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Our First Trip to Disney World
For Spring Break, we took the boys to Disney World for the first time. They are at the ages where everything is so magical and we don’t have to work around naps, etc. Since it’s been 18 years since any of us had been to Disney World and it was the kids’ first trip, we felt like it was everyone’s first time there! We had such a great time and it was so special seeing it all through the boys’ eyes. They are at the ages (3,5 and 7) where they are able to ride nearly all of the rides and roller coasters. We spent four nights in Orlando, and this is how we broke the trip up:
- Day One: travel day
- Day Two: park day
- Day Three: pool day
- Day Four: park day
- Day Five: pool day, and then we flew home that evening.
It felt like the perfect amount of time to be at Disney World!
Tips For Disney World
We are no experts in this area, but this is what we learned and what worked for us!
- Use a Disney Planner to help plan your trip. We used @mrs_sarah_shirley to help us plan our park days and help with the ins and outs of a park visit. She will also help make hotel and restaurant reservations. There is no charge for her services. We had already decided to stay at FS Orlando when she started to help us plan, so that part was done. (See more about our stay here.) In an initial conversation, Sarah mentioned the VIP Tour to us and we are so grateful she did!
- The VIP Tour- Since we had limited time, we did the VIP Tour for one of our days at the park. Your planner can help you book. We ended up doing a seven hour tour (the minimum amount of time for a tour), visited three parks and did 15 rides. There is no waiting in line. Your guide takes you to the front of the line, sometimes accessing through back of the house entrances or going in the exit! For Haunted Mansion, we even had our own private elevator ride! After exiting a ride, our guide would have water waiting for us and snacks like Mickey ice cream bars, popcorn, etc. We did everything on our “must-do” list on that first day, so the next park day was much more relaxing and laid back. No panic about getting on a must-do ride. If you can do it, most definitely do it! It made our entire visit so amazing and fun for us all.
- If you are staying at a Disney resort, including FS Orlando, you can access the parks 30 minutes early.
- We used the Lyft “Minnie Van” to be dropped off right at the front of Magic Kingdom.
- We brought the kids’ favorite snacks from home and brought sandwiches from the hotel snack bar to eat while we were at the Parks.
- We used Genie+ to book Lightning Lanes the day we were on our own. Our planner was helpful with our day on our own, but it was a lot more stressful than the VIP Tour. Thankfully we had already done our must-dos. The only ride we missed was Frozen. It was sold out when we went to book the Lightning Lane on our second day at the park. But in reality that was nothing compared to everything else we were able to do!
- We brought our stroller and couldn’t have done it otherwise! We have this stroller with the extra rumble seat and piggyback ride on board, so all three boys were able to ride whenever they got tired of walking. There is no way we could have covered the ground we did, especially on the VIP Tour, when we were trying to get to as much as possible while we still had front of the line access.
Cheers,
Stia, Jean and Katherine
Our Stay at Four Seasons Orlando
The kids’ first trip to Disney World was better than we could have imagined! We knew it was going to be fun, but it truly is such a magical place for all ages. We stayed at Four Seasons Orlando and it is such a special place for families!
Rooms
We stayed in a Park View Suite which was great for our family. It has a king bedroom with bathroom and the living room couch is a pull out sofa. There is also another full bathroom adjacent to the living area which was great for the boys to share. There was so much room and the closet space was huge! I like to get everyone unpacked and organized when we get to our room and I had so much space to do that. One of the things we loved the most was the balcony overlooking the pool and out to the parks! I’m the first one up, so I would take my coffee out there and read while I was waiting for everyone else to wake up. It was so peaceful! We also loved watching the Disney World fireworks at night from our balcony, right before getting the boys in bed. Also, the boys loved taking baths and watching tv in the mirror of the bathroom 
Restaurants
We ate all of our meals at the hotel. There are a lot of restaurants and variety, which was great since the kids were so tired at night and not up for leaving the hotel!
- Room service: If you book a room with balcony, I highly recommend room service one morning! We did this the morning after we got there. Our flight was delayed, so we ended up making it to the hotel at 11 pm. I ordered room service when we got to the room to be delivered at 9 am. We enjoyed it on the balcony and then headed to the parks for our first day!
- Ravello: The Four Seasons does a character breakfast on Thursday/Saturday mornings. We did this on our pool day, so we had time for a leisurely breakfast and the kids loved meeting Goofy, Mickey and Minnie in person. It was so cute and definitely a highlight for everyone. The breakfast books up quickly, so make your reservation as soon as you can!
- Lickety Split: This is a little coffee shop in the hotel and we did a quick breakfast here two days. The coffee was great! They also have snacks, wraps, sandwiches, etc that we grabbed to take for lunch on the second day we did the parks.
- PB&G: This is the pool restaurant and we ate here during our two pool days. The fish tacos were amazing and so was the margarita!
- The Lobby Bar: We ate here for dinner after our first day at Disney. The kids were exhausted and so were we! We were dropped off and went right into the Lobby Bar for dinner. We sat on the patio and saw the most beautiful sunset, and food was good! It was quick and perfect for us after our first day.
- Capa: We ate in the restaurant on our third night and then the Capa Bar on our fourth night. It’s located on the 17th floor of the hotel and the views are beautiful. Highly recommend getting a reservation around sunset – we had the most beautiful sunsets while we were there! It is a tapas and steakhouse, so one night we did more Spanish styled tapas and the next we did more of a steakhouse dinner. Both amazing and highly recommend! While we were there, the fireworks went off. Our waiter always told us a few minutes before so we were able to make our way to the balcony to watch!
PS: Capa is a Michelin-starred restaurant, but don’t let that deter you from taking the kids! There is a children’s menu and the staff couldn’t have been kinder or more accommodating. Ford really wanted a burger, which wasn’t on the children’s menu, so they went downstairs to the other restaurant and got one for him
What to do:
We all said that we would come back and stay at the hotel again, even without going back to Disney! There is so much to do at the resort!
- Character Breakfast: It was so cute and fun and we highly recommend! There are so many great opportunities for individual pictures with the characters and they interact to sweetly with the kids.
- Pool day: We had two pool days in between our park days. The resort has an adults only pool, infinity family pool, splash pad pool, water slides and lazy river. There is SO much to do and we spent two full days out by the pool.
- Kids for All Seasons: The kids club is located right next to the splash pad pool and the family pool. My two oldest went one afternoon for the scavenger hunt and crafts and I had to pull them away to get changed for our flight! They loved all the fun activities.
- Dive in Movie: There is a dive in movie night and Saturday during for lunch. We did the one during lunch Saturday and the kids loved it.
- Golf: The guys didn’t bring their golf clubs, but next time they will!
What to know:
- Book a park view room to see the Disney fireworks
- Kids 5 & under eat free at the restaurants
- The character breakfast books up very quickly- book as soon as possible!
- FS Orlando has shuttle transportation to/from the parks
- They have an adults only pool and it’s beautiful! We didn’t spend any time here, but next time would check it out while the kids are at the kids club.
- The Kids for All Seasons has a parents night out.
- We booked airport transportation through FS Orlando and it was seamless. We met our driver in the baggage claim and we got right to the car with car seats already installed, etc.
What to Pack
Cheers,
Stia, Jean and Katherine
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