We recently took a family trip to Disney - Caleb's first time! We were so excited. And we had a blast! I did a ton of research before we went and most was super helpful. Some wasn't worth my time reading and just a little silly. But I plan on writing about our trip in a few posts and I'll include the info that helped, what didn't, and some stuff we figured out on our own.
First: The Hotel
Disney's Art of Animation Resort
We chose a Cars family suite. They also have Little Mermaid, Nemo, and Lion King themed rooms. Actually - each "theme" has it's own part at the hotel. I only took pix of the Cars section...but here are some of them:
Our room was in the "Mater's Garage" building.
They had life-sized models of the Cars Characters...Caleb was going NUTS!
In our room: The table/Murphy bed....super convenient!
Decor in the hallways
Me and my little man with Lightning!
The hotel had a great check-in service, the staff were very helpful, and everything was very clean. It's the newest resort, so it should be...but sometimes you never know.
When we arrived we found that they had activities in the lobby area for kids at certain times of the day (ie - teach them how to draw Mickey Mouse) and games at the large pool all afternoon.
The hotel provides bus transportation to and from the parks - just be forewarned that the lines can get pretty long. As a resort guest you can also request a free parking pass to take your own vehicle to the park. We took the bus but we had extra help from grandma and grandpa - or else the folding up of the stroller, carrying the bags plus the kid, and the stroller itself could've been a little difficult.
The Room:
The Suites were incredible. They include a queen sized bed in it's own bedroom with adjoining bath/shower. In the "living room" there is a table that turns into a full-size Murphy bed, and a couch that pulls out into a full-sized bed as well. There is a small kitchenette with a microwave, sink, and mini fridge. A second bathroom with a sink and separate room with toilet/tub is right off of the main living area. We had four adults and a two year old in the room and had more than enough space. It was great!
Food:
We decided to bring most of our own food and forgo any meal plans and avoided eating out as much as we could. After all, spending tons of money on the room and tickets was enough.....we were trying to enjoy ourselves but save where we could. We made a breakfast casserole before leaving home, and brought it in cut-up pieces in ziplock bags (obviously in a cooler). Other good breakfast foods would be cereal (get a half gallon of milk for the mini fridge), boiled eggs, bread (no toaster though), etc.
We also brought small sandwich rolls, sliced cheese, lunch meat & spread to make mini sandwiches for lunch. The park allows you to bring in soft-sided coolers! (I never knew that until I did some digging)
We brought granola bars, raisins, juice boxes, gatoraid and small water bottles, too. So we snacked, ate our sandwiches, and had our drinks while in the park - no extra spending needed! It was great. I hate spending $3 on a bottle of water!! And, it being April in FL it was fairly warm - I'm 28 weeks pregnant so staying hydrated was a must. I survived. ;)
We were there a total of 4 days, 3 nights and only ate out at dinner time. On the last day we also had lunch at a park but that was a "Character lunch" - more about that in another post. Food alone saved us a ton of money. The average meal is $10 per person at the cheapest place - and the portion sizes were NOT that big. You know how parks are....the resorts aren't too much better. We did like the "food court"/diner at the Contemporary Resort (we took the monorail there and back one evening).
Let's say for kicks and giggles we spent $10 per meal, per adult (I won't count Caleb), per day. We would have spent $480 on food. We spend less than $100 in groceries for all of the food, snacks and drinks we brought, which fed all 4 adults and the toddler. Win!
Allright, I think that's enough info for now. I'll be posting more on the parks themselves, some helpful packing tips, taking a toddler a to Disney tips as well as being preggo at Disney! Coming soon ;)
XO
