load to do when we got home. Having the kitchen available allowed us to be able to give the kids the early breakfast they're used to (or at least enough to tide them over while we caught a bus to a restaurant breakfast) as well as give us alternative options for lunches and dinners on nights we didn't have reservations out somewhere. There are a lot of ways that you can stay somewhere that's almost like staying at home rather than a hotel and often they are rather affordable. Rent someone's timeshare, find a condo rental close by where you want to be, or crash with family or friends. It makes the vacation high last just a little bit longer when you return. (Sidebar: A lot of areas have off-property grocery services available that will be cheaper alternatives than what you buy on-property. Seek these out for toiletries, food, or laundry soap that you wouldn't pack in your luggage to save a few dollars.)
"Mommy made me noodles. I love them." - Evie
4. Butter Up Your Fellow Passengers (and Flight Crew) with Chocolate. Best $10-12 I ever spent. We got the flight crews up and back a bunch of Dove chocolate and wrote thank-you notes for their patience and assistance. We made our fellow passengers for the flight down little bags of Hershey's kisses with a note thanking them for their patience (and ignoring skills) of our two little ones for the plane ride down. The difference in how we were treated on the way down from our fellow passengers when I had the chocolate was TOTALLY different from the way back. Now that could probably be explained by just being a different crowd (plus who wants to leave Florida to come back to blizzard conditions), but it was definitely a noticable difference. Besides, by giving our flight crew chocolates, our kids got little plastic pilot's wings (which they promptly lost - but that's besides the point) that no one else did. So yeah - chocolate = worthy purchase, will do it again on our next trip. (Sidebar: If you look this idea up on Pinterest, you might find an apology letter to fellow passengers. I refuse to apologize for my kids just being kids, so I wrote thank-you notes instead because I appreciate patience & kindness & fun - not pity.)
...and if you can somehow manage to get them to nap on the plane - DO IT!
5. Go with the Flow. Kids are going to have meltdowns at dinner. Kids are going to get overexcited and loud at a time that might not be "appropriate". Parents are going to have end-of-day meltdowns because they're exhausted. You're going to have one exhausted kid and one that wants to keep going until they throw them out. Don't plan everything and just go with it. Steve and I LOVE Epcot. It's our favorite park in Walt Disney World; before we had kids, Epcot had 2 days of our vacation dedicated to it because we love it so much. There's just so much there to see and do. With our kids... Evie decided bedtime was bedtime and fell asleep at such times (nap and nighttime) in the stroller. Will wanted to stay up late... and we barely touched World Showcase. We spent the majority of our time in the Character Spot, The Seas with Nemo and Friends (both the ride and Turtle Talk with Crush were done twice), the Land, and Spaceship Earth. But that was OK - it was what our little guy wanted to do, and we let him steer the trip. He decided what we did, and we - in turn - experienced Disney through the eyes of the kids (he knows what his sister likes too, and stands up for "Evie wants to do this" pretty often). So as a wise philosophizing turtle once said: "Kill the motor dude". Go with it, and experience wherever you are - be it Walt Disney World or a mountain camping trip - through the eyes of the little ones. (Sidebar: No seriously, figure out ways to get them to nap if they normally nap - or at least rest for a bit if they don't. I know I said that already in #2 above - but it's so worth it.)
If you need to be told what it means to "Go with the Flow", listen to this song.
6. You Don't Always Need Your Camera to Capture a Memory. We are a big camera/picture family. Our camera - either our dSLR or our phones - go with us everywhere and anyone who knows me knows that I AM that annoying mom who posts too many pictures of their cute kids on Facebook/Instagram. As such, I try to make the effort to make sure that I don't always reach for the way to freeze that moment in time. Too often when you do, it kills the moment; kids start hamming it up for the camera, smiles become forced. My favorite memory of our trip is one that only someone from the outside following us around would have caught on camera - and I'm glad I didn't break to get mine.(Sidebar: If you're worried you'll forget things that happen on your trip without taking video or snapping pictures, bring a journal along and record things at the end of your day.)
"Oh, you guys just woke up from your naps? Cool. Now look at the camera and smile like you just ate chocolate."
To my last point, let me share the story with you I alluded to about my favorite memory of the trip. We had spent an entire day at Animal Kingdom and decided that rather than leave for dinner, we would just grab dinner at one of the restaurants in the park. It had been wall-to-wall people all day long, so the thought of fighting crowds with hungry kids (who wanted to see Chip & Dale more than they wanted to catch a bus for dinner) to leave was not appealing. When dinner was over and we left the restaurant - the park was deserted with still 2 hours left until they closed. There were only a handful of people milling about enjoying what was left of the day, and we were 4 of that handful. The day was starting to switch over to evening; the sun had left the sky but was still lighting it, and the moon had risen above the park. There was an African band playing music outside the restaurant we had eaten at, and it just made the atmosphere completely perfect. Steve had Evie in his arms, and started to bounce around and dance with her as her grin widened and her little pigeon giggle started to become a part of the music. Will, on the other hand, had noticed that it was getting darker and had immediately started to look for the moon - and found it. He pulled on my pant leg, all sorts of excited and said "Mom! I see the moon! Look, Mom!" as he pointed and smiled.
Then he ran away from me yelling with his arms out to his sides - "MOM!!! I AM FLYING!! I AM FLYING TO THE MOON MOM!! COME WITH ME!!!"
I, of course, put my arms out to my sides and ran around with him. Flying to the moon with my son while my husband danced with our daughter.
My biggest tip is to just enjoy each other. It doesn't matter where you travel to - just enjoy each other, savor the moments, and cherish the memories. Those are the things that you'll carry with you for the rest of your lives.
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**Coming soon - my thoughts specifically regarding our experience at Disney with little ones and a kiddo with food allergies. Keep your eyes peeled!**
Steve and I are planners by nature, so of course when we knew we had a weekend coming up in Martha's Vineyard we needed to make sure we mapped out places we were going to eat. While looking through Yelp and a couple of travel books for recommended places, Steve stumbled upon this place called "Back Door Donuts".
Before I go any further, if you don't know then you should know that my husband has a weakness for baked goods. Delicious warm cookies or donuts are a huge temptation for him, and that weakness is multiplied exponentially when the words "apple fritter" or "cannoli" are involved.
So imagine the reaction when, while looking through Yelp reviews of "Back Door Donuts", that Steve had when more than one reviewer left comments that the apple fritters served at this establishment were "orgasmic". I do believe there was eye-popping and excited pointing at my laptop that had I not immediately typed furiously onto the keyboard and added it to the list we were compiling, I'm pretty sure Steve might have exploded like the old Starburst commercials. Needless to say - we were going to Back Door Donuts.
After a shared dinner at The Lookout in Oak Bluffs, we made our way over to BDD. We had checked at the front counter earlier in the day (the store is actually called "Martha's Vineyard Gourmet Bakery") and knew 7:30 PM was the magical time that they started to serve donuts & pastries. What we didn't know was where to find them; we could smell them, but didn't know where to go to get them. The nice lady at the counter told us to follow the building and head around to the back - and that we'd know where to go from there. She wasn't kidding - when we got to the back of the building, there was quite a line already formed waiting for the deliciousness.
Steve stepped out of line to snap this. You can see me across from the lady in the white t-shirt. I'm wearing a blue sweatshirt, glasses, and have a lighter blue purse handle.
I will say this about standing in a line like this: there's a feeling that comes along with. A feeling of coolness, a feeling of being in the "in-club", those who KNOW things. This isn't the kind of place that you stumble on while walking through downtown Oak Bluffs; you won't see the line while strolling by shops and restaurants because the back door is nestled between the back of a small mom & pop grocer and the small strip of shops the bakery's front is in. Basically - in order to find this place you have to KNOW about it before getting to it somehow.
After about a 10-minute wait in line, we were at the window. We ordered an apple-fritter each and shared a glazed donut. After hearing me order an apple fritter, Steve pointed at a monstrosity and commented that I should have gotten the cinnamon bun... what he didn't realize that we soon discovered is that the plate-sized object he pointed at was the famed apple fritter itself. It was seriously the size of a salad plate, was warm and gooey (but not TOO gooey), and had a smattering of fresh cinnamon apples across the top. Frankly, it looked closer to a loaf of apple monkey bread than an apple fritter... and also looked delicious, which made us excited to dig in.
Fritter sitting on Steve's lap waiting to be eaten. It's freaking huge.
We got about halfway through this beast before we had to take a break; thankfully, Steve had run into the front of the bakery and got us some waters to help wash it down. It was SO good. It was warm, sticky without making you filthy and gross feeling, had what could be the perfect amount of cinnamon, wasn't greasy but yet almost melted in your mouth. What I loved about this fritter over others is that instead of that jellied apple goo, they actually put fresh chopped apples tossed in cinnamon sugar on top. It was the perfect "garnish" to this giant, delicious fried cake. Needless to say that even after sharing dinner and purposely leaving room for this puppy, we were both incredibly full.
But the question is: was it worth it? Absolutely. We made sure that others who were walking by smelling our delicious fritters knew exactly where they could get them. One couple saw us eating them, assumed we got them from the bakery, and when the wife went inside I told the husband to get her out of there and go around to the back. He ran in after her and off they went. It was awesome helping others to be "in the know", spreading the word about the amazingness that is Back Door Donuts.
Last weekend, Steve and I took a 3-day trip down to Martha's Vineyard as a late anniversary weekend. We had lots of good food, saw a lot of cool things, made an inventory of what we would want to do if we came again. One of the things we want to make sure we set time aside to see if we go to the Vineyard again I just had to share with you in the event you're planning to head down there at all this summer.
Friday night as we were recovering from our food hangover from Back Door Donuts (which will have its own post dedicated to it soon), we were walking back to our hotel past St. Andrew's Church in Edgartown when Steve paused and commented that he thought it was weird to have church services so late. There was music and lights coming through the stained glass windows and it sounded GOOD. We wandered over to the wide-open doors of the church because we wanted to see for ourselves what was going on - and we found something we wished we'd known about sooner.
In the front of the room were 8 or 10 college-aged young men singing A-Capella for a crowd of about 30-50 people. They were snapping their fingers, smiling, and as only would be seen on the Vineyard were dressed in untucked blue button-down shirts, solid colored ties (each guy had a different color), khaki shorts, and no shoes. That's right - a preppy A-Capella group which we found out were appropriately named The Vineyard Sound.
We happened to come at just the right time for the end of the song "Signed, Sealed, Delivered" and let me tell you - the guy singing lead on that had so much energy and soul that you could not help but get energized with him as each word passed out of his lungs. Outside the church sanctuary stood a simple folding table with a cash box open for accepting cash and a few stacks of CD's letting everyone know that the beautiful voices coming out of the church were those of the Vineyard Sound.
Vineyard Sound is exactly what it looks like - a group of college-aged young men who sing A-Capella on Martha's Vineyard. They arrive on the island in early June, practice heavily all summer and perform around the island in various venues. If you are on the Vineyard at all this summer, make sure to check their performance schedule ahead of time and plan on stopping in to one of their shows. I know that we wish we had known about them sooner - trust me, you won't regret it. Steve and I both agree that these guys could easily be in the same league as Straight No Chaser.
Here are some YouTube videos of their performances... kind of a "Try Before You Buy" so you don't just have to take my word for it.
The 2011 Vineyard Sound performing "Southern Cross".
The 2008 Vineyard Sound performing "Signed, Sealed, Delivered". The 2011 VS are the guys we saw sing this - they were just as good, and better live.
Since I was surprised with a trip to Jamaica for my 30th birthday, I made an executive decision to change my list around a bit (edits can be found on the original list here), so for October my "new thing" was snorkeling!
Why do I have "new thing" in quotations? Well, last year we went to Jamaica and I attempted to snorkel once before, so it doesn't make it entirely new. The problem was that I didn't breathe properly and instead of being calm and trying to figure it out - I panicked. And when I panic, I become afraid and averse to trying the thing I panicked about again because I hate the feeling of fear that comes along with a mild panic attack.
Leave it to my husband to know when to push with something. As part of the surprise trip, he went on Amazon and bought us each a dry snorkel & mask set (meaning a snorkel that will not open if it goes underwater). Because he knows me well enough to know that when I get nervous all I need is a bit of coaxing to realize everything is going to be OK, he went in the pool with me two days in a row before anyone else got in to give me a "snorkel lesson". Day one was mostly learning to breathe above water in and out of my mouth with the snorkel, and day two was actually spending time swimming with the mask & snorkel. When I asked for a day three (there was my nervousness) - Steve looked at me for a good minute and said "OK, I'll sign us up for tomorrow's 9:30 snorkeling session".
Out in the open water. Oh boy.
Terrible picture of a nervous me on my way to snorkel. Barrington is driving the boat. He rocks.
The boat took us out a couple of miles to a dive site with a coral reef and a sunken ship. Everyone threw on their fins and hopped off the sides of the boat... except me. I was having a hard time manipulating my flippers, and when I finally got my legs over the side of the boat - I felt my chest start to tighten and I looked at the water. The panic was starting to set in - but then I heard Steve from about 10 feet away calling me. I looked up and he was smiling, and reassured me that he wasn't going anywhere until I was in the water. So... I took a deep breath, and jumped in.
...and swallowed a ton of sea water, which resulted in about 3-4 minutes of coughing to get it out of my lungs and passages. Good work, Danielle.
Once I was done returning the ocean to its rightful spot NOT in my body - I looked around and saw Steve 5 feet away from me. He looked at me and smiled, said "You can do this, I'm right here." I put my face down in the water, and Steve stayed right beside me with words of encouragement until I was comfortable pulling away from him on my own.
Look, Mom! No hands!
Just keep swimming...
We were out in the big blue ocean for about a half an hour before they called us back in. I kept my face down the whole time, and my reward was lots of hugs and smiles from Steve. What was really cool about the whole experience was that I was able to see a whole part of God's creation that humans don't typically get a chance to see. I was a silent, floating observer to the whole world down below in the deep. I saw beautiful fish swimming in coral reefs, and even had a small school swim by about a foot beneath me (I stayed still as they passed by). I understood why Steve had so loved the experience last year, and am actually a bit excited to go snorkeling with him again. I love that we have one more thing that's so cool that we can do together.
