Disclaimer: Planning a Disney trip is not for the faint of heart.
At least, not if you have a hefty checklist of rides/restaurants/attractions you want to hit like I did! For me, Disney World has such a nostalgic effect, stemming from multiple trips with my family when I was a kid, and I wanted to share all of those feelings and memories with my own babies.
It’s totally doable. With a lot of planning, the right resources, and a little *pixie dust* you can do all the things you want to do without dropping from Griswold-style exhaustion.
In this post, I’ll outline some of the planning tips for Disney World — hotels, getting there, restaurant reservations, and some general tips. In later posts, I’ll go park by park and tell you how we did it!
embroidered family shirts: etsy || my shorts: Walmart || my shoes (seen below): Walmart || Scout’s bows: etsy || Scout’s bloomers: Amazon || Scout’s shoes (see them below): Adidas
Our Itinerary
I want to start by giving y’all the really basic itinerary we used –
Day 1: travel / relax / prep
Day 2: Magic Kingdom
Day 3: Animal Kingdom / EPCOT
Day 4: Hollywood Studios
Day 5: Pool day for me + Scout / Universal Studios for Dale + Ellie
Day 6: EPCOT / Magic Kingdom
Day 7: travel
Getting to Orlando
We’re in northwest Arkansas. Orlando is 18 hours from us. I do not have any desire to take a grippy sock vacation, so we flew. Orlando has a few different airports, but the two we’ve gone through in the past have been Orlando International (MCO) and Orlando Sanford (SFB). If you ever fly Allegiant, you’ll fly into Sanford. Here’s the rub with that Allegiant flight. You already know you’re getting nickel-and-dimed on the flights — extra for baggage, seat selection, etc. — but Sanford is also over an hour from Disney World. Shuttles from your hotels won’t come out to fetch you there, so you have to secure your own transporation. We decided to splurge and rent a limo service. Shockingly, it wasn’t too much more than just renting a car service, and it was way more fun!
Where To Stay
The obvious choice is on-site. Disney has categorizes its resorts into three tiers — value, moderate, and deluxe (you can see a detailed list here). Staying on property comes with so many perks — earlier entrance to the parks, preferred reservation booking, easy transportation, the ambiance — but it also comes with the price tag. It’s no secret that Disney prices have been rising rapidly, pricing out many families (even from the value resorts!).
We went into the trip looking for a suite. With me and Dale, plus an eighteen year old and a two year old, we knew we wanted as much space as we could muster (and afford!). Unfortunately, we chose to go the week before school started back, so a lot of parents had the same idea as us, and resorts were packed and holymoly expensive. Eye-poppingly expensive.
After that, I started broadening my search a little to get more ideas. Dale travels a lot for work and is fiercely loyal to the Marriott brand, so I decided to check and see if we could book anything with points. We ended up choosing the Orlando World Center Marriott. Was I a little bummed to walk away from staying in a Disney resort? Sure. Did that go away quickly when all we owed for an entire week’s hotel stay was $300 in fees. Why, yes. Yes, it did! And it had spacious rooms, great food options, free transportation to the parks, and a water park in its backyard with a kids pool. I did a full review of the Orlando World Center here if you’d like more details!
Park Tickets + Reservations
You have a place to sleep — now what? THE TICKETS!
In the wake of COVID-19, Disney requires not only a ticket to enter the park, but a park reservation as well. If you choose to buy Park Hopper tickets (giving you acess to multiple parks on the same day), the only reservation you have to make is for the first park you visit. After 2pm, the (Disney) World is your oyster and you are free to hop around anywhere. But for that rope drop, you have to book through the reservations system.
Getting the tickets is simple enough, but they’ll add up with all of the add-on suggestions they give you. We bought a four day pass and chose to add the Park Hopper option, but declined the Water Parks option. We knew we wanted to be as flexible as possible, and if someone was melting down (*ahem Scout*) or if we thought we’d seen all we needed to see, we could leave one park and try something new. I’m thankful we did it that way because we took advantage of park hopping. We used it every day but the first at Magic Kingdom.
***FYI: kids under three don’t require a ticket. Score!
Dining in the Parks
My favorite part of traveling: the food.
I’m only 30% kidding.
Remember the nostalgia I mentioned in the beginning? A lot of it comes from the restaurants in Disney World. I once had a birthday celebration at Chef Mickey’s and it has stuck with me for so, so long! Dole Whips, Mickey waffles, churros, turkey legs, dancing mice, alien movies … Disney World has something for every palate.
For any of the sit-down, table service restaurants, reservations are highly recommended. Honestly, though, they’re almost required for the popular places. You can start making dining reservations on the Disney website or on the app sixty (60) days before your visit. NOW, remember the staying on-property perks I talked about earlier? One of those is with making dining reservations. Let’s say your first day of a week-long vacation starts on August 7 (let’s just imagine 
). Sixty days prior to that, on June 10, you can make your reservations for August 7 … but if you’re staying in a Disney resort, you can also make your reservations for the rest of your stay. If you are staying off-property, like we did, you have to wake up at 5am every morning for a week to try to snag a reservation each day. Was it a pain? Yes. But it was also worth it from the money we saved.
Now that you know that, here are some of the most popular restaurants and where you can find them:
- Chef Mickey’s (especially for breakfast), Contemporary Resort
- Cinderella’s Royal Table, Magic Kingdom
- Sci Fi Diner, Hollywood Studios
- Morimoto Asia, Disney Springs
Chef Mickey’s
The number one reservation I wanted was Chef Mickey’s for breakfast. It’s a flat-fee-per-person rate (Scout wasn’t charged because by Disney law, she isn’t quite a person yet 
) for an all-you-can-eat, family-style breakfast. When I tell you I stalked these reservations, I STALKED THESE RESERVATIONS. Lifetime movie stalking. I wanted to do an early breakfast on a Magic Kingdom day because the Contemporary is connected to the Magic Kingdom via monorail, and I knew it would be easy to get there after breakfast. The six original characters (Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Daisy, Goofy and Pluto) and come around to your table for hugs and pictures in their chef outfits. If you want character experiences without having to wait in line in the heat, it’s a definite plus!
Cinderella’s Royal Table
The second big reservation I wanted was to Cinderella’s Royal Table in Magic Kingdom. The restaurant is actually inside Cinderella’s Castle. After you’re greeted, they bring you inside to meet Cinderella and have your picture taken with her, and are then taken upstairs to your table. It’s another flat fee dining experience, but you chose from 5-6 different dishes and can purchase alcohol for an additional charge.
I’ve always gone for lunch or for dinner, but I wanted a breakfast reservation this time, and here’s why:
Remember when I said that when you stay on Disney property, you get to enter Magic Kingdom earlier? It’s true. Guests staying in a Disney resort can enter at 8am, while everyone else enters at 9am.
UNLESS … you have a dining reservation between 8am-9am. Then you get in at 8am too.
We were able to take (almost) unobstructed pictures on Main Street and in front of the castle, and we were finished right at 9am and able to get to a ride before the masses came in.
Sci Fi Diner
This is literally my favorite dining experience at Disney World. The Sci Fi Diner is set up like an old drive-in movie. Your tables are inside cars and you’re watching old Sci Fi previews and commercials while you eat. The burgers are great, the milkshakes are better, and the A/C is always blasting. 10/10, always recommend.
Morimoto
Wouldn’t go, couldn’t get a reservation 😂😂
Dining Reservations Pro Tip
If you are desperate to get a reservation and keep striking out, sign up for Mousewatcher. You enter your preferred date or dates, which restaurant you want, and what time of day, and the website scans all day and night and will text and email you when a spot in your preferred time and places comes open. It’s literally the only reason I got my Chef Mickey’s reservation. It’s $14 for every entry you make, but it was well worth it in the end.
Some General Tips
Just a few more suggestions!
- When making dining plans and thinking ahead to rides, don’t forget to schedule a break in the middle of the day. Don’t skip nap time. Go back to the hotel, rest for a few hours, then get going again. This was a game-changer for us. I don’t think Scout would have made it two days without a break. Honestly, I think all of use benefited from it.
- Skip the parks for a day and just hang out at the pool or run to the mall. This. applies double if you have a little kid. Sleep late, eat whenever, play, and stay close to a bed Dale and Ellie hit Universal Studios and Harry Potter’d their little hearts out when Scout and I took our rest. We all won!
