Our Big Group Heading Down in June
Planning a Disney vacation can be overwhelming. Trying to plan a Disney vacation for a larger party makes it that much more tricky. With a little planning ahead and a few group discussions, you can have the magical vacation you are dreaming of for everyone. In my next few blog posts, I will share how I am planning a Disney vacation for my family of four, my parents, as well as my sister and her husband.
I will discuss how I booked our packages, made dining reservations, booked fastPasses and added magic to our trip as we will be celebrating two birthdays and a college graduation. Hopefully through my experiences I can help you with your planning.
My binder to keep track of everything
When planning any Disney vacation, the first decision is around when to go. As a family, we had to sit down and talk about when we would prefer to go. Managing the schedules of a large group can be tricky. Although we originally thought we would head down over spring break in March, with my sister student teaching that didn’t seem like the best choice so we then headed to early June where we can celebrate my daughter and father’s birthdays as well as my sister’s graduation from college.
Let’s face it I would live here
Now that we had determined when we were going, the next big talk is how long to stay. I learned here that compromise is key. Apparently not everyone is a Disney fanatic like I am so I had to realize that where I would love to stay two weeks, not everyone felt the same. As we made this decision, we also realized that we don’t all have to be there during the exact same time. It is okay with a big group to have some party members arriving early or staying longer than everyone else. This allows everyone to fit it into their personal planning.
With my family, we are all flying in on the same day; however, my sister and brother-in-law will only be staying five days where the rest of us will stay for eight. Again this gives us time together as a family to celebrate without making everyone feel like they are spending too much money, missing too much work or just having too much family time.
Once we knew when everyone would be there, our next big decision was what type of vacation package everyone wanted. This took into account what resort, dining plan and tickets everyone wanted. In my next post, we will get into how to manage all of this and how wonderful Disney’s customer service is at helping.
These two princesses are excited to go
Remember when planning a large family vacation to Disney to have a lot of conversations to make everyone is getting what they are expected out of the trip. Although compromise is key for everyone, making sure all voices are heard is important as well.
What are your tips for planning a vacation for a large family?
This is exactly what I am in the process of doing: planning for three separate families/couples. I’ll be looking forward to your next posts on how you proceeded!