Let me be the first to say that our family loves Disney World like nobody's business. My children are 5 and 3 1/2. The 5 year-old will be embarking on her 4th visit this December. She went when she was 13 months, 2 1/2 and 3 1/2. The poor child hasn't been there in over a year! Such a travesty!
Let me not lead you to believe, though, that this is all for the kids. My husband and I are huge fans too. Now we don't go all the way by wearing Mickey crocs and mouse ears in the parks. But this trip is definitely something we can't keep ourselves from planning time and time again. We had decided, after our trip last September, that we would probably not go again until this coming June as we didn't want to take our budding kindergartner out of school for a week. Yet when we started talking about the crowds during the summer, we just couldn't bring ourselves to endure them. We will be going again in December and my parents will be coming with us.
While I thoroughly enjoy all of the fantastic websites out there chock full o' information about the parks, getting there, the hotels, the restaurants, etc etc etc, I find myself sucked into that vortex only to emerge hours later. I would be ashamed if there was some hidden camera hooked up to my laptop that tracked how much time I've spent developing our itinerary. It didn't help, of course, that we were originally planned for December 6 - 12th and now we've moved that to December 13th through 19th.
For the millionth time, I've just gotten off the phone with the lovely people at the Disney Dining hotline trying to move a reservation we have at Chef Mickey to an earlier time. I will call another million times before our trip...that is unless I get the ressie I want. And let's be honest, even if I do, I'll still probably call again trying to change something else. *sigh* Is it an addiction?
I read the Disboards all the time, contributing my experiences and opinions and tucking away others. Honestly, the people there are the only ones I have to talk about my upcoming and past trips. My family is sick of me. Any conversation that starts with "When we go to Disney World..." is prompted replied to with a great big old eye roll from my husband. My mom is more subtle, but I sense some exasperation over the topic from her too.
All of this planning is bittersweet. On one hand, I love it. I love putting every detail together in an effort to see every parade, miss every fireworks display (the girlies are terrified), eat at our favorite establishments, ride the best rides with minimal line wait time and, and, and...the list seems endless. On the other hand, it annoys me greatly that you need to plan out every minute of your day. A vacation is supposed to be about relaxing a bit and going with the flow. I've learned in WDW, that going with the flow leaves you hungry and frustrated.
As I mentioned, my parents are coming with us this trip and that should be a unique experience. Dad is disabled and mom also has heart problems. We typically do a lot of hustling from place to place and little sitting down and resting. This trip is likely to have a lot more of that. It'll be a different mindset for hubby and I. It'll be worth it, though. Our girls are so so excited that their grandparents are coming. And my parents are so excited to be back at WDW after 30 years and at Christmas time - which I will say firsthand is amazing!
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