HOW TO DO DISNEY WORLD WITH KIDS UNDER 3

AHHH I’ve been waiting months to be able to write this post. We have been planning our trip to Disney for well over a year – since before I even got pregnant with Noah! Our original date was for February of this year, but that ended up being my due date month with Noah so we moved it to April. We traveled with Jack at a similar age and it was a great experience. We hoped that it would be similar with Noah so we went ahead with our trip. Our boys were 2.5 and 11 weeks old during this vacation! Here is our full itinerary, and all the helpful tips + tricks I can think of so that you can have an amazing trip with your little ones.

HOW TO DO DISNEY WORLD WITH KIDS UNDER 3

ITINERARY FOR THE WEEK:

Sunday: TRAVEL DAY + DISNEY SPRINGS

Orlando arrival: 11:45am | Took a private Mears SUV to the Art of Animation resort. HIGHLY recommend doing this instead of the bus. You are guaranteed an arrival time so you aren’t waiting with little kids and they can bring car seats for your kids so you don’t have to fly with them. We had them provide a forward-facing toddler seat for Jack. The only reason we didn’t have them supply one for Noah was because we were using it in our stroller in the parks.
We were able to get our room early, so we unpacked and then went around the resort to check everything out!
Disney Springs: 3:00pm | We had a 4:45pm dinner reservation at The Edison, so we arrived a little bit early so we could do some shopping and walking around.

Monday: ANIMAL KINGDOM

Park arrival: 9:00am | We ate breakfast around 7:30am and then went down to bus transportation around 8:30am. We got to the park a little before 9:00am and we had plenty of time to do some rides with shorter lines like the Triceratop Spin and the Dinosaur Ride before getting to our Lightning Lane time at the Safari.
Lunch: 12:00pm | We mobile ordered pizza at the Pizzafari restaurant and picked it up! It was super easy and we got ot pick our arrival time so it was ready for us when we got there. The Disney Experience app was absolutely critical for us on this trip.
Dinner: Tuskar House Character Meal | We booked the Tuskar House character meal for our Animal Kingdom meal. I would rate it a 6/10. Jack LOVED meeting all of the characters but the food was only so-so and it was SO expensive. For our group of 4 adults (Jack ate free), it was over $300. It was served family style so they just brought out a pre-done menu for us. For the price, I wasn’t impressed and wouldn’t do it again.
OVERALL: This was a great day. We rode everything we wanted to ride, lunch was yummy, and there was tons to do with little kids. There was so much for Jack to enjoy and several rides for the adults, too! This was Adam’s favorite day.

Tuesday: HOLLYWOOD STUDIOS

Park Arrival: 9:00am | We did the same thing we did on our AK day, breakfast and then bus transportation! We booked our first ride for Toy Story Mania right away, and then did a few other things in the Toy Story area. After that, we headed over to do the Lightning McQueen show for Jack and then head toward Galaxy’s Edge. Galaxy’s Edge was a HUGE highlight for us – it was truly immersive and SO impressive. We did rider swap for Smuggler’s Run instead of using one of our Lightning Lane passes because the line was short and we loved it. We did several shows – Frozen & Indiana Jones – to break up the heat and sit down for a little bit. We also did the Olaf meet-and-greet, which Jack LOVED. We ended the day with Rise of the Resistance and it was just as incredible as everyone said it was.
Lunch: 12:00pm | We did lunch in Galaxy’s Edge and it was so yummy! We ate while walking through the market stalls, and it was perfect.
Dinner: Hollywood and Vine Character Meal | This was another character meal with family style food service. It was better than Tuskar House, and the food was very yummy. However, I still feel like it was insanely expensive for what we were served. Again, it was over $300 for four adults. Jack had a total meltdown during this meal so he didn’t want to really hug or greet the characters, which was the whole reason I booked it. However – that was not the restaurant’s fault, so I’m not docking points for my toddler’s emotions. I’d give this one a 7/10!

Wednesday: RESORT DAY + DISNEY SPRINGS

We loved this day! We kicked it off by all sleeping in until 9:00am – and having the guys bring breakfast up in the room so Jack could play with some of his new toys. He needed the rest and normalcy to reset for the rest of our week. Around 10:30am, we made our way down to the big pool in the center of our resort. The adults got drinks at the Dive Bar and Jack played at the splash pad and shallow end of the pool for a few hours. Adam ended up staying up in the room while Noah napped in the pack-n-play.
Disney Springs: T-REX Lunch | We made our way down to Disney Springs at 1:00pm for our 1:45pm reservation at T-REX restaurant. It is an immersive dining experience and was absolutely delicious! There were giant dinosaur animatronics all around the restaurant and every 20 minutes there was a meteor shower on the ceiling. There is a build-a-bear workshop in the restaurant that exclusively makes dinosaurs, so after lunch we made Jack a dinosaur to bring home.
We came back to the resort for a hodgepodge dinner from the cafeteria and everyone ended up napping. There were baths for both boys, everyone took a long shower and then we all went to bed early!

Thursday: MAGIC KINGDOM

Park Arrival: 9:00am | We got to the park around 9 to get to our first LL ride – Jungle Cruise! We then did stand-by for Aladdin’s Magic Carpet Ride before zipping over to our next LL ride, Pirates of the Caribbean. Right after checking in for that, I booked Haunted Mansion. Before we made our way to that ride, we stopped to watch the morning parade. It was SO much fun!
Lunch: Casey’s 12:00pm | We LOVE Casey’s for hot dogs at Magic Kingdom. This is where we eat lunch every time we are here! The hot dogs are delicious and it puts you right on Main Street to watch everything. We popped by the front desk during this time because I lost my magic band on Haunted Mansion, but they weren’t able to find it. SUCH a bummer.
Dinner: The Crystal Palace | This was our favorite dinner BY FAR and I would absolutely come dine here again! The pricing was much better and the buffet-style food was better for our group. Plus, Jack actually ate his dinner here. A win for everyone! We stopped at the baby-care center for about an hour before dinner, I stayed with the kids while Adam and my parents went to do a ride. It was so nice to be able to let the kids relax in air conditioning. Noah ate and napped and Jack played with their toys. I can’t stress enough for you to take advantage of the baby-care centers! They have changing tables, movies for littles, extra diapers/wipes and more. We used them in every park when the kids needed a break.
This was the only park we stayed after dinner – and we stayed until park close! We did several more rides geared towards kids and made sure we all rode Space Mountain. We ended the night watching the fireworks show and then caught the bus back to the resort.

Friday: SKYLINER + TRAVEL DAY

Our flight wasn’t until later in the day but we still had an 11:00am checkout, so we decided to get up, get ready and head out to ride the skyliner again! We decided to take it all the way to Epcot and then walk through the Beach and Yacht club resort. We got drinks at the snack bar and enjoyed walking outside of Epcot! It was a great way to spend a couple hours before our flight. We got back to the resort and our Mears driver picked us up to take us to the airport!

Lightning Lane note: We bought Genie+ with our tickets so that we could utilize Lightning Lanes – with little kids and the heat, I absolutely wasn’t going to wait in lines that were over an hour long. We never waited any longer than 15 minutes with our Lightning Lane rides! SO worth it for us. I made sure I was on the app at 7:00am every day to book our first ride and then stacked rides throughout the day. The rule is you can book another ride after 2 hours or after you scan in for your most recent ride, whichever comes first. I joined several Facebook groups to figure out how to best use Genie+ and Lightning Lanes and was so worried that I’d be on my phone all day instead of enjoying everything but that really wasn’t the case at all. It was much easier to use than I thought and I was never on my phone more than a few minutes every couple hours to pick rides!! The only rides I did not successfully get LL passes for during our trip was Tower of Terror (it was down the day we were there) and Rise of the Resistance because of the insane demand.

BIGGEST TAKEAWAYS FROM OUR TRIP:

Get the private transportation to ensure no waiting with littles and make it the easiest transition from airport to resort.
Utilize the baby care centers at each of the parks for breaks throughout the day if you don’t want to go back to the resort or your kids don’t want to nap in the stroller.
Shoot for one character meal during your trip – I wouldn’t spend $300+ on 3 meals again, but I would do it once during the trip!
Get Genie+! I wouldn’t do Disney without it. Lines get long, it’s hot and little kids don’t want to wait. 15-20 minutes was our max wait time with Genie+, but most of the time, it was less than 10 minutes per ride.
Buy the bubble wands! Kids LOVE these! It was a great way to keep Jack entertained in his stroller when we needed to get across the park. We bought ours ahead of time so that we didn’t need to search for one in the park. You can buy them on the Disney website!
Our stroller must haves: stroller organizer, stroller fans, phone charger, extra snacks + waters.

ANSWERING SOME FAQs FROM READERS:

How did you handle naps for the kids?

Honestly, Noah napped on the go either in his carrier or in the stroller. Jack didn’t nap at all. We tried to get him to nap in the stroller, but he wasn’t having it. He did GREAT on no naps, and we put him to bed as soon as we got back to the room every time. A lot of kids will do stroller naps, Jack just wasn’t one of them. We also didn’t feel like we needed to go back to the hotel because he was doing ok even if he was a little bit tired. Both kids napped on our rest day, however. I think that helped reset us for the rest of the week!

How was stroller parking and leaving your stuff?

Stroller parking was easy – they are marked by the ride you are going on. We never had a single problem with anyone taking anything out of our stroller. We just left it as is – but my mom and I brought our fanny packs with our wallets/cash/IDs with us and did not leave those in the stroller.

Best / worst parks for kids?

BEST park for kids is Magic Kingdom. There are SO many rides that are kid friendly and don’t have height requirements. Jack rode stuff all day long, and so did Noah. It was great.
WORST park was probably Hollywood Studios (but even that wasn’t bad – I would still take a toddler again) only because there were very few rides that Jack could really go on. That park is definitely geared towards bigger kids and adults!

Did any rides scare Jack?

No ride scared Jack, but the It’s Tough To Be A Bug show at Animal Kingdom terrified him. We weren’t originally going to do this show, but decided to try it when there wasn’t a wait. He made it the whole time but hated it. I wouldn’t do a toddler in this show again.
Jack’s favorite rides were Barnstormer and the Tea Cups at Magic Kingdom! He asked to do both multiple times – he loved them!

What is rider swap?

Ride Swap is AWESOME for parents and groups with little kids. Essentially, one half of your group waits in the standby line, and the other half gets Lightning Lane passes for the ride. So, once the group waits in line and rides, they come out, and you can scan in and go through the LL so you don’t have to wait and there is always someone available to wait with the kiddos. It makes it so your group only has to do the standby wait once instead of multiple times. This is especially helpful when the lines are over an hour.

Are the character lines long since hugs are back?

The lines were about 20-30 minutes for character meet-and-greets! You CAN do lightning lanes for them, though! We waited for Olaf in standby and it was about a 20 minute wait.